This post is the eleventh in our Stoic Philosophy book club series on Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. Participants expressing interest are tagged at the end of the post, let us know if you're new and would like to join and be tagged!
Prior posts for context:
- Book 10
- Book 9
- Book 8
- Book 7
- Book 6
- Book 5
- Book 4
- Book 3: In Carnuntum
- Book 2: On the River Gran, Among the Quadi
- Book 1: Debts and Lessons
- Geneisis Post
Book 11
Summary and Highlights
Following on from Book 10, I really enjoyed Book 11 as well. I'm looking forward to each new book a little more than the prior. Apparently Marcus was visiting the theater around this time. There is a lengthy reflection on comedy and tragedy in #6, as well as many small, sniping quotes which feel like they're from plays or literature. Here are my highlights for this week.
As usual, Marcus leads off with a banger in #1, which I'll quote in its entirety.
Characteristics of the rational soul: Self-perception, self-examination, and the power to make of itself whatever it wants. It reaps its own harvest, unlike the plants (and, in a different way, animals), whose yield is gathered in by others. It reaches its intended goal, no matter where the limit of its life is set. Not like dancing and theater and things like that, where the performance is incomplete if it's broken off in the middle, but at any point -- no matter which one you pick -- it has fulfilled its mission, done its work completely. So that it can say, "I have what I came for." It surveys the world and the empty space around it, and the way it's put together. It delves into the endlessness of time to extend its grasp and comprehension of the periodic births and rebirths that the world goes through. It knows that those who come after us will see nothing different, that those who came before us saw no more than we do, and that anyone with forty years behind him and eyes in his head has seen both past and future -- both alike. Affection for its neighbors. Truthfulness. Humility. Not to place anything above itself -- which is characteristic of law as well. No difference here between the logos of rationality and that of justice.
Of course, as I read this, I'm ticking off boxes to make sure "I'm rational", an exercise of ego. But it's eloquently written and a well-rounded description of living in harmony with Nature and Universal Law. A great start.
In #2, Marcus provides a short instruction manual on how to dissolve attachment and desire, to:
"Analyze the melody into the notes that form it, and as you hear each one, ask yourself whether you're powerless against that. That should be enough to deter you."
What I found personally interesting here was his express inclusion of martial arts alongside singing and dancing as outer examples of artistic desire. Perhaps because I have plenty of experience with music and dancing, but only an unexplored curiosity for martial arts. Makes me want to try, and also reminds me of the way other practitioners like Joe Rogan or Lex Friedman describe Jiu Jitsu as beauty in strategy and sequence.
In #3, Marcus mentions "The resolute soul", and its resolve in "separation from the body" but claims,
But the resolution has to be the result of its own decision, not just in response to outside forces [like the Christians].
This is an interesting detail to me because he particularly mentions the Christians and expresses an interpretation of the movement at the time. Raised in a Christian environment, I pick on this detail because it has also been quite a challenge for me to discern my own motivations toward Truth during development. Outside pressure from family, church organization or culture can contribute to some confusion in finding and nurturing the Soul's internal resolution, or True Self. I guess that's also just a part of growing up for everyone, but it stands out to me that perhaps the pressures of external persecution, or the factors Marcus is describing at this time are still held in the DNA of Christian organizations and consciousness today.
- "And your profession?" "Goodness." (And how is that to be achieved, except by thought -- about the world, about the nature of people?)
The first time I read this, I almost wrote it off with a slight disagreement, reducing it to "thinking good thoughts makes me a good person", which leaves a dangerous amount of room for spiritual bypassing. However, upon closer inspection, it has a deeply Buddhist flavor if I consider that Goodness is equated with a "pure mind", one that thinks good thoughts because that is its nature, now that the subconscious has been cleaned. Interesting how my own interpretation is subject to a difference between outer perception and inner reality, probably coincident with the state of my own mind at that time. :/
In #6, Marcus does a little exposition of theater genre. Essentially, Tragedies exist "to remind us of what can happen, and that it happens inevitably. And "Then, after tragedy, Old Comedy: instructive in its frankness, its plain speaking designed to puncture pretensions". Of course, they never make it like they used to, as Marcus essentially follows this with commentary that "New Comedy" has lost this. True now, true then, true always?
#7. It stares you in the face. No role is so well suited to philosophy as the one you happen to be in right now.
I can't help but remember Marcus' entries in prior books which seem to despair his station at the expense of "being" a philosopher. Perhaps he's developed some acceptance of that. Either way, it's a classical acknowledgement of Plato's Philosopher-King.
