Quotes from Marcus Aurelius

Hay que soportar el viento de los dioses / y sus trabajos sin queja«[357]

Two points in the Stoic system deserve special mention. One is a careful distinction between things which are in our power and things which are not. Desire and dislike, opinion and affection, are within the power of the will; whereas health, wealth, honour, and other such are generally not so.

What of it then? You embarked, you set sail, you made port. Go ashore now. It is to another life, nothing is empty of the gods, even on that shore.

If anyone can give me good reason to think that I am going astray in my thoughts or my actions, I will gladly change my ways. For I seek the truth, which has never caused harm to anyone; no, the person who is harmed is one who persists in his self-deception and ignorance. 22

The cucumber is bitter? Then throw it out. There are brambles in the path? Then go around them. That's all you need to know. Nothing more. Don't demand to know "why such things exist." Anyone who understands the world will laugh at you

It can ruin your life only if it ruins your character.

Labour not as one to whom it is appointed to be wretched, nor as one that either would be pitied, or admired; but let this be thine only care and desire; so always and in all things to prosecute or to forbear, as the law of charity, or mutual society doth require.

The highest good was the virtuous life. Virtue alone is happiness, and vice is unhappiness.

You could have said of him (as they say of Socrates) that he knew how to enjoy and abstain from things that most people find it hard to abstain from and all too easy to enjoy.

and shalt respect thy mind only, and that divine part of thine, and this shall be thine only fear

Come tutte le cose rapidamente svaniscano, nel cosmo i corpi stessi, nel tempo il loro ricordo;

every man is worth just so much as the things are worth about which he busies himself. In

Not to live as if you had endless years ahead of you. Death overshadows you. While you're alive and able—be good.

Let not future things disturb thee, for thou wilt come to them, if it shall be necessary, having with thee the same reason which now thou usest for present things.

And therefore let thy chief fort and place of defence be, a mind free from passions. A stronger place, (whereunto to make his refuge, and so to become impregnable) and better fortified than this, hath no man. He that seeth not this is unlearned. He that seeth it, and betaketh not himself to this place of refuge, is unhappy.

To accept it without arrogance, to let it go with indifference. (8.33)

This day I did come out of all my trouble. Nay I have cast out all my trouble; it should rather be for that which troubled thee, whatsoever it was, was not without anywhere that thou shouldest come out of it, but within in thine own opinions, from whence it must be cast out, before thou canst truly and constantly be at ease.

The second point is a strong insistence on the unity of the universe, and on man's duty as part of a great whole. Public spirit was the most splendid political virtue of the ancient world, and it is here made cosmopolitan

Nothing is more pathetic than people who run around in circles, "delving into the things that lie beneath" and conducting investigations into the souls of the people around them, never realizing that all you have to do is to be attentive to the power inside you and worship it sincerely. To worship it is to keep it from being muddied with turmoil and becoming aimless and dissatisfied with nature—divine and human.

Out of several poets and comics. 'It will but little avail thee, to turn thine anger and indignation upon the things themselves that have fallen across unto thee. For as for them, they are not sensible of it

Ultrájate, ultrájate a ti misma, alma mía! Y no encontrarás luego la ocasión de adquirirte el honor que a ti misma debes. Breve es la vida de todos. La tuya se te pasó casi toda, y no te aprecias cuando, por el contrario, mides tu felicidad por lo que acontece en las almas ajenas.

We too will inevitably end up where so many eloquent orators have gone, so many distinguished philosophers (Heraclitus, Pythagoras, Socrates), so many heroes of old, and so many generals and tyrants

Don't waste the rest of your life worrying about what others think and do. Direct your thoughts to a useful end. When you dissipate your mental energy on things you can't control, you lose the opportunity to accomplish something yourself.

Then what can guide us? Only philosophy. Which means making sure that the power within stays safe and free from assault, superior to pleasure and pain, doing nothing randomly or dishonestly and with imposture, not dependent on anyone else's doing something or not doing it. And making sure that it accepts what happens and what it is dealt as coming from the same place it came from.