In Meditations, Marcus Aurelius quotes dozens and dozens of other writers and philosophers. Sometimes he attributes those quotes. Sometimes he doesn't. Since he wrote most of Meditations in a battlefield tent, he was often without a reference when he was quoting Socrates, Epictetus, or Homer. No, he was drawing purely from memory. He had absorbed their ideas—they have become a part of his mind.
This remarkable bit of recall demonstrates the ancient approach to being "well-read," a phrase that has lost its original meaning according to philosopher Mortimer Adler. Today, we consider someone "well-read" if they've read a lot of books. But the ancients valued those who truly knew their material—readers who dove deeply into the classic texts until they understood them, until they became infused with them. "A person who has read widely but not well," Mortimer says of the modern reader, "deserves to be pitied rather than praised." The 17th-century philosopher Thomas Hobbes made a similar observation. "If I read as many books as most men do," he said. "I would be as dull-witted as they are."
This is why reading and rereading a carefully chosen set of authors proves so powerful. Their insights gradually become embedded in your mind. As we'd said before, the Stoics aren't something you have read. They are writers you are reading. You should return to them over and over again over the course of your life, in the course of your daily life. As Marcus would say, we can't be satisfied with merely "getting the gist" of what we read. "Read attentively," he advised. Read deeply. Read repeatedly. Aim for quality, not quantity.
That's obviously the idea that we designed The Daily Stoic around almost ten years ago. We couldn't have anticipated that it would go on to sell millions of copies in dozens of languages, but we did understand that this was how Stoicism was designed to be read: a little bit each day.
It's 366 pages of the very best insights and practices—delivered one per day—from the Stoics. Just 5 minutes each morning is all it takes to connect with this timeless wisdom, which you can apply right away to living a better life. And as the Stoics suggest, the more you revisit Marcus and Seneca and Epictetus, the more they reveal to you.
Our leatherbound edition, exclusive to Daily Stoic, is designed to last a lifetime with features like:
Genuine leather cover
All-new chapter illustrations
Custom display box
Premium Munken cream paper
Vinyl endsheets and ribbons
Letters from the authors
Anyone can read a lot. The wise read well.
If you want to live better, if you want to go beyond the "gist" of things, don't skim the surface—go deep. Take your time. Read and re-read. Start with The Daily Stoic, and keep coming back. That's how the words become actions. That's how you become well-read.
That's probably the cheapest it will ever be, so now's your chance to check it out, gift it to a friend, or have a digital copy for when you're on the go.
And over at the Daily Stoic Store, you can also find signed hardcovers and leatherbound editions—meant to stand the test of time, just like the wisdom inside.
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