Timeless Stoic Wisdom by Marcus Aurelius: The Philosopher-King

Introduction: Living Stoically with Marcus Aurelius

• Embrace what you can control: Focus on your own judgments and actions; accept what lies beyond your power.

• Practice the cardinal Stoic virtues: Wisdom, courage, justice, and temperance are the path to a flourishing life.

• Align with Nature (Logos): View every challenge as an opportunity for growth, virtue, and self-mastery.

100 Enduring Quotes from Marcus Aurelius

Below you’ll find 100 of Marcus Aurelius’s most powerful and practical Stoic affirmations. Use them as morning meditations, reminders throughout your day, or inspiration for conversations, writing, and meaningful living.

On Mindset and Self-Mastery

1. You have power over your mind—not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.

2. Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.

3. The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.

4. Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself.

5. Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.

6. When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive—to think, to enjoy, to love.

7. The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.

8. Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.

9. If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself but to your estimate of it.

10. The best revenge is not to be like your enemy.

On Acceptance and Virtue

1. Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together.

2. Loss is nothing else but change, and change is Nature’s delight.

3. Receive without pride, let go without attachment.

4. It is not events that disturb people, but their judgments concerning them.

5. A man’s worth is no greater than the worth of what he values.

6. Live each day as if it were your last—without frenzy, without apathy, without pretense.

7. How much time he gains who does not look to see what his neighbor says or does or thinks, but only at what he does himself.

8. Be tolerant with others and strict with yourself.

9. The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.

10. People seek retreats for themselves—but nowhere can a man find a quieter or more untroubled retreat than in his own soul.

On Change, Nature, and Mortality

1. The universe is change; our life is what our thoughts make it.

2. Consider that before long you will be nobody and nowhere, nor will anything that you now behold exist, nor one of those who are now alive.

3. Death smiles at us all; all we can do is smile back.

4. No man is happy who does not think himself so.

5. Perfection of character: to live each day as if it were your last.

6. What we do now echoes in eternity.

7. Constantly regard the universe as one living being, having one substance and one soul.

8. The mind adapts and converts to its own purposes the obstacle to action.

9. To bear trials with a calm mind robs misfortune of its strength and burden.

10. Look well into thyself; there is a source of strength which will always spring up if thou wilt always look.

On Action and Perspective

1. It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.

2. Live in harmony with yourself, and you will live in harmony with the universe.

3. A man’s true delight is to do the things he was made for.

4. Nothing happens to any man which he is not formed by nature to endure.

5. What stands in the way becomes the way.

6. All is ephemeral—fame and the famous as well.

7. How ridiculous and how strange to be surprised at anything which happens in life!

8. Remember that all is opinion.

9. You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.

10. No loss is more regretful than the loss of time.

On Judgments and Equanimity

1. People are not disturbed by things, but by the views they take of them.

2. First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.

3. Be content with what you are, and wish not change.

4. A cucumber is bitter—throw it away. There are briars in the road—turn aside from them.

5. To live happily is an inward power of the soul.

6. The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing.

7. Even after a poor crop one should sow again; for often fertility follows barrenness.

8. Observe always that everything is the result of change, and get used to thinking that there is nothing Nature loves so well as to change existing forms.

9. Consider that before long you will be nobody, and know that the showcase of the world is empty.

10. Reject your sense of injury, and the injury itself disappears.

On Destiny, Fate, and Resilience

1. Love only what happens, what was destined.

2. It never ceases to amaze me: we all love ourselves more than other people, but care more about their opinions than our own.

3. Remember that to change your mind upon occasion, and to follow someone who can correct you, is equally ingenuous.

4. Perceive before you react.

5. To a rational being, nothing is more shameful than to give offense, nothing more disgraceful than to take offense.

6. All that happens happens as it should—and so it happens.

7. Everything that happens either has happened before or is bound to happen again.

8. When you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: ‘I must go to work—to the human tasks my nature assigned me.’

9. If someone can show me that what I think or do is not right, I will happily change—for I seek the truth.

10. The impediment to action advances action. The obstacle becomes the way.

On Joy, Endurance, and Growth

1. No act of virtue can be great if it is not also accompanied by great joy.

2. Bear and forbear.

3. Associate with those who will improve you.

4. Suffering arises from trying to control what is uncontrollable.

5. Fortune bids me follow philosophy with fewer encumbrances.

6. The best answer to anger is reason.

7. That which is not good for the hive is not good for the bee.

8. Kindness is invincible when it’s sincere.

9. Wipe out all irrelevant impressions.

10. Be like the rock that the waves keep crashing over—it stands unmoved.

On Character and True Good Fortune

1. True good fortune is what you make for yourself: good character, good intentions, good actions.

2. Treat every moment as an opportunity for virtue.

3. Nothing belongs to you but your flesh and blood; everything else is beyond control.

4. He who lives in harmony with himself lives in harmony with the universe.

5. When you arise in the morning, reflect on the fleeting nature of all things.

6. Live as if you were dying today. Learn as if you were living forever.

7. Respect the faculty that forms your judgments.

8. Speak only if it improves upon the silence.

9. Judge events by their nature, not by fear or desire.

10. The happiness and unhappiness of the rational animal depend not on feelings but on actions.

On Simplicity and Reflection

1. Avoid luxury in speech, conduct, and dress.

2. Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate all that comes before you.

3. The mind is its own place and can make a heaven of hell or a hell of heaven.

4. What concerns me is not the way things are but how people think they are.

5. If it is not right, do not do it; if it is not true, do not say it.

6. He who fears death will never do anything worthy of life.

7. Hold fast to what is within you.

8. Let your understanding enter into things that happen to you.

9. Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens.

10. Remember: you own only what you can part with.

On Adversity, Possessions, and Time

1. Treat adversity as the pathway to virtue.

2. Let not your mind run on what you lack but on what you have already.

3. Nothing happens to anyone that he cannot bear by nature.

4. Think of yourself as dead; take what remains and live it properly.

5. Be indifferent to that which makes no difference.

6. Whoever yields properly to fate is deemed wise among men.

7. When you are offended at any man’s fault, turn to yourself and study your own failings.

8. Remember: life is short, duty is urgent.

9. Live according to nature, and you will never err.

10. The universe is change; life is opinion.

Using the Maxims of Marcus Aurelius

• Daily Journaling: Reflect on one quote each morning to set your intention for the day.

• Mindful Practice: Use a maxim as a touchstone when faced with challenge or adversity.

• Conversation & Reflection: Share and discuss these principles with friends, family, or your community.

Let the wisdom of the Philosopher-King remind you: happiness, resilience, and virtue are found not in circumstances, but in how you govern your inner world and your response to each moment.