Epictetus Quotes
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Happiness and personal fulfillment are the natural consequences of doing the right thing.
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It is unlikely that the good of a snail should reside in its shell: so is it likely that the good of a man should?
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Every art and every faculty contemplates certain things as its principal objects.
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You will do the greatest service to the state if you shall raise, not the roofs of the houses, but the souls of the citizens: for it is better that great souls should dwell in small houses rather than for mean slaves to lurk in great houses.
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Watch yourself as you go about your daily business and later reflect on what you saw, trying to identify the sources of distress in your life and thinking about how to avoid that distress.
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Wherever any one is against his will, that is to him a prison.
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Books are the training weights of the mind.
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Act your part with honor.
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As in walking it is your great care not to run your foot upon a nail, or to tread awry, and strain your leg; so let it be in all the affairs of human life, not to hurt your mind or offend your judgment. And this rule, if observed carefully in all your deportment, will be a mighty security to you in your undertakings.
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He who is not happy with little will never be happy with much.
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Men are not worried by things, but by their ideas about things. When we meet with difficulties, become anxious or troubled, let us not blame others, but rather ourselves. That is: our ideas about things.
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When we are invited to a banquet, we take what is set before us; and were one to call upon his host to set fish upon the table or sweet things, he would be deemed absurd. Yet in a word, we ask the Gods for what they do not give; and that, although they have given us so many things! (35).
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Not things, but opinions about things, trouble men.
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In prosperity it is very easy to find a friend; but in adversity it is the most difficult of all things.
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God has made all men to be happy.
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Things true and evident must of necessity be recognized by those who would contradict them.
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I am not eternity, but a man; a part of the whole, as an hour is of the day.
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It is a mark of a mean capacity to spend much time on the things which concern the body, such as much exercise, much eating, much drinking, much easing of the body, much copulation. But these things should be done as subordinate things: and let all your care be directed to the mind.
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Never say about anything, "I have lost it," but only "I have given it back." Is your child dead? It has been given back. Is your wife dead? She has been returned.
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Authentic happiness is always independent of external conditions.
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If a man would pursue Philosophy, his first task is to throw away conceit. For it is impossible for a man to begin to learn what he has a conceit that he already knows.
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Forgiveness is better than revenge, for forgiveness is the sign of a gentle nature, but revenge is the sign of a savage nature. the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace.
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You are a principal work, a fragment of [Goddess herself], you have in yourself a part of [her]. Why then are you ignorant of your high birth?
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To know that you do not know and to be willing to admit that you do not know without sheepishly apologizing is real strength and sets the stage for learning and progress in any endeavor.