Marcus Aurelius · 121–180 CE
Meditations 2.4 — Marcus Aurelius
Translation by George Long (1862)
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 2.4
Remember how long thou hast been putting off these things, and how often thou hast received an opportunity from the gods, and yet dost not use it. Thou must now at last perceive of what universe thou art a part, and of what administrator of the universe thy existence is an efflux, and that a limit of time is fixed for thee, which if thou dost not use for clearing away the clouds from thy mind, it will go and thou wilt go, and it will never return.
Cite this passage
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 2.4, tr. George Long (1862)
https://whatwouldstoicsdo.com/passage/meditations/2.4
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, tr. George Long (1862). Text: Standard Ebooks (CC0). Sources and licences
In plain English
AI-written notesYou have kept postponing the work of living well, and the time you are given is limited. Use it to clear the fog from your mind before it runs out and does not come back.
Older wording
- “efflux”
- — an outflow or emanation
- “administrator of the universe”
- — the divine ordering power
Themes and situations
- Time and the present
- Death and mortality
- Learning and progress
- Procrastination
- Feeling life is slipping by
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