Page:Meditations of the Emperor Marcus Antoninus - Volume 1 - Farquharson 1944.pdf/82

 appears to refer in ix. 3 to the approaching birth of a child, and that his youngest child was born in 166–7. As to the composition of Book i the reasoning is hazardous in the extreme. There is the reference to Alexander the Platonist (i. 12), who is thought to have become Greek secretary about 174, but who is in this chapter classed as a teacher, with the other teachers of an earlier date; and there is the mention of Faustina in i. 17. 8, which would naturally be taken to imply that she was alive when it was written. The only ground advanced for a late date is that the sketch of Pius in vi. 30. 2 is shorter than that in i. 16, and so more likely to be written later than 174, about which time Book vi is dated.

As Mr. Haines says, as much may be said against as for Breithaupt's reasoning from the manner of composition, viz. that, assuming the present order of the Books, subjects of composition are treated more briefly when they recur. To me iv. 3. 2–3 would appear, by itself, fatal to Breithaupt's argument, for there seven favourite positions of the writer are enunciated for the first time, in the curtest fashion, and they are all treated later at various places and at considerable length. Such a passage shows that the statements of doctrine rest upon lessons accepted by the writer before he began to compose, as we should expect from their nature would be the case. When these points arise, as they do from time to time, the development of them is longer or shorter according to the mood and interest of the moment.

The conclusion that a study of the Meditations from its various sides has led me tentatively to adopt is that the book enshrines a variety of reflections gradually accumulated over a period of some ten to fifteen years, and governed by the idea of producing a work of consolation lxxiv