ARKCODEX
Meditations
1To do wrong is to commit impiety. The nature of the universe made rational beings for one another's sake. They should benefit each other according to their worth and never harm one another. Whoever violates this purpose commits impiety against the most ancient of the gods. The liar also commits impiety against this same goddess. The nature of the universe is the nature of all that exists. All that exists is bound together with all that is real. This nature is called Truth. She is the first cause of everything true. The deliberate liar commits impiety by deceiving and doing wrong. The unintentional liar commits impiety by falling out of harmony with universal nature. He creates disorder by fighting against the nature of the cosmos. Whoever drifts toward falsehood fights against himself. Nature gave him the capacity to discern. By neglecting it he can no longer distinguish false from true. The one who chases pleasures as goods and flees pains as evils also commits impiety. Such a person will inevitably find fault with universal nature for distributing things unfairly between the worthless and the virtuous. The worthless often live in pleasure and acquire what produces it. The virtuous often encounter pain and what produces that. Furthermore, whoever fears pain will someday fear something the cosmos brings about. This is impiety. Whoever chases pleasure will not refrain from wrongdoing. This is clearly impiety. Toward what universal nature regards with indifference, those who wish to follow nature must also be indifferent. Nature would not produce both if she did not regard both equally. Whoever does not regard with indifference pain and pleasure, death and life, fame and obscurity—things universal nature uses equally—clearly commits impiety. When I say universal nature uses these things equally, I mean they happen alike in the sequence of events. They follow from an ancient impulse of providence. From some first principle providence moved toward this ordered world. She gathered the seeds of all that would be. She set apart the generative powers of existence, change, and succession.
2It would have been more graceful to depart this life untouched by falsehood and all pretense and luxury and vanity. But to breathe your last only after you have had your fill of these things is second best. Or have you chosen to sit down with wickedness? Has not even experience persuaded you to flee from the plague? For corruption of the mind is a plague far worse than any foul change in the air around us. That plague attacks living creatures as animals. This plague attacks human beings as human beings.
3Do not despise death. Welcome it instead. It is one of the things nature wills. To be young and to grow old. To develop and to reach your prime. To grow teeth and a beard and grey hair. To father children and to carry them and to give birth. All the natural processes that life's seasons bring. Dissolution is just like these. This is what reason requires of a human being. Not to face death with resistance or violence or contempt. But to await it as one of nature's operations. Just as you now await the moment when your child will emerge from your wife's womb. So await the hour when your little soul will slip from its shell. But if you want a simpler remedy that speaks to the heart. Nothing will make you more ready for death than considering what you are about to leave behind. And the kind of characters your soul will no longer be entangled with. You must not take offense at them. Care for them instead. Bear with them gently. But remember this. You will not be parting from people who share your principles. That alone might have pulled you back and held you to life. If you could have lived among those who held the same beliefs. But now you see how exhausting it is to live at odds with others. So much that you say. Come quickly, death. Before I too forget myself.
4When you sin, you sin against yourself. When you do wrong, you wrong yourself. You make yourself evil.
5Wrongdoing is often in what we fail to do. Not only in what we do.
6It is enough that your present judgment grasps the truth. It is enough that your present action serves the common good. It is enough that your present disposition welcomes whatever comes from causes beyond your control.
7Wipe out false impressions. Stop being pulled by impulse. Quench desire. Keep your ruling mind in your own power.
8One soul is distributed among all creatures without reason. One rational soul is divided among all thinking beings. In the same way, one earth underlies all earthly things. By one light we see. One air we breathe—all of us who have sight and life.
9Everything that shares in something common rushes toward what is like itself. Everything earthy sinks toward earth. Everything liquid flows together. Everything airy does the same. They need barriers and force to keep them apart. Fire rises upward because of the elemental fire above. And any fire here is so ready to ignite with other fire that even dry material catches flame easily. It has less moisture mixed in to prevent burning. So too everything that shares in intelligent nature rushes toward what is kindred. Even more so. The higher something is above other things, the more ready it is to merge and blend with its own kind. Among irrational creatures we find hives and herds and the raising of young and something like love. For soul is present in them. The binding force grows stronger in higher beings. It is not found in plants or stones or wood. Among rational creatures there are states and friendships and households and assemblies. In wars there are treaties and truces. Among still higher beings a kind of unity exists even across vast distances. As with the stars. The ascent toward what is higher creates sympathy even among things far apart. See then what is happening now. Only intelligent beings have forgotten their eagerness for one another. Only among them is this flowing together not seen. Yet even as they flee they are overtaken. Nature prevails. Watch and you will see what I mean. You would sooner find something earthy that touches nothing earthy than a human being cut off from humanity.
10Humans bear fruit. So do the gods. So does the universe. Each bears fruit in its proper season. Common usage applies the word only to vines and similar plants. That does not matter. Reason bears fruit both for the common good and for oneself. And from reason come other things of the same nature as reason itself.
