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Meditations · Marcus Aurelius

I. Whatsoever thou doest hereafter aspire unto, thou mayest even now

enjoy and possess, if thou doest not envy thyself thine own happiness.

And that will be, if thou shalt forget all that is past, and for

the future, refer thyself wholly to the Divine Providence, and shalt

bend and apply all thy present thoughts and intentions to holiness

and righteousness. To holiness, in accepting willingly whatsoever is sent

by the Divine Providence, as being that which the nature of the universe

hath appointed unto thee, which also hath appointed thee for that,

whatsoever it be. To righteousness, in speaking the truth freely,

and without ambiguity; and in doing all things justly and discreetly.

Now in this good course, let not other men's either wickedness,

or opinion, or voice hinder thee: no, nor the sense of this thy

pampered mass of flesh: for let that which suffers, look to itself.

If therefore whensoever the time of thy departing shall come,

thou shalt readily leave all things, and shalt respect thy mind only,

and that divine part of thine, and this shall be thine only fear,

not that some time or other thou shalt cease to live, but thou shalt

never begin to live according to nature: then shalt thou be a

man indeed, worthy of that world, from which thou hadst thy beginning;

then shalt thou cease to be a stranger in thy country, and to wonder

at those things that happen daily, as things strange and unexpected,

and anxiously to depend of divers things that are not in thy power.