Fear Marcus Aurelius Quotes & Sayings

Now departure from the world of men is nothing to fear, if gods exist: because they would not involve you in any harm. If they do not exist, or if they have no care for humankind, then what is life to me in a world devoid of gods, or devoid of providence? But they do exist, and they do care for humankind: and they have put it absolutely in man's power to avoid falling into the true kinds of harm. — Marcus Aurelius

Manifold are our sins against God. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

International order is not an evolution; it is an imposition. It is the domination of one vision over others- in this case, the domination of liberal principles of economics, domestic politics, and international relations over other, nonliberal principles. It will last only as long as those who imposed it retain the capacity to defend it. — Robert Kagan

He who fears death either fears to lose all sensation or fears new sensations. In reality, you will either feel nothing at all, and therefore nothing evil, or else, if you can feel any sensations, you will be a new creature, and so will not have ceased to have life. — Marcus Aurelius

If you are pained by external things, it is not they that disturb you, but your own judgement of them. And it is in your power to wipe out that judgement now. — Marcus Aurelius

My only fear is doing something contrary to human nature - the wrong thing, the wrong way, or at the wrong time. — Marcus Aurelius

You need to be prepared for firm decisions and action, without losing gentleness towards those who obstruct or abuse you. It's as great a weakness to be angry with them as it is to abandon your plan of action and give up through fear. — Marcus Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius, AD 121-180, author of Meditations. Quoth said emperor: It is not death a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live. And also: You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realise this, and you will find strength. — Claire North

It is presumptuous to draw conclusions about a person from what one has heard — Jude Morgan

III. I have often wondered how it should come to pass, that every man loving himself best, should more regard other men's opinions concerning himself than his own. For if any God or grave master standing by, should command any of us to think nothing by himself but what he should presently speak out; no man were able to endure it, though but for one day. Thus do we fear more what our neighbours will think of us, than what we ourselves. — Marcus Aurelius

Your dreamer may do without a creed, but he always wants a ritual ... — Evelyn Underhill

I'm happy to be going," said Mig, putting a hand up and gently touching one of her cauliflower ears.
"Might just as well be happy, seeing as it doesn't make a difference to anyone but you if you are or not," said the soldier. — Kate DiCamillo

Where any work can be done conformably to the reason which is common to gods and men, there we have nothing to fear; for where we are able to get profit by means of the activity which is successful and proceeds according to our constitution, there no harm is to be suspected. — Marcus Aurelius

What else is love, but to give someone else happiness when you know your own is impossible? — Garon Whited

Either the gods have no power or they have power. If, then, they have no power, why do you pray to them? But if they have power, why do you not pray for them to give you the faculty of not fearing any of the things that you fear, or of not desiring any of the things that you desire, or not being pained at anything, rather than pray that they should grant this or refuse that? For certainly if they can cooperate with men, they can cooperate for these purposes. But perhaps you will say, the gods have placed this in your power. Well, then, is it not better to use what is in your power like a free man than to desire in a slavish and abject way what is not in your power? And who has told you that the gods do not aid us even in the things that are in our power? — Marcus Aurelius

Turn thy thoughts now to the consideration of thy life, thy life as a child, as a youth, thy manhood, thy old age, for in these also every change was a death. Is this anything to fear? — Marcus Aurelius

None of us have much time. And yet you act as if things were eternal - the way you fear and long for them. ... Before long, darkness. And whoever buries you mourned in their turn. — Marcus Aurelius

Do not fear death, but welcome it, since it too comes from nature. For just as we are young and grow old, and flourish and reach maturity, have teeth and a beard and grey hairs, conceive, become pregnant, and bring forth new life, and all the other natural processes that follow the seasons of our existence, so also do we have death. A thoughtful person will never take death lightly, impatiently, or scornfully, but will wait for it as one of life's natural processes. — Marcus Aurelius

Let me amplify and paraphrase, then, what it seems Jesus was saying [Luke 12]: 'In light of the fact that you have a God in heaven who is set on caring for you as a shepherd does his sheep, as a father does his children, and as a king does who is passing on an entire kingdom, don't be anxious. Sell your possessions, give to the poor, and don't worry. Your God - your Shepherd, your Father your King - has everything under control. — David Platt

A trite but effective tactic against the fear of death: think of the list of people who had to be pried away from life. What did they gain by dying old? In the end, they all sleep six feet under - Caedicianus, Fabius, Julian, Lepidus, and all the rest. They buried their contemporaries, and were buried in turn. Our lifetime is so brief. And to live it out in these circumstances, among these people, in this body? Nothing to get excited about. Consider the abyss of time past, the infinite future. Three days of life or three generations: what's the difference? — Marcus Aurelius

Either the gods have power or they don't. If they don't,
why pray? If they do, then why not pray for something else
instead of for things to happen or not to happen? Pray not to
feel fear. Or desire, or grief. If the gods can do anything, they
can surely do that for us. - But those are things the gods left up to me.
Then isn't it better to do what's up to you - like a free man
- than to be passively controlled by what isn't, like a slave
or beggar? And what makes you think the gods don't care
about what's up to us?
Start praying like this and you'll see.
Not "some way to sleep with her" - but a way to stop
wanting to.
Not "some way to get rid of him" - but a way to stop
trying.
Not "some way to save my child" - but a way to lose your
fear.
Redirect your prayers like that, and watch what happens. — Marcus Aurelius

XV. Is any man so foolish as to fear change, to which all things that once were not owe their being? And — Marcus Aurelius

I am out in public and using the phone. I am in a phone booth, got the phone in my hand and a man taps on the glass and says You using the phone? Nope, I'm superman, i am just looking for my costume. Here's your sign! — Bill Engvall

I test my bath before I sit, And I'm always moved to wonderment That what chills the finger not a bit Is so frigid upon the fundament. — Ogden Nash

It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live. — Marcus Aurelius

Why do you hunger for length of days? The point of life is to follow reason and the divine spirit and to accept whatever nature sends you. To live in this way is not to fear death, but to hold it in contempt. Death is only a thing of terror for those unable to live in the present. Pass on your way, then, with a smiling face, under the smile of him who bids you go — Marcus Aurelius