BOOK 5 -14

Reasoning and the art of reasoning are faculties self-determined by their own nature and their own products. They start from the relevant premise and follow the path to the proposed end. That is why acts of reason are called 'right' acts, signifying the rightness of the path thus followed.

BOOK 5 -13

I am made up of the casual and the material. Neither of these will disappear into nothing, just as neither came to be out of nothing. So every part of me will be assigned its changed place in some part of the universe, and that will change again into another part of the universe, and so on to infinity. A similar sequence of change brought me into existence, and my parents before me, and so back again in another infinity of regression. Nothing forbids this assertion, even if the universe is subject to the completion of cycles.

BOOK 5 -12

Here is a way to understand what sort of things the majority take to be 'goods'. If you think of the true goods, there are - wisdom, for example, self-control, justice, courage -with these in your mind you could not give any credence to the popular saying of 'too many goods to make room', because it will not apply. But bearing in mind what the majority see as goods you will hear and readily accept what the comic poet says as a fair comment. Even the majority can intuit the difference. Otherwise this saying would not cause offense and rejection, while at the same time we take it as a telling and witty comment on wealth and the privileges of luxury and fame. Go on, then, things which , when we have thought of them, would properly apply to their owner the saying, 'He is so rich, he has no room to shit.'

BOOK 5 -11

To what use, then, am I now putting my soul? Ask yourself this question on every occasion. Examine yourself. "What do I now have in this part of me called the directing mind? What sort of soul do I have after all? Is it that of a child? A boy? A woman? A despot? A beast of the field? A wild animal?

BOOK 5 -10-2

In all this murk and dirt, in all this flux of being, time, movement, things moved, I cannot begin to see what on earth there is to value or even to aim for. Rather the opposite: one should console oneself with the anticipation of natural release, not impatient of its delay, but taking comfort in just these two thoughts. One, that nothing will happen to me which is not in accordance with the nature of the Whole: the other, that it is in my control to do nothing contrary to my god and the divinity within me - no one can force me to this offense.

BOOK 5 -10

Realities are wrapped in such a veil (as it were) that several philosophers of distinction have thought them altogether beyond comprehension, while even the Stoics think them hard to comprehend. And every assent we may give to our perceptions is fallible: the infallible man does not exist. Pass, then, to the very objects of our experience - how short-lived they are, how shoddy: a catamite, a whore, a thief could own them. Go on now to the characters of your fellows: it is hard to tolerate even the best of them, not to speak of one's difficulty in enduring even oneself.

BOOK 5 -9

Do not give up in disgust or impatience if you do not find action on the right principles consolidated into a habit in all that you do. No: if you have taken a fall, come back again, and be glad if most of your actions are on the right side of humanity. And love what you return to. Do not come back to philosophy as schoolboy to tutor, but rather as a man with ophthalmia returns to his sponge and salve, or another to his poultice or lotion. In this way you will prove that obedience to reason is no great burden, but a source of relief. Remember too that philosophy wants only what your nature wants: whereas you were wanting something unnatural to you. Now what could be more agreeable than the needs of your own nature? This is the same that pleasure trips us: but look and see whether there is not something more agreeable in magnanimity, generosity, simplicity, consideration, piety. And what is more agreeable than wisdom itself, when you reflect on the sure and constant flow of our faculty for application and understanding?

BOOK 5 -8-5

So there are two reasons why you should be content with your experience. One is that this has happened to you, was prescribed for you, and is related to you, a thread of destiny spun for you from the first by the most ancient causes. The second is that what comes to each individual is a determining part of the welfare, the perfection, and indeed the very coherence of that which governs the Whole. Because the complete Whole is maimed if you sever even the tiniest fraction of its connection and continuity: this is true of its constituent parts, and true likewise of its causes. And you do sever something, to the extent that you can, whenever you fret at your lot: this is, in a sense, a destruction.

BOOK 5 -8 -4

You should take the same view of the process and completion of the design of universal nature as you do of your own health: and so welcome all that happens to you, even if it seems rather cruel, because its purpose leads to the health of the universe and the prosperity and success of Zeus. He would bring this on anyone, if it did not also bring advantage to the Whole: no more than any given natural principle brings anything inappropriate to what it governs.

BOOK 5 -8-3

In the whole of things there is one harmony: and just as all material bodies combine to make the world one body, a harmonious whole, so all causes combine to make Destiny one harmonious cause. Even quite unsophisticated people intuit what I mean. They say: Fate brought this on him.' Now if 'brought' is also 'prescribed', then let us accept these prescriptions just as we accept those of Asclepius - many of them too are harsh but we welcome them in the hope of health.

