The Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius - College of Stoic Philosophers

xi MARCUS AURELIUS 197
crooked stick. 1 Nothing is more disgraceful than a
wolfish friendship [false friendship]. Avoid this most of
all. The good and simple and benevolent show all these
things in the eyes, and there is no mistaking.
16. As to living in the best way, this power
is in the soul,
if it be indifferent, to things which are indifferent. And
it will be indifferent, if it looks on each of these things
separately and all together, and if it remembers that not
one of them produces in us an opinion about itself, nor
comes to us ;
but these things remain immovable, and it
is
we ourselves who produce the judgments about them,
and, as we may say, write them in ourselves, it being in
our power not to write them, and it
being in our power,
if
perchance these judgments have imperceptibly got
admission to our minds, to wipe them out ;
and if we
remember also that such attention will only be for a short
time, and then life will be at an end. Besides, what trouble
is there at all in doing this ? For if these things are accord
ing to nature, rejoice in them, and they will be easy to
thee : but if
contrary to nature, seek what is conformable
to thy own nature and strive towards this, even if it bring
no reputation ; for every man is allowed to seek his own
good.
17. Consider whence each thing
is come, and of what
it consists,f and into what it changes, and what kind of
a thing it will be when it has changed, and that it will
sustain no harm.
18. [If any have offended against thee, consider first]
:
What is my relation to men, and that we are made for one
another ;
and in another respect, I was made to be set over
them, as a ram over the flock or a bull over the herd.
But examine the matter from first principles, from this :
1
Instead of oWA/i/; Saumaise reads ovca^r?. There is a Greek
proverb, ffKap.ftbv &AOV ovtifn-or :
opti&v You cannot make a
crooked stick straight.
The wolfish friendship is an allusion to the fable of the sheep and
the wolves.