Meditations XI.18

Firstly: Consider thy relation⁴² to mankind and that we came into the world for the sake of one another⁴³; and taking another point of view, that I have come into it to be set over men, as a ram over a flock or a bull over a herd.⁴⁴ Start at the beginning from this premiss: If not atoms,⁴⁵ then an all-controlling Nature. If the latter, then the lower are for the sake of the higher and the higher for one another.⁴⁶ *

Secondly: What sort of men they are at board and in bed and elsewhere.⁴⁷ Above all how they are the self-made slaves of their principles, and how they pride themselves on the very acts in question.

Thirdly: That if they are acting rightly in this, there is no call for us to be angry. If not rightly, it is obviously against their will and through ignorance.⁴⁸ For it is against his will that every soul is deprived, as of truth, so too of the power of dealing with each man as is his due. At any rate, such men resent being called unjust, unfeeling, avaricious, and in a word doers of wrong to their neighbours.

Fourthly: That thou too doest many a wrong thing thyself and art much as others are,⁴⁹ and if thou dost refrain from certain wrong-doings, yet hast thou a disposition inclinable thereto⁵⁰ even supposing that through cowardice or a regard for thy good name or some such base consideration thou dost not actually commit them.

Fifthly: That thou hast not even proved that they are doing wrong, for many things are done even ‘by way of policy.’⁵¹ Speaking generally a man must know many things before he can pronounce an adequate opinion on the acts of another.

Sixthly: When thou art above measure angry or even out of patience, bethink thee that man’s life is momentary, and in a little while we shall all have been laid out.⁵²

Seventhly: That in reality it is not the acts men do that vex us—for they belong to the domain of their ruling Reason—but the opinions we form of those acts.⁵³ Eradicate these, be ready to discard thy conclusion that the act in question is a calamity, and thine anger is at an end.⁵⁴ How then eradicate these opinions? By realizing that no act of another debases us. For unless that alone which debases is an evil, thou too must perforce do many a wrong thing and become a brigand⁵⁵ or any sort of man.

Eighthly: Bethink thee how much more grievous are the consequences of our anger and vexation at such actions than are the acts themselves which arouse that anger and vexation.

Ninthly: That kindness is irresistible,⁵⁶ be it but sincere and no mock smile or a mask assumed. For what can the most unconscionable of men do to thee, if thou persist in being kindly to him, and when a chance is given exhort him mildly and, at the very time when he is trying to do thee harm, quietly teach him a better way⁵⁷ thus: Nay, my child, we have been made for other things. I shall be in no wise harmed, but thou art harming thyself,⁵⁸ my child*. Shew him delicately and without any personal reference that this is so, and that even honey-bees do not act thus nor any creatures of gregarious instincts. But thou must do this not in irony⁵⁹ or by way of rebuke, but with kindly affection and without any bitterness at heart, not as from a master’s chair, nor yet to impress the bystanders, but as if he were indeed alone even though others are present.

Bethink thee then of these nine heads, taking them as a gift from the Muses, and begin at last to be a man while life is thine. But beware of flattering⁶⁰ men no less than being angry with them.⁶¹ For both these are non-social and conducive of harm. In temptations to anger a precept ready to thy hand is this to be wroth is not manly, but a mild and gentle disposition, as it is more human, so it is more masculine. Such a man, and not he who gives way to anger and discontent, is endowed with strength and sinews and manly courage. For the nearer such a mind attains to a passive calm,⁶² the nearer is the man to strength. As grief is a weakness, so also is anger. In both it is a case of a wound and a surrender.

But take if thou wilt as a tenth gift from Apollo, the Leader of the Muses, this, that to expect the bad not to do wrong is worthy of a madman; for that is to wish for impossibilities.⁶³ But to acquiesce in their wronging others, while expecting them to refrain from wronging thee, is unfeeling and despotic.⁶⁴

• 42.See v. 16, 30; viii. 27.
• 43.See viii. 56, 59.
• 44.Dio Chrysostom, Orations ii, On Kingship, 97, Reiske’s edition: ὁ δὲ ταῦρος σαφῶς πρὸς βασιλέως εἰκόνα πεποίηται. Epictetus’s Discourses i. 2, § 30.

  Dio Chrysostom’s second oration, On Kingship; the Greek, in translation: “the bull is plainly made as an image of a king.”

• 45.See iv. 3, § 2; viii. 17; ix. 39; x. 6.
• 46.See ii. 1; v. 16.
• 47.See viii. 14; x. 19.
• 48.See ii. 1; iv. 3; vii. 22, 63.
• 49.See vii. 70; x. 30.
• 50.See i. 17, near the beginning.
• 51.Or, “with an eye to circumstances,” “with some further end in view,” knowledge of which would justify the action or shew its necessity.
• 52.See ix. 38.
• 53.See vii. 16; viii. 40; ix. 13; xi. 11, 16.
• 54.See vii. 16.
• 55.See x. 10.
• 56.Seneca’s On Benefits vii. 31: vincit malos pertinax bonitas.

  Seneca’s Latin, in translation: “persistent goodness overcomes the wicked.”

• 57.See v. 28; vi. 27; viii. 59; x. 4; xi. 13.
• 58.See ix. 4.
• 59.See xi. 13.
• 60.Compare Dio’s Roman History 71. 3, § 4.
• 61.See iv. 31.
• 62.The Stoic ἀπάθεια.

  Apatheia: the Stoic freedom from the passions.

• 63.See v. 17; vii. 71; ix. 42.
• 64.vi. 27; Seneca’s On Anger ii. 31. ἄγνωμον might also be translated senseless.