Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 8.19

Everything exists for some end—a horse, a vine. Why do you wonder? Even the sun will say, I am for some purpose, and the rest of the gods will say the same.

For what purpose then are you—to enjoy pleasure? See if common sense allows this.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 8 (tr Long)

As soon as I ask myself, what is it? I must also ask myself, in the same breath, so what is it for?

Purpose is implicit in form. Everything that moves and changes, moves and changes from one state, and into another, and that is inseparable from its very identity. It is coming from somewhere, and going to somewhere. What it is, is itself only complete through what it is made to become.

So I am a creature of flesh and bone, of feelings and instincts, and of reason and choice. To say that alone is not enough. What am I meant to do with those qualities? What sort of life do they point me toward?

I can look at a plant, or an animal, or a tool made by other men, and I can quite clearly discern what they are intended to do. Now let me look at myself. What am I supposed to be?

Some of us will look at a lower aspect alone, at the expense of a higher aspect. We know that we can enjoy pleasure, and so we assume that this is all that there is, all that there could be. We neglect the whole at the expense of the part. Am I a creature of gratification? Of course. Am I a creature only of gratification? Not at all.

As the Philosopher-Emperor says, there is no sense at all in making an animal of a man. A man will feel pleasure or pain, but what distinguishes him from other creatures is his power to know true from false, right from wrong, and thereby to give meaning to his pleasure and pain. He directs what he feels by what he knows.

He understands that how well he feels follows from how well he lives. Pleasure is not the end, but a consequence of the end.

Understanding is greater than utility. Love is greater than contentment. Utility and contentment follow from understanding and love, and never the other way around.

Let me keep my hand on my heart, but let me first and foremost keep my head turned upwards, to an awareness of truth, goodness, and beauty. 

Written in 3/2008