Epictetus, Golden Sayings 8

". . . Yes, but to debase myself so would be unworthy of me!" 

"That," said Epictetus, "is for you to consider, not for me. You know yourself what you are worth in your own eyes, and at what price you will sell yourself. For men sell themselves at various prices. 

"This was why, when Florus was deliberating whether he should appear at Nero's shows, taking part in the performance himself, Agrippinus replied, 'But why do you not appear?' he answered, 'Because I do not even consider the question.' 

"For the man who has once stooped to consider such questions, and to reckon up the value of external things, is not far from forgetting what manner of man he is. Why, what is it that you ask me? Is death preferable, or life? I reply, Life. Pain or pleasure? I reply, Pleasure."
 
"Well, but if I do not act, I shall lose my head!"

"Then go and act! But for my part I will not act."

"Why?"

"Because you think yourself but one among the many threads which make up the texture of the doublet. You should aim at being like men in general—just as your thread has no ambition either to be anything distinguished compared with the other threads. 

"But I desire to be the purple—that small and shining part which makes the rest seem fair and beautiful. Why then do you bid me to become even as the multitude? Then I would no longer be in the purple." 

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.17

Happiness is a good spirit, or a good thing. What then are you doing here, O imagination?

Go away, I entreat you by the gods, as you did come, for I want you not. But you are come according to your old fashion. I am not angry with you, only go away.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

I understand imagination here not in the broad sense of creativity, but in the more specific, Classical sense of the apprehension of our impressions. In other words, Marcus Aurelius isn’t telling us that we shouldn’t, as we now like to say, “think outside of the box”, but rather that we shouldn’t allow our lives to be ruled by the power of appearances.

This can be quite confusing, because we are so familiar with the idea that happiness is about how things feel. Yet the Stoic, in a manner similar to the Aristotelian and in contrast to the Epicurean, seeks happiness through virtue, the excellence of our thoughts and actions. The value of how we feel is in turn only relative to the merit of how well we live. Happiness is therefore a fundamentally active principle, not a passive one, and is measured by what we do, not by what is done to us.

Let me look beyond the appearances, which can be so confusing and disturbing, and which can toss me here and there, to a clear and calm understanding of the nature of things. Let me move through the image to the reality, from the realm of seeming to the depth of being. I should consider any impression of sense, and any of my own passions, only from the perspective of what I was made to do in this life, to know what is true and to love what is good, and to direct all of my judgments toward that end.

That is happiness, a commitment to the actions of living well. The rest is fantasy and illusion.

I should never resent the power of my imagination, even as I leave its effects to be for what they are. It helps me to remember all of the ways that impressions, taken only in their own right, have been an occasion for me to let myself be misled. Great pleasures or great pains have clouded my judgment. Ugly things masquerading as beautiful things have led me to hasty action, and beautiful things seeming like ugly things have led me to deep neglect. As an old friend of mine liked to say, “Look behind the veil!”

Was I impressed with someone because he was rich, or did I fall in love with someone because she was charming, or did I act only to pursue gratification and avoid hardship? How often have I taken right for wrong and wrong for right, because I chose only to be pulled by feelings, not motivated by judgment?

I will face people every day who tempt me, or who put up some sort of hindrance to me, or who enjoy, as they say, to simply push my buttons.

Let them be. Accept them, even love them, but do not follow them.

So it is with my impressions. They weave about, always changing, sometimes enticing, sometimes terrifying.

See them in their rightful place, and do not hate them, but do not let them lead you. Ask them politely to be on their own way. Do not be afraid to ask Providence to assist you in that task.

It isn’t at all that I shouldn’t be feeling, but rather that I should be doing something so much more than only feeling. 

Written in 10/2007

IMAGE: Antonio de Pereda, The Knight's Dream (c. 1650)

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 7

What did Antisthenes say? Have you never heard?

"It is a kingly thing, O Cyrus, to do well and to be evil spoken of."

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.16

The ruling faculty does not disturb itself.

I mean, it does not frighten itself or cause itself pain. But if any one else can frighten or pain it, let him do so. For the faculty itself will not by its own opinion turn itself into such ways.

Let the body itself take care, if it can, that is suffer nothing, and let it speak, if it suffers. But the soul itself, that which is subject to fear and to pain, which has completely the power of forming an opinion about these things, will suffer nothing, for it will never deviate into such a judgment.

