Marcus Aurelius quotes in ms bookshelf 2000, five quotations, 



Integrity

A man should be upright, not be kept upright.

Marcus Aurelius (121–180 AD), Roman emperor, philosopher. Meditations, bk. 3, sct. 5.



Motives

Let it be your constant method to look into the design of people’s actions, and see what they would be at, as often as it is practicable; and to make this custom the more significant, practice it first upon yourself.

Marcus Aurelius (121–180), Roman emperor, philosopher. Meditations, bk. 10, sct. 37.

See also:
Eliot on Good Deeds
Blake on Truth



Self-interest

Remember how often you have postponed minding your interest, and let slip those opportunities the gods have given you. It is now high time to consider what sort of world you are part of, and from what kind of governor of it you are descended; that you have a set period assigned you to act in, and unless you improve it to brighten and compose your thoughts, it will quickly run off with you, and be lost beyond recovery.

Marcus Aurelius (121–80), Roman emperor, philosopher. Meditations, bk. 2, sct. 4.



Sociology

To understand the true quality of people, you must look into their minds, and examine their pursuits and aversions.

Marcus Aurelius (121–80), Roman emperor, philosopher. Meditations, bk. 4, sct. 38.

See also:
The Social Sciences



The Environment

That which is not good for the beehive cannot be good for the bees.

Marcus Aurelius (121–80), Roman emperor, philosopher. Meditations, bk. 6, sct. 54.

See also:
Ecology





Marcus Aurelius (121-180), Roman emperor from 161 to 180, and Stoic philosopher. Marcus Aurelius was born in Rome. He was the nephew by marriage of Antoninus Pius, later emperor, who adopted his nephew and married him to his daughter. Marcus Aurelius became emperor in 161, and throughout his reign he engaged in defensive wars on the northern and eastern frontiers of the empire. In his domestic policy Marcus Aurelius was a champion of the poor. As a philosopher he is remembered for his Meditations, an important formulation of the philosophy of Stoicism.

Stoicism

Stoicism, school of philosophy in Athens in ancient Greece. It was founded about 300 BC by Zeno of Citium. Zeno opened his school in a colonnade known as the Stoa Poikile (painted porch). Stoicism was later introduced to the Romans by Panaetius of Rhodes. Outstanding Roman Stoics included Marcus Tullius Cicero, Cato the Younger, Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Epictetus, and the emperor Marcus Aurelius. Stoicism was the most influential philosophy in the Roman Empire prior to the rise of Christianity.

The Stoics held that all reality is material, but that matter proper is to be distinguished from the animating principle, called Logos. They believed that the human soul is a manifestation of the Logos. The foundation of Stoic ethics is the principle that good lies not in external objects but in the state of the soul itself and in the wisdom and restraint by which a person is delivered from the passions that perturb the ordinary life. The four cardinal virtues of the Stoic philosophy are wisdom, courage, justice, and temperance. All people are manifestations of the one universal spirit and should, according to the Stoics, love and help one another, regardless of rank and wealth.





ms bookshelf 2000, Columbia Dictionary of Quotations, Encarta