Beyond Philosophy

Marcus lays out his own approach to life, one that finds good by recourse to communal standards (evident in religion, and in shared human and animal interaction). What is not good for the community he inhabits he categorically rejects as good for himself. This reveals a conception of good that will not work in most modern environs (which presume a level of autonomy in the individual self that is largely alien to antiquity, not just Marcus: philosophers intent upon individual ethics, as opposed to communal, were seen as strange, mad, even dangerous; this is one of the problems Athens has with Socrates). Εἰ μὲν οὖν ἐβουλεύσαντο περὶ ἐμοῦ καὶ τῶν ἐμοὶ συμβῆναι ὀφειλόντων οἱ θεοί, καλῶς ἐβουλεύσαντο· ἄβουλον γὰρ θεὸν οὐδὲ ἐπινοῆσαι ῥᾴδιον, κακοποιῆσαι δέ με διὰ τίνα αἰτίαν ἔμελλον ὁρμᾶν; τί γὰρ αὐτοῖς ἢ τῷ κοινῷ, οὗ μάλιστα προνοοῦνται, ἐκ τούτου περιεγένετο; εἰ δὲ μὴ ἐβουλεύσαντο κατ’ ἰδίαν περὶ ἐμοῦ, περί γε τῶν κοινῶν πάντως ἐβουλεύσαντο, οἷς κατ’ ἐπακολούθησιν καὶ ταῦτα συμβαίνοντα ἀσπ...

Faith, trust, confidence: Unamuno believes that these are for people, not things. It is easier for him to trust the ignorance of a person than to have faith in knowledge or information, as things in themselves. La fe que definió San Pablo, la πίστις , pistis , griega, se traduce mejor por confianza. La voz pisti s, en efecto, procede del verbo πείθω , peitho, que si en su voz activa significa persuadir, en la media equivale a confiar en uno, hacerle caso, fiarse de él, obedecer. Y fiarse, fidare se , procede del tema fid— de donde fides , fe, y de donde también confianza —. Y el tema griego πιθ —pith— y el latino fid parecen hermanos. Y en resolución, que la voz misma fe lleva en su origen implícito el sentido de confianza, de rendimiento a una voluntad ajena, a una persona. Sólo se confía en las personas. Confíase en la Providencia que concebimos como algo personal y consciente, no en el Hado, que es algo impersonal. Y así se cree en quien nos dice la verdad, en quien nos da ...

Seneca finishes his epistle on how masters should relate to servants, showcasing the abiding contempt that Romans had for kings, even in the age of the emperors. Note his warning about the power of luxury: having our every whim catered to makes us naturally furious, inclined to rage whenever the least little thing is denied us (whether by accident or on purpose, by human intervention or by nature). Dicet aliquis nunc me vocare ad pilleum servos et dominos de fastigio suo deicere, quod dixi, colant potius dominum quam timeant. Ita inquit prorsus? colant tamquam clientes, tamquam salutatores? Hoc qui dixerit obliviscetur id dominis parum non esse quod deo sat est. Qui colitur, et amatur: non potest amor cum timore misceri. Rectissime ergo facere te iudico quod timeri a servis tuis non vis, quod verborum castigatione uteris: verberibus muta admonentur. Non quidquid nos offendit et laedit; sed ad rabiem cogunt pervenire deliciae, ut quidquid non ex voluntate respondit iram evocet. Regum ...