Meditations — Marcus Aurelius
p. 46against the hard realities of his daily life. A poor re mark it is which I have seen somewhere, and made in a disparaging way, that the emperor's reflections show that he had need of consolation and comfort in life, and even to prepare him to meet his death. True that he did need comfort and support, and we see how he found it.
He constantly recurs to his fundamental principle that the universe is wisely ordered, that every man is a part of it and must conform to that order which he cannot change, that whatever the Deity has done is good, that all mankind are a man's brethren, that he must love and cherish them and try to make them better, even those who would do him harm. This is his conclusion (ii. 17) : " What then is that which is able to conduct a man ?
One thing and only one, Philosophy.
But this consists in keeping the divinity within a man free from violence and unharmed, superior to pains and pleasures, doing nothing without a purpose nor yet falsely and with hypocrisy, not feeling the need of another man's doing or not doing anything ; and besides, accepting all that happens and all that is allotted, as coming from thence, wherever it is, from whence he himself came ; and finally waiting for death with a cheerful mind as being nothing else than a dissolution of the elements of which every living being is compounded. But if there is no harm to the elements themselves in each continually changp. 47ing into another, why should a man have any apprehension about the change and dissolution of all the elements [himself] ? for it is according to nature ; and nothing is evil that is according to nature. The Physic of Antoninus is the knowledge of the Nature of the Universe, of its government, and of the relation of man's nature to both. He names the universe (17 rStv o\<ov ovo-ta, vi.
I),1 " the universal substance,'' and he adds that " reason " (*oyos) governs the universe. He also (vi. 9) uses the terms " universal nature " or " nature of the universe" He (vi. 25) calls the universe "the one and all, which we name Cosmos or Order " 1 As to the word ofoia, the reader may see the Index. I add here a few examples of the use of the word ; Antoninus has (v. 24), 7) (rvfivdaa ofola, " the universal substance. He says (xii.
30 and iv. 40), "there is one common substance" (oi5<r/a), distributed among countless bodies. In Stobaeus (torn. i. lib. 1, tit. 14) there is this definition, oia-lav 64 <pao-tv tC)v 6vtu)v cLicâvtujv t^v trpd)Ti)v i\r)v. In viii. 11, Antoninus speaks of t6 oixnwdes ical v\ik6v, " the substantial and the material;" and (vii. 10) he says that "everything material" (c w\ov) disappears in the substance of the whole (jy r(bv tiXuv owlq) .
The oiicria is the generic name of that existence which we assume as the highest or ultimate, because we conceive no existence which can be co-ordinated with it and none above it. It is the philosopher's " substance : " it is the ultimate expression for that which we conceive or suppose to be the basis, the being of a thing.
"From the Divine, which is substance in itself, or the only and sole substance, all and everything that is created exists " (Swedenborg, Angelic Wisdom, 198).
48 pniLOSOPHT. (ko<7/aos).
If he ever seems to use these general terms as significant of the All, of all that man can in any way conceive to exist, he still on other occasions plainly distinguishes between Matter, Material things (vXt;, vAikoV), and Cause, Origin, Reason (alria aiVtcoSe?, Aoyos).1 This is conformable to Zeno's doctrine that there are two original principles (apxa0 °f a^ things, that which acts 1 I remark, in order to anticipate any misapprehension, that all these general terms involve a contradiction.
The " one and all," and the like, and " the whole," imply limitation. "One" is limited; "all" is limited; the "whole" is limited. We cannot help it. We cannot find words to express that which we cannot fully conceive. The addition of "absolute" or any other such word does not mend the matter.
Even the word God is used by most people, often unconsciously, In such a way that limitation is implied, and yet at the same time words are added which are intended to deny limitation. A Christian martyr, when he was asked what God was, is said to have answered that God has no name like a man; and Justin says the same (Apol. il.
C), " the names Father, God, Creator, Lord, and Master are not names, but appellations derived from benefactions and acts." (Compare Seneca, De Benef. iv. 8.) We can conceive the existence of a thing, or rather we may have the idea of an existence, without an adequate notion of it, "adequate" meaning coextensive and coequal with the thing.
We have a notion of limited space derived from the dimensions of what we call a material thing, though of space absolute, if I may use the term, we have no notion at all; and of infinite space the notion is the same, — no notion at all; and yet we conceive it in a sense, though I know not how, and we believe that space is infinite, and we cannot conceive it to be finite.
