What are Alexander and Pompey and Augustus, Marcus Aurelius asks, compared with Socrates and Diogenes and Heraclitus—the man who said that nothing in the world is permanent? “This is the chief thing: be not perturbed, for all things are according to the nature of the Universal; and in a little time you will be nobody and nowhere.…” So leave this life satisfied, because He who releases you is also satisfied.
