Marcus Aurelius ( 26 April 121 AD – 17 March 180 AD) was a Roman Emperor from 161 to 180. He ruled with Lucius Verus as co-emperor from 161 until Verus’ death in 169. He was the last of the Five Good Emperors, and is also considered one of the most important Stoic philosophers.
During his reign, the Empire defeated a revitalized Parthian Empire in the East. In central Europe, Aurelius fought the Marcomanni, Quadi, and Sarmatians with success during the Marcomannic Wars, with the threat of the Germanic tribes beginning to represent a troubling reality for the Empire. A revolt in the East led by Avidius Cassius failed to gain momentum and was suppressed immediately.
Marcus Aurelius’ Stoic tome Meditations, written in Greek while on campaign between 170 and 180, is still revered as a literary monument to a philosophy of service and duty, describing how to find and preserve equanimity in the midst of conflict by following nature as a source of guidance and inspiration.
Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.
You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.
Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.
It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.
The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing.
Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.
Do every act of your life as if it were your last.
The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.
How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.
A man’s worth is no greater than his ambitions.
When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.
He who lives in harmony with himself lives in harmony with the universe.
Because a thing seems difficult for you, do not think it impossible for anyone to accomplish.
Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.
Our life is what our thoughts make it.
The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.
Poverty is the mother of crime.
Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future, too.
Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under thy observation in life.
Be content with what you are, and wish not change; nor dread your last day, nor long for it.
If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.
The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.
A man should be upright, not be kept upright.
Reject your sense of injury and the injury itself disappears.
Let not your mind run on what you lack as much as on what you have already.
To live happily is an inward power of the soul.
Nowhere can man find a quieter or more untroubled retreat than in his own soul.
The only wealth which you will keep forever is the wealth you have given away.
That which is not good for the bee-hive cannot be good for the bees.
To the wise, life is a problem; to the fool, a solution.
Each day provides its own gifts.
Death, like birth, is a secret of Nature.
Men exist for the sake of one another.
Where a man can live, he can also live well.
The universe is change; our life is what our thoughts make it.
You will find rest from vain fancies if you perform every act in life as though it were your last.
He was a man who looked at what ought to be done, not to the reputation which is got by a man’s acts.
You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength
Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.
Here is a rule to remember in future, when anything tempts you to feel bitter: not “This is misfortune,” but “To bear this worthily is good fortune.”
Never esteem anything as of advantage to you that will make you break your word or lose your self-respect.
Reverence the gods, and help men. Short is life.
Soon you will have forgotten the world, and soon the world will have forgotten you.