The leading principle in itself wants nothing, unless it makes a want for itself, and therefore it is both free from perturbation and unimpeded, if it does not disturb and impede itself.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

I have read about and heard about all sorts of different philosophical accounts on what makes us human, and about what defines awareness, and about how we can explain the nature of choice. All of those classroom years, and all of that time spent with the most fancy of scholars, were not entirely wasted.

Some of the books and teachers told me that I was a creature of pure reason, intended only for the most abstract and purest of contemplation. Those were usually the Kantians, or Hegelians, or quite often also the stuffiest of Thomists. I was a mind, made to ponder. I was to ignore all of the rest.

Others told me I was a creature of passion, motivated by my drive to be gratified, to possess, or to conquer. On the milder end were the Utilitarians and Humeans, on the harsher end were the Nietzscheans. I was a powerful piece of desire. I was to ignore all of the rest.

I was especially fascinated by those who told me I had no identity at all, and that I had to make up my own sense of self. Thank you to all of those Existentialists and Phenomenologists. Life has no inherent meaning, they told me, so we create it. I was to ignore all of the rest.

I know this will get me in trouble, but they were all right, and they were also all wrong. Yes, a man is made to think. Yes, a man is made to feel. Yes, a man is even made to form himself. Yet he is none of these things on their own. He is all of them, all joined together, but only in the right and proper order. You cannot cut a man into pieces, or dissect him, and only examine one of the bits on your table. You must look at the whole, as he is living, breathing, and doing.

Welcome to Stoicism, a philosophy of practical living, not only of abstract reflection, which considers the relationship of these layers, from the exterior to the interior, from the lesser to the greater.

Yes, I am thrown into a world, and I am born with no sense of myself. It is something I must find.

Yes, I am gifted with powerful emotions, and I learn that they drive me this way and that.

Yes, through it all, I realize that I have a mind, not merely to consider abstractions, but to make the most concrete of judgments and choices.

I need to make those choices each and every day, and they are not just about fancy ideals. They are about the most immediate needs. I want this, and I want it now. Should I have it? Why, or why not? What might make it worth my time?

Look what I have just realized, and how truly wonderful it is.

I am confused by my situation, and I have strong emotions about it all. What happens to me is beyond my power. I feel that I would like to make it all mine, but I cannot do so. Now what remains for me?

I do not make the world as it is, and I do not make my passions as they are. They are both an essential part of what forms me, but they do not define all of me. I am more than what happens, and I am more than what I feel.

Good grief, I am, at my core, within all of those other layers, what I think. What a realization, both frightening and liberating. My thinking doesn’t make the world to be what it is, but it makes the world to be what I will make of it.

Let me observe all of the ways that the world can act upon me. Now let me observe all of the ways that I can act upon the world. There is only one difference, and only one, between those two factors. My own judgment, and my own choice.

Look at all the ways that you can influence me, or change me, or force me. Now look at the one way that you can’t. I will only commit or submit if I so think, or if I so choose. It is only my estimation that is immovable. That is the essence of tranquility.

Written in 10/2007

IMAGE: Apollo 11, Tranquility Base, 1969

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 6

But what says God?

"Had it been possible, Epictetus, I would have made both that body of yours and your possessions free and unimpeded, but as it is, be not deceived.

"It is not your own. It is but finely tempered clay. 

"Since then this I could not do, I have given you a portion of Myself, in the power of desiring and declining, and of pursuing and avoiding, and in a word the power of dealing with the things of sense. 

"And if you do not neglect this, but place all that you have in it, you shall never be deprived or hindered. You shall never lament. You shall not blame or flatter anyone. 

"What then? Does this seem like a little thing?"

God forbid!

"Be content then with it!"

And so I pray to the Gods. 
 

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.15

Whatever anyone does or says, I must be good, just as if the gold, or the emerald, or the purple were always saying this:

Whatever anyone does or says, I must be emerald and keep my color.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

If the philosophy of Stoicism is asking me to live according to Nature, it is asking me to always be completely human in the ways that I think and act.

This does not need to be a vague and mysterious concept, or the pursuit of some impossible task. It is simply asking me to be who I was made to be, to live in harmony with my very identity as a creature designed to know and to love. This responsibility always comes first, and all other wants or circumstances must be ordered toward it.

