and to bring me
to the knowledge that it is possible for a man to live in a palace
without wanting either guards or embroidered dresses, or torches
and statues, and such-like show; but that it is in such a man's
power to bring himself very near to the fashion of a private
person, without being, for this reason, either meaner in thought or
more remiss in action, with respect to the things which must be
done for the public interest in a manner that befits a ruler.

What more dost thou want when thou hast done a man a service? Art
thou not content that thou hast done something conformable to thy
nature, and dost thou seek to be paid for it? Just as if the eye
demanded a recompense for seeing, or the feet for walking. As a
horse when he has run, a dog when he has traced the game, a bee
when it has made the honey, so a man, when he has done a good act,
does not call out for others to come and see, but goes on to
another act, as a vine goes on to produce again the grapes in
season.

Accustom thyself to attend carefully to what is said by another,
and as much as it is possible, be in the speaker's mind.

Some things are hurrying into existence, and others are hurrying
out of it; and of that which is coming into existence, part is
already extinguished. Motions and changes are continually renewing
the world, just as the uninterrupted course of time is always
renewing the infinite duration of ages.

Understand that every man is worth just so much as the things are
worth about which he busies himself.

Wickedness does no harm at all to the universe--it is only harmful
to him who has it in his power to be released from it.

Nothing is more wretched than a man who traverses everything in a
round, and pries into the things beneath the earth, as the poet
says, and seeks by conjecture what is in the minds of his
neighbors, without perceiving that it is sufficient to attend to
the deity within him, and to reverence it sincerely.

The prayers of Marcus Aurelius to the gods are for one thing
only--that their will be done. All else is vain, all else is
rebellion against the universe itself. Our form of worship should
be like this: Everything harmonizes with me which is harmonious to
thee, O Universe. Nothing for me is too early nor too late, which