Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 6.25

Consider how many things in the same indivisible time take place in each of us, things that concern the body and things that concern the soul.

And so you should not wonder if many more things, or rather all things which come into existence in that which is the one and all, which we call the Cosmos, exist in it at the same time.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 6 (tr Long)

It becomes frighteningly easy to ignore the scale, the depth, and the diversity of the Universe, and thereby underestimate the profound and beautiful pattern in which all things participate. Even though I am only a tiny part within that whole, I will also neglect my own significance when I oversimplify my many aspects.

There isn’t just one change going on within me at any given moment, but a whole array of them, all of them related to one another and acting upon one another. Sometimes these different motions seem to be working together, and sometimes they seem to be in opposition, but each still plays a role within a greater harmony. Thinking, choosing, feeling, acting or being acted upon, a state of exertion or a state of rest, coming or going, growing or dying.

The way it is within each part is a reflection of the order of the whole. When I consider only one aspect of my existence, and judge myself by that alone, I am failing to understand the fullness of myself, and what I am made to be. Likewise, when I consider only one aspect of the whole world, and judge it by that alone, I am failing to understand the fullness of the Universe, and what it is made to be. Narrow thinking leads to narrow living.

Some people are intimidated when they think of the vastness and complexity of things, though I suspect this may only happen when we are tempted to view ourselves out of context. I don’t need to feel small or insignificant when I see how big or broad everything else is. I can just as easily be happy and proud to be a part of something so grand. The whole and the part do not exclude one another, and the distinct importance of one thing is not in conflict with the rather different importance of another.

I often think of those lines from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams:

Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space.

A friend of mine would use this as an example of how meaningless life really was. In that vast expanse of space and time, he said, we are surely just nothing.

“Not nothing,” I would say. “Still something. Just not everything.” He did not take kindly to this, but we were still friends.

Yes, just a speck of flesh, on a pebble circling a star, in a cluster of stars among countless others. But that speck of flesh can ponder that very meaning, have a conscious sense of wonder at how that works, and is able to know and to love. That will more than do.

Written in 3/2007