Both a powerful Roman emperor and an important philosopher, Marcus Aurelius (121–180) penned one of the most influential philosophical texts of his era. Meditations, which the emperor wrote between battles in eastern Europe, remains one of the best-known works of Stoic philosophy, a school of thought that emphasized the importance of personal virtue and acceptance of one’s fate.
Marcus, known as the last of the Five Good Emperors, ruled Rome when the empire was at the peak of its might. The arts, philosophy, and commerce flourished during a time of relative peace known as the Pax Romana, or Roman peace, which the philosopher-monarch struggled to maintain and which ended shortly after his death.
Born Marcus Annius Verus, he was a distant relative of the emperor Trajan (53–117). His father was a Roman official whom Marcus credited with teaching him “modesty and a manly character.” At age seventeen, however, after his father’s death, Marcus was adopted by Antoninus Pius (86–161), who became emperor in 138 and hired one of Rome’s best teachers, Marcus Cornelius Fronto (c. 100–170), to tutor the boy.
After the death of Antoninus, Marcus took the throne at age forty, renaming himself Marcus Aurelius. His adoptive brother, Lucius Verus (130–169), served as coemperor for the first eight years of his rule. Wars with the Parthian Empire in Asia and Germanic tribes in Europe preoccupied Marcus for much of his reign.
It is believed that it was during a war with one of the German tribes, the Quadi, that Marcus began writing the Meditations. A compilation of twelve shorter books, the Meditations is both an autobiography of the emperor and the best-known treatise on Stoicism.
According to the Stoics, there is no afterlife, every man and woman is fated for oblivion, and the tribulations of existence are meaningless. “Everything is by nature made but to die,” the emperor wrote.
Still, Marcus believed that people should live virtuously, following natural law. “If thou holdest to this, expecting nothing, fearing nothing, but satisfied with thy present activity according to nature, and with heroic truth in every word and sound which thou utterest, thou wilt live happy,” he wrote. While visiting what’s now the city of Vienna, Marcus Aurelius died at age fifty-eight. He was succeeded by his son, Commodus (161–192).
ADDITIONAL FACTS
- Spotted early in life as being brilliant and hardworking, Marcus was only eight years old when he was named a priest by the emperor Hadrian (76–138).
- Although in theory the position of Roman emperor was hereditary, Marcus was the fifth consecutive Roman emperor who was not the biological son of his predecessor. His own son, Commodus, was the first son to succeed his father to the Roman throne in almost a century.
