Quotes from Marcus Aurelius

Everything is in a state of metamorphosis. Thou thyself art in everlasting change and in corruption to correspond; so is the whole universe.

No form of nature is inferior to art; for the arts merely imitate natural forms.

All things are changing; and thou thyself art in continuous mutation and in a manner in continuous destruction and the whole universe to.

The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing, in so far as it stands ready against the accidental and the unforeseen, and is not apt to fall.

Thou art a little soul bearing about a corpse.

In the morning, when you are sluggish about getting up, let this thought be present: 'I am rising to a man's work.'

When you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning, remember that your defining characteristic-what defines a human being-is to work with others.

At day's first light have in readiness, against disinclination to leave your bed, the thought that "I am rising for the work of man."

Hast thou reason? I have. Why then dost not thou use it? For if this does its own work, what else dost thou wish?

I, who have never willfully pained another, have no business to pain myself.

A little flesh, a little breath, and a Reason to rule all - that is myself.

Remember how often you have postponed minding your interest, and let slip those opportunities the gods have given you. It is now high time to consider what sort of world you are part of, and from what kind of governor of it you are descended; that you have a set period assigned you to act in, and unless you improve it to brighten and compose your thoughts, it will quickly run off with you, and be lost beyond recovery.

Never esteem anything as of advantage to you that will make you break your word or lose your self-respect.

To my great-grandfather I owed the advice to dispense with the education of the schools and have good masters at home instead - and to realize that no expense should be grudged for this purpose.

Death - a stopping of impressions through the senses, and of the pulling of the cords of motion, and of the ways of thought, and of service to the flesh.

Severally on the occasion of everything that thou doest, pause and ask thyself, if death is a dreadful thing because it deprives thee of this.

Body. Soul. Mind. Sensations: the body. Desires: the soul. Reasoning: the mind.

Whatever may happen to you was prepared for you from all eternity; and the implication of causes was from eternity spinning the thread of your being.

Whatever the universal nature assigns to any man at any time is for the good of that man at that time.

All is ephemeral - fame and the famous as well.

Everything is banal in experience, fleeting in duration, sordid in content; in all respects the same today as generations now dead and buried have found it to be.

Failure to read what is happening in another's soul is not easily seen as a cause of unhappiness: but those who fail to attend the motions of their own soul are necessarily unhappy.

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts

Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.