Marcus Aurelius

It is a shame then that ignorance and conceit should be stronger than wisdom.

Things themselves touch not the soul, not in the least degree; nor have they admission to the soul, nor can they turn or move the soul: but the soul turns and moves itself alone, and whatever judgments it may think proper to make, such it…

In one respect man is the nearest thing to me, so far as I must do good to men and endure them.

Reverence that which is best in the universe; and this is that which makes use of all things and directs all things.

That which does no harm to the state, does no harm to the citizen.

Often think of the rapidity with which things pass by and disappear, both the things which are and the things which are produced.

And consider this which is near to thee, this boundless abyss of the past and of the future in which all things disappear.

Think of the universal substance, of which thou hast a very small portion; and of universal time, of which a short and indivisible interval has been assigned to thee; and of that which is fixed by destiny, and how small a part of it thou…

I now have what the universal nature now wills me to have; and I do what my nature now wills me to do.

So thou lovest not thyself, for if thou didst, thou wouldst love thy nature and her will.

How easy it is to repel and to wipe away every impression which is troublesome or unsuitable, and immediately to be in all tranquillity.

Judge every word and deed which are according to nature to be fit for thee; and be not diverted by the blame which follows from any people, nor by their words, but if a thing is good to be done or said, do not consider it unworthy of thee.

For those persons have their peculiar leading principle and follow their peculiar movement; which things do not thou regard, but go straight on, following thy own nature and the common nature; and the way of both is one.

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.

Let the perfecting and accomplishment of the things which the common nature judges to be good, be judged by thee to be of the same kind as thy health.

Neither does the nature of anything, whatever it may be, cause anything which is not suitable to that which is directed by it.

For the integrity of the whole is mutilated, if thou cuttest off anything whatever from the conjunction and the continuity either of the parts or of the causes.

And thou dost cut off, as far as it is in thy power, when thou art dissatisfied, and in a manner triest to put anything out of the way.

And consider if magnanimity, freedom, simplicity, equanimity, piety, are not more agreeable.

For what is more agreeable than wisdom itself, when thou thinkest of the security and the happy course of all things which depend on the faculty of understanding and knowledge?

And all our assent is changeable; for where is the man who never changes?

Carry thy thoughts then to the objects themselves, and consider how short-lived they are and worthless, and that they may be in the possession of a filthy wretch or a whore or a robber.

Then turn to the morals of those who live with thee, and it is hardly possible to endure even the most agreeable of them, to say nothing of a man being hardly able to endure himself.

In such darkness then and dirt, and in so constant a flux both of substance and of time, and of motion and of things moved, what there is worth being highly prized, or even an object of serious pursuit, I cannot imagine.

All that is from the gods is full of providence.