The Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius
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page 8
EDITOR S NOTE
"
To the gods
I
am indebted for having
grandfathers, good parents, a good
sister, good teachers, good associates, good
good
kinsmen, nearly everything
good."
In
this
manner Marcus Aurelius, the best of the
Roman Emperors, and the noblest of pagan
philosophers, summarises the influences which
went to the making of his character. Of
patrician birth he responded eagerly to the
teaching of his tutors, and at eleven years of
age he embraced those doctrines of Stoicism
which became the controlling force, and the
object of study, for the remainder of his life.
When as a child he attracted the attention of
the Emperor Hadrian, his character was so
definitely formed that the Emperor renamed
him Verissimus(" the most true
His life s
").
story as related in the following pages reveals
him as a man of extraordinary calibre.
His Meditations, composed as opportunity
presented in the whirl of his strenuous life,
contain thoughts which represent the finest
fruits
of paganism.
His philosophy was
He not merely
suggested them.
The translation here presented is that of
the eminent classical scholar Professor George
Long, who was born Nov. 4, 800, and died
Aug. 10, 1879.
Marcus Tullius Cicero, the greatest orator
and writer of ancient Rome, was born 106 B.C.
and died 43 B.C. In him centred the full
sternly practised by himself.
wrote precepts
-his life
1
glory of classic culture, and through the long
centuries the light of his genius has burned
with undiminished brilliance.
page 9
THE THOUGHTS
MARCUS 4
AURELIUS
GEORGE
OF
LONG
Translated by
With his Life, and an Essay on his
Philosophy
by
the
Translator
Also the Essay on Marcus Aurelius by
MATTHEW ARNOLD
Together
with
CICERO S
ESSAY ON FRIENDSHIP
Translated by
W. MELMOTH
CASSELL AND COMPANY, LTD.
LONDON, PARIS, NEW YORK,
TORONTO & MELBOURNE
MCMVIII
page 11
CONTENTS
PACK
OF THE EMPEROR MARCUS AURELIUS
ANTONINUS. BY GEORGE LONG
LIFE
THE PHILOSOPHY OF ANTONINUS
....
....
9
33
THE THOUGHTS OF MARCUS AURELIUS
FIRST BOOK
........
SECOND BOOK
THIRD BOOK
71
81
88
FOURTH BOOK
97
FIFTH BOOK
110
SIXTH BOOK
123
SEVENTH BOOK
EIGHTH BOOK
NINTH BOOK
.
,
136
.
.........
TENTH BOOK
151
165
178
ELEVENTH BOOK
192
205
INDEX OF TERMS
217
GENERAL INDEX
220
ESSAY ON MARCUS AURELIUS.
BY MATTHEW ARNOLD
OR, AN ESSAY
MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO
.....
L^LIUS;
225
ON FRIENDSHIP. BY
255
page 15
THE LIFE OF THE EMPEROR
MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS
M. ANTONINUS was born at Rome A.D. 121, on April 26.
His father Annius Verus died while he was praetor. His
mother was Domitia Calvilla also named Lucilla. The
Emperor T. Antoninus Pius married Annia Galeria
Faustina, the sister of Annius Verus, and was consequently
M. Antoninus uncle. When Hadrian adopted Antoninus
Pius and declared him his successor in the empire, Antoni
nus Pius adopted both L. Ceionius Commodus, the son of
Aelius Caesar, and M. Antoninus, whose original name was
M. Annius Verus. Antoninus took the name of M. Aelius
Aurelius Verus, to which was added the title of Caesar
in A.D. 139
the name Aelius belonged to Hadrian s
family, and Aurelius was the name of Antoninus Pius.
When M. Antoninus became Augustus, he dropped the
name of Verus and took the name of Antoninus. Accord
ingly he is generally named M. Aurelius Antoninus or
simply M. Antoninus.
