Epictetus Quotes
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People are not disturbed by things, but by the view they take of them.
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The soul that companies with Virtue is like an ever-flowing source. It is a pure, clear, and wholesome draught; sweet, rich, and generous of its store; that injures not, neither destroys.
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We must ever bear in mind --that apart from the will there is nothing good or bad, and that we must not try to anticipate or to direct events, but merely to accept them with intelligence.
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There is only one thing for which God has sent me into the world, and that is to develop every kind of virtue or strength, and there is nothing in all the world that I cannot use for this purpose.
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Law intends indeed to do service to human life, but it is not able when men do not choose to accept her services; for it is only in those who are obedient to her that she displays her special virtue.
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When the Idea, of any Pleasure strikes your Imagination... let that time be employed in making a just Computation between, the duration of the Pleasure, and that of the Repentance sure to follow it.
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It is not reasonings that are wanted now; for there are books stuffed full of stoical reasonings.
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We all dread a bodily paralysis, and would make use of every contrivance to avoid it; but none of us is troubled about a paralysis of the soul.
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It is not events that disturb the minds of men, but the view they take of them.
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Fight against yourself, recover yourself to decency, to modesty, to freedom. And, in the first place, condemn your actions; but when you have condemned them, do not despair of yourself. For both ruin and recovery are from within.
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It is wicked to withdraw from being useful to the needy, and cowardly to give way to the worthless.
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To make anything a habit, do it; to not make it a habit, do not do it; to unmake a habit, do something else in place of it.
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Act your part with honor.
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He is a drunkard who takes more than three glasses though he be not drunk.
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Living a good life leads to enduring happiness. Goodness in and of itself is the practice AND the reward.
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What you shun enduring yourself, attempt not to impose on others. You shun slavery-beware of enslaving others! If you can endure to do that, one would think you had been once upon a time a slave yourself. For Vice has nothing in common with virtue, nor Freedom with slavery. (41).
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If we are not stupid or insincere when we say that the good or ill of man lies within his own will, and that all beside is nothing to us, why are we still troubled?
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What is a child? Ignorance. What is a child? Want of instruction.
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No living being is held by anything so strongly as by its own needs. Whatever therefore appears a hindrance to these, be it brother, or father, or child, or mistress, or friend, is hated, abhorred, execrated.
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To a longer and worse life, a shorter and better is by all means to be preferred.
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All religions must be tolerated... for every man must get to heaven in his own way.
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God has entrusted me with myself.
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We are not disturbed by what happens to us, but by our thoughts about what happens to us.
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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.