An emerald should keep its color. A man should keep his virtue. Anything less is an abandonment of who and what I am. Yes, other people will change their tune, or pull away from their promises, or speak in one way and then act in another. Yes, others may sadly make their excuses, but I do not need to do so.

I will fail at my task when I allow a change in how others live to modify the way that I choose to live. We may not speak of it much in our time, and that perhaps tells us something, but the remedy is the virtue of constancy, of being enduring, reliable, and committed, even when others are fickle, slippery, and unfaithful.

Whatever someone else has said and done, I do not need to define myself by what he has said and done. I do not need to respond in kind to the way I have been treated, and I do not need to become what I must of necessity confront. I can be good, I can be an emerald, and I can keep my color.

Likewise, when I have failed to be the man I should be, I may well expect wrath and indignation in return. I may well receive it, but it remains up to me to make it right. I will see that I have fallen short, and then it is my job, and mine alone, to correct my error. Someone else who is being resentful or vindictive never excuses me from the requirement of never being resentful or vindictive.

I will grow weary of the games, of the lies, of the abuse, and of the betrayals. Only one judgment will fix this. Let it all be as it is, but I will be something rather different.

I meet a good friend most every week for a cup of coffee, and he worries about the state of the world. “People can just be so terrible,” he says. “I can’t keep up with it.”

And I tell him, time and time again, that he doesn’t need to keep up with them. He only needs to keep up with himself. He needs to keep his own color, and not anyone else's.

Written in 9/2007

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 5

Rufus used to say, If you have the leisure to praise me, what I say is nothing. 

In truth he spoke in such a manner, that each of us who sat there, thought that someone had accused him to Rufus. 

So surely did he lay his finger on the very deeds we did, so surely did he display the faults of each before his very eyes.

Boethius, The Consolation 2.19

. . . “Is there then no good that belongs to you and is implanted within you, so that you seek your good things elsewhere, in things without you and separate from you? Have things taken such a turn that the animal, whose reason gives it a claim to divinity, cannot seem beautiful to itself except by the possession of lifeless trappings?

“Other classes of things are satisfied by their intrinsic possessions, but men, though made like God in understanding, seek to find among the lowest things adornment for their higher nature. And you do not understand that you do a great wrong thereby to your Creator. He intended that the human race should be above all other earthly beings, yet you thrust down your honorable place below the lowest. For if every good thing is allowed to be more valuable than that to which it belongs, surely you are putting yourselves lower than them in your estimation, since you think precious the most worthless of things, and this is indeed a just result.

“Since, then, this is the condition of human nature, that it surpasses other classes only when it realizes what is in itself. As soon as it ceases to know itself, it must be reduced to a lower rank than the beasts. To other animals ignorance of themselves is natural; in men it is a fault. How plainly and how widely do you err by thinking that anything can be adorned by ornaments that belong to others! Surely that cannot be. For if anything becomes brilliant by additions to it, the praise for the brilliance belongs to the additions. But the subject remains in its own vileness, though hidden and covered by these externals.

“Again, I say that nothing can be a good thing which does harm to its possessor. Am I wrong? ‘No,’ you will say. Yet many a time do riches harm their possessors, since all base men, who are therefore the most covetous, think that they themselves alone are worthy to possess all gold and precious stones. You therefore, who now go in fear of the cudgel and sword of the robber, could laugh in his face if you had entered upon this path with empty pockets.

“How wonderful is the surpassing blessing of mortal wealth! As soon as you have acquired it, your cares begin!”

—from Book 2, Prose 5

This is one of my favorite passages in the whole of the Consolation. In my own thinking, I will often break it down into smaller bits, but I realize that it works best as a complete whole. The parts all fit together. I offer it simply as it is.

I will sometimes present the message to myself in the form of four basic questions, and this helps me to see how ridiculous my misguided thinking and living can become. While I know that not all people appreciate sarcasm, the final sentence of the passage puts it all in its proper place. Isn’t it grand how I wish to add something to myself, and I end up only diminishing myself?

Why am I looking for something on the outside, when I should be looking on the inside?

Why am I estimating myself as less by thinking of my possessions more?

Why do I insist that having anything beyond myself is to my merit, when the merit of what I desire is already within itself?

