Marcus Aurelius Quotes

16th Roman Emperor from 161 to 180 and Stoic philosopher

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Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (26 April 121 – 17 March 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 and a Stoic philosopher. He was the last of the rulers known as the Five Good Emperors (a term coined some 13 centuries later by Niccolò Machiavelli), and the last emperor of the Pax Romana (27 BC to 180), an age of relative peace and stability for the Roman Empire. He served as Roman consul in 140, 145, and 161.

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Native Name: Marcus Aurelius Antoninus

Alternative Names: Caesar Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus • Marcus Annius Verus • Marcus Catilius Severus Annius Verus • Verissimus • Marcus Aurelius Verus • Antoninus

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And virtue they will curse, speaking harsh words.

Socrates used to call the opinions of the many by the name of Lamiae, bugbears to frighten children.

“If you don’t have a consistent goal in life, you can’t live it in a consistent way.” (Hays translation)

That to expect bad people not to injure others is crazy. It's to ask the impossible. And to let them behave like that to other people but expect them to exempt you is arrogant—the act of a tyrant. (Hays translation)

Pain is the opposite of strength, and so is anger. (Hays translation)

How much more damage anger and grief do than the things that cause them. (Hays translation)

A straightforward, honest person should be like someone who stinks: when you're in the same room with him, you know it. (Hays translation)

The man who is honest and good ought to be exactly like a man who smells strong, so that the bystander as soon as he comes near him must smell whether he choose or not.

Someone despises me. That's their problem. Mine: not to do or say anything despicable. Someone hates me. Their problem. Mine: to be patient and cheerful with everyone, including them. (Hays translation)

There is no nature which is inferior to art, the arts imitate the nature of things.

In contemplating thyself never include the vessel which surrounds thee, and these instruments which are attached about it. For they are like an ax, differing only in this, that they grow to the body. For indeed there is no more use in these parts without the cause which moves and checks them than in the weaver's shuttle, and the writer's pen, and the driver's whip.

Remember that what pulls the strings is the force hidden within; there lies the power to persuade, there the life,—there, if one must speak out, the real man.

Learn to ask of all actions, “Why are they doing that?” Starting with your own. (Hays translation)

There is no man so fortunate that there shall not be by him when he is dying some who are pleased with what is going to happen. Suppose that he was a good and a wise man, will there not be at least some one to say to himself, Let us at last breathe freely, being relieved from this schoolmaster? It is true that he was harsh to none of us, but I perceive that he tacitly condemns us.—This is what is said of a good man. But in our own case how many other things are there for which there are many who wish to get rid of us.

The healthy eye ought to see all visible things and not to say, I wish for green things; for this is the condition of the diseased eye. And the healthy hearing and smelling ought to be ready to perceive all that can be heard and smelled. And the healthy stomach ought to be with respect to all food just as the mill with respect to all things which it is formed to grind. And accordingly the healthy understanding ought to be prepared for everything which happens; but that which says, Let my dear children live, and let all men praise whatever I may do, is an eye which seeks for green things, or teeth which seek for soft things.