BOOK 5 -8

Just as it is said commonly that Asclepius has prescribed someone horse-riding, or cold baths, or walking barefoot, so we could say that the nature of the Whole has prescribed him disease, disablement, loss, or any other such affliction. In the first case 'prescribed' means something like this: 'ordered this course for this person as conductive to his health'. In the second the meaning is that what happens to each individual is somehow arranged to conduce to his destiny. We speak of the fitness of these happenings as masons speak of the 'fit' of squared stones in walls or pyramids, when they join each other in a defined relation.

BOOK 5 -7

A prayer of the Athenian people:

Rain, Rain, dear Zeus:
rain on the cornfields
and the fields of Athens.

Prayer should be thus simple and open, or not at all.

BOOK 5 - 6-2

A horse that has raced, a dog that has tracked, a bee that has made honey, and a man that has done good - none of these knows what they have done, but they pass on to the next action, just as a vine passes on to bear grapes again in due season. So you ought to be one of those who, in a sense, are unconscious of the good they do. 'Yes', he says, 'but this is precisely what one should be conscious of:  because it defines the social being to be aware of his social action, and indeed to want his fellow to be aware of it also.' 'True, but you misunderstand the point I am making: and for that reason you will fall into one of the first categories I mentioned. They too are misled by some sort of plausible logic. But if you want to follow my meaning, don't fear that this will lead you to any deficiency of action.'

BOOK 5 -6

One sort of person, when he has done a kindness to another, is quick also to chalk up the return due to him. A second is not so quick in that way, but even so he privately thinks of the other as his debtor, and is well aware of what he has done. A third sort is in a way not even conscious of his actions, but is like the vine which has produced grapes and looks for nothing else once it has borne its fruit.

BOOK 5 -5

They cannot admire you for your intellect. Granted - but there are many other qualities of which you cannot say, but 'that is not the way I am made'. So display those virtues which are wholly in your own power - integrity, dignity, hard work, self-denial, contentment, frugality, kindness, independence, simplicity, discretion, magnanimity. Do you not see how many virtues you can already display without any excuse of lack of talent or aptitude? And yet you are still content to lag behind. Or does the fact that you have no inborn talent oblige you to grumble, to scrimp, to toady, to blame your poor body, to suck up, to brag, to have your mind in such turmoil? No, by heaven, it does not! You could have got rid of all this long ago, and only be charged - if charge there is - with being rather slow and dull of comprehension. And yet even this can be worked on - unless you ignore or welcome your stupidity.

BOOK 5 -4

I travel on by nature's path until I fall and find rest, breathing my last into that air from which I draw my daily breath, and falling on that earth which gave my father his seed, my mother her blood, my nurse her milk: the earth which for so many years has fed and watered me day by day; the earth which bears my tread and all the ways in which I abuse her.

BOOK 5 -3

Judge yourself entitled to any word or action which is in accord with nature, and do not let any subsequent criticism or persuasion from anyone talk you out of it. No, if it was a good thing to do or say, do not revoke your entitlement. Those others are guided by their own minds and pursue their own impulses. Do not be distracted by any of this, but continue straight ahead, following your own nature and universal nature: these two have one and the same path.

BOOK 5 -2

How easy it is to drive away or to obliterate from one's mind every impression which is troublesome or alien, and then to be immediately in perfect calm.

BOOK 5 -1-3

The point is that you do not love yourself - otherwise you would love both your own nature and her purpose for you. Other men love their own pursuit and absorb themselves in its performance to the exclusion of bath and food: but you have less regard for your own nature than the smith has for his metal-work, the dancer for his dancing, the money-grubber for his money, the exhibitionist for his little moment of fame. Yet these people, when impassioned, give up food and sleep for the promotion of their pursuits: and you think social action less important, les worthy of effort?

BOOK 5 -1

At break of day, when you are reluctant to get up, have this thought ready to mind: 'I am getting up for a man's work. Do I still then resent it, if I am going out to do what I was born for, the purpose for which I was brought into the world? Or was I created to wrap myself in blankets and keep warm?' 'But this is more pleasant.' Were you then born for pleasure - all for feeling, not for action? Can you not see plants , birds, ants, spiders, bees all doing their own work, each helping in their own way to order the world? And then you do not want to do the work of a human being - you do not hurry to the demands of your own nature. 'But one needs rest too.' One does indeed: I agree. but nature has set limits to this too, just as it has to eating and drinking, and yet you go beyond these limits, beyond what you need. Not in your actions, though, not any longer: here you stay below your capability.  

BOOK 4 -51

Always run on the short road: and nature's road is short. Go then for the healthiest in all you say and do. Such a purpose releases a man from the labors of service, from all need to manage or impress.

