Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 8.51

“A cucumber is bitter.” Throw it away. “There are briers in the road.” Turn aside from them. This is enough.

Do not add, “And why were such things made in the world?” For you will be ridiculed by a man who is acquainted with Nature, as you would be ridiculed by a carpenter and shoemaker if you found fault because you see in their workshop shavings and cuttings from the things that they make.

And yet they have places into which they can throw these shavings and cuttings, and the Universal Nature has no external space; but the wondrous part of her art is that though she has circumscribed herself, everything within her that appears to decay and to grow old and to be useless she changes into herself, and again makes other new things from these very same, so that she requires neither substance from without, nor wants a place into which she may cast that which decays.

She is content then with her own space, and her own matter, and her own art.

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

This is one my very favorite passage in Marcus Aurelius. It speaks directly to a misunderstanding I must regularly overcome, one that I suspect is also an obstacle for many others.

I may see something in life that appears unfair, or broken, or painful, or inconvenient, or simply unnecessary, and I may then wonder why such things are even allowed to exist. If they are obstacles and hindrances, or just wasted, why would Providence permit them?

At the very least I will begin to complain about them, and my complaints can easily become resentments. I think of all the times I have griped that it is too hot or too cold, or that greedy and thoughtless people surround me, or that Nature would dare to allow me to feel any sort of pain.

At the very worst, I will transform my own frustration into a metaphysical conundrum. I will use my dissatisfaction as an excuse to insist that the Universe can never truly be subject to Providence, because there are bits I find to be a troublesome burden. It can actually end up growing into the problem of how a loving God could possibly permit the existence of evil.

Yet everything is a part of the whole, and even what I might consider to be an evil will exist so that out it may come a greater good. Nature never wastes anything, or discards anything, or considers anything to be useless. If it exists, it exists for a perfectly good reason, though I might not grasp this immediately through my limited awareness, or through my stubborn insistence.

Is it an obstacle to me? Then I can cast it aside, or walk around it, or even make something worthy out of it, just like those proverbial lemons. Yet notice how anything I do can do with something painful already gives me a chance to make myself better, and so it has unwittingly served a wonderful purpose after all!

The cucumber and the brier are what they are, and they are meant to be what they are. What I am is measured by my own wisdom and virtue, by my power to do good, and not by what other things do to me. I can still transform anything for my own moral good.

And Nature herself transforms everything, rebuilds it, and recycles it, so that nothing ever gets thrown away. Is it just a leftover piece of junk, some residue, or a worn-out part? Give it a moment. Before you know it, Providence will change it into something else, and it will have a new lease on life. It passes away, and then becomes new.

Without the wood shavings the carpenter could never use his plane. And Nature is so thrifty that even those shavings on the floor shall be put to a good use. 

Written in 5/2008