Marcus Aurelius Antoninus to Himself - College of Stoic Philosophers

iv TO HIMSELF 43
munity of reason ;
a blind man, with cataract of the
mental eye ; a pauper, who needs another's help,
and cannot provide his own living ;
an excrescence,
who as it were excretes and separates himself from
the order of nature, by
discontent with his sur-
roundings ; for the same nature which produced
you, produced them too ; a social outcast, who
dissevers his individual soul from the one common
soul of reasoning things.
One philosopher goes without coat ; another 30
without book. Quoth our half-clad friend, '
I have none, yet
say I,
yet
*
'
Bread
I hold fast to reason.' And so
Provender of learning I have none, and
hold fast.'
Love your trade, however humble,' and find in 31
it refreshment. Spend life's remainder,
as one who
with his whole heart has committed his all to the
gods, and is neither tyrant nor slave to any man.
Picture, for instance, the times of Vespasian
there you see folk marrying, rearing children,
falling sick, dying, warring, feasting, trading, farm-
ing, flattering, pushing, suspecting, plotting, praying
for deaths, grumbling at fate, loving, amassing,
coveting consulships or crowns. Yet, where now
is all that restless life ? Or pass a step on to the
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