Outlive your names. Marcus Aurelius 4.33
Think
carefully. Work with others. Don't cheat or be cheated. That's it, according to
Marcus Aurelius. Making a name is not as important as living well,
since all names are forgotten in time. Remember that your life is just one moment in the vastness of all life, and that every event in your life happens according to nature. Greet all events, even the hard ones, as part of your fate that you accept.
Αἱ
πάλαι συνήθεις λέξεις γλωσσήματα νῦν·
οὕτως οὖν καὶ τὰ ὀνόματα τῶν πάλαι
πολυυμνήτων νῦν τρόπον τινὰ γλωσσήματά
ἐστιν· Κάμιλλος, Καίσων, Οὐόλεσος,
Δεντάτος, κατ’ ὀλίγον δὲ καὶ Σκιπίων
καὶ Κάτων, εἶτα καὶ Αὔγουστος, εἶτα
καὶ Ἁδριανὸς καὶ Ἀντωνῖνος· ἐξίτηλα
γὰρ πάντα καὶ μυθώδη ταχὺ γίνεται,
ταχὺ δὲ καὶ παντελὴς λήθη κατέχωσεν.
καὶ ταῦτα λέγω ἐπὶ τῶν θαυμαστῶς πως
λαμψάντων· οἱ γὰρ λοιποὶ ἅμα τῷ
ἐκπνεῦσαι «ἄιστοι, ἄπυστοι». τί δὲ
καὶ ἔστιν ὅλως τὸ ἀείμνηστον; ὅλον
κενόν. τί οὖν ἐστι περὶ ὃ δεῖ σπουδὴν
εἰσφέρεσθαι; ἓν τοῦτο· διάνοια δικαία
καὶ πράξεις κοινωνικαὶ καὶ λόγος, οἷος
μήποτε διαψεύσασθαι, καὶ διάθεσις
ἀσπαζομένη πᾶν τὸ συμβαῖνον ὡς
ἀναγκαῖον, ὡς γνώριμον, ὡς ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς
τοιαύτης καὶ πηγῆς ῥέον.
Words
once common are now so rare that we remember them only with the aid
of a glossary. The same fate has befallen names belonging to heroes
once celebrated in song: Camillus, Kaeso, Volesus, Dentatus, then
Scipio and Cato, and more recently Augustus, Hadrian, and Antoninus
(†). All these turn swiftly into empty ciphers, marks from myths we
scarce remember, and then forgetfulness swallows them whole. I am
describing the end of those whose worship shines brightest: the rest
of humanity passes out of sight, out of mind the moment its
last breath expires. What is the one thing whose memory endures
forever? An utterly empty void. What then is worth our efforts here?
Just this: a righteous mind, shared labors, and a sense of law that
refuses all deceit. Also a disposition or frame of mind that greets
every event we meet as something necessary and familiar, since it arises from
the same origin and wellspring that produces us.
---
(†)
The
final names in Marcus' list are from imperial
times, including his own dynasty.
Scipio and Cato are names
from the latter days
of the Roman republic, when
Publius Cornelius Scipio (Africanus) defeated Hannibal at Zama (202
BCE) in close proximity to Utica, where Marcius Porcius Cato would
commit suicide (46 BCE) after failing to save the republic from
Caesar. The first set
of names—(i) Camillus, (ii) Kaeso, (iii) Volesus, (iv)
Dentatus—comes from Rome's earliest recorded history, the era of
the early republic and before that the kings. (i) Marcus Furius
Camillus (c. 446-365 BCE) was born into a family of Roman patricians
originally from Tusculum, and pursued a career in the early republic
with great success, leading Roman armies to victory against
Etruscans, Gauls, and Latins. His victory over the Gallic troops of
Brennus, who occupied Rome in the aftermath of the battle of the
Allia (c. 387), earned him the title pater patriae. (ii) Kaeso
(or Caeso) was a praenomen that more than one ancient Roman
bore in early days, including Kaeso
Fabius Vibulanus, a patrician
of the early republic who
perished with all the other
adult males of the gens Fabia
in the battle of the Cremera (477 BCE), against the Etruscans of
Veii. (iii)
The gens Valeria traced its
lineage to one Volesus, a retainer in the court of the Sabine king
Titus Tatius, who
settled the Capitoline hill with his people in the aftermath of the
legendary rape of the Sabine women
(an episode from the era
of Romulus, Rome's first
king).
Valerii (and others) bore the name Volesus
thereafter, as late as the
first century CE. (iv) Manius Curius (ob.
270 CE), the plebeian conqueror of the Samnites and of the Greek king
Pyrrho, was called Dentatus
('toothed') because he was
born with teeth already in his mouth.