Customer Reviews

The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus: And a Selection from the Letters of Marcus and Fronto (Oxford World's Classics)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Book 2, paragraph 7: "Do things from outside break in to distract you? Give yourself a time of quiet to learn some new good thing and cease to wander out of your course. But, when you have done that, be on your guard against a second kind of wandering. For those who are sick to death in life, with no mark on which they direct every impulse or in general every imagination, are triflers, not in words only but also in their deeds."

One long look at the equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius in Rome - discovered intact in the Tiber 1700 years after his death - shows you a man too wise, too humane, and too busy to found another mystery-cult religion. Thankfully.

I have been reading this book now off and on for over a year and have finally finnished it. Marcus' thoughts on "the whole" and nature are fascinating. One of my favorite passages was when he said that Caesar's brilliant oratory used simple words which were straight to the point "like the blast of a trumpet, not the trill of a flute."

This is an amazing book, a window into the mind of a 1st Century Roman. It's a day book of thoughts of a Roman emperor written in Greek nearly 2000 years ago. Marcus grapples with spiritual issues, philosphical and some immediate conerns. There are many references to Greek philosophers and Greek literature. The Oxford World's Classics edition, translated by A.S.L. Farquharson is immensely englightened by R.B Rutherford's notes. The notes, never intrusive, provide much needed philosphical and historical context.

I have been reading this book now off and on for over a year and have finally finnished it. Marcus' thoughts on "the whole" and nature are fascinating. One of my favorite passages was when he said that Caesar's brilliant oratory used simple words which were straight to the point "like the blast of a trumpet, not the trill of a flute."

The wisdom of resignation is wisdom, but it is not all the wisdom of life.
Marcus Aurelius wrote this work while warring for the Empire near its borders from 170 to 180 A.D. He knew his fellow late Stoic philosophers well, and his wisdom is much in accord with theirs.
As Epictetus taught what is not in our control is not for us to worry about.
Marcus Aurelius shows his concern for us in other ways, in teaching us how to bear the pains and sufferings of this life, and to minimize the pain.
We are after all, even the Emperors among us, merely minor specks of dust in a vast cosmos in which there is great darkness.
The wise words here are for a time of trouble, a time of war at the borders, a time of imminent decline, a time when Hope seems to be going out of the world.
Contrast the wisdom of others lives at other times. Wordsworth's 'Bliss was it to be alive that day , and to be young was very heaven' Or Whitman's "Do I contain contradictions.Well then I contain contradictions. I am multitudes' Spirits of times of expansion and hope and reshaping the world will not find their strength in Aurelius.
But tired, and in old age, and nodding before the fires of life, perhaps most of us will find at twilight moments these words as goads to consolation.
I think now of another wiseman, one much more to my heart and faith, Koheleth, as he speaks of vanity of vanities, and yet paradoxically inspires us to love life more.
"Don't look back" Satchel Paige said, "Someone may be gaining on you."

This second-century book of advice reflects its stoic deistic/atheist tradition. In a word, his goal is to encourage the reader toward good works and inner peace disregarding personal circumstances. He ends up sounding much like Confucius, and much like the "under the sun" part of King Solomon's Ecclesiastes. The arguments he gives for us to be at peace despite the continual thriving of evil around us center around its chaos and our own inability to change anything. Such a view is profoundly unsatisfying, and leaves us in perplexity over the purpose of it all, anchorless and hopeless. Whereas Aurelius says "The world is chaotic, but you're powerless so be a man and do right", Solomon says "The world is chaotic because man is inwardly evil, but take heart because it's all part of God's righteous and sovereign plan and part of that plan is our salvation." Life against God is meaningless, no matter how many nice things you do; life under His loving care is meaningful, because we have a sure hope of redemption and life to come.