BOOK 4 - 50

An unphilosophic but nonetheless effective help to putting death in its place is to run over the list of those who have clung long to life. What did they gain over the untimely dead? At any rate they are all in their graves by now - Caedicianus, Fabius, Julianus, Lepidus, and all others like them who took part in funerals and then their own. In truth, the distance we have to to travel is small: and we drag it out with such labour, in such poor company, in such a feeble body. No great thing, then. Look behind you at the huge gulf of time, and another infinity ahead. In this perspective what is the difference between an infant of three days and a Nestor of three generations?

BOOK 4 -49

Be like the rocky headland on which waves constantly break. It stands firm, and round it the seething waters are laid to rest. 

'It is my bad luck that this has happened to me.' No, you should rather say: 'It is my good luck that, although this has happened to me, I can bear it without pain, neither crushed by the present nor fearful of the future.' Because such a thing could have happened to any man, but not every man could have borne it without pain. So why see more misfortune in the event than good fortune in your ability to bear it? Or in general would you call anything a misfortune for a man which is not a deviation from man's nature? Or anything a deviation from man's nature which is not contrary to the purpose of his nature? Well, then. You have learnt what that purpose is. Can there be anything, then, in this happening which prevents you being just, high-minded, self-controlled, intelligent, judicious, truthful, honorable and free - or any other of those attributes whose combination is the fulfillment of man's proper nature? So in all future events which might induce sadness remember to call on this principle: 'this is no misfortune, but to bear it true to yourself is good fortune.'

BOOK 4 -48

Think constantly how many doctors have died, after knitting their brows over their own patients, how many astrologers, after predicting the deaths of others, as if death were something important; how many philosophers, after endless deliberation on death or immortality; how many heroes, after the many others they killed; how many tyrants, after using their power over mens's lives with monstrous insolence, as if they themselves were immortal. Think too how many whole cities have 'died' - Helice, Pompeii, Herculaneum, innumerable others. Go over now all those you have known yourself, one after the other:  then another one man follows a friend's funeral and is then laid out himself, then another follows him - and all in a brief space of time. The conclusion of all this? You should always look on human life as short and cheap. Yesterday sperm: tomorrow a mummy or ashes.

So one should pass through this tiny fragment of time in tune with nature, and leave it gladly, as an olive might fall when ripe, blessing the earth which bore it and grateful to the tree which gave it growth.

BOOK 4 -47

Just as if a god told you that you would die tomorrow or at least the day after tomorrow, you would attach no importance to the difference of one day, unless you are a complete coward (such is the tiny gap of time): so you should think there no great difference between life to the umpteenth year and life to tomorrow.

BOOK 4 -46

Always remember Heraclitus: 'The death of earth is the birth of water; the death of water is the birth of air; the death of air is fire , and back again.' Remember too his image of the man who forgets his way home; his saying that men are at odds with their most constant companion, the Reason which governs all things; that their everyday experience takes them by surprise; that we must not act or speak as if asleep, and sleep brings the illusion  of speech and action; and that we should not be like children with their parents, simply accepting what we are told.

BOOK 4 -45

What comes after is always in affinity to what went before. Not some simple enumeration of disparate things and a merely necessary sequence, but a rational connection: and just as existing things are harmoniously interconnected, so the processes of becoming exhibit no mere succession, but a wonderfully inherent affinity.

BOOK 4 - 44

All that happens is as habitual and familiar as roses in spring and fruit in the summer. True, too, of disease, death, and defamation, and conspiracy - and all that delights or gives pain to fools.

BOOK 4 -43

There is a river of creation, and time is a violent stream As soon as one thing comes into sight, it is swept past and another is carried down: it too will be taken on its way.

BOOK 4 -42

Change: nothing inherently bad in the process, nothing inherently good in the result.

BOOK 4 -41

You are a soul; carrying a corpse, as Epictetus used to say.

BOOK 4 -40

Think always of the universe as one living creature, comprising one substance and one soul: how all is absorbed into this one consciousness; how a single impulse governs all its actions; how all things collaborate in all that happens; the very web and mesh of it all.

BOOK 4 -39

Harm to you cannot subsist in another's directing mind, nor indeed in any turn or change of circumstance. Where, then? In that part of you which judge harm. So no such judgement, and all is well. Even if what is closet to it, your own body, is subjected to knife or cautery, or left to suppurate or mortify, even so that faculty in you which judges these things should stay untroubled. That is , it should assess nothing either bad or good which can happen equally to the bad man or good: because what can happen to a man irrespective of his life's conformity to nature is not of itself in accordance with nature or contrary to it.

BOOK 4 -38

Look into their directing minds: observe what even the wise will avoid or pursue.