Why do I stubbornly continue to believe that the things I crave are always good for me, when they are, in fact, quite often harmful for me?

I will think of all the times I have been so busy with my situation, that I am paying absolutely no attention to myself. It is as if my obsession with some problem or other, which really has nothing to do with me, has taken control. I am so fixated on what is happening, that I forget what I should be doing, and about the inherent value in my thoughts and actions.

I will think of all the times I placed my position, or my reputation, or my possessions up on some sort of pedestal, and in the process made myself subservient to them. I am seeking them on the assumption that they will improve me, and therefore making them better than me. I think that I am somehow freeing myself, but I am actually making myself a sort of slave.

I will think of all the times I have behaved more like an animal than like a man, until I realize that I have, in fact, become worse than an animal. An animal is supposed to act only on instinct, and is not made to understand in the way that I am made. The animal is living its nature, and I have failed to live up to mine.  I can add all the accessories and decorations that I like, but much like cosmetics only hide blemishes and do not remove them, the trappings of life are only a cover for my inner ugliness.

I will think of all the times I have pursued vanities, only to find myself miserable. If it really is so good, why does it hurt so badly? How is it that the desire to possess and control brings with it even more trouble that I started with? Once I value all the money, and the power, and the recognition, people just as greedy as myself will want to take it all away, yet as soon as I leave these things behind me, I will be free of that harm. The more I have, the more I need to have to keep what I have. It never ends, and always brings with it worry.

So it does help me to tell myself sarcastically, “My, look what a big man you are! Look at all those wonderful troubles you’ve heaped up for yourself!” My problem has arisen from how I think about what is valuable, and how I relate myself on the inside to the things in my world on the outside. My problem is, as that classic song says, that I was looking for love in all the wrong places. 

Written in 9/2015

Off-Topic, or Perhaps Not: New York Minute

Those few who know me well also know that I am deeply romantic and sentimental. This is not always to my credit.

As much I love all sorts of music, and as much of a sucker as I am, there are actually very few songs that will make me cry. The ones that get me are usually deeply moving Irish or Scottish ballads.

Yet this song will inevitably leave me weeping, each and every time I hear it. A fellow once played it on the jukebox at my local watering hole, and in the middle of all sorts of very strong manly men, my buddy looked at me and asked, "Dude, is that a tear?"

Yup. It most certainly was. If I hadn't been trying so hard to hold it all back, you might have seen waterworks. There might have been bawling. It would have been ugly.

I suspect I was at heart somehow a Stoic long before I even knew what Stoicism was. I don't mean the Hipster Stoicism, the smug and cynical stuff you'll easily find in trendy bookstores or on the internet nowadays. I mean the real stuff, where you look at yourself, and then you look at the world, and then you realize you have had it all messed up. You suddenly see the world upside down from the way you saw it before.

You recognize that who you are has nothing to do with all the noise around you. You realize that you are a part of a whole, not a disposable accessory. You begin to see the Divine around you, a world charged with beauty and truth.

And, so very importantly, you accept that everything comes and goes. And you are actually content with all of that, knowing that the impermanence of your situation in no way reduces the importance of your character. Something will have clicked inside you, to allow you to find peace in passing.

A New York minute. What a wonderful phrase. Yes, everything can change in a moment. I need to love and to appreciate what I have, because tomorrow may well be too late.

Don Henley, "New York Minute", from The End of the Innocence (1989)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58la7YuVTAs

Harry got up
Dressed all in black
Went down to the station
And he never came back
They found his clothing
Scattered somewhere down the track
And he won't be down on Wall Street in the morning

He had a home
The love of a girl
But men get lost sometimes
As years unfurl
One day he crossed some line
And he was too much in this world
But I guess it doesn't matter anymore

In a New York minute
Everything can change
In a New York minute
Things can get pretty strange
In a New York minute
Everything can change
In a New York minute

Lying here in the darkness
I hear the sirens wail
Somebody going to emergency
Somebody's going to jail
You find somebody to love in this world
You better hang on tooth and nail
The wolf is always at the door

In a New York minute
Everything can change
In a New York minute
Things can get little strange
In a New York minute
Everything can change
In a New York minute

And in these days
When darkness falls early
And people rush home
To the ones they love
You better take a fool's advice
And take care of your own
One day they're here
Next day they're gone

I pulled my coat over my shoulders
And took a walk down through the park
The leaves were falling around me
The groaning city in the gathering dark
On some solitary rock
A desperate lover left his mark
Baby, I've changed, please come back

What the head makes cloudy
The heart makes very clear
The days were so much brighter
In the time when she was here
I know there's somebody, somewhere
Make these dark clouds disappear
Until that day, I have to believe
I believe, I believe

In a New York minute
Everything can change
In a New York minute
You can get out of the way
In a New York minute
Everything can change
In a New York minute

Written in 4/2012

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 4

But I have one whom I must please, to whom I must be subject, whom I must obey: God, and those who come next to Him. 

