A third in a manner does not even know what he has done, but he is like a vine which has produced grapes, and seeks for nothing more after it has once produced its proper fruit.
In his reflections on giving, Marcus Aurelius describes the ideal benefactor as one who gives selflessly, like a vine producing fruit without expectation.
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For he who yields to pain and he who yields to anger, both are wounded and both submit.
The third, then, is the ruling part; consider thus: Thou art an old man; no longer let this be a slave, no longer be pulled by the strings like a puppet to unsocial movements, no longer be either dissatisfied with thy present lot, or…
Further, he was not fond of change nor unsteady, but he loved to stay in the same places, and to employ himself about the same things; and after his paroxysms of headache he came immediately fresh and vigorous to his usual occupations.
Whatever this is that I am, it is a little flesh and breath, and the ruling part.
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