reign, to a career of almost continuous warfare.
Marcus Aurelius, born in 121 A.D., was adopted by the Emperor Antoninus Pius in 138 and himself became Emperor in 161. A good deal of his time in
power was spent pacifying the northern and eastern frontiers of the Empire, and the twelve books of Meditations are almost certainly the result of his
private self-communing during his campaigns. Book 2 was probably written 'among the Quadi on the Gran' and Book 3 at Carnuntum, now Haimburg, in
Austria. This will give a date of somewhere between 171 and 173. Unlike the Discourses of Epictetus, they were not intended for an audience; but like
them they are not composed in an orderly, schematic fashion. There seems to have been no idea in the mind of Marcus of future publication, and in that
respect they differ from the Letters of Pliny or of Gregory of Nazianzus, which though perhaps initially meant for the immediate addressee, seem almost
always, perhaps as a result of later revision, to have a wider audience in view. Marcus' Meditations, however, passed unnoticed until 350, and then they
drop out of notice for 550 years. It was, in fact, only with their printing in 1558 that their popularity as a work of comfort and instruction began.
He presents the same sort of problems of classification as did his master Epictetus. He too uses from time to time dualistic language about the relation of
body and soul, and personal transcendent language about the divine. Meditation 5. 27 is a good example of this practice. 'Walk with the Gods. And he
does walk with the Gods who lets them see his soul invariably satisfied with his lot and carrying out the will of that "genius", a particle of himself, which
Zeus has given to every man as his captain and guide.' On the other hand Med. 4.23 seems to hold up as an ideal conformity with the Universe, which is
taken as the equivalent of Nature and the city of Zeus. Such language is more monist in tone. In another traditionally Stoic passage Marcus writes 'For
there is but one Universe, made up of all things and one God immanent in all things, and one substance and one law, one Reason common to all created
intelligences, and one Truth.' There is also an unresolved ambiguity in his mind on the question of personal survival, an ambiguity which seems to
distinguish him from Epictetus. Thus he can write 'What then remains [sc. of us] after death? To wait with a good grace for the end, whether it be
extinction or translation.' One point, particularly connected with his moral advice, seems to distinguish him from his master, and to argue at the same
time in favour of a slightly greater influence of Platonism. Marcus was a great advocate of introversion. 'Look within. Within is the fountain of Good,
ready always to well forth if you are prepared to dig deep enough.' Introversion of this sort, and the reflexion it implies, would appear to rule out a purely
materialistic concept of the soul, and this point, together with the distinct possibility of the existence of life after death, seems to tip the scales in favour
of seeing in Marcus a Platonizing Stoic.