Emperor as he was, Marcus Aurelius found himself in a hollow and
troublous world; but he did not give himself up to idle regret or
querulous lamentations. If these sorrows and perturbations came from the
gods, he kissed the hand that smote him; "he delivered up his broken
sword to Fate the conqueror with a humble and a manly heart." In any
case he had duties to do, and he set himself to perform them with a
quiet heroism--zealously, conscientiously, even cheerfully.
The principles of the Emperor are not reducible to the hard and definite
lines of a philosophic system. But the great laws which guided his
actions and moulded his views of life were few and simple, and in his
book of Meditations, which is merely his private diary written to
relieve his mind amid all the trials of war and government, he recurs to
them again and again. "Plays, war, astonishment, torpor, slavery," he
says to himself, "will wipe out those holy principles of thine;" and
this is why he committed those principles to writing. Some of these I
have already adduced, and others I proceed to quote, availing myself, as
before, of the beautiful and scholar-like translation of Mr.
George Long.
All pain, and misfortune, and ugliness seemed to the Emperor to be most
wisely regarded under a threefold aspect, namely, if considered in
reference to the gods, as being due to laws beyond their control; if
considered with reference to the nature of things, as being subservient
and necessary; and if considered with reference to ourselves, as being
dependent on the amount of indifference and fortitude with which we
endure them.
The following passages will elucidate these points of view:--
"The intelligence of the Universe is social. Accordingly it has made the
inferior things for the sake of the superior, and it has fitted the
superior to one another." (v. 30.)
"Things do not touch the soul, for they are eternal, and remain
immovable; but our perturbations come only from the opinion which is
within.... The Universe is Transformation; life is opinion" (iv. 3.)
"To the jaundiced honey tastes bitter, and to those bitten by mad dogs
water causes fear; and to little children the ball is a fine thing. Why
then am I angry? Dost thou think that a false opinion has less power
than the bile in the jaundiced, or the poison in him who is bitten by a
mad dog?" (vi. 52.)
"How easy it is to repel and to wipe away every impression which is
troublesome and unsuitable, and immediately to be at tranquillity."
(v. 2.)
The passages in which Marcus speaks of evil as a relative thing,--as
being good in the making,--the unripe and bitter bud of that which shall
be hereafter a beautiful flower,--although not expressed with perfect
clearness, yet indicate his belief that our view of evil things rises in
great measure from our inability to perceive the great whole of which
they are but subservient parts.
"All things," he says, "come from that universal ruling power, either
directly or by way of consequence. And accordingly the lion's gaping
jaws, and that which is poisonous, and every hurtful thing, as a thorn,
as mud, are after-products of the grand and beautiful. Do not therefore
imagine that they are of another kind from that which thou dost
venerate, but form a just opinion of the source of all."
In another curious passage he says that all things which are natural and
congruent with the causes which produce them have a certain beauty and
attractiveness of their own; for instance, the splittings and
corrugations on the surface of bread when it has been baked. "And again,
figs when they are quite ripe gape open; and in the ripe olives the very
circumstances of their being near to rottenness adds a peculiar beauty
to the fruit. And the ears of corn bending down, and the lion's
eyebrows, and the foam which flows from the mouth of wild boars, and
many other things--though they are far from being beautiful, if a man
should examine them severally--still, because they are consequent upon
the things which are formed by nature, help to adorn them, and they
please the mind; so that if a man should have a feeling and deeper
insight about the things found in the universe there is hardly one of
those which follow by way of consequence which will not seem to him to
be in a manner disposed so as to give pleasure." (iv. 2.)
This congruity to nature--the following of nature, and obedience to all
her laws--is the key-formula to the doctrines of the Roman Stoics.
"Everything which is in any way beautiful is beautiful in itself, and
terminates in itself, not having praise as part of itself. Neither
worse, then, nor better is a thing made by being praised.... Is such a
thing as an emerald made worse than it was, if it is not praised? or
gold, ivory, purple, a lyre, a little knife, a flower, a shrub?"
(iv. 20.)
"Everything harmonizes with me which is harmonious to thee, O Universe.
Nothing for me is too early nor too late, which is in due time for thee.
Everything is fruit to me which thy seasons bring, O Nature! from thee
are all things, in thee are all things, to thee all things return. The
poet says, Dear city of Cecrops; and wilt not thou say, Dear city of
God?" (iv. 23.)
"Willingly give thyself up to fate, allowing her to spin thy thread into
whatever thing she pleases." (iv. 34.)
