Aurelius’ straightforward style of philosophizing in Meditations is a refreshing change from the dominant academic approach to philosophy. Aurelius is not interested in teaching or researching. He doesn’t make arguments because he doesn’t need to. The arguments for why one should care only about virtue and live life according to reason, while remaining indifferent to everything else, had already been put forward by Socrates. Marcus is too busy being an emperor. He simply wants to use philosophy as a tool to make his life tolerable: philosophy as therapy.
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