Plain
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor

The parts that came from earth will return to earth. The parts that came from heaven will return to heaven. Maybe it's just atoms breaking apart and scattering. Maybe it's simple elements dispersing back where they belong... 'People try to avoid death with food and drink and magic tricks. They want to change their fate. But we all must face that wind from above, no matter how hard we work or struggle.'

Meditations, Book 7, Section 27 Book 7 · 35 of 58
Death & Mortality Freedom & Control
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor Original

'And as for those parts that came from the earth, they shall return unto the earth again; and those that came from heaven, they also shall return unto those heavenly places.' Whether it be a mere dissolution and unbinding of the manifold intricacies and entanglements of the confused atoms; or some such dispersion of the simple and incorruptible elements... 'With meats and drinks and divers charms, they seek to divert the channel, that they might not die. Yet must we needs endure that blast of wind that cometh from above, though we toil and labour never so much.'

Meditations, Book 7, Section 27 Book 7 · 35 of 58
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor

Look back at history — at how kingdoms and governments have changed over and over again. You can also see the future, because it will all be the same kind of thing. Nothing can break away from this pattern that has already started with what happens now. So it makes no difference whether you watch life for forty years or ten thousand years. What more would you see?

Meditations, Book 7, Section 27 Book 7 · 34 of 58
What Matters Most Death & Mortality
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor Original

To look back upon things of former ages, as upon the manifold changes and conversions of several monarchies and commonwealths. We may also foresee things future, for they shall all be of the same kind; neither is it possible that they should leave the tune, or break the concert that is now begun, as it were, by these things that are now done and brought to pass in the world. It comes all to one therefore, whether a man be a spectator of the things of this life but forty years, or whether he see them ten thousand years together: for what shall he see more?

Meditations, Book 7, Section 27 Book 7 · 34 of 58
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Ancient philosophy, in plain English.

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