rannveig aamodt

If you find anything

better in human life than justice,

honesty, moderation and courage — if,

to put it generally, you find anything better

than the self-sufficiency of your mind on those

occasions that your actions are compatible with

right reason, as well as when something is allotted

to you by fate without your having chosen it —

if, I say, you’re aware of anything better

than this, turn to it with all your heart

and enjoy the supreme good

you’ve discovered.

But if you find

nothing better than the

guardian spirit lodged within you,

which has brought all your particular

impulses under its control, which scrutinizes

your thoughts, which, as Socrates used to say, has

withdrawn itself from sensations, which has put itself

in the gods’ hands, and which cared providentially for

other people — if everything else turns out to be

trivial and worthless by comparison,

then make room for

nothing else.

Marcus Aurelius

the annotated marcus