contrast, things outside our control have no ability to harm
us. Acts of wrongdoing by a human agent (torture, theft, or
other crimes) harm the agent, not the victim. Acts of nature
such as fire, illness, or death can harm us only if we choose
to see them as harmful. When we do so, we question the
benevolence and providence of the logos, and thereby
degrade our own logos.
This, of course, we must not do. Instead we must see
things for what they are (here the discipline of perception is
relevant) and accept them, by exercising the discipline of
will, or what Epictetus calls (in a phrase quoted by Marcus)
“the art of acquiescence.” For if we recognize that all events
have been foreseen by the logos and form part of its plan,
and that the plan in question is unfailingly good (as it must
be), then it follows that we must accept whatever fate has in
store for us, however unpleasant it may appear, trusting that,
in Alexander Pope’s phrase, “whatever is, is right.” This
applies to all obstacles and (apparent) misfortunes, and in
particular to death—a process that we cannot prevent, which
therefore does not harm us, and which accordingly we must
accept willingly as natural and proper.
Together, the three disciplines constitute a comprehensive
approach to life, and in various combinations and
reformulations they underlie a large number of the entries in
the Meditations. We see them laid out starkly and explicitly
in Meditations 7.54: