The Religion of Self (or Time is a Point) - Marcus Aurelius

Of human life

Time is a point

Substance is in a flux

The perception dull

The composition of the whole body subject to putrefaction

The soul a whirl

Fortune hard to divine

Fame a thing devoid of judgement

-

To say all in a word:

Everything which belongs to the body is a stream

And

What belongs to the soul is a dream and vapour

And

Life is a warfare

And

A strangers sojourn

And

After fame is oblivion

-

What then is that which is able to conduct a man?

-

One thing

One thing

And

Only one:

PHILOSOPHY

This consists in keeping the daemon within a man free from violence

Unharmed

Superior to pains and pleasures

Doing nothing without purpose

Nor yet falsely or with hypocrisy

Not feeling the need of another mans doings or not doing anything

Adapting all that happens

And all that is allotted

As coming from thence

(Where ever it is)

From whence

He himself came

Finally

Waiting for death with a cheerful mind

(As being nothing else than a dissolution of the elements

Of which

Every living being is compounded)

-

So

If there is no harm to the elements themselves

(In each continually changing into another)

Why should Man have any apprehension about the change and dissolution

Of all the elements?

For

It is according to nature.

-

And nothing is evil which is according to nature

-

MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONIUS