Chapter 6 volume five

1. When you rise reluctantly in the morning, let this thought arise - I am getting up to do one's work.If I am going to do the work for which I am brought into this world, for which I am, why should I be dissatisfied?Am I born to sleep under the warm quilt? - but this is more pleasant. - Then you exist for pleasure, and not at all for action and effort?Don't you see the little plants, the birds, the ants, the spiders, the bees all working together to do their part in the universe in an orderly way?Would you not do one's work, and hasten to do that which is in your nature? - But rest is also necessary. - Rest is necessary, but nature has set limits for it, she has set limits for eating and drinking, and yet you go beyond these limits, beyond enough; Stopped before doing it.So you don't love yourself, because, if you love, you will love your nature and its will.Those who love their respective crafts are too busy at work, they have no bath, they have no food; and you have even less respect for your own nature than the juggler respects the art of juggling, the dancer respects the art of dancing, The rich man respects his money, or the vain man respects his little glory.Such people, when they have a passion for one thing, would rather go without food or sleep to perfect the thing they care about.And in your eyes, is what is good for society a nuisance, and not worth your labors?

2. How easy it is: to resist and clear away all distressing or inappropriate impressions, and enter quickly into complete tranquility. 3. Judge every word and action that is in accordance with your nature, and be not influenced by condemnation or words from anyone, and if it is good to do and say a thing, do not think it is worthless to you.Because those people have their particular guiding principles, follow their particular activities, you don't take those things seriously, but go straight ahead, following your own nature and common nature, following the path that is both as one. 4. I went through what happened by nature, until I fell and rested, until my breath became the element I breathed in daily, until I fell on this earth from which my father collected seeds, From it my mother drew her blood, from which my nurse drew her milk, from which I was supplied with food and drink for many years; and silently bore me while I trampled on it and abused it for many purposes. .

5. You say that people don't appreciate your wit - and even so, there are a lot of other things you can't say that way, and a lot of things I'm right about.Then exhibit those qualities that are well within your power: sincerity, seriousness, endurance of labor, aversion to pleasure, contentment with your share and little, kindness, frankness, love of superfluous things, abstinence from rash generosity.Don't you see how many qualities you can demonstrate right away that you have no excuse for being incompetent or unsuitable by nature, and are you willing to keep yourself below the standard?Are you inherently handicapped to complain, to be mean, to flatter, to be dissatisfied with your poor body, to try to please, to show off, and to be on edge?No, it is true, you could have been freed from these things long ago, unless your understanding was indeed naturally rather dull and dull, but you must train yourself in this too, not to ignore it nor to take your dullness as a reason. happy.

6. There is a person who, when he does a good thing for another person, is ready to credit it to his account as a favor, and there is another person who is not ready to do this, but still regards this person as his own in his heart. beneficiary, and he remembers what he has done.The third man somehow doesn't even know what he's doing, he's like a vine that produces grapes and doesn't seek more after it has once produced what it should.A horse when it has run, a dog when it has hunted, a bee after it has made honey, so a man should not ask others to come and see him after he has done a good deed, but Go on to another good, just as a vine goes on to bear fruit next season. - Then one must act in such a way and not notice it? -yes. - But it is also necessary, namely to observe what one is doing.For, so to speak, it is a social animal trait to perceive that he is working in a socially beneficial way, and indeed to want his social fellows to perceive it too. - You are right, but you do not understand what is being said: thus you will be one of those whom I have said before, for even they are led astray by some display of reason.But if you will understand the meaning of what is being said now, do not be afraid that you will thereby overlook any action which is good for society.