In #8, Marcus draws an interesting psychological analogy to a tree:
A branch cut away from the branch beside it is simultaneously cut away from the whole tree. So too a human being separated from another is cut loose from the whole community. The branch is cut off by someone else. But people cut themselves off -- through hatred, through rejection -- and don't realize that they're cutting themselves off from the whole civic enterprise. Except that we also have a gift, given to use by Zeus, who founded this community of ours. We can reattach ourselves and become once more components of the whole. But if tthe rupture is too often repeated, it makes the severed part hard to reconnect, and to restore. You can see the difference between the branch that's been there since the beginning, remaining on the tree and growing with it, and the one that's been cut off and grafted back. "One trunk, two minds." As the gardeners put it.
There are a few different parts I like about this one. Firstly, the part about people cutting themselves off through hatred and rejection. It's a reminder for me that relationships are important. Sometimes I feel like I'll be all good if I can just sort myself and my life out -- meditate by myself and have little to do with the outside world, like a monk on a mountaintop. But perhaps there is unconscious rejection, anger or fear behind this desire? Secondly, I find it interesting that Marcus credits "Zeus, who founded this community of ours". Zeus is the Greek god of gods and Marcus is Roman. Does Zeus represent sovereignty here? Or Reason? Besides the syncretism here, I find the selection of Zeus interesting as a symbol for the rise of rational thought in the development of human religious ideas, which I've explored in some other book review posts. And of course, the final two paragraphs summarized with "One trunk, two minds" is a wonderful, allegorical representation of psychological trauma and the development of psychological complexes. Well described.
In #9, Marcus advocates that you shouldn't let difficult people "stop you from putting up with them" and that "anger, too, is weakness, as much as breaking down and giving up the struggle." We often describe the fundamental natural instincts of "fight or flight" as a root-level automatism, but my reading here is that both fight or flight are losing the conflict. Stay centered, stay grounded and still.
Which is further developed in #12:
The soul as a sphere in equilibrium: Not grasping at things beyond it or retreating inward. Not fragmenting outward, not sinking back on itself, but ablaze with light and looking at the truth, without and within.
A fiery, dynamic stasis. Like the Sun.
- They flatter one another out of contempt, and their desire to rule one another makes them bow and scrape.
Possessed by their obsessive desires, people are twisted into the opposite expressions of behavior.
Reflection #15 is my favorite from Book 11:
The despicable phoniness of people who say, "Listen, I'm going to level with you here." What does that mean? It shouldn't even need to be said. It should be obvious -- written in block letters on your forehead. It should be audible in your voice, visible in your eyes, like a lover who looks into your face and takes in the whole story at a glance. A straightforward, honest person should be like someone who stinks: when you're in the same room with him, you know it. But false straightforwardness is like a knife in the back. False friendship is the worst. Avoid it at all costs. If you're honest and straightforward and mean well, it should show in your eyes. It should be unmistakable.
Incredibly based. Stinky based. I can't say it any better, or add much to it. Go stink it up with the Truth.
Entry #18 is a very long, exploratory post of Marcus breaking down his mind's own misconceptions. It's well worth its own consideration, but a segment on masculinity stands out:
When you start to lose your temper, remember: There's nothing manly about rage. It's courtesy and kindness that define a human being -- and a man. That's who possesses strength and nerves and guts, not the angry whiners. To react like that brings you closer to impassivity -- and so to strength.
It's tough to be a man out there these days, and there aren't many positive examples of masculinity out there, so here's one from Marcus The Man himself.
- Socrates used to call popular beliefs "the monsters under the bed" -- only useful for frightening children with.
Sounds about right with all the cultural drama around The Current Thing(tm). As Marcus frequently reminds elsewhere, this phenomena isn't new and we can expect it again. Learn to recognize cultural drama, detach identity from it and grow up, become a Man, not a child (or a sheep) and see the world for what it is.
- This advice from Epicurean writings: to think continually of one of the men of old who lived a virtuous life.
Both ironic and inspiring to be reading this text and following that advice about the writer, Marcus. He's become his own ideal 2000 years later.
- Mastery of reading and writing requires a master. Still more so life.
This one is pretty enigmatic. The wisdom probably lies in the mystery still half-concealed. Must one become the master oneself? Or must one become a slave to something higher? What is the difference? Is there any?
- Socrates: What do you want, rational minds or irrational ones? -- Rational ones. Healthy or sick? -- Healthy. Then work to obtain them. -- We already have. Then why all this squabbling?
LOL. I wish I could hang out with Socrates.
Thanks for reading.
Participants
Thank you everyone who has been reading Meditations, and participated in the discussions. Feel free let me know if you don't want to be on the tag list anymore :)
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We only have one more book left, but feel free to signal interest in the comments if you'd like to be tagged.