Page:The Emperor Marcus Antoninus - His Conversation with Himself.djvu/297

 Rh XXX. Rub out the Colours of Imagination ; Don't suffer your Passions to make a Machine of you. Confine your Care to the present ; Look through the Quality, and press into the Nature of that which happens either to your self, or another. Distinuish the parts of your Subject, and divide them into Matter and Form, and into Body, and Spirit when they have them : Think upon your Last Hour; and don't trouble your self about other Peoples Faults , but leave them with those that must answer for them.

XXXI. When you hear a Discourse, make your Understanding keep pace with it, and reach as far as you can into those Things which fall under your Observation.

XXXII. Would you set off your Person, and recommend your self? Let it be done by Simplicity and Candour, by Modesty of Behaviour, and by Indifference to External Advantages : Love Mankind, and resign to Providence: For as the Poet observes, All things are under Law, and Superiour Direction. And what if the Elements only had their Course chalk'd out, and their Motions prescribed them ? But we may carry the conclusion farther. For there are at the most but very few things in the World perfectly turn'd over to Chance and Liberty. Rh