He has entrusted me with myself. He has made my will subject to myself alone and given me rules for the right use thereof.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.14

Let there fall externally what will on the parts that can feel the effects of this fall. For those parts which have felt will complain, if they choose.

But I, unless I think that what has happened is an evil, am not injured. And it is in my power not to think so.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

Things will happen, and things will hurt. Sometimes they will hurt terribly. I will still feel that my heart is broken once again each and every day, from the very moment I wake up in the morning. I will do all that is within my power to avoid pain and suffering, but I have learned a hard lesson. I can’t always kill the hurt, though I can determine what I make of it.

I have been told by people who mean well, though speaking from complete ignorance, that I can simply will it to disappear. I think of the worst physical pain I have ever felt, and I remember that the agony could not be wished away. I could only wait for it to end. Now imagine that you know it isn’t going to end. There’s the Black Dog at his finest, and at his most destructive.

That may seem quite hopeless, but it is hardly hopeless. Events will certainly not go my way, and people will act with the nastiest of malice or carelessness. Of course that will have its effect on me. Losing my possessions or reputation will make me feel that I have been deprived of my very life. Being treated with hatred or indifference will make me feel that I am the most worthless of creatures. Still, it is not hopeless.

Things have fallen, but I do not need to fall. What has actually been lost? What I think I own has been taken from me, and my sense of pride will complain. It will shout quite loudly. My body has been wounded, and every nerve within me screams. My feelings may feel crushed, and the torment will seem unbearable. I worry that I will end up on the street, cold, hungry, and alone. It could happen right now, as it does to millions and millions of people across the world.

Still, something remains, and that is the only thing within me that is truly mine. My thinking and my choices, how I judge and how I act, however terrifying the circumstances, are always my own. One moment they will be snuffed out, but not at this precise moment, not right here and right now.

I was once trying to run a Twelve Step meeting where a fellow, clearly distraught, described his life like someone holding a gun to his head and just about to pull the trigger. A few members tried to talk him out of the idea, and I was afraid they were just dismissing his concerns. We all closed our fancy mouths when someone spoke up in a deeply Stoic manner:

That can happen, and it will happen. Maybe you can’t pull the gun from his hands, or manage some incredible escape. Imagine how all those folks in all the death camps around the world must feel, or what it might be like when you are dragged into a room where you are about to be executed. You are powerless over that.

But you have complete power over one thing. You can love the man who hates you, and you can forgive him.

Well, that shut us all up. Lesson learned.

An evil done to me will hurt like hell, but an evil I commit will send me straight to hell. The former is beyond me. The latter is entirely up to me. Only my judgments are truly my own, and it is completely right to say that something will only be as evil to me as I choose to make it.

Yes, it may hurt. Now what am I going to do with the hurt? There was a wonderful moment in my life when I realized what it meant to turn swords into plowshares. I must remember that if I think of it rightly, who I am, in my mind and heart, is invincible. You can’t take that away.

Written in 9/2007

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 3

Try to enjoy the great festival of life with other men.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.13

Just as it is with the members in those bodies that are united in one, so it is with rational beings that exist as separate, for they have been constituted for one cooperation.

And the perception of this will be more apparent to you, if you often say to yourself that I am a “member” of the system of rational beings. But if you say that you are only a” part”, you do not yet love men from your heart.

 Beneficence does not yet delight you for its own sake. You still do it barely as a thing of propriety, and not yet as doing good to yourself.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

We certainly use terms in very different ways. I find that so many of our disagreements and misunderstandings proceed precisely from this. What I may say, and intend, may not necessarily be what another understands.

