Epictetus Quotes
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There is nothing good or evil save in the will.
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And have you not received faculties which will enable you to bear all that happens to you? Have you not received greatness of spirit? Have you not received courage? Have you not received endurance?
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A thing either is what it appears to be; or it is not, but yet appears to be; or it is, but does not appear to be; or it is not, and does not appear to be.
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Although we can't control which roles are assigned to us, it must be our business to act our given role as best we possibly can and to refrain from complaining about it. Where ever you find yourself and in whatever circumstances, give an impeccable performance.
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The soul's impurity consists in bad judgements, and purification consists in producing in it right judgements, and the pure soul is one which has right judgements, for this alone is proof against confusion and pollution in its functions.
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Be free from grief not through insensibility like the irrational animals, nor through want of thought like the foolish, but like a man of virtue by having reason as the consolation of grief.
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We need to regularly stop and take stock; to sit down and determine within ourselves which things are worth valuing and which things are not; which risks are worth the cost and which are not. Even the most confusing or hurtful aspects of life can be made more tolerable by clear seeing and by choice.
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When you close your doors, and make darkness within, remember never to say that you are alone, for you are not alone; nay, God is within, and your genius is within. And what need have they of light to see what you are doing?
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Every difficulty in life presents us with an opportunity to turn inward and to invoke our own submerged inner resources. The trials we endure can and should introduce us to our strengths.
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Wisdom means understanding without any doubt that circumstances do not rise to meet our expectations. Events happen as they may. People behave as they will.
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If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid with regard to external things. Don't wish to be thought to know anything; and even if you appear to be somebody important to others, distrust yourself. For, it is difficult to both keep your faculty of choice in a state conformable to nature, and at the same time acquire external things. But while you are careful about the one, you must of necessity neglect the other.
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Pleasure, like a kind of bait, is thrown before everything which is really bad, and easily allures greedy souls to the hook of perdition.
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When you do anything from a clear judgment that it ought to be done, never shun the being seen to do it, even though the world should make a wrong supposition about it; for, if you don't act right, shun the action itself; but, if you do, why are you afraid of those who censure you wrongly? (35).
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Shall I show you the sinews of a philosopher? 'What sinews are those?' - A will undisappointed; evils avoided; powers daily exercised, careful resolutions; unerring decisions.
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Don't explain your philosophy. Embody it.
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Even as bad actors cannot sing alone, but only in chorus: so some cannot walk alone. Man, if thou art aught, strive to walk alone and hold converse with yourself, instead of skulking in the chorus! at length think; look around thee; bestir thyself, that thou mayest know who thou art! (103).
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If you see anybody wail and complain, call him a slave, though he be clad in purple.
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He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has.
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The universe is but one great city, full of beloved ones, divine and human, by nature endeared to each other.
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It were no slight attainment could we merely fulfil what the nature of man implies.
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Neither should a ship rely on one small anchor, nor should life rest on a single hope.
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Bid a singer in a chorus, Know Thyself; and will he not turn for the knowledge to the others, his fellows in the chorus, and to his harmony with them?
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Never call yourself a philosopher, nor talk a great deal among the unlearned about theorems, but act conformably to them. Thus, at an entertainment, don't talk how persons ought to eat, but eat as you ought. For remember that in this manner Socrates also universally avoided all ostentation.
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When you want to hear a philosopher, do not say, 'You say nothing to me'; only show yourself worthy or fit to hear, and then you will see how you will move the speaker.