Meditations

“He was not one to bathe at all hours; he had no urge to build houses; he was not particular about food, the material and colour of his clothes, or youthful beauty in slaves; the fact that his dress came from Lorium, sent up from his country house there; the many details of his way of life at Lanuvium; how he handled the apologetic customs officer in Tusculum, and all such modes of behavior.”

Marcus’s description of Antoninus Pius here exemplifies the personal nature of his text. He begins by discussing his adoptive father in a way that is personable and even affectionate, listing the qualities that Marcus wants to emulate. As the entry continues, however, it becomes more impenetrable to the outside reader, who may not know “the many details of his way of life at Lanuvium” or what happened with the “apologetic customs officer” and its related “modes of behavior” (3).

“The works of the gods are full of providence. The works of Fortune are not independent of Nature or the spinning and weaving together of the threads governed by Providence. All things flow from that world: and further factors are necessity and the benefit of the whole universe, of which you are a part.”

Here, Marcus explains the nature of the cosmos and the place of Fortune, Nature, and Providence. Of particular importance to understanding Marcus’s Meditations is that the cosmos (“the whole universe”) is conceived of as a woven garment, whose design is overseen by divine foresight (11). Everything that is—all matter— is thread that is woven into the whole.

“[L]ooked at in isolation these things are far from lovely, but their consequence on the processes of Nature enhances them and gives them attraction. So any man with a feeling and deeper insight for the workings of the Whole will find some pleasure in almost every aspect of their disposition, including the incidental consequences.”

Marcus has here been discussing the “incidental effects of the processes of Nature”—bread that splits open owing to a failure of the baker’s technique, figs that have split open, ripened olives on a vine (16). They may seem unappealing when viewed out of context but situating them within a larger process enables one to observe their “charm and attraction” (16).