The youth was most carefully brought up. He thanks
the gods (i, 17) that he had good grandfathers, good
:
parents, a good sister, good teachers, good associates,
good kinsmen and friends, nearly everything good. He
had the happy fortune to witness the example of his uncle
and adoptive father Antoninus Pius, and he has recorded
work (i, 16
vr, 30) the virtues of this excellent
man and prudent ruler. Like many young Romans he
Herodes
tried his hand at poetry and studied rhetoric.
Atticus and M. Cornelius Pronto were his teachers in
in his
eloquence.
;
There are
extant
11
letters
between
Pronto
page 16, segment 1/2
LIFE OF
12
THE EMPEROR
and Marcus, which show the great affection of the pupil
for the master, and the master s great hopes of his in
dustrious pupil. M. Antoninus mentions Fronto (i, 11)
among those to whom he was indebted for his education.
When he was eleven years old, he assumed the dress of
philosophers, something plain and coarse, became a hard
student, and lived a most laborious abstemious life, even
so far as to injure his health.
Finally, he abandoned
and
rhetoric
for
philosophy, and he attached him
poetry
But he did not neglect the
self to the sect of the Stoics.
of
a
useful
was
which
law,
preparation for the high
study
to
fill.
His teacher was
he
which
was
place
designed
L.
Volusianus
Maecianus,
a
distinguished
jurist.
We
must suppose that he learned the Roman discipline of
arms, which was a necessary part of the education of a
man who afterwards led his troops to battle against a
warlike race.
Antoninus has recorded in his first book the names of
and the obligations which he owed to each
of them.
The way in which he speaks of what he learned
from them might seem to savour of vanity or self-praise,
if we look carelessly at the way in which he has expressed
himself
but if any one draws this conclusion, he will be
his teachers
;
mistaken.
Antoninus means to commemorate the merits
of his several teachers, what they taught and what a pupil
might learn from them. Besides, this book, like the eleven
other books, was for his own use, and if we may trust the
note at the end of the first book, it was written during one
of M. Antoninus
campaigns against the Quadi, at a time
when the commemoration of the virtues of his illustrious
teachers might remind him of their lessons and the prac
tical uses which he might derive from them.
Among his teachers
page 16, segment 2/2
of philosophy was Sextus of Chaegrandson of Plutarch. What he learned from
His favourite
this excellent man is told by himself (i, 9).
roneia,
?.
teacher was Q. Junius Rusticus (i, 7), a philosopher and
page 17, segment 1/2
MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS
13
also a man of practical good sense in public affairs.
Rusti-
cus was the adviser of Antoninus after he became emperor.
Young men who are destined for high places are not often
fortunate in those who are about them, their companions
and teachers and I do not know any example of a young
;
prince having had an education which can be compared
with that of M. Antoninus. Such a body of teachers
distinguished
by their acquirements and their character
hardly be collected again ; and as to the pupil, we
have not had one like him since.
will
Hadrian died in July A.D. 138, and was succeeded by
Antoninus Pius. M. Antoninus married Faustina, his
cousin, the daughter of Pius, probably about A.D. 146,
M. Antoninus received
for he had a daughter born in 147.
from his adoptive father the title of Caesar and was asso
ciated with him in the administration of the state.
The
father and the adopted son lived together in perfect friend
ship
and confidence.
Antoninus was a dutiful son, and
the Emperor Pius loved and esteemed him.
Antoninus Pius died in March A.D. 161. The Senate,
urged M. Antoninus to take the sole administra
the
tion of
empire, but he associated with himself the other
it is said,
adopted son of Pius, L. Ceionius Commodus, who is gener
Thus Rome for the first time had
ally called L. Verus.
two emperors. Verus was an indolent man of pleasure
and unworthy of his station. Antoninus however bore
with him, and it is said that Verus had sense enough to
pay to his colleague the respect due to his character. A
virtuous emperor and a loose partner lived together in
peace, and their alliance was strengthened by Antoninus
giving to Verus for wife his daughter Lucilla.