46 PHILOSOPHY. against the hard realities of his daily life. A poor re mark it is which I have seen somewhere, and made in a disparaging way, that the emperor's reflections show that he had need of consolation and comfort in life, and even to prepare him to meet his death. True that he did need comfort and support, and we see how he found it.
He constantly recurs to his fundamental principle that the universe is wisely ordered, that every man is a part of it and must conform to that order which he cannot change, that whatever the Deity has done is good, that all mankind are a man's brethren, that he must love and cherish them and try to make them better, even those who would do him harm. This is his conclusion (ii. 17) : " What then is that which is able to conduct a man ?
One thing and only one, Philosophy.
But this consists in keeping the divinity within a man free from violence and unharmed, superior to pains and pleasures, doing nothing without a purpose nor yet falsely and with hypocrisy, not feeling the need of another man's doing or not doing anything ; and besides, accepting all that happens and all that is allotted, as coming from thence, wherever it is, from whence he himself came ; and finally waiting for death with a cheerful mind as being nothing else than a dissolution of the elements of which every living being is compounded. But if there is no harm to the elements themselves in each continually chang- MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS. 47 ing into another, why should a man have any apprehension about the change and dissolution of all the elements [himself] ? for it is according to nature ; and nothing is evil that is according to nature. The Physic of Antoninus is the knowledge of the Nature of the Universe, of its government, and of the relation of man's nature to both. He names the universe (17 rStv o\<ov ovo-ta, vi.
I),1 " the universal substance,'' and he adds that " reason " (*oyos) governs the universe. He also (vi. 9) uses the terms " universal nature " or " nature of the universe" He (vi. 25) calls the universe "the one and all, which we name Cosmos or Order " 1 As to the word ofoia, the reader may see the Index. I add here a few examples of the use of the word ; Antoninus has (v. 24), 7) (rvfivdaa ofola, " the universal substance. He says (xii.
30 and iv. 40), "there is one common substance" (oi5<r/a), distributed among countless bodies. In Stobaeus (torn. i. lib. 1, tit. 14) there is this definition, oia-lav 64 <pao-tv tC)v 6vtu)v cLicâvtujv t^v trpd)Ti)v i\r)v. In viii. 11, Antoninus speaks of t6 oixnwdes ical v\ik6v, " the substantial and the material;" and (vii. 10) he says that "everything material" (c w\ov) disappears in the substance of the whole (jy r(bv tiXuv owlq) .
The oiicria is the generic name of that existence which we assume as the highest or ultimate, because we conceive no existence which can be co-ordinated with it and none above it. It is the philosopher's " substance : " it is the ultimate expression for that which we conceive or suppose to be the basis, the being of a thing.
"From the Divine, which is substance in itself, or the only and sole substance, all and everything that is created exists " (Swedenborg, Angelic Wisdom, 198).
48 pniLOSOPHT. (ko<7/aos).
If he ever seems to use these general terms as significant of the All, of all that man can in any way conceive to exist, he still on other occasions plainly distinguishes between Matter, Material things (vXt;, vAikoV), and Cause, Origin, Reason (alria aiVtcoSe?, Aoyos).1 This is conformable to Zeno's doctrine that there are two original principles (apxa0 °f a^ things, that which acts 1 I remark, in order to anticipate any misapprehension, that all these general terms involve a contradiction.
The " one and all," and the like, and " the whole," imply limitation. "One" is limited; "all" is limited; the "whole" is limited. We cannot help it. We cannot find words to express that which we cannot fully conceive. The addition of "absolute" or any other such word does not mend the matter.
Even the word God is used by most people, often unconsciously, In such a way that limitation is implied, and yet at the same time words are added which are intended to deny limitation. A Christian martyr, when he was asked what God was, is said to have answered that God has no name like a man; and Justin says the same (Apol. il.
C), " the names Father, God, Creator, Lord, and Master are not names, but appellations derived from benefactions and acts." (Compare Seneca, De Benef. iv. 8.) We can conceive the existence of a thing, or rather we may have the idea of an existence, without an adequate notion of it, "adequate" meaning coextensive and coequal with the thing.
We have a notion of limited space derived from the dimensions of what we call a material thing, though of space absolute, if I may use the term, we have no notion at all; and of infinite space the notion is the same, — no notion at all; and yet we conceive it in a sense, though I know not how, and we believe that space is infinite, and we cannot conceive it to be finite.
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