The Emperor's Handbook

First published 2002 · 148 pages · English

9 quotes ★ 4.28 (371,146) Classics

Quotes from the Book

Your days are numbered. Use them to throw open the windows of your soul to the sun. If you do not, the sun will soon set, and you with it.

The best revenge is not to do as they do.

Every hour be firmly resolved... to accomplish the work at hand with fitting and unaffected dignity, goodwill, freedom, justice. Banish from your thoughts all other considerations. This is possible if you perform each act as if it were your last, rejecting every frivolous distraction, every denial of the rule of reason, every pretentious gesture, vain show, and whining complaint against the decrees of fate. Do you see what little is required of a man to live a well-tempered and god-fearing life? Obey these precepts, and the gods will ask nothing more (II.5).

What am I but a little flesh, a little breath, and the thinking part that rules the whole?

Remember how long you have procrastinated, and how consistently you have failed to put to good use you suspended sentence from the gods. It is about time you realized the nature of the universe (of which you are part) and of the pwoer that rules it (to which your art owes its existence). Your days are numbered. Use them to throw open the windows of your soul to the sun. If you do not, the sun will soon set, and you with it. (II.4)

Bear in mind that the measure of a man is the worth of the things he cares about.

We live only in the present, in this fleet-footed moment. The rest is lost and behind us, or ahead of us and may never be found. Little of life we know, little the plot of earth on which we dwell, little the memory of even the most famous who have lived, and this memory itself is preserved by generations of little men, who know little about themselves and far less about those who died long ago.

Go on abusing yourself, O my soul! Not long and you will lose the opportunity to show yourself any respect. We have only one life to live, and yours is almost over. Because you have chosen not to respect yourself, you have made your happiness subject to the opinions others have of you. (Book 2, Verse 6)

We live only in the present, in this fleet-footed moment. The rest is lost and behind us, or ahead of us and may never be found. Little of life we know, little the plot of earth on which we dwell, little the memory of even the most famous who have lived, and this memory itself is preserved by generations of little men, who know little about themselves and far less about those who died long ago. (Book 3, Verse 10)

Did you know?

The Meditations was written by Marcus Aurelius as a private journal and was never intended for publication.
Much of the work was composed while Marcus was on military campaign on the northern frontiers of the Roman Empire.
This translation was produced by two brothers, C. Scot Hicks and David V. Hicks, who divided the work between literal rendering of the Greek and conveying its meaning in natural English.
David V. Hicks is the author of Norms & Nobility, a treatise on classical education that won an American Library Association Outstanding Book Award in the education category.
The Hicks brothers aimed to translate Marcus as if he were writing in English rather than in second-century Greek.

About Marcus Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius (121-180 AD) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 AD and a Stoic philosopher; his private notebook, known as the Meditations, was written for himself and became one of the most enduring texts of Stoic philosophy. This edition was translated by the brothers C. Scot Hicks and David V. Hicks, longtime educators and defenders of classical learning.

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More by Marcus Aurelius

Meditations Marcus Aurelius

★ 4.28

About the book

The Emperor's Handbook is a modern English translation of the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher who ruled from 161 to 180 AD. The private notebooks were never intended for publication; they are a collection of personal reflections, self-admonitions, and spiritual exercises Marcus wrote to himself, largely while on military campaign, as reminders of how to live well amid the pressures of power, war, and mortality. This edition, prepared by the brothers C. Scot Hicks and David V. Hicks, presents those reflections as practical ethical guidance rather than abstract theory.

The book's central concerns are recognizably Stoic: the distinction between what is within our control and what is not, the disciplined governing of one's own judgments and reactions, acceptance of nature and fate, the shortness of life, and the duty to act justly and rationally toward other human beings. Marcus returns again and again to the same themes, urging himself toward equanimity, humility, and service to the common good, treating philosophy less as a system to be argued than as a daily practice to be lived.

The Hicks translation is distinguished by its aim to render Marcus as though he were writing in contemporary English rather than second-century Greek, prioritizing clarity and immediacy so that the emperor reads as a man of action addressing pressures modern readers still recognize. Alongside the many translations that have kept the Meditations continuously in print for centuries, this accessible version helped introduce the work to a wide general and business readership in the twenty-first century, and it remains a popular gateway into Stoic thought.

Book details

First published: 2002
Length: 148 pages
Reading time: 3 hours
Author: Marcus Aurelius
Genre: Classics
Goodreads rating: 4.28 (371k ratings) →

If you liked this, read…

1
Letters from a StoicSeneca's practical Stoic letters cover the same themes of virtue, mortality, and self-mastery.
2
Discourses and Selected WritingsEpictetus, whom Marcus admired, lays out the Stoic distinction between what is and isn't in our control.
3
The EnchiridionEpictetus's short handbook of Stoic ethics is a natural companion to Marcus's reflections.