Meditations 12.8

Contemplate the formative principles [forms] of things bare of their coverings; the purposes of actions; consider what pain is, what pleasure is, and death, and fame; who is to himself the cause of his uneasiness; how no man is hindered by another; that everything is opinion.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 12.8, translated by George Long

Look at the principles of causation stripped of their husks; at the objective of actions; at what pain is, what pleasure, what death, what fame. See who is to blame for a man's inner unrest; how no one can be thwarted by another; that nothing is but what thinking makes it.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 12.8, translated by C. R. Haines