The reign of Antoninus was first troubled by a Parthian
war, in which
page 17, segment 2/2
Verus was sent to command, but he did
nothing, and the success that was obtained by the Romans
in Armenia and on the Euphrates and Tigris was due to his
This Parthian war ended in 165.
generals.
page 18, segment 1/2
LIFE OF
14
THE EMPEROR
The north of Italy was also threatened by the rude
people beyond the Alps from the borders of Gallia to the
eastern side of the Hadriatic. These barbarians attempted
to break into Italy, as the Germanic nations had attempted
near three hundred years before
;
and the rest of the life
of Antoninus with some intervals was employed in driving
back the invaders. In 169 Verus suddenly died, and
Antoninus administered the state alone.
In A.D. 175 Avidius Cassius, a brave and skilful Roman
commander who was at the head of the troops in Asia,
revolted and declared himself Augustus.
But Cassius was
assassinated by some of his officers,
came
to
an end.
and so the rebellion
Antoninus showed
his
humanity by
treatment of the family and the partisans of Cassius,
and his letter to the Senate in which he recommends mercy
his
extant.
(Vulcatius, Avidius Cassius, c. 12.)
Antoninus set out for the east on hearing of Cassius
revolt.
We know that in A.D. 174 he was engaged in a
is
war against the Quadi, Marcomanni and other German
tribes, and it is probable that he went direct from the
German war without returning to Rome. His wife
Faustina who accompanied him into Asia died suddenly
at the foot of the Taurus to the great grief of her husband.
Capitolinus, who has written the life of Antoninus, and
also Dion Cassius accuse the empress of scandalous in
But
fidelity to her husband and of abominable lewdness.
Capitolinus says that Antoninus either knew it not or pre
tended not to know it. Nothing is so common as such
malicious reports in all ages, and the history of imperial
Rome is full of them.
Antoninus loved his wife, and he
obedient, affectionate and simple.
says that she was
The same scandal had been spread about Faustina s
mother, the wife of
page 18, segment 2/2
Antoninus Pius, and yet he too was
Antoninus Pius says in
perfectly satisfied with his wife.
a letter to Fronto that he would rather live in exile with his
wife than in his palace at Rome without her.
There are
page 19, segment 1/2
15
not many men who would give their wives a better charac
ter
than these two emperors.
time of Diocletian.
Capitolinus wrote in the
He may have intended to tell the
Dion Cassius,
truth, but he is a poor feeble biographer.
the most malignant of historians, always reports and
perhaps he believed any scandal against anybody.
Antoninus continued his journey to Syria and Egypt,
and on his return to Italy through Athens he was initiated
into the Eleusinian mysteries.
It was the practice of the
to
conform
to
the
established
rites of the age and
emperor
to perform religious ceremonies with due solemnity.
We
cannot conclude from this that he was a superstitious man,
though we might perhaps do so, if his book did not show
that he was not. But this is only one among many in
stances that a ruler s public acts do not always prove his
A prudent governor will not roughly
even
the
oppose
superstitions of his people, and though he
that
wish
may
they were wiser, he will know that he cannot
real
opinions.
make them so by offending their prejudices.
Antoninus and his son Commodus entered Rome in
triumph on December 23, A.D. 176. In the following year
Commodus was associated with his father in the empire and
took the name of Augustus. This year A.D. 177 is memor
able in ecclesiastical history. Attalus and others were
put to death at Lyon for their adherence to the Christian
religion.
The evidence
preserved by Eusebius
of
this
persecution
(Eccles. Hist,
v,
1
;
is
a letter
printed in
Routh s Reliquiae Sacrae, vol. i, with notes). The letter
is from the Christians of Vienna and Lugdunum in Gallia
(Vienne and Lyon) to their Christian brethren in Asia and
and it is preserved perhaps nearly entire. It
;
contains a very particular description of the tortures in
Phrygia
page 19, segment 2/2
flicted on the Christians in Gallia, and it states that while
the persecution was going on, Attalus, a Christian and a
Roman citizen, was loudly demanded by the populace and
brought into the amphitheatre, but the governor ordered