Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 11.30

A slave you are: free speech is not for you.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 11.30 (tr Long)

I have unfortunately never been able to find any other reference for this quote, and so I am unable to consider it within a larger context. Perhaps Marcus Aurelius is citing a certain philosopher, or poet, or playwright? Taken only on its own, however, I still find it fascinating. I do wonder how I am intended to understand it.

My own thinking takes me along two different, yet complementary, paths. One part of me reads it in a conventional manner, looking at human nature as most of us will do from day to day, taking life as defined by circumstances. The other part of me reads it in a Stoic manner, looking at human nature from a very different angle, taking life as defined by our own judgment and character.

In the first case, I might imagine a man of great wealth and power, speaking to another man whom he effectively “owns” lock, stock, and barrel. The big man may possess the small man’s body as property, as in chattel slavery, or the big man may control all the worldly conditions of the small man, as in wage slavery. Whatever the case, the big man calls the shots, and he tells the small man what he must do, and he even tells him what he is permitted to say.

In the second case, I might imagine only myself, in a moment of completely honest awareness, recognizing that I am enslaved because I have surrendered my own freedom. I allow myself to be ruled by the racing impressions, by the force of passions, by the push and pull of each and every little thing that flits about me. I jump through hoops like a trained animal, desperate for the treat of some gratification at the end of the routine. I am not thinking for myself, I am not acting for myself, so I cannot even speak for myself.

Which if these is the more terrible bondage? The conventional view tells me that nothing is worse than having someone else enslave my body. The Stoic view tells me that nothing is worse than allowing my own passions and circumstances to enslave my mind.

Perhaps another man tells me how I may speak, but he cannot tell me how to think. When I bow down to what is lesser than me, I have even given up that right to think.

I may well be reading far too much into this brief statement, but in a case like this that concerns my very freedom, I’d rather err on the side of having too much reflection over too little.

Written in 6/2009