11If you can, change their mind. If you cannot, remember that kindness was given to you for this. Even the gods are kind to such people. In some things they even help them. Health. Wealth. Reputation. That is how good they are. You can be the same. Or tell me. Who is stopping you?
12Work hard. But not like someone miserable. Not like someone wanting pity or admiration. Want only one thing: to act and to rest as reason for the common good demands.
13Today I escaped from every difficulty. Or rather, I cast out every difficulty. For it was not outside me. It was within, in my judgments.
14All these things are familiar through experience. They last only a day in time. They are sordid in their substance. Everything now is just as it was for those we have buried.
15Things stand outside the door, entirely in themselves. They know nothing about themselves. They make no claims about themselves. What then makes claims about them? The ruling mind.
16The good and evil of a rational, social creature lie not in what happens to it, but in what it does. So too its virtue and vice lie not in what happens to it, but in what it does.
17A stone thrown into the air suffers no harm in falling. It gains no benefit in rising.
18Go inside their minds. Enter their ruling centers. You will see what kind of judges you fear. You will see how poorly they judge even themselves.
19Everything is in flux. You yourself are constantly changing. In some way, you are constantly decaying. So too is the entire universe.
20Leave another person's wrongdoing where it belongs. With them.
21An activity ends. An impulse fades. A belief passes away. A kind of death. There is no evil in this. Now turn to the stages of life. Childhood. Youth. Young manhood. Old age. Every change between them is a death. Is that so terrible? Now turn to the life you lived under your grandfather. Then under your mother. Then under your father. You will find many endings. Many changes. Many dissolutions. Ask yourself: is that so terrible? So too with the ending of your whole life. Its rest. Its change. Nothing to fear.
22Run to three ruling centers: your own, the universe's, and this person's. To your own, so you may shape it into a mind that is just. To the universe's, so you may remember what whole you are part of. To this person's, so you may understand whether their action stems from ignorance or intention. And recognize that they are your kin.
23Just as you yourself are a vital part of a political community, so let every action of yours contribute to a life of community. Any action that does not relate to the common good, whether directly or indirectly, tears your life apart. It prevents your life from being whole. It is an act of rebellion. Like a man in an assembly who breaks from the common purpose to pursue his own.
24Children's tantrums and games. Little spirits carrying corpses. So the vision of the Underworld strikes more vividly home.
25Turn your attention to the essential nature of the thing. Strip away its material form and examine what remains. Then determine the longest time that this particular thing can possibly last.
26You have suffered countless troubles because you refused to let your ruling mind do what it was designed to do. But enough.
27When someone criticizes you or hates you or speaks against you, go to their little souls. Enter inside and see what kind of people they really are. You will see that you need not strain yourself for their approval. Yet you must still wish them well. They are your kin by nature. The gods themselves help them in every way. Through dreams. Through signs. At least toward the things they care about.
28These are the world's cycles. Up and down. From age to age. Either the mind of the whole makes a fresh impulse toward each thing—and if so, embrace what it wills—or it made one impulse at the start, and all else follows as consequence. Then why struggle? In a sense, it comes down to atoms or indivisible things. But the whole is what matters. If it is God, all is well. If it is chance, do not let yourself be ruled by chance. Soon the earth will cover us all. Then the earth itself will change. And what comes from that will change endlessly. And again endlessly. Whoever considers these rising waves of change and how swiftly they move will hold all mortal things in contempt.
29The nature of all things is a rushing torrent. It carries everything away. How worthless are these political affairs. How worthless are these little people who think they act as philosophers. They are full of snot. Friend, what are you doing? Do what nature demands of you now. Move forward if the way opens. Do not look around to see if anyone will notice. Do not hope for Plato's ideal republic. Be satisfied if the smallest thing moves forward. And consider even that outcome a small thing. For who will change their minds? Without a change of mind, what else is there but slavery? People groaning while pretending to obey. Now go ahead and tell me about Alexander. Tell me about Philip. Tell me about Demetrius of Phalerum. They will be judged by whether they saw what universal nature wanted. They will be judged by whether they trained themselves accordingly. But if they were merely playing tragic roles, no one has condemned me to imitate them. The work of philosophy is simple and humble. Do not drag me toward pompous pretense.
30Look down from above on countless herds of people. Countless rituals. Every kind of voyage through storms and calm seas. The endless variety of those being born. Those living together. Those dying. Consider too the lives others lived long before you. The lives that will be lived after you are gone. The lives being lived right now among foreign nations. How many do not even know your name. How many will forget it almost instantly. How many who praise you now will very soon condemn you. Remember this: memory is not worth much. Neither is reputation. Neither is anything else at all.
31Remain undisturbed by whatever comes from external causes. Act justly in whatever you do by your own choice. Let your impulse and action aim at the common good. This is your nature.
