Let me tell you one of my favourite stories… Two and a half thousand years ago the Greek philosopher Socrates remarked that society will never flourish until kings become philosophers, or philosophers become kings. However, there had never actually been a king who was a Socratic-style philosopher. In fact, about five hundred years elapsed before a man appeared on the world-stage whom historians would confidently call a philosopher-king. Or rather, not just a king but an emperor. His name was Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Emperor of Rome in the late 2nd century AD.

Marcus followed a Hellenistic philosophy called Stoicism, which…

The Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius was extremely well-read. Indeed, he urges himself several times in The Meditations, his personal notebook of philosophical reflections, to set aside his reading and focus on improving his character instead. He was clearly a bit of a bookworm. So what exactly did he like to read?

In his love of ancient literature he was second to no man, Roman or Greek…

We have several Roman histories which discuss Marcus Aurelius’ life. These contain a few references to his literary interests. Indeed, one historian, Herodian, writes:

He was concerned with all aspects of…

I do not withdraw the wise man from the category of man, nor do I deny to him the sense of pain as though he were a rock that has no feelings at all. — Seneca, Letters, 71

Stoicism has become a quite trendy over the past couple of decades. When I first began writing about it, roughly 25 years ago now, things were very different.

Until recently, there were very few popular books about the subject and they weren’t very widely-read. There were not many articles on websites. Now, though, new books and articles appear every day. That’s a…

Every single “academy” in the world is named after the original Akademia of Athens. Founded by Plato after the execution of his teacher, Socrates, at the start of the 4th century BC, Plato’s Academy was the first major school of philosophy, the first academic institution. It’s one of the very foundation stones of Western civilization. For centuries, it was considered a centre of learning, and a beacon of light, throughout the Western world.

“What happened to it?”, people ask, “Where was it located?” and “Does Plato’s Academy still exist?”

I’m an author, writing about philosophy, who happens to live in…

This month I was added to Medium’s new Writer Support Program. It’s still a bit of an experiment so you may not have received notifications about all of the new articles below…

• The Military Metaphor in Marcus Aurelius
• How Socrates Could Save America
• Marcus Aurelius in Therapy
• The Stoicism of George Washington
• Death, Love, Stoicism

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Donald Robertson

In one of the most famous passages of The Meditations, the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius writes that everything physical is as transient as a stream rushing past us, everything belonging to the mind is as insubstantial as vapour and deceptive as smoke or mist, and that…

…life is warfare, and a sojourn in foreign land. — Meditations, 2.17

Only one thing can save us from all this confusion: philosophy, the love of wisdom.

Marcus was literally engaged in warfare, in a foreign land, when he wrote this.

He goes on to say many striking things about the philosophy he followed…

George Washington, known for his exemplary self-discipline and mental composure, is a figure in whom many see the influence of Stoicism. Unlike some of the other Founding Fathers, he lacked a classical education. Nevertheless, according to Eliot Morison’s The Young Man Washington (1932), Washington was indeed inspired by Stoic philosophy.

Morison attributed Washington’s self-discipline to a philosophy of life acquired in his late teens from his friends the Fairfaxes. The Fairfax family, although devout Christians, drew considerable inspiration from the writings of Plutarch, Marcus Aurelius, and other classical authors influenced by Stoicism. …

The idea of a Roman emperor undergoing a course of psychotherapy probably sounds like historical fiction, right? Well, it’s not. The Roman emperor, Marcus Aurelius, was famously a lifelong follower of the ancient Greek philosophy of Stoicism. Stoic philosophers employed an early form of cognitive psychotherapy, and Marcus had a therapist.

Indeed, the word Marcus uses here in Greek is therapeia — there’s no question that it means therapy.

How do we know this? Because he tells us so, right at the beginning of his personal notebook, known to us today as The Meditations. Marcus is looking back on the…