What does living according to nature mean?
“Live in accordance with nature.” It’s one of the core principles repeated throughout ancient Stoic teachings, a phrase echoed by Zeno, Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius. But for a concept so central to Stoicism, it seems to create more confusion than give us any kind of clarity.
What exactly do the Stoics mean by “nature”?
Are they talking about Mother Nature—forests, rivers, and sunsets?
Are they referring to human nature—our instincts, emotions, and biological drives?
Or is it something broader, like the natural order of the universe, the cosmic web that connects everything?
Scroll through any Stoic forum or social media thread, and you’ll find people wrestling with this question. The term “nature” seems slippery, open to interpretation, and often gets reduced to vague ideas like “just go with the flow” or “be your authentic self.”
But if we’re serious about applying Stoic philosophy to our lives, we need more than that. We need to understand what the Stoics actually meant.
After all, Stoic wisdom often points back to this principle. Marcus Aurelius constantly reminds himself to reflect on his nature. Epictetus speaks of living in harmony with the universe. Seneca frames virtue as aligning with reason, which, to the Stoics, is deeply connected to nature itself.
Unfortunately, we can’t flip through Zeno’s original work, On Life According to Nature—it’s been lost to time like much of the early Stoic writings. But Stoicism’s later thinkers, especially the Roman Stoics, left us plenty of clues to piece it together.
As Marcus Aurelius wrote:
“This thou must always bear in mind, what is the nature of the whole, and what is my nature.”
That’s the key.
To live according to nature, we first have to understand two things:
- The nature of the universe.
- The nature of ourselves.
- Reason itself
This article will break down what the Stoics meant by “nature,” how it applies to our daily lives, and why it’s the foundation for living a virtuous, meaningful existence.
The Stoic Definition for Nature:
Fortunately, even though much of the original Stoic texts have been lost to time, the surviving works from thinkers like Epictetus, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, and Diogenes Laertius give us a clear picture of what the Stoics meant when they talked about “nature.”
Simply put, “nature” to the Stoics is not just one thing—it’s a combination of three key ideas:
- The Nature of the Universe
- The Nature of Living Beings (Natural Processes)
- The Nature of Human Beings (Reason)
Let’s break these down.
1. The Nature of the Universe
The first layer of “nature” refers to the universe itself—the grand, ordered system that governs everything.
The Stoics believed that the universe operates according to rational principles. It’s not chaotic or random; it’s structured, interconnected, and runs on cause and effect. In modern terms, you might compare this to the natural laws of physics or the concept of fate—everything happens for a reason, even if we can’t always see it.
Cleanthes, one of the early Stoic leaders, believed that living in accordance with nature meant aligning ourselves with this universal order. It’s about accepting the world as it is, not as we wish it to be.
In the book, Lives of The Eminent Philosophers, Diogenes Laertius writes:
“The nature according to which one should live Chrysippus takes to be both universal nature and, in particular, human nature. Cleanthes, however, holds that it is only the universal nature that should be followed, and not that of the particular.”
Cleanthes proposed that we should only concern ourselves with the nature of the universe. We should see the world for what it is, accept how it works, and act in alignment with it, rather than resisting it.
For example, we might resent aging, hate the winter, resist bad weather, or dislike the fact that delicious food is bad for our health. However, these are examples of the way the world works; we cannot change them, so we must align ourselves with them and act accordingly.
You can’t stop the seasons from changing, prevent yourself from aging, or control the weather. You might resent getting older, hate the cold of winter, or be frustrated that your favorite foods aren’t healthy—but none of that changes reality. The Stoic approach? Accept it. Adapt to it. Work with it, not against it.
Epictetus captured this mindset perfectly in the Enchiridion:
“Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well.”
This doesn’t mean being passive or indifferent. It means understanding that while you can’t control the universe, you can control how you respond to it.
