Marcus Aurelius Quotes

Search men's governing principles, and consider the wise, what they shun and what they cleave to.

Let it judge that nothing is either bad or good which can happen equally to the bad man and the good. For that which happens equally to him who lives contrary to nature and to him who lives according to nature, is neither according to nature nor contrary to nature.

Light may earth's crumbling sand be laid on thee, that dogs may dig thy bones up easily

All things of the body stream away like a river, all things of the mind are dreams and delusion; life is warfare, and a visit to a strange land; the only lasting fame is oblivion.

Look deeply. Don't miss the inherent quality and value of everything.

Nature set a limit on sleep - as it did on eating and drinking. And youre over the limit. But not of working. There youre still below your quota. You dont love yourself enough. Or youd love your nature too and what it demands of you. People who love what they do wear themselves down doing it. They even forget to wash and eat.

Give yourself a gift: the present moment.

Suppose that men kill thee, cut thee in pieces, curse thee, what can these things do to prevent thy mind from remaining pure, wise, sober, just?

Because your own strength is unequal to the task, do not assume that it is beyond the powers of man; but if anything is within the powers and province of man, believe that it is within your own compass also.

I was once a fortunate man but at some point fortune abandoned me. But true good fortune is what you make for yourself. Good fortune: good character, good intentions, and good actions.

Accept whatever comes to you woven in the pattern of your destiny, for what could more aptly fit your needs?

People who labor all their lives but have no purpose to direct every thought and impulse toward are wasting their time-even when hard at work.

Our wills are ours, to make them Thine.

No one can keep you from living as your nature requires. Nothings can happen to you that is not required by Nature.

Letting go all else, cling to the following few truths. Remember that man lives only in the present, in this fleeting instant: all the rest of his life is either past and gone, or not yet revealed. This mortal life is a little thing, lived in a little corner of the earth; and little, too, is the longest fame to come - dependent as it is on a succession of fast-perishing little men who have no knowledge even of their own selves, much less of one long dead and gone.

Without a purpose, nothing should be done.

Death, like birth, is a secret of Nature.

And in the case of superior things like stars, we discover a kind of unity in separation. The higher we rise on the scale of being, the easier it is to discern a connection even among things separated by vast distances.

Now departure from the world of men is nothing to fear, if gods exist: because they would not involve you in any harm. If they do not exist, or if they have no care for humankind, then what is life to me in a world devoid of gods, or devoid of providence? But they do exist, and they do care for humankind: and they have put it absolutely in man's power to avoid falling into the true kinds of harm.

The man who doesn't know what the universe is doesn't know where he lives.

Alexander the Great and his mule driver both died and the same thing happened to both.

A man should remove not only unnecessary acts, but also unnecessary thoughts, for then superfluous activity will not follow.

Every man's life lies within the present; for the past is spent and done with, and the future is uncertain.

Nothing can come out of nothing, any more than a thing can go back to nothing.

One universe made up all that is; and one God in it all, and one principle of being, and one law, the reason shared by all thinking creatures, and one truth.

When force of circumstance upsets your equanimity lose no time in recovering your self-control, and do not remain out of tune longer than you can help. Habitual recurrence to the harmony will increase your mastery of it.

A wrongdoer is often a man who has left something undone, not always one who has done something.

Within ten days thou wilt seem a god to those to whom thou art now a beast and an ape, if thou wilt return to thy principles and the worship of reason.

Neither in writing nor in reading wilt thou be able to lay down rules for others before thou shalt have first learned to obey rules thyself.

The blazing fire makes flames and brightness out of everything thrown into it.

If you are pained by external things, it is not they that disturb you, but your own judgement of them. And it is in your power to wipe out that judgement now.

Remember: Matter: how tiny your share of it. Time: how brief and fleeting your allotment of it. Fate: how small a role you play in it.

Art thou angry with him whose armpits stink? Art thou angry with him whose mouth smells foul?

It doesn't hurt me unless I interpret its happening as harmful to me. I can choose not to.

Happiness is no other than soundness and perfection of mind.

Poverty is the mother of crime.

Remember this - that there is a proper dignity and proportion to be observed in the performance of every act of life.

Stick to what's in front of you - idea, action, utterance.

Everything is interwoven, and the web is holy.

You don't have to turn this into something. It doesn't have to upset you. Things can't shape our decisions by themselves.

Say to yourself in the early morning: I shall meet today ungrateful, violent, treacherous, envious, uncharitable men. All of these things have come upon them through ignorance of real good and ill... I can neither be harmed by any of them, for no man will involve me in wrong, nor can I be angry with my kinsman or hate him; for we have come into the world to work together.

You have to assemble your life yourself - action by action.

Look well into thyself; there is a source of strength which will always spring up if thou wilt always look.

Think of the country mouse and of the town mouse, and of the alarm and trepidation of the town mouse.

My only fear is doing something contrary to human nature - the wrong thing, the wrong way, or at the wrong time.

It's normal to feel pain in your hands and feet, if you're using your feet as feet and your hands as hands. And for a human being to feel stress is normal - if he's living a normal life. And if it's normal, how can it be bad?

The sinner sins against himself; the wrongdoer wrongs himself, becoming the worse by his own action.

Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.