Everything Is a Seed
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Θεώρει διηνεκῶς πάντα κατὰ μεταβολὴν γινόμενα καὶ ἐθίζου ἐννοεῖν, ὅτι οὐδὲν οὕτως φιλεῖ ἡ τῶν ὅλων φύσις ὡς τὸ τὰ ὄντα μεταβάλλειν καὶ ποιεῖν νέα ὅμοια. σπέρμα γὰρ τρόπον τινὰ πᾶν τὸ ὃν τοῦ ἐξ αὐτοῦ ἐσομένου, σὺ δὲ μόνα σπέρματα φαντάζῃ τὰ εἰς γῆν ἣ μήτραν καταβαλλόμενα, τοῦτο δὲ λίαν ἰδιωτικόν.
Behold continually all things coming to be through change, and accustom yourself to consider that the nature of the Whole loves nothing so much as to change the things that exist and to make new ones like them. For everything that exists is, in a way, a seed of what will come to be from it; but you imagine that only seeds are those cast into earth or womb — and that is far too crude.
Train yourself to see all things continually coming to be through change: the nature of the Whole loves nothing more than transforming what exists into new things like it. Every present thing is a seed of its successor — not just what is sown in soil or womb.
Marcus turns his constant theme of impermanence into a positive spiritual exercise. The imperatives are those of training: θεώρει διηνεκῶς, "keep contemplating without a break," and ἐθίζου, "make it a habit," to see the world as ceaseless transformation. And he gives the process a warm coloring: the nature of the Whole φιλεῖ, "loves," nothing so much as changing existing things into new ones. Change is not decay grudgingly tolerated but the very activity the universe delights in — the way a living nature keeps itself fresh.
The illuminating image is the seed. Everything that presently exists is σπέρμα τρόπον τινά, "in a way a seed," of whatever will arise out of it — its death is the sowing of its successor. Marcus then catches the ordinary, narrow imagination in the act: you think "seeds" means only what is dropped into soil or womb (εἰς γῆν ἢ μήτραν), the literal germs of plants and babies. But that, he says bluntly, is λίαν ἰδιωτικόν, "far too crude," the view of the untrained ἰδιώτης. Rightly seen, every dissolving thing is generative; a corpse seeds the elements, a fallen empire seeds the next age. To grasp this is to stop mourning change as loss and start reading it as the universe’s way of always making "new things like" the old — endlessly fertile, never merely destructive.
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Meditations 4.36 — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/meditations-greek/4.36/