7. One of the prayers among the Athenians is: Let it rain, let it rain, dear Zeus, let the rain fall on the land that the Athenians have plowed, on the plain. - We should not pray, or we should pray in this simple and noble way. 8. Just as we must understand the statement: Esculap prescribes a medicine for this man to practice horseback riding or take a cold bath or walk barefoot, so we must also understand the statement: The nature of the universe prescribes a medicine for this man, Let him be sick, or mutilated, or lost, or something of that sort.For in the former case, prescribing means that he prescribes to the person what is fit to obtain health; For him) things are determined for him in a certain way, and are adapted to his destiny.For that is what we call things fit for us, just as the craftsman says the square stones in a wall or in a pyramid are fit when he joins the stones up to fit each other.Because this whole is a fit, a harmony.As the universe is such a body from all individual bodies, so necessity (fate) is such a cause from all real individual causes.Even those who are completely ignorant understand what I mean, because they say: It (necessity, imperative) brings such a thing to such a person. - Then, it was this that brought him, this was prescribed to him.Let us accept these things, then, with Esculap's prescription!There were of course many inconsistencies in his prescriptions, but we all accepted them in the hope of health.Fulfillment and fulfillment of all things—that which is judged good by the common nature, judge it also of the same kind as your health!To accept everything that happens, even if it seems inconsistent, because it leads to the health of the universe and the success and happiness of Zeus (the universe).For what Zeus brings to anyone, if it is not useful to the whole, will not bring to him.Whatever it is, its very nature does not cause anything that is not in harmony with that which it governs.There are therefore two reasons why you should be content with what happened to you, first, because it was made for you, prescribed for you, and in some way connected to you by Those are the oldest reasons why your destinies are intertwined; second, because even that which befalls everyone else elsewhere is a cause of happiness and fulfillment to the power that governs the universe, and even that it continues to exist. reason.If you interrupt anything from the connection and continuation of the parts or causes, the wholeness of the whole is destroyed.And when you are dissatisfied and somehow try to destroy something, you do interrupt it as much as you can.

9. Do not resent, be dismayed, or be dissatisfied if you do not do everything according to right principles; Be content with your nature, love the homeland you have returned to, but don't go back to philosophy as if she were a master, but act like those who have sore eyes with a bit of sponge and egg white, or like another with a plaster , or the same as soaking in water.For then you will not fail in obeying reason, and you will find peace in it.Remember that philosophy requires only what your nature requires, and you have something else that does not correspond to your nature. - You may object, why is that more pleasurable than what you are doing? - But isn't it precisely because happiness is deceiving us?Then consider whether generosity, liberty, simplicity, calm, piety are not more pleasant.When you think of the secure and happy course of all things that depend on understanding and knowing, what could be more pleasing than wisdom itself?

10. Things are surrounded in such a way that they are utterly incomprehensible to philosophers (not a few, nor are they common), and incomprehensible even to the Stoics themselves of.All our consents are in flux, and where is the one who never changes?Then bring your thoughts to the objects themselves, and consider how fleeting and worthless their existence is, that they may be possessed by a vile wretch, or a whore, or a robber.Then consider the level of morality of those with whom you live. It is almost impossible to tolerate even the most agreeable of them, let alone one who can hardly tolerate himself.So in such darkness and sordidness, in such an ever-flowing torrent of substance and time, motion and propelled objects, is there any object worthy of high praise or even serious pursuit?I can't imagine such an object.On the contrary, it is a person's duty to conform to oneself, wait for the natural decomposition, and worry about delay, but only let you find peace in these: first, everything that happens to me is in line with the nature of the universe; The second is that it is within my power to act against the God outside and within me, because no one will compel me to do so.

11. What shall I now use my own soul for?On all occasions I must ask myself the question, what do I have in this part of me called the governing principle?Whose soul do I have now?Is a child's soul?Or the soul of a young man, a weak woman, a tyrant, a domestic animal, a wild beast? 12. We can even learn from this question - what kind of things are those things that are good in the eyes of many people?For, whoever regards such things as prudence, temperance, justice, firmness, as being really good, he will, after first having this knowledge, be impatient to hear anything that contradicts what is really good.But if one first understands as good what the majority thinks is good, then one is likely to listen and embrace what the comic writer says as really fitting.In this way, even most people feel the difference.For if it were not so, we would not be jarred, nor rejected from the first place, when we hear clever and witty things about wealth, about the means of promoting luxury and fame.So then ask ourselves, do you value these things, do you think they are good?Has the comic writer's words been properly applied to them, with a preconceived notion of them in mind--the man who possesses them, by sheer abundance, has no means of making himself at peace.

