Marcus Aurelius' Meditations: the present is all you can lose
The short answer
Marcus Aurelius, emperor of Rome, lived from 26 April 121 to 17 March 180: 21,510 days, under 2% of the three thousand years he imagines in Book II of his Meditations. Yet he argues that the longest life and the shortest lose the same thing at death, the present, because no one can lose a past or future he does not have. All present time, he wrote, is but one point of eternity.
Chapters and transcript
- 0:00
Marcus Aurelius was emperor of Rome, and for years led its armies himself.
Set at the head of the Roman Empire when great dangers threatened, he commanded his armies in chief for several years, the edition's introduction says.
- 0:07
In camp he dated a book of his Meditations: in the country of the Quadi.
In camp before the Quadi he dated the first book of his Meditations; the note closing it is headed “In the country of the Quadi at Granua”.
- 0:13
He was born on 26 April 121 and died on 17 March 180.
The introduction gives his birth on 26 April 121 and his death in Pannonia on 17 March 180.
- 0:21
That is 21,510 days of life.
Counting the days between those dates gives 21,510, about 58.9 years, computed in the film.
- 0:35
If you should live three thousand years, he wrote, or ten thousand,
In Book II he writes: if thou shouldst live three thousand, or as many as ten thousands of years.
- 0:44
against them, his own life is 1.96% of the first, 0.59% of the second.
Against those spans, 58.9 years is 1.96% of three thousand and 0.59% of ten thousand, computed in the film.
- 1:01
Yet the longest life and the shortest lose the same thing at death.
Yet that which is longest of duration and that which is shortest come both to one effect, he writes: the life the longest and the shortest liver parts with is the very same.
- 1:09
Only the present: no one can lose what he does not have.
The present is equal unto all men, and it is all that either can lose; the past and the future a man cannot part with, for how should he part with that which he has not?
- 1:21
Asia and Europe are corners of the world; the whole sea, one drop.
In Book VI: Asia and Europe are but corners of the whole world, the whole sea but one drop, and Mount Athos but a clod.
- 1:29
And all present time is but one point of eternity.
As all present time, he adds, is but as one point of eternity.
Sources
Every figure in the film comes from these. The animation is illustrative.