Meditations — Marcus Aurelius
76 PHiLOSornY. any wrong, immediately consider with what opinion about good or evil he has done wrong. For when thou hast seen this, thou wilt pity him and wilt neither wonder nor be angry " (vii. 26).
Antoninus would not deny that wrong naturally produces the feeling of anger and resentment, for this is implied in the recommendation to reflect on the nature of the man's mind who has done the wrong, and then you will have pity instead of resentment ; and so it comes to the same as St. Paul's advice to be angry and sin not ; which, as Butler well explains it, is not a recommendation to be angry, which nobody needs, for anger is a natural passion, but it is a warning against allowing anger to lead us into sin.
In short the emperor's doctrine about wrongful acts is this : wrong-doers do not know what good and bad are : they offend out of ignorance, and in the sense of the Stoics this is true.
Though this kind of ignorance will never be admitted as a legal excuse, and ought not to be admitted as a full excuse in any way by society, there may be grievous injuries, such as it is in a man's power to forgive without harm to society ; and if he forgives because he sees that his enemies know not what they do, he is acting in the spirit of the sublime prayer, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. The emperor's moral philosophy was not a p. 77feeble, narrow system, which teaches a man to look directly to his own happiness, though a man's happiness or tranquillity is indirectly promoted by living as he ought to do.
A man must live conformably to the universal nature, which means, as the emperor explains it in many passages, that a man's actions must be conformable to his true relations to all other human beings, both as a citizen of a political community and as a member of the whole human family.
This implies, and he often expresses it in the most forcible language, that a man's words and action, so far as they affect others, must be measured by a fixed rule, which is their consistency with the conservation and the interests of the particular society of which he is a member, and of the whole human race.
To live conformably to such a rule, a man must use his rational faculties in order to discern clearly the consequences and full effect of all his actions and of the actions of others : he must not live a life of contemplation and reflection only, though he must often retire wi ,hin himself to calm and purify his soul by thought,1 but he must mingle in the work of man and be a fellow laborer for the general good.
A man should have an object or purpose in life, that he may direct all his energies to it; of course * Ut nemo in sese tentat descendere, nemo. — Persius, tr. 21.
p. 78a good object (ii. 7). He who has not one object or purpose of life, cannot be one and the same all through his life (xi. 21). Bacon has a remark to the same effect, on the best means of u reducing of the mind unto virtue and good estate ; which is, the electing and propounding unto a man's self good and virtuous ends of his life, such as may be in a reasonable sort within his compass to attain.
He is a happy man who has been wise enough to do this when he was young and has had the opportunities ; but the emperor seeing well that a man cannot always be so wise in his youth, encourages himself to do it when he can, and not to let life slip away before he has begun.
He who can propose to himself good and virtuous ends of life* and be true to them, cannot fail to live conformably to his own interest and the universal interest, for in the nature of things they are one. If a thing is not good for the hive, it is not good for the bee (vi. 54). One passage may end this matter.
"If the gods have determined about me and about the things which must happen to me, they have determined well, for it is not easy even to imagine a deity without forethought ; and as to doing me harm, why should they have any desire towards that ? For what advantage would result to them from this or to the whole, which is the special object of their providence ? But if
76 PHiLOSornY. any wrong, immediately consider with what opinion about good or evil he has done wrong. For when you have seen this, you will pity him and will neither wonder nor be angry " (vii. 26). Antoninus would not deny that wrong naturally produces the feeling of anger and resentment, for this is implied in the recommendation to reflect on the nature of the man's mind who has done the wrong, and then you will have pity instead of resentment ; and so it comes to the same as St. Paul's advice to be angry and sin not ; which, as Butler well explains it, is not a recommendation to be angry, which nobody needs, for anger is a natural passion, but it is a warning against allowing anger to lead us into sin. In short the emperor's doctrine about wrongful acts is this : wrong-doers do not know what good and bad are : they offend out of ignorance, and in the sense of the Stoics this is true. Though this kind of ignorance will never be admitted as a legal excuse, and ought not to be admitted as a full excuse in any way by society, there may be grievous injuries, such as it is in a man's power to forgive without harm to society ; and if he forgives because he sees that his enemies know not what they do, he is acting in the spirit of the sublime prayer, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." The emperor's moral philosophy was not a MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS. 77 feeble, narrow system, which teaches a man to look directly to his own happiness, though a man's happiness or tranquillity is indirectly promoted by living as he ought to do.
A man must live conformably to the universal nature, which means, as the emperor explains it in many passages, that a man's actions must be conformable to his true relations to all other human beings, both as a citizen of a political community and as a member of the whole human family.
This implies, and he often expresses it in the most forcible language, that a man's words and action, so far as they affect others, must be measured by a fixed rule, which is their consistency with the conservation and the interests of the particular society of which he is a member, and of the whole human race.
To live conformably to such a rule, a man must use his rational faculties in order to discern clearly the consequences and full effect of all his actions and of the actions of others : he must not live a life of contemplation and reflection only, though he must often retire wi ,hin himself to calm and purify his soul by thought,1 but he must mingle in the work of man and be a fellow laborer for the general good.
A man should have an object or purpose in life, that he may direct all his energies to it; of course * Ut nemo in sese tentat descendere, nemo. — Persius, tr. 21.
78 PHILOSOPHY. a good object (ii. 7). He who has not one object or purpose of life, cannot be one and the same all through his life (xi. 21). Bacon has a remark to the same effect, on the best means of u reducing of the mind unto virtue and good estate ; which is, the electing and propounding unto a man's self good and virtuous ends of his life, such as may be in a reasonable sort within his compass to attain.
He is a happy man who has been wise enough to do this when he was young and has had the opportunities ; but the emperor seeing well that a man cannot always be so wise in his youth, encourages himself to do it when he can, and not to let life slip away before he has begun.
He who can propose to himself good and virtuous ends of life* and be true to them, cannot fail to live conformably to his own interest and the universal interest, for in the nature of things they are one. If a thing is not good for the hive, it is not good for the bee (vi. 54). One passage may end this matter.
"If the gods have determined about me and about the things which must happen to me, they have determined well, for it is not easy even to imagine a deity without forethought ; and as to doing me harm, why should they have any desire towards that ? For what advantage would result to them from this or to the whole, which is the special object of their providence ? But if
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