13. I am composed of form and matter, neither of which can disappear into non-existence, just as neither of them can change from non-existence to existence.Then each part of me will be brought back by change to some part of the universe, and will become another part of the universe again, and so will live forever.I also exist as a result of such a change, and so do those who begot me, and so can be traced forever in the other direction.For nothing prevents me from saying so, even though the universe is governed according to ages of innumerable changes. 14. Reason and reasoning arts (philosophy) are a self-sufficient force for themselves and their work.Starting from a first principle of their own, they make their way to the end prescribed for them; road.

15. These things should never be called a person's things, they do not belong to a person as a person.They do not require man, nor does man's nature promise to produce them, nor are they the means by which man's nature achieves its ends.Hence man's end is not in these things, nor is that which helps to attain it, but what helps to aim at it is that which is good.Besides, if any of these things really belong to man, it is not right for a man to belittle and oppose them, nor is he to be commended for showing that he does not want them, and if these things are really good, not to intervene in them People are not good either.But now, the more a man deprives himself of these things, or similar things, even if he is deprived of them, the more patiently he bears the loss, and is in the same degree a better man.

16. Thy habitual thought shall be like this, and so shall the character of your soul, for the soul is dyed by thought.Then dye your soul with a series of such thoughts: For example, where a man can live, he can live well there.Does he have to live in a palace? Well, he can live well in a palace.Consider again that whatever purpose each thing was constituted, it was constituted for this purpose, and to which it was brought; Where the end is, there also is the good and the good of every thing: the good of rational animals, then, lies in society, for we are made for society, as has been shown.Low things exist for high things, isn't that very clear?And living beings are superior to inanimate beings, and the most superior among living beings is the rational being. 17. It is madness to seek the impossible, and it is impossible for the wicked not to do such things. 18. Nothing happens to a person that is inherently intolerable to that person.The same things happen to another man, either because he does not see them happening, or because he displays a great spirit which keeps him firm and unharmed.It is a shame then that ignorance and deceit should overwhelm wisdom. 19. Things in themselves do not touch the soul, not even in the least degree; A judgment made for itself about what is presented to it. 20. Insofar as I must do good to people and bear with them, man is the closest being to me in this respect.But as soon as some person stands in the way of my proper behaviour, man becomes one of those neutral things to me, no less than the sun, the wind, or a beast.It is true that these people may hinder my actions, but they do not hinder my feelings and temperaments, which have the power to qualify and modify behaviour.As the mind turns every obstacle into an aid to its activity, so that what is a hindrance becomes an advance to an action, what is a barrier in the way helps us to proceed in the way. 21. Respect what is best in the universe, which is what makes use of and guides all things.Likewise, honor the best in yourself, which is of the same nature as above.For that which utilizes all other things is also in you, and your life is directed by it. 22. That which does not harm the country will not harm the citizens.Apply this rule to all phenomena that appear to be injurious: if the state is not injurious by it, I am not injurious either.But if the country is damaged, instead of being angry with the person who damaged the country, show him his mistake. 23. Often think how quickly that which is and that which is produced changes and disappears.For substance is like a swiftly flowing river, the actions of things are in constant flux, causes are at work in infinite flux, and little remains static.Consider that which is near to you, the endless abyss of past and future into which all things disappear.Is not then a fool who takes pleasure in these things, or worries about them, and makes himself miserable?Because these things only bothered him for a while, a short time. 24. Think of the universal substance, of which you possess only a small part; think of the universal time, of which you have but a short and indivisible interval; think of that which is fixed by fate, how small you are a part of. 25. Has someone done something wrong to you?Let him pay attention to it.He has his own temperament, his own activities.I now have what my universal nature wants me to have, and I do what my nature now wants me to do. 26. Let that part of your soul which directs and governs not be disturbed by bodily activities, be they pleasure or pain; They themselves do not affect the soul.And when these feelings arise in the mind through other sympathies that are naturally present in the body as a whole, then you must not try hard to resist the feeling, because it is natural, but do not let your own The dominant part adds to this feeling its opinion whether it is good or bad. 27. Live with the gods.He who continually shows to the gods that his own soul is content with what is allotted to him, shows his soul as the god within (then a share of himself which Zeus gives to everyone as his protection and guide) hope People who do everything it does live with gods.This is the understanding and rationality of everyone. 