Thoughts Of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus by Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (e book free reading TXT) 📖
- Author: Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
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Body, That Is, The Interior Man, Who By The Body Acts In The
World And From Whom The Body Itself Lives" (Quoted By Clissold,
P. 456 Of "The Practical Nature Of The Theological Writings Of
Emanuel Swedenborg, In A Letter To The Archbishop Of Dublin
(Whately)," Second Edition, 1859; A Book Which Theologians
Might Read With Profit). This Is An Old Doctrine Of The Soul,
Which Has Been Often Proclaimed, But Never Better Expressed
Than By The "Auctor De Mundo," C. 6, Quoted By Gataker In His
"Antoninus," P. 436. "The Soul By Which We Live And Have Cities
And Houses Is Invisible, But It Is Seen By Its Works; For The
Whole Method Of Life Has Been Devised By It And Ordered, And By
It Is Held Together. In Like Manner We Must Think Also About
The Deity, Who In Power Is Most Mighty, In Beauty Most Comely,
In Life Immortal, And In Virtue Supreme: Wherefore Though He Is
Invisible To Human Nature, He Is Seen By His Very Works." Other
Passages To The Same Purpose Are Quoted By Gataker (P. 382).
Bishop Butler Has The Same As To The Soul: "Upon The Whole,
Story 2 (The Philosophy Of Marcus Aurelius Antonius) Pg 26Then, Our Organs Of Sense And Our Limbs Are Certainly
Instruments, Which The Living Persons, Ourselves, Make Use Of
To Perceive And Move With." If This Is Not Plain Enough, Be
Also Says: "It Follows That Our Organized Bodies Are No More
Ourselves, Or Part Of Ourselves, Than Any Other Matter Around
Us." (Compare Anton, X. 38).
[C] The Reader May Consult Discourse V., "Of The Existence And
Nature Of God," In John Smith's "Select Discourses." He Has
Prefixed As A Text To This Discourse, The Striking Passage Of
Agapetus, Paraenes. § 3: "He Who Knows Himself Will Know God;
And He Who Knows God Will Be Made Like To God; And He Will Be
Made Like To God, Who Has Become Worthy Of God; And He Becomes
Worthy Of God, Who Does Nothing Unworthy Of God, But Thinks The
Things That Are His, And Speaks What He Thinks, And Does What
He Speaks." I Suppose That The Old Saying, "Know Thyself,"
Which Is Attributed To Socrates And Others, Had A Larger
Meaning Than The Narrow Sense Which Is Generally Given To It.
(Agapetus, Ed. Stephan. Schoning, Franeker, 1608. This Volume
Contains Also The Paraeneses Of Nilus.)
There Is In Man, That Is In The Reason, The Intelligence, A Superior
Faculty Which If It Is Exercised Rules All The Rest. This Is The Ruling
Faculty ([Greek: To Hêgemonikon]), Which Cicero (De Natura Deorum, Ii.
11) Renders By The Latin Word Principatus, "To Which Nothing Can Or
Ought To Be Superior." Antoninus Often Uses This Term And Others Which
Are Equivalent. He Names It (Vii. 64) "The Governing Intelligence." The
Governing Faculty Is The Master Of The Soul (V. 26). A Man Must
Reverence Only His Ruling Faculty And The Divinity Within Him. As We
Must Reverence That Which Is Supreme In The Universe, So We Must
Reverence That Which Is Supreme In Ourselves; And This Is That Which Is
Of Like Kind With That Which Is Supreme In The Universe (V. 21). So, As
Plotinus Says, The Soul Of Man Can Only Know The Divine So Far As It
Knows Itself. In One Passage (Xi. 19) Antoninus Speaks Of A Man's
Condemnation Of Himself When The Diviner Part Within Him Has Been
Overpowered And Yields To The Less Honorable And To The Perishable Part,
The Body, And Its Gross Pleasures. In A Word, The Views Of Antoninus On
This Matter, However His Expressions May Vary, Are Exactly What Bishop
Butler Expresses When He Speaks Of "The Natural Supremacy Of Reflection
Or Conscience," Of The Faculty "Which Surveys, Approves, Or Disapproves
The Several Affections Of Our Mind And Actions Of Our Lives."
Much Matter Might Be Collected From Antoninus On The Notion Of The
Universe Being One Animated Being. But All That He Says Amounts To No
More, As Schultz Remarks, Than This: The Soul Of Man Is Most Intimately
United To His Body, And Together They Make One Animal, Which We Call
Man; So The Deity Is Most Intimately United To The World, Or The
Material Universe, And Together They Form One Whole. But Antoninus Did
Not View God And The Material Universe As The Same, Any More Than He
Viewed The Body And Soul Of Man As One. Antoninus Has 110 Speculations
On The Absolute Nature Of The Deity. It Was Not His Fashion To Waste His
Time On What Man Cannot Understand.[A] He Was Satisfied That God Exists,
That He Governs All Things, That Man Can Only Have An Imperfect
Knowledge Of His Nature, And He Must Attain This Imperfect Knowledge By
Reverencing The Divinity Which Is Within Him, And Keeping It Pure.
