The Names Fade
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Αἱ πάλαι συνήθεις λέξεις νῦν γλωσσήματα· οὕτως οὖν καὶ τὰ ὀνόματα τῶν πάλαι πολυυμνήτων νῦν τρόπον τινὰ γλωσσήματά ἐστι, Κάμιλλος, Καίσων, Οὐόλεσος, Δέντατος, κατ’ ὀλίγον δὲ καὶ Σκιπίων καὶ Κάτων, εἶτα καὶ Αὔγουστος, εἶτα καὶ Ἁδριανὸς καὶ Ἁντωνῖνος· ἐξίτηλα γὰρ πάντα καὶ μυθώδη ταχὺ γίνεται, ταχὺ δὲ καὶ παντελὴς λήθη κατέχωσεν. καὶ ταῦτα λέγω ἐπὶ τῶν θαυμαστῶς πως λαμψάντων· οἱ γὰρ λοιποὶ ἅμα τῷ ἐκπνεῦσαι ʽ ἄιστοι, ἄπυστοι ʼ. τί δὲ καὶ ἔστιν ὅλως τὸ ἀείμνηστον; ὅλον κενόν. τί οὖν ἐστι περὶ ὃ δεῖ σπουδὴν εἰσφέρεσθαι; ἓν τοῦτο, διάνοια δικαία καὶ πράξεις κοινωνικαὶ καὶ λόγος, οἷος μήποτε διαψεύσασθαι, καὶ διάθεσις ἀσπαζομένη πᾶν τὸ συμβαῖνον ὡς ἀναγκαῖον, ὡς γνώριμον, ὡς ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς τοιαύτης καὶ πηγῆς ῥέον.
The words once in familiar use are now obscure archaisms; and so too the names of those once celebrated on every tongue are now, in a way, archaisms — Camillus, Caeso, Volesus, Dentatus, and by degrees Scipio and Cato, then Augustus too, then Hadrian and Antoninus. For all things fade and quickly become the stuff of legend, and quickly utter oblivion buries them. And I say this of those who shone in some wonderful way; the rest, the moment they breathed their last, are "unseen, unheard of." And what, in the end, is even everlasting remembrance? Wholly empty. What, then, is it on which we must spend our earnest effort? This one thing: a just mind, and actions done for the common good, and speech that never lies, and a disposition that welcomes everything that happens as necessary, as familiar, as flowing from such a source and spring.
Even language grows obsolete, and so do the greatest names — Camillus, Scipio, Cato, Augustus, Hadrian, Antoninus, all fading toward oblivion. If everlasting fame is empty, what deserves earnest effort? Only this: a just mind, social action, truthful speech, and a disposition that welcomes all that happens.
Marcus makes the mortality of fame vivid by starting with language itself. Words that were once συνήθεις, everyday, have become γλωσσήματα — obsolete terms that need a glossary to be understood. If ordinary speech decays like this, so do the great names carried on it. He then lets a roll-call of Roman glory run down into obscurity: from the half-legendary heroes Camillus and Dentatus, through Scipio and Cato, to Augustus, and at last to Hadrian and Antoninus — his own adoptive father and the name of his own house. That the list ends on "Antoninus" is not accidental; Marcus is quietly including himself among the names that oblivion will bury, "quickly" (ταχύ) reducing even emperors to fable and then to nothing. Those who shone brightest merely take a little longer; everyone else is "unseen and unheard of" (ἄιστοι, ἄπυστοι, a Homeric-sounding tag) from the instant they die.
Having emptied out the prize of remembrance — ἀείμνηστον? ὅλον κενόν, "everlasting fame? wholly empty" — he asks the question the whole chapter was built to reach: what, then, is actually worth taking seriously? The answer is one of the finest summaries of his ethics in the book, four things held in a single breath: a διάνοια δικαία, a mind set on justice; πράξεις κοινωνικαί, actions that serve the human community; a λόγος that never lies, truthfulness in word; and a διάθεσις that ἀσπάζεται, warmly welcomes, everything that happens — accepting it as necessary, as familiar, and as flowing "from such a source and spring," that is, from the rational cosmos that is one’s own origin. Set against the vanity of being remembered, this is what does not decay: not what others will say of you, but the justice, usefulness, honesty, and glad acceptance that constitute a life actually lived well.
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Meditations 4.33 — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/meditations-greek/4.33/