2. The Nature of Living Beings (Natural Functions)
The second meaning of “nature” focuses on the basic biological functions that all living things share—growth, nutrition, reproduction, and survival. This is about understanding the natural processes that govern life itself.
For example, plants grow towards the light because that’s in their nature. Animals hunt, migrate, and reproduce because those behaviors support their survival. In the same way, humans have natural drives and instincts—like the need for food, rest, social connection, and even the desire to avoid pain.
Living according to nature in this context means recognizing and honoring these natural processes. It’s about taking care of your body, respecting your health, and not working against the biological needs that are hardwired into you.
But the Stoics didn’t stop there. They believed humans have something extra, something that sets us apart from every other living thing.
3. The Nature of Human Beings (Reason)
Here’s where it gets more personal. Chrysippus, another key Stoic philosopher, agreed with Cleanthes that we should align with the universe’s natural order—but he took it a step further. He argued that living according to nature also means living in accordance with human nature.
So, what makes human nature unique?
Our ability to reason.
Unlike animals driven purely by instinct, humans can reflect, question, and choose how to act. We can distinguish between what’s good, bad, and indifferent. We can think critically, control our impulses, and make decisions based on logic rather than emotion. This capacity for reason is the core of what it means to be human—and, according to the Stoics, the key to living a virtuous life.
As Marcus Aurelius wrote in Meditations:
“This thou must always bear in mind: what is the nature of the whole, and what is my nature.”
For the Stoics, virtue is the ultimate goal of life. And virtue comes from living in alignment with reason—choosing wisdom, justice, courage, and self-discipline over impulsive reactions and fleeting pleasures.
How Do We Act In Accordance With Nature?
Human Nature:
Humans possess a nature similar to animals and plants. It is the nature of plants to draw nutrients from the soil, photosynthesise, grow towards light and bear fruit in the right season.
It is the nature of animals to act upon their urges and instinct to survive, eat, shelter, seek comfort and reproduce. An animal will attack if threatened, eat when hungry, and run when afraid. This is the nature of the animal.
Alongside these living things humans have the drive for self preservation and will be fiercely defensive if our existence is threatened, in the same way an animal will become aggressive when threatened. We have the need to eat, rest, mate, and socialise, a nature common with chimps and wolves.
However, we humans differ from other animals. While we still have the drive to survive and reproduce, we also have another layer, the unique ability to reason.
Our ability to reason allows us to choose one action over another. Therefore human nature is not simply to follow every urge to survive and reproduce, it is to balance our base animal nature with the human ability to reason. This balance is what will lead to a happy and virtuous life.
For example, it is in our animal nature to eat when hungry, however if we eat whenever we want to we’ll soon become overweight and unhealthy. This animal nature needs to be moderated with our human nature.
Our animal nature will want to lash out when disrespected or mistreated, however if we allow anger to guide our actions we will quickly find ourselves regretting our behaviour. This animal impulse also needs moderation from our human nature.
So, regarding the Stoics, our human nature is twofold:
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To accept that we share the same base impulses as other creatures. However as humans we do not simply submit to them, but use our reason to both satisfy them and moderate them in order to balance a good life.
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To constructively take a deliberate role and be an active participant in our small corner of the universe. To influence it in a very human way, with virtue.
Cicero writes:
“As the Stoics hold, everything that the earth produces is created for human use; and as human beings too, are born for the sake of human beings, that they may be able mutually to help one another; in this direction we are to follow nature as our guide, to contribute to the general good by an interchange of acts of kindness, by giving and receiving, and thus by our skill, our industry, and our talents to cement human society more closely together, human being to human being.”
Universal Nature:
“Frightened of change? But what can exist without it?
What’s closer to nature’s heart? Can you take a hot bath and
leave the firewood as it was? Eat food without transforming
it? Can any vital process take place without something being
changed?
Can’t you see? It’s just the same with you—and just as vital to nature.”
