This is a pretty packed paragraph, in my opinion. The Apollonius to whom Aurelius refers is Apollonius of Chalcedon, not one of the most famous Apollonii (it was a pretty common name). Chalcedon is in Asia Minor but presumably Apollonius would have been of Greek descent. He was a significant representative of the Stoic school of philosophy during Aurelius’ youth, and in fact he was a teacher of some of the other emperors of the time (including Verus). Not that any of this is particularly relevant, but if anyone is actually reading this blog there’s a good chance they’re as interested in Roman history as I am…

So, what can we glean from Aurelius’ second listing of virtues he learned from a mentor figure? I don’t want to repeat my previous post, so let’s take a look at the kind of stuff Aurelius was thinking about that day. I am struck by the strength of this statement: look to nothing else, not even for a moment, except to reason. To me, this is one of the most attractive tenets of Stoicism. I certainly don’t have quite the same mastery of my emotions as M claims to have over his own, but in my daily life I avoid displays of emotion and in particular I strive to refrain from acting on emotion.

This approach to life is certainly open to several criticisms. I do not intend to argue over the role that emotions “should” play in a person’s life. In my opinion, my emotions are my mind’s poetic interpretation of my current situation, and so I should be guided by them, but never ruled by them. For to be ruled by emotions is to be ruled by your environment, and one of the most widely glorified aspects of human nature is our freedom of will.

Another related aspect of this feature of Stoicism is discussed in a recent post on The Zen Stoic — my esteemed colleague in blogging discusses whether the unemotional and self-reliant nature of Stoics impedes their capacity as social beings. I myself will come to this later, when M makes more specific comments about friendship and social interaction.

The other statement I am interested in here is that the same man can be both most resolute and yielding. It reminds me Emerson’s immortal line: “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” One cannot be totally resistant to change, for then he can never learn. One must be able to admit mistakes, poorly formed opinions, and ignorance with grace. The other side of the coin is more difficult. Both Emerson and Aurelius clearly believe that one must sometimes stand his ground. If one does not maintain some set of basic principles, and yield to change only upon sufficiently weighty provocation, then how could that person’s life be anything but whimsical and arbitrary? And it seems rather common for people to desire some kind of meaning, purpose, or continuity in life. How else could one sustain the motivation to do good?

But I find it difficult to properly defend this point. I think that all I’ve done is wave my hands. And in truth, I do feel that my entire system of beliefs lies on no foundation. If you dig deep enough, I will literally have nothing more to say, no more structure to reveal. And as I mentioned in the previous post, I don’t believe that anything other than this is possible. I live in my foundationless castle of reason, and I am prepared to rebuild, perhaps in new and interesting ways, the halls and wings that collapse under the weight of my accumulating experiences.

There’s not much for me to say about this one. It’s hard to imagine exactly what Aurelius meant with the things he’s saying he learned — what was a “manly character”? What did he mean by “piety and beneficence”? But I think from this we are not to take a list of virtues that Aurelius is setting out. Instead we should notice how he accredits his grandfather and parents for what he learned. So today let’s not consider what we can learn from Aurelius but instead what we can learn from our own family.

From my mother I learned patience and selflessness. From my grandparents, my sense of humor. My sister taught me to accept and love even that which is much different from myself. And from my father I learned to dedicate myself vigorously to any enterprise I might undertake.

I suppose this illustrates one major difference between me and Aurelius already. I am a strong believer in moral relativism, whereas Aurelius simply forgave other people for their ignorance of what he believed to be the one and true morality. This is why in my rendition I make no mention of morality, while Aurelius is concerned with that and with such concepts as piety. I imagine this will be a recurring bone of contention in future posts.

I’m not going to cite my source every time. The book is Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, translated by George Long, Peter Pauper Press, 1957. It’s not a complete translation; Aurelius gets repetitive after a while anyway.