32You can cut away most of the things that trouble you. They exist entirely in your own judgment. You will create vast space within yourself by grasping the whole universe in your mind. By contemplating infinite time. By considering how swiftly each thing changes. The span from birth to dissolution is brief. The time before birth is boundless. And the time after dissolution stretches on without end.
33Everything you see will soon decay. Those who watch it decay will soon decay themselves. And the one who dies in extreme old age will end up equal to the one who dies too young.
34What are the ruling principles of these people? What do they strive for? What do they love and honor? Imagine you see their petty souls laid bare. When they think they harm you by blaming or help you by praising, how great is their self-deception.
35Loss is nothing other than change. And change is what the nature of the universe delights in. Through change all things happen as they should. They have happened this way from eternity. They will continue this way forever. So why do you say that everything has always gone badly? That everything will always go badly? That among all the gods no power has ever been found to set things right? That the universe is condemned to endless suffering?
36Consider the rottenness of the matter underlying everything. Water. Dust. Bones. Stench. Or consider again: marble is justite calluses of the earth. Gold and silver are mere sediments. Clothing is animal hair. Purple dye is blood. And so it goes with all the rest. Even the breath of life is no different. It shifts endlessly from one such thing into another.
37Enough of this miserable life. Enough complaining. Enough pretending. Why are you troubled? What here is new? What drives you out of your mind? The cause? Look at it directly. The material? Look at that too. Beyond these, nothing exists. And toward the gods, become at last more simple and more kind. To observe these things for a hundred years is the same as observing them for three.
38If he did wrong, the evil lies with him. But perhaps he did not do wrong.
39Either all things flow from one intelligent source and happen as they would to a single body. In that case the part has no right to complain about what serves the whole. Or there are only atoms. Nothing but chaos and scattering. If so, why are you troubled? Say to your ruling mind: You are dead. You are ruined. You have turned savage. You are playing a part. You run with the herd. You graze like cattle.
40Either the gods can do nothing or they can do something. If they can do nothing, why pray? If they can do something, why not pray for this instead: that they grant you neither to fear any of these things, nor to crave any of these things, nor to grieve over any of these things. Why not pray for this rather than for something to be absent or present? For surely, if they can help people at all, they can help with this too. But perhaps you will say the gods have placed these matters in your own hands. Then is it not better to use what is in your power with freedom? Rather than to struggle against what is not in your power with slavery and humiliation? And who told you the gods do not also assist us in what depends on us? Begin to pray for these things and you will see. One man prays: How can I sleep with that woman? You pray: How can I be free from the desire to sleep with her? Another prays: How can I be rid of him? You pray: How can I not need to be rid of him? Another prays: How can I not lose my child? You pray: How can I not fear losing my child? Turn your prayers in this direction altogether. And see what happens.
41Epicurus says: "During my illness, my conversations were not about my body's sufferings. I did not speak of such things to those who visited me. Instead, I continued studying the fundamental principles of nature. I focused on this question: how can the mind share in the body's disturbances yet remain untroubled, preserving its own good? Nor did I give the doctors occasion to preen themselves as if they were accomplishing something remarkable. My life continued well and nobly." Follow his example. In illness, if you fall ill. In any other circumstance. Never abandon philosophy, whatever befalls you. Never join in idle chatter with those ignorant of nature's ways. This is common to every school of thought. Be present only to the task at hand. And to the faculty by which you perform it.
42When someone's shamelessness offends you, ask yourself at once: Can the world exist without shameless people? It cannot. So do not demand the impossible. This person is simply one of those shameless people who must exist in the world. Keep this same thought ready for the rogue, the faithless, and anyone who does wrong. The moment you remember that such people cannot fail to exist, you will feel more kindly toward each one. It also helps to consider immediately what virtue nature gave us to meet this fault. Against the ungrateful, nature gave gentleness as a remedy. Against others, she gave other powers. And you are always free to teach the one who has gone astray. Everyone who does wrong has missed the mark and lost their way. Besides, what harm have you really suffered? You will find that none of these people who anger you has done anything that could damage your mind. Your only true harm and injury lies there. And what is strange or surprising if an ignorant person acts ignorantly? Perhaps you should blame yourself instead. You failed to expect this person to commit this fault. Reason gave you every means to see that this fault was likely. Yet you forgot and now marvel that it happened. Above all, when you blame someone for disloyalty or ingratitude, turn to yourself. The fault is clearly yours. Either you trusted someone of such character to keep faith. Or you gave a favor without giving it completely. You did not make the act itself your full reward. What more do you want after helping someone? Is it not enough that you acted according to your nature? Must you also seek payment? That would be like the eye demanding reward for seeing. Or the feet for walking. Just as these organs fulfill their function and find their completion in doing what they were made to do, so too are human beings made for beneficence. When you do something beneficial or contribute to the common good, you have done what you were designed for. You have what is yours.