– Marcus Aurelius
The quote above from Marcus Aurelius helps us to understand part of what the Stoics mean by universal nature. In the case her for Aurelius he tells us that the nature of the universe is change, we can either accept it and work alongside change, or we can resist it and suffer as it inevitably happens around us.
Looking at universal nature more broadly it is about accepting the world around us for what it is, not resisting it because it is not what we think it should be.
The world is what it is and it will behave in its nature. Trees will bear fruit when it is their time, the tides will rise and fall, time will pass as it always has done, rain will fall, animals will age, and everything changes. To live in accordance with universal nature is to accept the conditions of the world and live in harmony with them.
The Stoics tackled universal nature through the concepts of death, change, time, and fate, to name a few.
Seneca writes:
“If you regard your last day not as a punishment but as a law of nature, the breast from which you have banished the dread of death no fear will dare to enter.”
To live in accordance with nature is to accept the boundaries of the natural world. We cannot control the way the universe works and we cannot change human nature. However we can decide how to act within their rules.
What Did The Stoics Say About Nature?
Seneca The Younger
Seneca often talks about Nature in his letters to his friend Lucilius. Highlighting the importance of focusing on Nature in our daily habits and behaviours.
He even goes so far as to say it should be a “moto” for a Stoic philosopher.
Our motto, as you know, is “Live according to Nature”; but it is quite contrary to nature to torture the body, to hate unlaboured elegance, to be dirty on purpose, to eat food that is not only plain, but disgusting and forbidding. Just as it is a sign of luxury to seek out dainties, so it is madness to avoid that which is customary and can be purchased at no great price. Philosophy calls for plain living, but not for penance; and we may perfectly well be plain and neat at the same time. This is the mean of which I approve; our life should observe a happy medium between the ways of a sage and the ways of the world at large; all men should admire it, but they should understand it also.
– Seneca, Letters 5.4-5
Virtue is according to nature; vice is opposed to it and hostile.
– Seneca, Letters 50.8
Let us keep to the way which Nature has mapped out for us, and let us not swerve therefrom. If we follow Nature, all is easy and unobstructed; but if we combat Nature, our life differs not a whit from that of men who row against the current.
– Seneca, Letters 122.19
Diogenes Laertius
Looking again to Diogenes Laertius, he provides us with one of the greatest sources on a number of philosophical subjects when it comes to Stoicism. This is what he wrote on nature:
An animal’s first impulse, say the Stoics, is to self preservation, because nature from the outset endears it to itself, as Chrysippus affirms in the first book of his work On Ends: his words are, ‘The dearest thing to every animal is its own constitution and its consciousness thereof’; for it was not likely that nature should estrange the living thing from itself or that she should leave the creature she has made without either estrangement from or affection for its own constitution.
We are forced then to conclude that nature in constituting the animal made it near and dear to itself; for so it comes to repel all that is injurious and give free access to all that is serviceable or akin to it.’ For [animals], say the Stoics, Nature’s rule is to follow the direction of impulse. But when reason by way of a more perfect leadership has been bestowed on the beings we call rational, for them life according to reason rightly becomes the natural life. For reason supervenes to shape impulse scientifically.
This is why Zeno was the first (in his treatise On the Nature of Man) to designate as the end ‘life in agreement with nature’ (or living agreeably to nature), which is the same as a virtuous life, virtue being the goal towards which nature guides us. So too Cleanthes in his treatise On Pleasure, as also Posidonius, and Hecato in his work On Ends. Again, living virtuously is equivalent to living in accordance with experience of the actual course of nature, as Chrysippus says in the first book of his De Finibus; for our individual natures are parts of the nature of the whole universe.
And this is why the end may be defined as life in accordance with nature, or, in other words, in accordance with our own human nature as well as that of the universe, a life in which we refrain from every action forbidden by the law common to all things, that is to say, the right reason which pervades all things … Diogenes [of Babylon] then expressly declares the end to be to act with good reason in the selection of what is natural. Archedemus says the end is to live in the performance of all befitting actions.
