Marcus actually imagines Nature herself as a physician, like Asclepius, the god of medicine, prescribing hardships to him as if they were painful remedies.33 To take Nature’s medicine properly, we must accept our fate and respond virtuously, with courage and self-discipline, thereby improving our character. So Marcus sees voluntarily accepting hardship as a psychotherapy of the passions. We must swallow the bitter pills of Fate and accept painful feelings and other unpleasant symptoms of illness when they befall us.
