"Meditations" is a book written by Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius. It was originally published in 1909, however it was written roughly between 170 and 180 AD. It is often considered to be a sort of handbook for stoicism, although there is some controversy surrounding it.
Marcus Aurelius was well known for persecuting and killing Christians. He did so quite frequently and with a lot of cruelty. So why would I care about this book? Well, for one, Marcus Aurelius is very dead, and, secondly, he never intended anything in this book to be published. I mean... just look at how long it took for it to even be published. "Meditations" were notes he wrote to help himself become more of a stoic person, and those reasons are more than enough to push aside what he did and to take a better look at how he structured himself as a man in a world of humans.
There is a lot to take in with this book, and it is difficult to boil it all down to one thing. There is a lot of repetition, which sort of helps with the problem. I think the most important thing I got from this book was the concept that we are ultimately in charge of our own behaviors and should not let others influence who we are. If we do, then it is really us that's doing that because we are actively allowing it.
A good example of the latter is revenge. The act of getting revenge is to become like the person you get getting revenge against. You are ultimately allowing the bad person to manipulate your anger into committing some sort of similar act. This means you are not truly in control of yourself.
Marcus was also very aware of the mortality of people, including himself. He often expressed that all the famous people of the past had all died, and he knew he would die too. He even expressed that there was a good chance that he would never be remembered, so it was important to live his life to the fullest, and as a good person, while he was yet there. Well, he is actually fondly remembered today for his writing---something I doubt he expected.
Due to him being an emperor of Rome, he believed in a polytheistic religion. He would however also refer to a God with a capital "G." Now, I am not completely sure what this was about. The context of it was unclear, and I assume that there is someone more informed than I am about it. It could just be his way of referring to nature. Marcus talked about nature a lot, and how the nature of different things never change. The nature of various people were often different to each other, but he would hold them to it just as he held to himself.
At the end of the day, Marcus just wanted to control himself and his behaviors. He wanted to be calm and non-emotional, which is actually not a bad quality for an emperor. It allowed him to deal with ruling a country with a very analytical and sane mind. Yes, he went after the Christians, but it was because he believed they were obstinate. His views about Christians were only mentioned one time in Meditations 11:3. You can look this up if you wish to see the verse for yourself.
All in all, this is a very good study guide into what it means to be a stoic, if you were interested in such a thing. I would say, however, that nothing in this book really matters without Christianity as a basis. Marcus was not really a good man, although I do believe he was trying to be one.
I do recommend this book to anyone studying stoicism or the life of Marcus Aurelius. Beyond that, you may want to take a pass, because you will probably find it a boring read.
This blog was written on October 1, 2025.
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