28. Are you angry with someone who has body odor?Are you mad at someone with bad breath?How do you deal with this trouble?He had such a mouth, he had such an armpit, and it was only natural that this smell came from these things. - but it is said that he has reason, and if he thinks about it, he can see why he offends people. - I hope you are satisfied with your discovery, so good, you also have reason, use your rational ability to stimulate his rational ability, point out his mistakes to him, and admonish him.For if he will listen, you will heal him, but there is no need to be angry.You are neither a tragic actor nor a whore... 29. Just as you don't want to die when you're gone... so living here is within your power.But if people won't let you, then give up your life and still act as if nothing hurts you.The house is smoky and I'm leaving it.But why do you think this is any distress?As long as nothing of the sort compels me to go out, I stay, free, and nobody prevents me from doing what I want, what is in keeping with reason and the nature of a social animal. 30. The rationality of the universe is social.So it creates lower things for higher things, and adapts them to higher things.You see how it puts the high and the low in order, and cooperates with each other, and gives each thing its due share, and binds them together in harmony with that which is best. 31. How will you behave henceforth to the gods, your parents, brothers, children, teachers, those who have cared for you from childhood, your friends, your countrymen, and your slaves?Consider whether you are henceforth to appear to all in such a way that it may be said of you that you are a man who makes no mistakes in conduct or speech. Remember how much you have been through, how much hardship you have been able to endure, how much your life history is now ended, your service is now ended; how many beautiful things you have seen, how much pleasure and pain you have despised, how much you rejected How many so-called honorable things have you done, how many bad-hearted mediocrities you have shown kindness to. 32. How can an incompetent and ignorant soul bother a capable and knowledgeable person?So what soul is capable and knowledgeable?That which knows the beginning and the end, knows the rational soul which is implied in the whole entity and governs the universe in definite epochs (changes) throughout all time. 33. Soon you will be dust, or a skeleton, a name, not even a name, but names are sounds and echoes.The things that are so highly valued in life are hollow, perishable, and trivial, biting at each other like puppies, little children arguing, laughing, and crying right away.But loyalty, temperance, justice, and truth: Fly from the wide earth to Mount Olympus. If the objects of sense are mutable, and never remain still; the organs of perception are dull, and prone to false impressions; and the poor soul itself is a hush from the blood, what keeps you here?To have a good name in such an empty world.So why don't you wait quietly for your end, whether it be death or migration to another country?Until that time comes, what will be enough?Is it not to reverence and praise to the gods, to do good to men, to exercise patience and temperance; and as for all things, then poor flesh and breath, remember that they are neither yours nor your power. 34. If you walk the right path, think and act rightly, you can live your life in a peaceful flow of happiness.These two things are common to the soul of God and to the soul of man, to the soul of a rational being, and should not be disturbed by other things.Well hold on to the temperament of justice and practice justice so that you can eliminate your desires. 35. If it is not my own evil, nor is it the result of my own evil, and the public welfare is not damaged, why should I worry about it?What is the damage to the public welfare? 36. Don't be led by the phenomenon of things without consideration, but help everyone according to your ability and whether it is suitable for them; if they suffer insignificant material losses, don't think of it as is a detriment.Because it is a bad habit.But when the old man, when he's gone, looks back at the peak of the child he raised, remembering it was the prime, and you do that on the occasion. When you call from the pulpit, man, have you forgotten what these things are? - yes, but they are the objects of intense concern of these people - and are you so foolish about these things yourself? - I used to be a lucky person, but I lost it and I don't know what to do. — But luck only means that a man assigns himself a good fortune: a good fortune is a good disposition of the soul, of good affections, of good deeds.