And here, in a very small matter--getting out of bed in a morning--is
one practical application of the formula:--
"In the morning when thou risest unwillingly, let these thoughts be
present--'I am rising to the work of a human being. Why, then, am I
dissatisfied if I am going to do the things for which I exist, and for
which I was brought into the world? Or have I been made for this, to
lie in the bedclothes and keep myself warm?' 'But this is more
pleasant.' Dost thou exist, then, to take thy pleasure, and not for
action or exertion? Dost thou not see the little plants, the little
birds, the ants, the spiders, the bees, working together to put in order
their several parts of the universe? And art thou unwilling to do the
work of a human being, and dost thou not make haste to do that which is
according to thy nature?" (v. 1.) ["Go to the ant, thou sluggard;
consider her ways, and be wise!"]
The same principle, that Nature has assigned to us our proper
place--that a task has been given us to perform, and that our only care
should be to perform it aright, for the blessing of the great Whole of
which we are but insignificant parts--dominates through the admirable
precepts which the Emperor lays down for the regulation of our conduct
towards others. Some men, he says, do benefits to others only because
they expect a return; some men even, if they do not demand any return,
are not forgetful that they have rendered a benefit; but others do not
even know what they have done, but are like a vine which has produced
grapes, and seeks for nothing more after it has produced its proper
fruit. So we ought to do good to others as simple and as naturally as a
horse runs, or a bee makes honey, or a vine bears grapes season after
season, without thinking of the grapes which it has borne. And in
another passage, "What more dost thou want when thou hast done a service
to another? Art thou not content to have done an act conformable to thy
nature, and must thou seek to be paid for it, just as if the eye
demanded a reward for seeing, or the feet for walking?"
"Judge every word and deed which is according to nature to be fit for
thee, and be not diverted by the blame which follows...but if a thing is
good to be done or said, do not consider it unworthy of thee." (v. 3.)
Sometimes, indeed, Marcus Aurelius wavers. The evils of life overpower
him. "Such as bathing appears to thee," he says, "oil, sweat, dirt,
filthy water, all things disgusting--so is every part of life and
everything" (viii. 24); and again:--"Of human life the time is a point,
and the substance is in a flux, and the perception dull, and the
composition of the whole body subject to putrefaction, and the soul a
whirl, and fortune hard to divine, and fame a thing devoid of judgment."
But more often he retains his perfect tranquillity, and says, "Either
thou livest here, and hast already accustomed thyself to it, or thou
art going away, and this was thine own will; or thou art dying, and hast
discharged thy duty. But besides these things there is nothing. Be of
good cheer, then." (x. 22.) "Take me, and cast me where thou wilt, for
then I shall keep my divine part tranquil, that is, content, if it can
feel and act conformably to its proper constitution." (viii. 45.)
There is something delightful in the fact that even in the Stoic
philosophy there was some comfort to keep men from despair. To a holy
and scrupulous conscience like that of Marcus, there would have been an
inestimable preciousness in the Christian doctrine of the "forgiveness
of the sins." Of that divine mercy--of that sin-uncreating power--the
ancient world knew nothing; but in Marcus we find some dim and faint
adumbration of the doctrine, expressed in a manner which might at least
breathe calm into the spirit of the philosopher, though it could never
reach the hearts of the suffering multitude. For "suppose," he says,
"that thou hast detached thyself from the natural unity,--for thou wast
made by nature a part, but now hast cut thyself off--yet here is the
beautiful provision that it is in thy power again to unite thyself. God
has allowed this to no other part--after it has been separated and cut
asunder, to come together again. But consider the goodness with which
He has privileged man; for He has put it in his power, when he has been
separated, to return and to be reunited, and to resume his place" And
elsewhere he says, "If you cannot maintain a true and magnanimous
character, go courageously into some corner where you can maintain
them; or if even there you fail, depart at once from life, not with
passion, but with modest and simple freedom--which will be to have done
at least one laudable act." Sad that even to Marcus Aurelius death
should have seemed the only refuge from the despair of ultimate failure
in the struggle to be wise and good!
Marcus valued temperance and self-denial as being the best means of
keeping his heart strong and pure; but we are glad to learn he did not
value the rigours of asceticism. Life brought with it enough, and more
than enough, of antagonism to brace his nerves; enough, and more than
enough, of the rough wind of adversity in his face to make it
unnecessary to add more by his own actions. "It is not fit," he says,
"that I should give myself pain, for I have never intentionally given
pain even to another." (viii. 42.)
