October 2003

So despite the fact that I’d like to think that I’m at least marginally better than Hollywood trends, here I am writing a sequel piece. I wouldn’t have but the response to the first piece on Albert Einstein’s opinions has been so overwhelming, what with all the donations and letters from across the globe, that I felt obligated to Naked Sunfish’s legions of fans. That or it’s easy to write about the words of past geniuses.

For whatever reason I’ve chosen a few more brief passages from a book of, well, Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. Born in A.D. 121 and Emperor of Rome from A.D. 161 until his death in A.D. 180, one might think that his thoughts at least, if not Einstein’s from a half-century ago, would be out of date. Considering the times, of great lasting wars across continents, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus had a great many lucid thoughts to share on a myriad of subjects during his reign. Many of these passages were written literally in the midst of his personal engagement in battle on Roman front lines, which leaves little doubt after reading through them that his was truly a great mind.

In his times of very short life spans due to death in battle and disease, it’s not surprising to find a number of passages relating to the brevity of life. Parts of the following examples could perhaps be summed up more succinctly as carpe diem, but to hear such a learned mind wax poetic about his awareness of the fleeting life we’re all granted is worthwhile nonetheless.

“Remember how long you have been putting off these things, and how many times the gods have given you days of grace, and yet you do not use them. Now is it high time to perceive the kind of Universe whereof you are a part and the nature of the governor of the Universe from whom you subsist as an effluence, and that the term of your time is circumscribed, and that unless you use it to attain calm of mind, time will be gone and you will be gone and the opportunity to use it will not be yours again” (Med. II. 4)

“Hasten then to the goal, lay idle hopes aside and come to your own help, if you care at all for yourself, while still you may” (Med. III. 14)

“Don’t live as though you were going to live a myriad years. Fate is hanging over your head; while you have life, while you may, become good” (Med. IV. 17)

This I find a wonderful message, if you do one thing with your short time here, “become good”. These messages of anti-procrastination and violent urgency are touched on throughout Meditations in numerous passages and are often, not surprisingly, tied in closely with his sense of man’s need to be modest and to constantly remind oneself of their own insignificance, and hence the insignificance of Earthly desires and woes.

“Of man’s life, his time is a point, his existence a flux, his sensation clouded, his body’s entire composition corruptible, his vital spirit an eddy of breath, his fortune hard to predict, his fame uncertain. Briefly, all the things of the body, a river; all the things of the spirit, dream and delirium; his life a warfare and a sojourn in a strange land, his after-fame oblivion” (Med. II. 17)

“Look at the swiftness of the oblivion of all men; the gulf of endless time, behind and before . . . . . For the entire Earth is a point in space, and how small a corner thereof is this your dwelling place, and how few and how paltry those who will sing your praises here!” (Med. IV. 3)

Considering these were written in the 2nd Century A.D. when anthropocentrism was a large part of religious beliefs, although not to the degree it would dominate religious thoughts in centuries to come (like the 16th, 17th, and 18th), a point of view as modest and humble as this is quite remarkable, especially for a Roman Emperor. Same goes for the following passage which is much the same but touches a little more on the worthless concept of fame and the pursuit of such.

“Ponder, too, the life led by others long ago, the life that will be led after you, the life being led in uncivilized races; how many do not even know your name, how many will very soon forget it and how many who praise you perhaps now will very soon blame you; and that neither memorial nor fame nor anything else at all is worth a thought” (Med. IX. 30)

Once again for a Roman Emperor this is quite remarkable, knowing the breadth of the empire Marcus Aurelius presided over. All the more reason to pay less attention to people in Hollywood for their paltry accomplishments. But perhaps I should be careful in criticizing them or anyone else for that matter (impossible, I know) for fear that they’d throw a Marcus Aurelius quote right back at me, such as this regarding critics:

“Penetrate within, into their governing selves, and you will see what critics you fear, and what poor critics they are of themselves” (Med. IX. 18)

True enough, and timelessly so. This is equally true for the advice that Marcus Aurelius passes on in the first book of Meditations, imparted to him by members of his immediate family as a child.

“Not to have attended public schools but enjoyed good teachers at home, and to have learned the lesson that on things like these it is a duty to spend liberally” (Med. I. 4)

“To bear pain and be content with little; to work with my own hands, to mind my own business, and to be slow to listen to slander” (Med. I. 5)

Valuable lessons, true and simple. Not surprising then that his gift for imparting wisdom so succinct yet so beautiful, is so prevalent.

“Whenever you desire to cheer yourself, think upon the merits of those who are alive with you; the energy of one, for instance, the modesty of another, the generosity of a third, of another some other gift. For nothing is so cheering as the images of the virtues shining in the character of contemporaries” (Med. VI. 48)

“Habituate yourself not to be inattentive to what another has to say and, so far as possible, be in the mind of the speaker” (Med. VI. 53)

Surprisingly, seeing as how Marcus Aurelius was so in touch with all aspects of his rule, he writes little of politics in Meditations. One might rather obviously surmise however that privately ruminating at length about politics, when one leads the most political of lives, might not be the best way to meditate. These passages seem to be more of an escape for him whilst surrounded by the constant maelstrom of war and strife. The one comment I found relating to anything political seems to have been written hastily in disgust at politicians themselves:

“How cheap are these mere men with their policies and their philosophic practice, as they suppose; they are full of drivel. For who will change men’s convictions? And without a change of conviction what else is there save a bondage of men who groan and pretend to obey?” (Med. IX. 29)

Still an apt notion, that until you change the will and conviction of men, you will not be able to radically change their policies and practices. In the global political theater this concept could stand to be considered at length.

And finally some last advice, my favorite of course, that everyone could stand to heed nowadays. For at no time in history has the average man been so detached from the glory and constant significance of the heavens.

“Watch and see the courses of the stars as if you ran with them, and continually dwell in mind upon the changes of the elements into one another; for these imaginations wash away the foulness of life on the ground” (Med. VII. 47)

All quotes taken from:

Aurelius, Marcus. Meditations. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc, 1992