Marcus Aurelius Antoninus to Himself - College of Stoic Philosophers

68 MARCUS ANTONINUS BOOK v
justice lies their good, and therewith cessation of
desire.
35 If the fault is not in me, nor the act by fault
of mine, nor the common weal injured, why trouble
more about it ? What injury is it to the common
weal?
36 Do not let impression overbear judgment ;
cope with it according to your power, and by scale
of worth. Should you come short at all in things
of secondary worth, do not regard it as an injury
that were an evil habitude. Like the old man
in the play, who at parting begged for his foster-
child's top, but did not forget that after all it was
a top and nothing more so be it too with life.
37 Declaiming from the rostra you cry, *
My good
man, have you forgotten what these good things
come to after all ?
'
' *
but for all that eagerly pursued.'
reason for your joining in the folly ?
True/ comes the answer,
'
Is that a good
'
Whereso-
time become a man 'of
ever stranded, I can at any
fortune.' For '
fortune '
means self-appropriation
of endowments truly good, and good endowments
are good moods, good impulses, good
acts. 1
1 The references that might clear up this section have perished,
and both in language and arrangement much is obscure and
unintelligible.