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Marcus Aurelius Quotes
121–180
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (26 April 121 – 17 March 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 and a Stoic philosopher. He was the last of the rulers known as the Five Good Emperors (a term coined some 13 centuries later by Niccolò Machiavelli), and the last emperor of the Pax Romana (27 BC to 180), an age of relative peace and stability for the Roman Empire.
Military leaders Philosophers Also known as: Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, Marcus Aurelius Antonius
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The rottenness of the matter which is the foundation of everything!
Use these rules then, and trouble thyself about nothing else.
It is satisfaction to a man to do the proper works of a man.
What is not good for the swarm is not good for the bee.
And virtue they will curse, speaking harsh words.
Very little is needed to make a happy life.
A man should be upright, not kept upright.
All things proceed from the universal governing mind, either by direct and primary intention, or by necessary consequence and connexion with things primarily intended.
I shall meet today inquisitive, ungrateful, violent, treacherous, envious, uncharitable men. All these things have come upon them through ignorance of real good and ill.
If mind is common to us, then also the reason, whereby we are reasoning beings, is common.
By a tranquil mind I mean nothing else than a mind well ordered.
Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.
Socrates used to call the opinions of the many by the name of Lamiae, bugbears to frighten children.
He that dies in extreme old age will be reduced to the same state with him that is cut down untimely.
Let no act be done at haphazard, nor otherwise than according to the finished rules that govern its kind.
Whatever happens at all happens as it should; you will find this true, if you watch narrowly.
All that happens is as usual and familiar as the rose in spring and the crop in summer.
That which makes the man no worse than he was makes his life no worse: it has no power to harm, without or within.
Blot out vain pomp; check impulse; quench appetite; keep reason under its own control.
Many the lumps of frankincense on the same altar; one falls there early and another late, but it makes no difference.
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