[A] "God, Who Is Infinitely Beyond The Reach Of Our Narrow
Capacities" (Locke, Essay Concerning The Human Understanding,
Story 2 (The Philosophy Of Marcus Aurelius Antonius) Pg 27Ii. Chap. 17).
From All That Has Been Said, It Follows That The Universe Is
Administered By The Providence Of God ([Greek: Pronoia]), And That All
Things Are Wisely Ordered. There Are Passages In Which Antoninus
Expresses Doubts, Or States Different Possible Theories Of The
Constitution And Government Of The Universe; But He Always Recurs To His
Fundamental Principle, That If We Admit The Existence Of A Deity, We
Must Also Admit That He Orders All Things Wisely And Well (Iv. 27; Vi.
1; Ix. 28; Xii. 5; And Many Other Passages). Epictetus Says (I. 6) That
We Can Discern The Providence Which Rules The World, If We Possess Two
Things,--The Power Of Seeing All That Happens With Respect To Each
Thing, And A Grateful Disposition.
But If All Things Are Wisely Ordered, How Is The World So Full Of What
We Call Evil, Physical And Moral? If Instead Of Saying That There Is
Evil In The World, We Use The Expression Which I Have Used, "What We
Call Evil," We Have Partly Anticipated The Emperor's Answer. We See And
Feel And Know Imperfectly Very Few Things In The Few Years That We Live,
And All The Knowledge And All The Experience Of All The Human Race Is
Positive Ignorance Of The Whole, Which Is Infinite. Now, As Our Reason
Teaches Us That Everything Is In Some Way Related To And Connected With
Every Other Thing, All Notion Of Evil As Being In The Universe Of Things
Is A Contradiction; For If The Whole Comes From And Is Governed By An
Intelligent Being, It Is Impossible To Conceive Anything In It Which
Tends To The Evil Or Destruction Of The Whole (Viii. 55; X. 6).
Everything Is In Constant Mutation, And Yet The Whole Subsists; We Might
Imagine The Solar System Resolved Into Its Elemental Parts, And Yet The
Whole Would Still Subsist "Ever Young And Perfect."
All Things, All Forms, Are Dissolved, And New Forms Appear. All Living
Things Undergo The Change Which We Call Death. If We Call Death An Evil,
Then All Change Is An Evil. Living Beings Also Suffer Pain, And Man
Suffers Most Of All, For He Suffers Both In And By His Body And By His
Intelligent Part. Men Suffer Also From One Another, And Perhaps The
Largest Part Of Human Suffering Comes To Man From Those Whom He Calls
His Brothers. Antoninus Says (Viii. 55), "Generally, Wickedness Does No
Harm At All To The Universe; And Particularly, The Wickedness [Of One
Man] Does No Harm To Another. It Is Only Harmful To Him Who Has It In
His Power To Be Released From It As Soon As He Shall Choose." The First
Part Of This Is Perfectly Consistent With The Doctrine That The Whole
Can Sustain No Evil Or Harm. The Second Part Must Be Explained By The
Stoic Principle That There Is No Evil In Anything Which Is Not In Our
Power. What Wrong We Suffer From Another Is His Evil, Not Ours. But This
Is An Admission That There Is Evil In A Sort, For He Who Does Wrong Does
Evil, And If Others Can Endure The Wrong, Still There Is Evil In The
Wrong-Doer. Antoninus (Xi. 18) Gives Many Excellent Precepts With
Respect To Wrongs And Injuries, And His Precepts Are Practical. He
Teaches Us To Bear What We Cannot Avoid, And His Lessons May Be Just As
Useful To Him Who Denies The Being And The Government Of God As To Him
Who Believes In Both. There Is No Direct Answer In Antoninus To The
Objections Which May Be Made To The Existence And Providence Of God
Because Of The Moral Disorder And Suffering Which Are In The World,
Except This Answer Which He Makes In Reply To The Supposition That Even
The Best Men May Be Extinguished By Death. He Says If It Is So, We May
Be Sure That If It Ought To Have Been Otherwise, The Gods Would Have
Ordered It Otherwise (Xii. 5). His Conviction Of The Wisdom Which We May
Observe In The Government Of The World Is Too Strong To Be Disturbed By
Story 2 (The Philosophy Of Marcus Aurelius Antonius) Pg 28Any Apparent Irregularities In The Order Of Things. That These Disorders
Exist Is A Fact, And Those Who Would Conclude From Them Against The
Being And Government Of God Conclude Too Hastily. We All Admit That
There Is An Order In The Material World, A Nature, In The Sense In Which
That Word Has Been Explained, A Constitution ([Greek: Kataskeuê]), What We
Call A System, A Relation Of Parts To One Another And A Fitness Of The
Whole For Something. So In The Constitution Of Plants And Of Animals
There Is An Order, A Fitness For Some End. Sometimes The Order, As We
Conceive It, Is Interrupted, And The End, As We Conceive It, Is Not
Attained. The Seed, The Plant, Or The Animal Sometimes Perishes Before
It Has Passed Through All Its Changes And Done All Its Uses. It Is
According To Nature, That Is A Fixed Order, For Some To Perish Early And
For Others To Do All Their Uses And Leave Successors To Take Their
Place. So Man Has A Corporeal And Intellectual And Moral Constitution
Fit
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