Plain
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor

A person who runs from reason is truly running away. Reason is what makes us able to live together. A person who cannot see with their mind's eye is blind. A person who needs others for everything and has nothing within themselves is poor. A person who gets upset with what happens to them becomes like a disease in the world. They turn away from the natural order that governs us all. The same nature that brings you whatever happens now is the same nature that brought you into the world. A person who acts without reason stirs up trouble in the city. They pull their own soul away from the shared soul that connects all thinking beings.

Meditations, Book 4, Section 24 Book 4 · 31 of 54
Human Nature Doing The Right Thing
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor Original

He is a true fugitive, that flies from reason, by which men are sociable. He blind, who cannot see with the eyes of his understanding. He poor, that stands in need of another, and hath not in himself all things needful for this life. He an aposteme of the world, who by being discontented with those things that happen unto him in the world, doth as it were apostatise, and separate himself from common nature's rational administration. For the same nature it is that brings this unto thee, whatsoever it be, that first brought thee into the world. He raises sedition in the city, who by irrational actions withdraws his own soul from that one and common soul of all rational creatures.

Meditations, Book 4, Section 24 Book 4 · 31 of 54
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor

There are mean people, weak people, cruel people, savage people, cowardly people, childish people. There are stupid people, dishonest people, crude people, scheming people, bullying people. So what? If someone who doesn't know how the world works is a stranger here, then why not be a stranger too — someone who wonders at all the things that happen in it?

Meditations, Book 4, Section 23 Book 4 · 30 of 54
Human Nature Calm Your Mind
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor Original

A black or malign disposition, an effeminate disposition; an hard inexorable disposition, a wild inhuman disposition, a sheepish disposition, a childish disposition; a blockish, a false, a scurril, a fraudulent, a tyrannical: what then? If he be a stranger in the world, that knows not the things that are in it; why not be a stranger as well, that wonders at the things that are done in it?

Meditations, Book 4, Section 23 Book 4 · 30 of 54
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Ancient philosophy, in plain English.

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