There’s apparently a clever play on words in the original Greek here (“melos”, as distinct from “meros”), and it distinguishes between being a member and a part. I am hardly a scholar on the subtlety of the Greek language, but I have understood this as a difference between an active commitment and a passive acceptance. It is one thing to be a willing participant. It is quite another to be an indifferent presence.

Observe any group, of any sort. Some people stand up, and they take it as a joyful responsibility to do their part, with all their hearts, minds, and souls. Others shuffle about, and they only begrudgingly accept their place.

Some are inspired, and some go through the motions. For some it is a blessing, and for some it is a chore. Have I freely joined the club, or did I just inherit my membership? Am I working from what I can give, or only from what I expect to be given? The difference is one of night and day.

So it is with being human. I am a member of humanity when I devote myself to what is right and good for all of us. I am simply a part of humanity when I sit around and do the least that is expected of me.

I notice how many of those we consider to be our worst nevertheless give everything of themselves to be human. Many of those we consider to be our best will still simply go through the motions of being human. We become confused when we mix up how something really is with only how it appears.

I knew a wonderful and truly eccentric fellow who lived out of his van, and who helped me to learn the mandolin for Irish music. He would say time and time again:

Doers are doers, and players are players. Give all of yourself in love, or spend the rest of your life pretending that you love. Take your pick. Live with your choice, and you will also die with it. It’s one of the only real differences there is.

How often have I been sure that I am a member, not just a part, but yet I have not been a doer, just a player?

Love is the law, not as a begrudging obligation, but as a willing dedication.

Written in 9/2007

IMAGE: Allegory of Charity (1561)

Off-Topic, or Perhaps Not: Pingu, Eskimo Disco, and the 7-11

I am a crazy fellow who raised his poor children with a healthy dose of Pingu videos. There are few things finer in life than learning about right and wrong from a Swiss children's show about penguins.

As they watched about Pingu and his family, I discovered a brilliant song by a British EDM band called Eskimo Disco. Those fine folks had somehow managed to get new Pingu footage for a music video, for their song called "7-11".

I immediately played it for the whole family, and it began a wonderful tradition we started calling "Late Night Dance Party", where the kids would wildly prance around to a song of my choice before they went to bed.

"Look at my cool moves!" my son would say. "Hey, watch this!" my daughter would respond. They would spin and twirl, with no worries about anything else.

What I loved about all of it so much was that they were finding happiness without any concern for what the world thought of them. They were simply being themselves. It will, to my dying day, remain one of my most precious memories.

They've grown older now, and any mention of "Late Night Dance Party" makes them roll their eyes. That's fine. I saw them, if only for a moment, not caring if what they did would make them popular, or rich, or important to anyone else. I saw them before all of the presumption, before all of the foolish social games they had to play, before all of the disappointment and uncertainty that came from defining themselves by imposed standards.

I think of those great moments now gone, and all I can do is wish that they will one day rediscover that time for themselves. I gave them what I could. They helped me to renew myself, and I pray that the memory of that time will eventually help them to renew their own lives, at that moment when they most need it.

Written in 1/2016

Eskimo Disco, "7-11" (2005)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7RcqRmBlIQ

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 2

How then do men act? As though one returning to his country, who had sojourned for the night in a fair inn, should be so captivated thereby as to take up his abode there.

"Friend, you have forgotten your intention! This was not your destination, but only lay on the way there." 

"No, but it is a proper place!"
  
And how many more of the sort there may be, only to pass through upon your way!

Your purpose was to return to your country, to relieve your kinsmen's fears for you; yourself to discharge the duties of a citizen; to marry a wife, to beget offspring, and to fill the appointed round of office. 

You did not come to choose out what places are most pleasant, but rather to return to where you were born, and where you were appointed to be a citizen.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.12

Stand up, or be made to stand up.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

I have understood this passage in two different ways, both as an encouragement and as a warning. Which it is at any given moment will, I suppose, tells me quite a bit about the current state of my soul.

Nature will arrange all things precisely as they are supposed to be. She will put a man in his proper place, but because she has given him reason, the power to understand for himself, she also gives him the opportunity to freely participate in that part. By coming to know himself and his world, he may choose to become a joyful and willing cooperator in the order of Providence.

But what if he is unwilling? Surely if he has the right to say yes, he also has the right to say no? Indeed he does. He will still play a role, and he will still be a part of the whole, but that part will now be forced on him from without, not proceeding freely from within. Either a man will choose to live well in service, or he will find himself corrected back into service.

