Marcus Aurelius Quotes

483 Sourced Quotes

If thou workest at that which is before thee... expecting nothing, fearing nothing, but satisfied with thy present activity according to Nature, and with heroic truth in every word and sound which thou utterest, thou wilt live happy. And there is no man who is able to prevent this.

Marcus Aurelius
Ambition means tying your well-being to what other people say or do. Self-indulgence means tying it to the things that happen to you. Sanity means tying it to your own actions.

Marcus Aurelius
Be cheerful, also, and seek not external help, nor the peace which others give. A man must stand straight, and not be kept straight by others.

Marcus Aurelius
Not even the vicissitudes of fortune are contrary to nature or to the providential ordering of the universe. It all flows from the gods, who determine what is needed for the welfare of the whole universe, of which you are a part.

Marcus Aurelius
Consider when thou art much vexed or grieved, that man's life is only a moment, and after a short time we are all laid out dead.

Marcus Aurelius
The gods have provided me with clear and compelling signs of what it means to live in conformity to nature. They did their part. So far as their gifts, aid, and inspiration are concerned, nothing prevented me from following the path prescribed by nature. If from time to time I have strayed from this path, the fault lies with me and with my failure to heed the gods' signs, or rather, their explicit instructions.

Marcus Aurelius
This is enough. Do not add, And why were such things made in the world?

Marcus Aurelius
If it's time for you to go, leave willingly - as you would to accomplish anything that can be done with grace and honor.

Marcus Aurelius
Cultivate these, then, for they are wholly within your power: sincerity and dignity; industriousness; and sobriety. Avoid grumbling, be frugal, considerate, and frank; be temperate in manner and speech; carry yourself with authority.

Marcus Aurelius
Be satisfied with your business, and learn to love what you were bred to.

Marcus Aurelius
If anyone can refute me-show me I'm making a mistake or looking at things from the wrong perspective-I'l l gladly change. It's the truth I'm after, and the truth never harmed anyone. What harms us is to persist in self-deceit and ignorance.

Marcus Aurelius
Reflect often upon the rapidity with which all existing things, or things coming into existence, sweep past us and are carried away.

Marcus Aurelius
From Apollonius I learned freedom of will and undeviating steadiness of purpose; and to look to nothing else, not even for a moment, except to reason.

Marcus Aurelius
A good man does not spy around for the black spots in others, but presses unswervingly on towards his mark.

Marcus Aurelius
Just as nature takes every obstacle, every impediment, and works around it--turns it to its purposes, incorporates it into itself, so, too, a rational being can turn each setback into raw material and use it to achieve its goal.

Marcus Aurelius
Reflect frequently upon the instability of things, and how very fast the scenes of nature are shifted. Matter is in perpetual flux. Change is always and everywhere at work; it strikes through causes and effects, and leaves nothing fixed and permanent.

Marcus Aurelius
The only thing that isn't worthless: to live this life out truthfully and rightly, And be patience with those who don't.

Marcus Aurelius
Persuade me or prove to me that I am mistaken in thought or deed, and I will gladly change - for it is the truth I seek, and the truth never harmed anyone. Harm comes from persisting in error and clinging to ignorance.

Marcus Aurelius
Consider in what condition both in body and soul a man should be when he is overtaken by death; and consider the shortness of life, the boundless abyss of time past and future, the feebleness of all matter.

Marcus Aurelius
Stop whatever you're doing for a moment and ask yourself: Am I afraid of death because I won't be able to do this anymore?

Marcus Aurelius
All things from eternity are of like forms and come round in circle.

Marcus Aurelius
A little flesh, a little breath, and a Reason to rule all - that is myself.

Marcus Aurelius
In reading and writing, you cannot lay down rules until you have learnt to obey them. Much more so in life.

Marcus Aurelius
Be like the rocky headland on which the waves constantly break. It stands firm, and round it the seething waters are laid to rest.

Marcus Aurelius
When you have been compelled by circumstances to be disturbed in any manner, quickly return to yourself, and do not continue out of tune longer than the compulsion lasts. You will have increasing control over your own harmony by continually returning to it.

Marcus Aurelius
External things are not the problem. It's your assessment of them. Which you can erase right now.

Marcus Aurelius
One whose chief regard is for his own mind, and for the divinity within him and the service of its goodness, will strike no poses, utter no complaints, and crave neither for solitude nor yet for a crowd. Best of all, his life will be free from continual pursuing and avoiding.

Marcus Aurelius
In death, Alexander of Macedon's end differed no whit from his stable-boy's. Either both were received into the same generative principle of the universe, or both alike were dispersed into atoms.

Marcus Aurelius
I bless the gods for not letting my education in rhetoric, poetry, and other literary studies come easily to me, and thereby sparing me from an absorbing interest in these subjects.

Marcus Aurelius
Think of the country mouse and of the town mouse, and of the alarm and trepidation of the town mouse.

Marcus Aurelius