Marcus Aurelius
Our anger and annoyance are more detrimental to us than the things themselves which anger or annoy us.Collection: Forgiveness
Because other people are fools, must you be so too?Collection: People
Your task is to stand straight; not to be held straight.Collection: Character
Poverty is the mother of crime.Collection: Mother
When you are annoyed at someone's mistake, immediately look at yourself and reflect how you also fail; for example, in thinking that good equals money, or pleasure, or a bit of fame. By being mindful of this you'll quickly forget your anger, especially if you realize that the person was under stress, and could do little else. And, if you can, find a way to alleviate that stress.Collection: Mistake
When you need encouragement, think of the qualities the people around you have: this one's energy, that one's modesty, another's generosity, and so on. Nothing is as encouraging as when virtues are visibly embodied in the people around us, when we're practically showered with them. It's good to keep this in mind.Collection: Encouragement
The wise man sees in the misfortune of others what he should avoid.Collection: Wise
On the occasion of every act ask thyself, How is this with respect to me? Shall I repent of it? A little time and I am dead, and all is gone.Collection: Gone
That which had grown from the earth, to the earth, But that which has sprung from heavenly seed, Back to the heavenly realms returns. This is either a dissolution of the mutual involution of the atoms, or a similar dispersion of the unsentient elements.Collection: Atoms
Love the people with whom fate brings you togetherCollection: Valentines Day
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.Collection: Boys
When thou art offended at any man's fault, forthwith turn to thyself and reflect in what manner thou doest error thyself. For by attending to this thou wilt quickly forget thy anger, if this consideration is also added, that the man is compelled; for what else could he do? or, if thou art able, take away from him the compulsion.Collection: Art
The universal nature out of the universal substance, as if it were wax, now molds a horse, and when it has broken this up, it uses the material for a tree, then for a man, then for something else.Collection: Horse
Reason and the reasoning faculty need no foreign assistance, but are sufficient for their own purposes. They move within themselves, and make directly for the point in view. Wherefore, acts in accordance with them are called right acts, for they lead along the right road.Collection: Moving
When forced, as it seems, by your environment to be utterly disquieted, return with all speed into your self, staying in discord no longer than you must. By constant recurrence to the harmony, you will gain more command over it.Collection: Self
All things are changing; and thou thyself art in continuous mutation and in a manner in continuous destruction and the whole universe to.Collection: Art
When we consider we are bound to be serviceable to mankind, and bear with their faults, we shall perceive there is a common tie of nature and relation between us.Collection: Nature
Doth perfect beauty stand in need of praise at all? Nay; no more than law, no more than truth, no more than loving kindness, nor than modesty.Collection: Beauty
Let there be freedom from perturbations with respect to the things which come from the external cause; and let there be justice in the things done by virtue of the internal cause, that is, let there be movement and action terminating in this, in social acts, for this is according to thy nature.Collection: Justice
When you find an unwillingness to rise early in the morning, endeavor to rouse your faculties, and act up to your kind, and consider that you have to do the business of a man; and that action is both beneficial and the end of your being.Collection: Morning
Find time still to be learning somewhat good, and give up being desultory.Collection: Giving Up
Think of the country mouse and of the town mouse, and of the alarm and trepidation of the town mouse.Collection: Country
Man is born for deeds of kindness.Collection: Kindness
A good disposition is invincible, if it be genuine.Collection: Disposition
Time is like a river made up of the events which happen, and a violent stream; for as soon as a thing has been seen, it is carried away, and another comes in its place, and this will be carried away too.Collection: Rivers
I consist of a little body and a soul.Collection: Soul
Now departure from the world of men is nothing to fear, if gods exist: because they would not involve you in any harm. If they do not exist, or if they have no care for humankind, then what is life to me in a world devoid of gods, or devoid of providence? But they do exist, and they do care for humankind: and they have put it absolutely in man's power to avoid falling into the true kinds of harm.Collection: Fall
All those things at which thou wishest to arrive by a circuitous road, thou canst have now, if thou dost not refuse them to thyself.Collection: Refuse
We are born for cooperationCollection: Cooperation
At day's first light have in readiness, against disinclination to leave your bed, the thought that "I am rising for the work of man."Collection: Work
Whatever may happen to thee, it was prepared for thee from all eternity.Collection: Fate
Do not act as if you had a thousand years to live.Collection: Procrastination
Let no act be done without purpose.Collection: Purpose
Snow endures but for a season, and joy comes with the morning.Collection: Morning
I, who have never willfully pained another, have no business to pain myself.Collection: Pain
Understand however that every man is worth just so much as the things are worth about which he busies himself.Collection: Men
Everything is banal in experience, fleeting in duration, sordid in content; in all respects the same today as generations now dead and buried have found it to be.Collection: Generations
Why do you hunger for length of days? The point of life is to follow reason and the divine spirit and to accept whatever nature sends you. To live in this way is not to fear death, but to hold it in contempt. Death is only a thing of terror for those unable to live in the present. Pass on your way, then, with a smiling face, under the smile of him who bids you goCollection: Way
...the sole thing of which any man can be deprived is the present; since this is all he owns, and nobody can lose what is not his.Collection: Men
Dig inside. Inside is the fountain of good, and it will forever flow, if you will forever dig.Collection: Forever
Get rid of the judgement ... get rid of the 'I am hurt,' you are rid of the hurt itself.Collection: Hurt
Infinity is a fathomless gulf, into which all things vanish.Collection: Ontology
Live out your life in truth and justice, tolerant of those who are neither true nor just.Collection: Justice
It is not the body, nor the personality that is the true self. The true self is eternal. Even on the point of death we can say to ourselves, "my true self is free. I cannot be contained."Collection: Inspirational
The wrongdoer is often the person who left something undone, rather than the person who has done somethingCollection: Done
He who fears death either fears to lose all sensation or fears new sensations. In reality, you will either feel nothing at all, and therefore nothing evil, or else, if you can feel any sensations, you will be a new creature, and so will not have ceased to have life.Collection: Reality
Receive the gifts of fortune without pride, and part with them without reluctance.Collection: Pride
It is satisfaction to a man to do the proper works of a man.Collection: Men