Cosmopolis. Marcus Aurelius 4.4

Marcus offers a brief sketch of the Stoic universe, which is imagined as a great city, in which all thought, word, and action reside, including our little human ones beside those of the gods and other living beings. Does sharing here imply agreement, or not? The natural elements Marcus introduces as comparands for human thought, reason, and law do not always dance together peacefully, though we find harmony in their movement over time. From the perspective Marcus takes here, thought and its derivatives exist as expressions of something larger than just the individual: when my thoughts are communicable to others, they cannot be simply or solely mine, and must come from elsewhere, even as particular manifestations of weather come from natural elements diffuse in the universe. The source of thought is identified as government, discernible in collective action, mediated by signals.

Εἰ τὸ νοερὸν ἡμῖν κοινόν, καὶ ὁ λόγος, καθ᾽ ὃν λογικοί ἐσμεν, κοινός· εἰ τοῦτο, καὶ ὁ προστακτικὸς τῶν ποιητέων ἢ μὴ λόγος κοινός· εἰ τοῦτο, καὶ ὁ νόμος κοινός· εἰ τοῦτο, πολῖταί ἐσμεν· εἰ τοῦτο, πολιτεύματός τινος μετέχομεν· εἰ τοῦτο, ὁ κόσμος ὡσανεὶ πόλις ἐστί· τίνος γὰρ ἄλλου φήσει τις τὸ τῶν ἀνθρώπων πᾶν γένος κοινοῦ πολιτεύματος μετέχειν; ἐκεῖθεν δέ, ἐκ τῆς κοινῆς ταύτης πόλεως, καὶ αὐτὸ τὸ νοερὸν καὶ λογικὸν καὶ νομικὸν ἡμῖν ἢ πόθεν; ὥσπερ γὰρ τὸ γεῶδές μοι ἀπό τινος γῆς ἀπομεμέρισται καὶ τὸ ὑγρὸν ἀφ᾽ ἑτέρου στοιχείου καὶ τὸ πνευματικὸν ἀπὸ πηγῆς τινος καὶ τὸ θερμὸν καὶ πυρῶδες ἔκ τινος ἰδίας πηγῆς (οὐδὲν γὰρ ἐκ τοῦ μηδενὸς ἔρχεται, ὥσπερ μηδ᾽ εἰς τὸ οὐκ ὂν ἀπέρχεται), οὕτω δὴ καὶ τὸ νοερὸν ἥκει ποθέν.

If thought is something we share, then so is reason, and sharing it makes us rational beings. If this is true, then the governing principle of all our collective actions is nothing but shared reason. Grant this, and we see that law is something we share. Sharing law, we become citizens, and as citizens we share government. Thus, we discover the universe bestowed as though it were a city. What better name could we find for a government shared by all the race of man? And so, our shared thought and reason and law must come from this same city of the universe, that we share. Whence else could they come? Every sort of dirt comes from earth, and what is wet from water. Likewise, every breath has its source in the air, and things warm and fiery elsewhere. For nothing arises from nothing, as we can see from the fact that nothing passes away into nothing. Even so, thought must derive from somewhere.