Page:Marcus Aurelius (Haines 1916).djvu/20

INTRODUCTION throughout is abrupt and concise, and words have occasionally to be supplied to complete the sense. There is here no reasoned treatise on Ethics, no exposition of Stoic Philosophy, such as the sectarum ardua ac perocculta or the ordo praeceptionum, on which Marcus is said to have discoursed before he set out the last time for the war in 178, but we have a man and a ruler taking counsel with himself, noting his own shortcomings, excusing those of others, and "whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honourable, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are pure," exhorting his soul to think on these things. Never were words written more transparently single-hearted and sincere. They were not merely written, they were lived. Those who accuse Marcus of pharisaism wilfully mistake his character and betray their own. Very noticeable is the delicacy of the author's mind and the restrained energy of his style. He eschews all the windflowers of speech, but the simplicity, straight-forwardness, and dignity of his thoughts lend an imperial nobility to his expression of them. There is a certain choiceness and even poetry in his words "which amply condone an occasional roughness and technicality of phrase. Striking images are not infrequent, and such a passage as Book II, 2 is unique in ancient literature. This is not a book of confessions, and comparatively few allusions to personal incidents are to be found except in the first book, while an air of complete aloofness and detachment pervades the whole. The author expressly disclaims all or originality and xii