It was a commonplace of ancient philosophy that the life of the wise man
should be a contemplation of, and a preparation for, death. It certainly
was so with Marcus Aurelius. The thoughts of the nothingness of man, and
of that great sea of oblivion which shall hereafter swallow up all that
he is and does, are ever present to his mind; they are thoughts to which
he recurs more constantly than any other, and from which he always draws
the same moral lesson.
"Since it is possible that thou mayest depart from life this very
moment, regulate every act and thought accordingly.... Death certainly,
and life, honour and dishonour, pain and pleasure, all these things
happen equally to good men and bad, being things which make us neither
better nor worse. Therefore they are neither good nor evil." (ii. 11.)
Elsewhere he says that Hippocrates cured diseases and died; and the
Chaldaeans foretold the future and died; and Alexander, and Pompey, and
Caesar killed thousands, and then died; and lice destroyed Democritus,
and other lice killed Socrates; and Augustus, and his wife, and
daughter, and all his descendants, and all his ancestors, are dead; and
Vespasian and all his Court, and all who in his day feasted, and
married, and were sick and chaffered, and fought, and flattered, and
plotted, and grumbled, and wished other people to die, and pined to
become kings or consuls, are dead; and all the idle people who are doing
the same things now are doomed to die; and all human things are smoke,
and nothing at all; and it is not for us, but for the gods, to settle
whether we play the play out, or only a part of it. "There are many
grains of frankincense on the same altar; one falls before, another
falls after; but it makes no difference." And the moral of all these
thoughts is, "Death hangs over thee while thou livest: while it is in
thy power be good." (iv. 17.) "Thou hast embarked, thou hast made the
voyage, thou hast come to shore; get out. If, indeed, to another life
there is no want of gods, not even there. But if to a state without
sensation, thou wilt cease to be held by pains and pleasures." (iii. 3.)
Nor was Marcus at all comforted under present annoyances by the thought
of posthumous fame. "How ephemeral and worthless human things are," he
says, "and what was yesterday a little mucus, to-morrow will be a mummy
or ashes." "Many who are now praising thee, will very soon blame thee,
and neither a posthumous name is of any value, nor reputation, nor
anything else." What has become of all great and famous men, and all
they desired, and all they loved? They are "smoke, and ash, and a tale,
or not even a tale." After all their rages and envyings, men are
stretched out quiet and dead at last. Soon thou wilt have forgotten all,
and soon all will have forgotten thee. But here, again, after such
thoughts, the same moral is always introduced again:--"Pass then through
the little space of time conformably to nature, and end the journey in
content, just as an olive falls off when it is ripe, blessing nature
who produced it, and thanking the tree on which it grew" "One thing
only troubles me, lest I should do something which the constitution of
man does not allow, or in the way which it does not allow, or what it
does not allow now."
To quote the thoughts of Marcus Aurelius is to me a fascinating task. But
I have already let him speak so largely for himself that by this time
the reader will have some conception of his leading motives. It only
remains to adduce a few more of the weighty and golden sentences in
which he lays down his rule of life.
"To say all in a word, everything which belongs to the body is a stream,
and what belongs to the soul is a dream and vapour; and life is a
warfare, and a stranger's sojourn, and after fame is oblivion. What,
then, is that which is able to enrich a man? One thing, and only
one--philosophy. But this consists in keeping the guardian spirit within
a man free from violence and unharmed, superior to pains and pleasures,
doing nothing without a purpose, nor yet falsely, and with
hypocrisy... accepting all that happens and all that is
allotted ... and finally waiting for death with a cheerful
mind" (ii. 17.)
"If thou findest in human life anything better than justice, truth,
temperance, fortitude, and, in a word, than thine own soul's
satisfaction in the things which it enables thee to do according to
right reason, and In the condition that is assigned to thee without thy
own choice; if, I say, thou seest anything better than this, turn to it
with all thy soul, and enjoy that which thou hast found to be the best.
But ... if thou findest everything else smaller and of less value than
this, give place to nothing else.... Simply and freely choose the
better, and hold to it." (iii. 6.)