When I’m managing my life rightly, this inspires me to do better, knowing that I am happy to have my own thoughts and actions as their own reward. When I’m messing things up, it is cautionary, reminding me that when I refuse to do right, Nature will make me right. My actions will have very real consequences. This may not always be as pleasant an experience as I would like.

I once worked for a fellow who had a lazy habit of parking his car right in front of the restaurant he owned. The problem was that this convenient spot also happened to have a fire hydrant on the curb, and he received dozens of parking tickets. They would get tossed into a drawer below the register.

One day, a local cop had enough. He didn’t even bother to write another ticket, but promptly called a tow truck. Sensing that the officer meant business, my friend ran out to argue with him. I remember that wonderful sight of a seasoned Boston Irish cop and a Lebanese businessman yelling wildly at one another.

The discussion ended quickly when the cop quite colorfully said, “Listen buddy, this car is not gonna be sittin’ here in this spot in ten minutes. Now you can move it yourself, or I’m gonna move it for you. But you ain’t gonna like what happens when I move it for you. And you sure ain’t gonna like what I’m gonna do to your face if I ever see it parked here again.” I have removed the many expletives to protect tender ears.

My friend did not say another word, promptly moved the car, and never parked by that hydrant again.

To keep it in the spirit of my Boston years, I can choose to be a stand-up guy, or Nature is going to light a fire under my ass. My call.

Written in 9/2007

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 1

Are these the only works of Providence within us? What words suffice to praise or set them forth? Had we but understanding, should we ever cease hymning and blessing the Divine Power, both openly and in secret, and telling of His gracious gifts? Whether digging, or plowing, or eating, should we not sing the hymn to God:

"Great is God, for that He has given us such instruments to till the ground. Great is God, for that He has given us hands and the power of swallowing and digesting, of unconsciously growing and breathing while we sleep!"

Thus should we ever have sung, yes and this, the grandest and divinest hymn of all:

"Great is God, for that He has given us a mind to apprehend these things, and duly to use them!"

What then? seeing that most of you are blinded, should there not be someone to fill this place, and sing the hymn to God on behalf of all men?

What else can I do, that am old and lame, but sing to God? Were I a nightingale, I should do after the manner of a nightingale. Were I a swan, I should do after the manner of a swan. But now, since I am a reasonable being, I must sing to God. 

That is my work. I do it, nor will I desert this my post, as long as it is granted me to hold it, and upon you too I call to join in this same hymn. 

* * * * * 

One of the first Stoic texts I came across was an old, dusty, and worn copy of The Golden Sayings of Epictetus, a collection of passages selected and translated by Hastings Crossley, first printed back in 1909.  It had been sitting quite neglected on a shelf in my college library, last checked out over a decade earlier. It was used as a part of the Harvard Classics series.

Now there are many more contemporary translations available, complete with all the newest scholarship. Yet I still have a weakness for this old version, because it eventually became a close friend. 

It was my first introduction to reading a passage of Stoicism each and every day, something I then expanded to other Stoic writers, and it later became the basis for jotting down my own personal reflections on these texts. 

When I got my first e-mail account, I started changing the signature file every week to include a new quote from this edition. I didn't think anyone noticed for some time, until one of my professors voiced encouragement, and suggested other texts I would appreciate.

I have such a soft spot for this old version that I once picked up a few different battered copies at used bookstores from around Boston to pass on to my friends. I don't think I ever paid any more than two dollars for a copy. At that kind of price, it was one the most profitable investments I could ever imagine. 

Yes, truly golden. 

Written in 10/1995

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.11

To the rational animal the same act is according to nature and according to reason.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

Ah, human nature! We speak of it as an explanation of why we act as we do, for good or for ill, and when we say that something is “only natural” we offer it as a justification or an excuse for how we are living. Sometimes we appeal to it as a thing of great strength, and sometimes we are ashamed of it as a thing of great weakness. So we are proud to speak of our “nature” to strive, to love, or to sacrifice, but we shudder at our “nature” to conform, to hate, or to destroy.

