Σωτηρία βίου — "the saving of a life." The word is a strong one and not philosophical in origin: σωτηρία is rescue from destruction, from shipwreck, from disease. Marcus attaches it to what is required for it, and not much is required: to see, to do what is just, to say what is true.

The three disciplines again, and for the third time. Here they are given in their most compressed form: EXERCISEto see what a thing is (assent), TERMto do what is just (action), to say what is true (assent again, but by way of speech). The same three are given by 12.3 in participles, by 12.15 under the names of virtues, and by 12.17 as two prohibitions. The analysis meanwhile is cut down to two members, ὑλικόν and αἰτιῶδες, without ἀναφορά or χρόνος (cf. 12.10, 12.18).

And then, unexpectedly, enjoyment. τί λοιπὸν ἢ ἀπολαύειν τοῦ ζῆν; — "what is left but to enjoy living?" The verb ἀπολαύω means precisely "to take pleasure in, to have the benefit of," and in a Stoic's mouth it comes as a surprise. But the object of the enjoyment is named on the spot, and it is not an external one: συνάπτοντα ἄλλο ἐπ’ ἄλλῳ TERMἀγαθόν — "fastening one good thing onto the next."

The image of a chain and a gap. ὥστε μηδὲ τὸ βραχύτατον διάστημα ἀπολείπειν — "so as to leave not even the shortest interval." Διάστημα is a "distance, gap," and among other things a musical interval: good acts are laid end to end, with no rests. This settles in advance the question of a full life that will be raised in 12.35 and 12.36: a life is full not by being long but by being unbroken. The governing discipline is assent, the sustaining one action.