"Body, soul, intelligence: to the body belong sensations, to the soul
appetites, to the intelligence principles." To be impressed by the
senses is peculiar to animals; to be pulled by the strings of desire
belongs to effeminate men, and to men like Phalaris or Nero; to be
guided only by intelligence belongs to atheists and traitors, and "men
who do their impure deeds when they have shut the doors.... There
remains that which is peculiar to the good man, to be pleased and
content with what happens, and with the thread which is spun for him;
and not to defile the divinity which is planted in his breast, nor
disturb it by a crowd of images; but to preserve it tranquil, following
it obediently as a god, neither saying anything contrary to truth, nor
doing anything contrary to justice. (iii. 16.)
"Men seek retreats for themselves, houses in the country, sea-shores,
and mountains, and thou too art wont to desire such things very much.
But this is altogether a mark of the commonest sort of men, for it is in
thy power whenever thou shalt chose to retire into thyself. For nowhere
either with more quiet or with more freedom does a man retire than into
his own soul, particularly when he has within him such thoughts that by
looking into them he is immediately in perfect tranquillity,--which is
nothing else than the good ordering of the mind." (iv. 3.)
"Unhappy am I, because this has happened to me? Not so, but happy am I
though this has happened to me, because I continue free from pain;
neither crushed by the present, nor fearing the future." (iv. 19.)
It is just possible that in some of these passages some readers may
detect a trace of painful self-consciousness, and imagine that they
detect a little grain of self-complacence. Something of
self-consciousness is perhaps inevitable in the diary and examination
of his own conscience by one who sat on such a lonely height; but
self-complacency there is none. Nay, there is sometimes even a cruel
sternness in the way in which the Emperor speaks of his own self. He
certainly dealt not with himself in the manner of a dissembler with God.
"When," he says (x. 8), "thou hast assumed the names of a man who is
good, modest, rational, magnanimous, cling to those names; and if thou
shouldst lose them, quickly return to them.... For to continue to be
such as thou hast hitherto been, and to be torn in pieces, and defiled
in such a life, is the character of a very stupid man, and one over-fond
of his life, and like those half-devoured fighters with wild beasts,
who, though covered with wounds and gore, still entreat to be kept till
the following day, though they will be exposed in the same state to the
same claws and bites. Therefore fix thyself in the possession of these
few names: and if thou art able to abide in them, abide as if thou were
removed to the Islands of the Blest." Alas! to Aurelius, in this life,
the Islands of the Blest were very far away. Heathen philosophy was
exalted and eloquent, but all its votaries were sad; to "the peace of
God, which passeth all understanding," it was not given them to attain.
We see Marcus "wise, self-governed, tender, thankful, blameless," says
Mr. Arnold, "yet with all this agitated, stretching out his arms for
something beyond--tendentemque manue ripae ulterioris amore"
I will quote in conclusion but three short precepts:--
"Be cheerful, and seek not external help, nor the tranquillity which
others give. A man must stand erect, not be kept erect by
others." (iv. 5.)
"Be like the promontory against which the waves continually break, but
it stands firm and tames the fury of the water around it" (iv. 49.)
This comparison has been used many a time since the days of Marcus
Aurelius. The reader will at once recall Goldsmith's famous lines:--
"Short is the little that remains to thee of life. Live as on a
mountain. For it makes no difference whether a man lives there or here,
if he lives everywhere in the world as in a civil community. Let men
see, let them know a real man who lives as he was meant to live. If they
cannot endure him, let them kill him. For that is better than to live as
men do." (x. 15.)
Such were some of the thoughts which Marcus Aurelius wrote in his diary
after days of battle with the Quadi, and the Marcomanni, and the
Sarmatae. Isolated from others no less by moral grandeur than by the
supremacy of his sovereign rank, he sought the society of his own noble
soul. I sometimes imagine that I see him seated on the borders of some
gloomy Pannonian forest or Hungarian marsh; through the darkness the
watchfires of the enemy gleam in the distance; but both among them, and
in the camp around him, every sound is hushed, except the tread of the
sentinel outside the imperial tent; and in that tent long after midnight
sits the patient Emperor by the light of his solitary lamp, and ever and
anon, amid his lonely musings, he pauses to write down the pure and holy
thoughts which shall better enable him, even in a Roman palace, even on
barbarian battlefields, daily to tolerate the meanness and the
malignity of the men around him; daily to amend his own shortcomings,
and, as the sun of earthly life begins to set, daily to draw nearer and
nearer to the Eternal Light. And when I thus think of him, I know not
whether the whole of heathen antiquity, out of its gallery of stately
and royal figures, can furnish a nobler, or purer, or more lovable
picture than that of this crowned philosopher and laurelled hero, who
was yet one of the humblest and one of the most enlightened of all
ancient "Seekers after God."