But now I ask myself, what is truly natural for me? As with so many profound terms, I may be quite happy to use it, but hard pressed to understand it. With the whole tradition of Classical wisdom, I can say that a nature in anything is how it is disposed, and to what sorts of actions it is ordered to. This isn’t just a matter of how other things move it, but how it moves from within itself. I can perhaps discern this by first simply asking what something does, and how this reflects its identity and purpose.

Now I have a body, but I share that with any physical being. My nature is surely something more than that. I have a living body, but I share that with any plant. I have senses, and I have instincts, and I have feelings, but I share that with any animal.

What is distinctly my own as human, in addition to all the other powers I possess, is my power of understanding. Because it acts consciously, and not unconsciously, this is a power that may rule over the others and direct them. It is one thing to act, it is another think to act with awareness, which is itself what makes it possible for me to freely choose how I will act.

What is natural for me is to be rational. I am not determined by what I possess, or by what circumstances surround me, or even by what I sense or feel, but rather by how well I think, and by how well my actions proceed from my knowledge of what is true and good.

Now my own nature, like the nature of all things, is in and of itself good, because it is ordered toward what is good. Yet because I am the conscious cause of my own acts, it is within my power to both choose well and to choose poorly.

This is why, I would suggest, we sometimes see what is wonderful in our nature, when we use it for what it was intended. We are made to know and to love. It is also why we see what is terrible in our nature, when we abuse it contrary to what was intended. This happens when we follow ignorance and hatred.

Man can indeed be the greatest of creatures when he embraces his own nature, and he can be the worst of creatures when he rejects his nature. Since he is a creature of reason and choice, which one he becomes will depend entirely upon him.

Written in 9/2007

Diogenes for the Day, 9/23/2018

When Diogenes was sold as a slave, he endured it most nobly. For on a voyage to Aegina he was captured by pirates under the command of Scirpalus, conveyed to Crete and exposed for sale. 

When the auctioneer asked in what he was proficient, he replied, "In ruling men." Thereupon he pointed to a certain Corinthian with a fine purple border to his robe, the man named Xeniades, and said, "Sell me to this man. He needs a master." 

Thus Xeniades came to buy him, and took him to Corinth and set him over his own children and entrusted his whole household to him. And he administered it in all respects in such a manner that Xeniades used to go about saying, "A good spirit has entered my house."

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.10

Everything material soon disappears in the substance of the whole, and everything formal is very soon taken back into the Universal Reason.

And the memory of everything is very soon overwhelmed in time.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

Just as we regularly view humans in opposition to one another, so too we will often see all the things in the world through their distinction and separation. This here is different from that, and so we consider them only individually, not collectively. Yet the matter these things are composed of is of one and the same sort, and the identity these things take upon themselves is from one and the same source. They proceed from a complete unity, and they return back into a complete unity. In and of themselves, they have nothing separate from their universal origin and end.

Time offers the ideal indication of this fact, for however quickly or slowly it may seem to unfold, all particular things are subject to change and transformation. Only the measure of what is Absolute can give meaning and purpose to what is relative, and it is the passage of time that helps us to understand how the contingent exists only as a dependence on the necessary.

I have often felt sadness and regret when the things I have grown attached to pass away. Friends are lost, people I love have died, places are no more, and moments that may still remain in memory are never to be repeated. You can’t take it with you, they say, and you can’t go home again. That can seem to be quite a burden, for some of us too hard to bear.

But I will only think this to myself when I dwell upon the parts at the expense of the whole, of the particulars at the expense of the universal. Yes, this or that aspect may seem to be gone, but it isn’t gone at all, because it has only been modified. Everything that ever was, and all that ever will be, still remains.

I was amazed to meet a family in rural New Hampshire who had lived on the same plot of land for many generations. They would tell stories about how it was old forest when the land was first settled, and then it was cleared as farmland. A swamp was drained, and an outcropping of rock broken down to build walls. As the years passed, and agriculture left the region, the trees began to grow back, and now it was so very slowly returning to what it had once been before.

Parts of their house, along with an old barn, had been rebuilt a few times over, but each time, their story had it, the family would reuse old stone and wood from the previous structure when constructing the new one. They had some very old photos of what it had once looked like, and I could barely recognize the place.

Yet, for them, it was one and the same place, even as it had been repeatedly transformed, and even as those people who were older made way for those who were younger. The amateur poet and philosopher in me found that deeply beautiful. It’s like that other old phrase, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Written in 9/2007