Stoic Reflection From Marcus Aurelius: Words We Call Ourselves By (Part 3)
Do You Understand The Words You Use To Describe Good Character?
In two earlier posts, we have explored important lessons and questions for our relationships stemming from a set of passages in Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations. They come up in book 10, chapter 8. First, we looked at the meanings of the terms Marcus suggests we should want to call ourselves (and our partners) by. Second, we considered whose views on whether we have these qualities or not we ought to value, and whether or not we want to live a genuinely better life.
Another aspect of that chapter that we haven’t touched on yet, but is well worth exploring and applying to our own lives and relationships, comes up in a portion of the chapter we haven’t cited yet, specifically this part (in a slightly modified version of Hayes’ translation:
Keep in mind that “sanity” means understanding things— each individual thing—for what they are. And not losing the thread.
And “cooperation” means accepting what nature assigns you—accepting it willingly.
And “high-minded” means that the intelligence should rise above the movements of the flesh—the rough and the smooth alike. Should rise above fame, above death, and everything like them.
Marcus here is reminding himself, quite literally telling himself “remember” (memnēso), that these terms he would like to apply to himself have real, determinate meanings. They can’t be interpreted however one likes in order to fit oneself into them, and feel good about being able to label oneself with positive characteristics.
In fact, something that gets left out in the English translation, but is clearly there in Marcus’ Greek is that he attributes these terms a kind of agency in meaning, admittedly perhaps one that is metaphorical. He says “remember that sanity wishes (ebouleto) to be interpreted as (semainein)”, or you could say “to mean”. And then he provides the short gloss on what that quality is.
We’ll look at each of his characterizations of these three positive qualities in just a bit. But before that, we should dwell on what significance the fact holds that he does linger for a moment over the meaning of these terms. What reasons might he have for reminding himself of their meanings?
It is easy to throw around terms that we think correspond to good traits of character. Really, just about anyone can do it. It’s just as easy, if one remains sufficiently vague about what they mean, to ascribe them to ourselves or to others. People do that all the time. Think about the stretching of the term “brave” in our own current culture, where you might call unironically someone else (or even yourself) “brave” for dealing with some trivial instance or challenge, or even for just continuing to exist in the face of some adversity. Not quite the same thing as the “bravery” required to stand up for a bullied co-worker, knowing that stance will likely make you a target as well, now is it?
Not just anything can be wisdom, or justice, or temperance, even if people want to stretch the meanings of these terms so far that you’re surprised they don’t just snap. Everybody can use terms like “good”, “modest”, or “truthful” to describe themselves, to flatter other people, or to fake themselves out about people they’d like to think better of. When called out for that, if they don’t just admit they don’t really understand what the words mean, they might come up with their own mischaracterizations of those terms. But they can’t really make those words stick, not if the terms have any genuine meaning corresponding to actual moral qualities.
Reading between the lines, Marcus is telling himself (and us, his readers): you want to call yourself things like “sane, cooperative, high-minded”, and that’s great. Now make those words refer to something. He’s not necessarily giving us formal definitions in those three sentences, but he is picking out some key aspects to what sanity, cooperativeness, and high-mindedness involve.
We could do this with all sorts of other moral vocabulary. Are you attracted to the Stoic schema of four main, “cardinal” virtues? Would you like to be able to call yourself, or your partner, a person who is prudent, just, courageous, and temperate? That’s great! Now explain what those are. If you can’t give any sort of explanation, those are at this point, for you, just buzzwords, what my kindergarten teacher used to call “warm fuzzies” (as opposed to “cold pricklies”).
Since Marcus did provide us with characterizations of these three terms, let’s look briefly at them. Being “sane” (to emphrōn) involves attentiveness (epistasin) in judgement (dialēptikēn) to each particular matter (eph’ hekasta). This arguably names either a subordinate virtue or a type of conduct belonging to the cardinal virtue of prudence.
The way he characterizes cooperation (or being cooperative, or in concord, to sumphōn) seems a bit odd, since it doesn’t mention other people, but rather those things that are assigned to you (aponemomenōn) by nature. Actually not just by nature, but by “common nature” (apo tēs koinēs phuseōs), or you might say nature as the totality or whole. What does the cooperative person do? They accept, or welcome (apodexin), and they do so willingly or voluntarily (ekousion) rather than grudgingly. This one also can be located within the sphere of a cardinal virtue, namely justice.
Then there’s being high-minded (uperphrōn), which is elevation (uperstasin) of the thinking part (tou phronountos moriou) of ourselves above the movements of the flesh (kinēsin tēs sarkos), our little reputation (doxarion), death, and “all that sort of stuff” (kai hosa toiauta), that is, the sort of stuff our culture and other people (and even we ourselves) will tell us are really important and obsess over. This clearly falls within the scope of the cardinal virtue of courage, and high-mindedness might even just be a synonym Marcus uses for the subordinate virtue of magnanimity or great-souledness (megalopsukhia).
When you spell out what each of these means and requires, then the question becomes a bit more pointed. Do I really have this quality, or not? Can I say my habits, my mindset, my choices, my attitudes, my emotional responses, my actions fit these characterizations? What about my partner’s? Have I been fooling myself, or perhaps even fooling them?
We can close up this third exploration of the passage by thinking about three more questions it might be helpful to ask ourselves.
With positive terms I’d like to apply to myself or my partner, do I really know what they mean?
Do my partner and I share the same conceptions of what the terms that matter to us mean?
If it turns out that we don’t really understand what they mean, where can we go to find out their real meanings?
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