BOOK 4 -37

Your death will soon be on you: and you are not yet clear-minded, or untroubled, or convinced that justice of action is the only wisdom.

BOOK 4 -36

Constantly observe all that comes through change, and habituate yourself to the thought that the nature of the Whole loves nothing so much as to change one form of existence into another, similar but new. All that exists is in a sense the seed of its successor: but your concept of 'seed' is simply what is put into the earth or the womb - that is very unphilosophic thinking.

BOOK 4 -35

All is ephemeral, both memory and the object of memory.

BOOK 4 -34

Gladly surrender yourself to Clotho: let her spin your thread into whatever web she wills.

BOOK 4 -33

Words in common use long ago are obsolete now. So too the names of those once famed are in a sense obsolete - Camillus, Caeso, Volesus, Dentatus; a little later Scipio and Cato, then Augustus too, then Hadrian and Antoninus. All things fade and quickly turn to myth: quickly too utter oblivion drowns them. And I am talking of those who shone with some wonderful brilliance: the rest, once they have breathed  their last, are immediately 'beyond knowledge'. But what in any case is everlasting memory? Utter emptiness.

So where should a man direct his endeavor? here only - a right mind, action for the common good, speech incapable of lies, a disposition to welcome all that happens as necessary, intelligible, flowing from an equally intelligible spring of origin.

BOOK 4 -32-2

Pass on again to the time of Trajan, Again, everything the same. That life too is dead.

Similarly, look at the histories of other eras and indeed whole nations, and see resolution into the elements. Above all, review in your mind those you have seen yourself in empty struggles, refusing to act in accord with their own natural constitution, to hold tight to it and find it sufficient. And in this context you must remember that there is proportionate value in our attention to each action - so you will not lose heart if you devote no more time than they warrant to matters of less importance.

BOOK 4 -32

Consider, for example, the time of Vespasian. You will see everything the same. People marrying, having children, falling ill, dying, fighting, feasting, trading, farming, flattering, pushing, suspecting, plotting, praying for the death of others, grumbling at their lot, falling in love, storing up wealth, longing of consulships and kingships. And now that life of theirs is gone, vanished.

BOOK 4 -31

Love the art which you have learnt, and take comfort in it. Go through the remainder of your life in sincere commitment of all your being to the gods, and never making yourself a tyrant or slave to any man.

BOOK 4 -30

One philosopher has no shirt, one has no book. Here is another half-naked: 'I have no bread', he says, 'but I am faithful to Reason.' But I, for my part, have all the food of learning, and yet I am not faithful.

BOOK 4 -29

If one who does not recognize the contents of the universe is a stranger in it, no less a stranger is the one who fails to recognize what happens on it. He is a fugitive if he runs away from social principle; blind, if he shuts the eye of the mind; a beggar, if he depends on others and does not possess within him all he needs for life; a tumor on the universe, if he stands aside and separates himself from the principle of our common nature in dissatisfaction with his lot (for it is nature which brings this about, just as it brought you about too); a social splinter, if he splits his own soul away from the soul of all rational beings, which is a unity.

BOOK 4 -28

A black character, an effeminate, unbending character, the character of a brute or dumb animal: infantile, stupid, fraudulent, coarse,  mercenary, despotic.

BOOK 4 -27

Either an ordered universe, or a stew of mixed ingredients, yet still coherent order. otherwise how could a sort of private order subsist within you, if there is disorder in the Whole? Especially given that all things, distinct as they are, nevertheless permeate and respond to each other.

BOOK 4 -26

You have seen that: now look at this. do not trouble yourself, keep yourself simple. Someone does you wrong? He does wrong to himself. Has something happened to you? Fine. All that has happens has been fated by the Who;e from the beginning and spun for you own destiny. In sum, life is short: make your gain from the present moment with right reason and justice. keep sober and relaxed.

BOOK 4 -25

Try out too how the life of the good man goes for you - the man content with his dispensation from the Whole, and satisfied in his own just action and kind disposition.

BOOK 4 -24

'If you want to be happy' says Democritus, 'do little.' May it not be better to do what is necessary, what the reason of a naturally social being demands, and the way reason demands it done? This brings the happiness both of right action and of little action. Most of what we say and do is unnecessary: remove the superfluity, and you will have more time and less bother. So in every case one should prompt oneself: 'Is this, or is it not, something necessary?' And the removal of the unnecessary should apply not only to actions but to thoughts also: then no redundant actions either will follow.

BOOK 4 -23

Universe, your harmony is my harmony: nothing in your good time is too early or too late for me. Nature, all that you your seasons bring is fruit to me: all comes from you, exists in you, returns to you. The poet says, 'Dear city of Cecrops': will you not say "Dear city of Zeus'?