Plain
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor

The sun seems to pour out everywhere. And it does spread out, but it doesn't spill wastefully. Its spreading is a stretching or extension. That's why sunbeams are called rays - from the word meaning "to stretch out." You can see what a sunbeam really is if you watch sunlight pierce through a small hole into a dark room. It always travels in a straight line. When it hits something solid that air can't pass through, it gets cut off and stopped. But it doesn't slide away or fall down - it just stays right there.

Meditations, Book 8, Section 54 Book 8 · 62 of 67
Calm Your Mind Human Nature
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor Original

The sun seemeth to be shed abroad. And indeed it is diffused but not effused. For that diffusion of it is a τάσις or an extension. For therefore are the beams of it called ἀκτῖνες from the word ἐκτείνεσθαι to be stretched out and extended. Now what a sunbeam is, thou mayest know if thou observe the light of the sun, when through some narrow hole it pierceth into some room that is dark. For it is always in a direct line. And as by any solid body, that it meets with in the way that is not penetrable by air, it is divided and abrupted, and yet neither slides off, or falls down, but stayeth there nevertheless:

Meditations, Book 8, Section 54 Book 8 · 62 of 67
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor

My neighbor's free will is completely separate from mine, just like his life or his body. We were made to help each other, but our minds each have their own space. Otherwise, another person's wickedness could become my evil. God wouldn't want that. He wouldn't want another person to have the power to make me unhappy. Nothing can do that except my own wickedness.

Meditations, Book 8, Section 53 Book 8 · 61 of 67
Freedom & Control Knowing Yourself
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor Original

Unto my free-will my neighbour's free-will, whoever he be, (as his life, or his bode), is altogether indifferent. For though we are all made one for another, yet have our minds and understandings each of them their own proper and limited jurisdiction. For else another man's wickedness might be my evil which God would not have, that it might not be in another man's power to make me unhappy: which nothing now can do but mine own wickedness.

Meditations, Book 8, Section 53 Book 8 · 61 of 67
‹ Previous Next ›

Ancient philosophy, in plain English.

About · Support