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    The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius: A Primer
    The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius: A Primer
    The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius: A Primer
    Ebook62 pages59 minutes

    The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius: A Primer

    By David Tuffley

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    About this ebook

    The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius is a perennial, belonging to a very special category of book that has but a few members out of the millions of books ever published; longevity. It has a simple, powerful message that is as fresh and useful today as it was nearly two thousand years ago. The greater the Truth, the more simply it can be put. The original book states a few great Truths, and states them very simply.

    That alone makes it worthy of careful study, but it has more to commend it than that. The greater the Truth, the more simply it can be put. The original book states a few great Truths, and states them very simply.

    Meditations is basically the author’s personal journal, written in private over a ten year period. It is doubtful whether he intended it to ever be read by others. It was a way for him to remind himself what he recognised as being most important to remember about Life.
    As a result, there is much repetition of ideas. A few big ideas are constantly discussed, these being uppermost in the author’s mind as the months and years rolled by.

    Therefore this Primer provides a summary of the recurrent ideas of Meditations, and does so in 21st Century language, easily accessible to modern readers. It presents the first five books as being representative of the entire twelve books. This is sufficient to grasp the essence of the original.

    In Meditations you come to know the real man, and to the reader this can seem an extraordinary privilege. But the man was also an emperor, and no ordinary emperor, one of the finest in Rome’s illustrious history. A truly remarkable man by any standard, but as you will see, a modest, even humble man. Even today, Meditations stands tall as a guide to staying calm under pressure when there is a difficult job to do.
    Marcus Aurelius might have been a Roman, but his thinking had been shaped, like so many educated Romans, by the classical period of ancient Greece. Indeed, Meditations was written in Greek. Even today, classical Greek thinking still permeates the foundations of Western civilisation.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAltiora Publications
    Release dateJan 10, 2012
    ISBN9781466030756
    The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius: A Primer
    Author

    David Tuffley

    David Tuffley (PhD) is a Senior Lecturer in Applied Ethics & Socio-Technical Studies at Griffith University in Australia.David writes on a broad range of interests; from Comparative Religion, Anthropology, Psychology, Ancient and Modern History, Linguistics, Rhetoric, Philosophy, Architectural History, Environments and Ecosystems.

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      Book preview

      The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius - David Tuffley

      The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius

      A Primer

      David Tuffley

      Published by Altiora Publications at Smashwords

      www.altiorapublications.com

      © Copyright 2012 David Tuffley

      Until ‘kings were philosophers or philosophers were kings’ there will be injustice in the world - Plato

      Smashwords Edition, License Notes

      This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the work of this author.

      About the Author

      David Tuffley PhD is a Lecturer at Griffith University in Australia where he lectures in Philosophy. He has a particular interest in the comparative Ethics of the Eastern and Western traditions.

      Contents

      Prologue

      The rarest of all

      The essence of stoic philosophy

      Book 1

      Book 2

      Book 3

      Book 4

      Book 5

      Epilogue

      Prologue

      The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius is a perennial, belonging to a very special category of book that has but a few members out of the millions of books ever published; longevity. It has a simple, powerful message that is as fresh and useful today as it was nearly two thousand years ago.

      That alone makes it worthy of careful study, but it has more to commend it than that. The greater the Truth, the more simply it can be put. The original book states a few great Truths, and states them very simply.

      Meditations is basically the author’s personal journal, written in private over a ten year period. It is doubtful whether he intended it to ever be read by others. It was a way for him to remind himself what he recognised as being most important to remember about Life.

      As a result, there is much repetition of ideas. A few big ideas are constantly discussed, these being uppermost in the author’s mind as the months and years rolled by.

      Therefore this Primer provides a summary of the recurrent ideas of Meditations, and does so in 21st Century language, easily accessible to modern readers. It presents the first five books as being representative of the entire twelve books. This is sufficient to grasp the essence of the original.

      The rarest of all

      Marcus Aurelius (full name Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, 121 – 180 AD) is an exceedingly rare individual; a genuine philosopher-king. His leadership is based on the often misunderstood Stoic philosophy. The power and relevance of this philosophy is as potent today as it was when he was Roman Emperor (161 to 180AD).

      Meditations is essentially the private journal that he wrote for his own guidance later in life (between 170 and 180) when away from Rome on military campaigns. Written in a plain, unvarnished manner, it offers the reader a candid portrait of his innermost thoughts and feelings. Remember that he is talking to himself when he refers to ‘you’. This will make it less likely that you will take offence at his didactic tone.

      In Meditations you come to know the real man, and to the reader this can seem an extraordinary privilege. But the man was also an emperor, and no ordinary emperor, one of the finest in Rome’s illustrious history. A truly remarkable man by any standard, but as you will see, a modest, even humble man. Even today, Meditations stands tall as a guide to staying calm under pressure when there is a difficult job to do.

      Marcus Aurelius might have been a Roman, but his thinking had been shaped, like so many educated Romans, by the classical period of ancient Greece. Indeed, Meditations was written in Greek. Even today, classical Greek thinking still permeates the foundations of Western civilisation.

      The Greek philosopher Plato (427 to 347 BC) famously wrote that until ‘kings were philosophers or philosophers were kings’ there will be injustice in the world. Marcus Aurelius worked diligently to apply Plato’s ideas and those of the Stoic philosophers who followed Plato.

      A note on this translation

      Earlier English translations of this text are accurate but difficult to understand for many readers living in the 21st Century. The mode of expression and the figures of speech are the product of that far-off time. This book faithfully re-expresses in modern day language the underlying message of the original text. Every effort has been made to preserve the underlying spirit of the message.

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