Quotes By Marcus Aurelius

A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, by one lower than himself. The one produces aspiration; the other ambition, which is the way in which a vulgar man aspires.

Do every act of your life as if it were your last.

Begin - to begin is half the work, let half still remain; again begin this, and thou wilt have finished.

Be content with what you are, and wish not change; nor dread your last day, nor long for it.

Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under thy observation in life.

Observe constantly that all things take place by change, and accustom thyself to consider that the nature of the Universe loves nothing so much as to change the things which are, and to make new things like them.

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.

Everything that exists is in a manner the seed of that which will be.

Tomorrow is nothing, today is too late; the good lived yesterday.

Our life is what our thoughts make it.

Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.

How much time he saves who does not look to see what his neighbor says or does or thinks.

Execute every act of thy life as though it were thy last.

Natural ability without education has more often raised a man to glory and virtue than education without natural ability.

The universal order and the personal order are nothing but different expressions and manifestations of a common underlying principle.

When thou art above measure angry, bethink thee how momentary is man's life.

There is nothing happens to any person but what was in his power to go through with.

Death, like birth, is a secret of Nature.

The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.

Because your own strength is unequal to the task, do not assume that it is beyond the powers of man; but if anything is within the powers and province of man, believe that it is within your own compass also.

Each day provides its own gifts.

We ought to do good to others as simply as a horse runs, or a bee makes honey, or a vine bears grapes season after season without thinking of the grapes it has borne.

Men exist for the sake of one another.

He who lives in harmony with himself lives in harmony with the universe.

Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.

Death is a release from the impressions of the senses, and from desires that make us their puppets, and from the vagaries of the mind, and from the hard service of the flesh.

Forward, as occasion offers. Never look round to see whether any shall note it... Be satisfied with success in even the smallest matter, and think that even such a result is no trifle.

Nothing happens to any man that he is not formed by nature to bear.

Perhaps there are none more lazy, or more truly ignorant, than your everlasting readers.

Be content to seem what you really are.