Epictetus Quotes
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To a reasonable creature, that alone is insupportable which is unreasonable; but everything reasonable may be supported.
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Don't be concerned with other people's impressions of you. They are dazzled and deluded by appearances. Stick with your purpose. This alone will strengthen your will and give your life coherence.
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When we blather about trivial things, we ourselves become trivial, for our attention gets taken up with trivialities. You become what you give your attention to.
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These reasonings are unconnected: "I am richer than you, therefore I am better"; "I am more eloquent than you, therefore I am better." The connection is rather this: "I am richer than you, therefore my property is greater than yours;" "I am more eloquent than you, therefore my style is better than yours." But you, after all, are neither property nor style.
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To live a life of virtue, match up your thoughts, words, and deeds.
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The materials of action are variable, but the use we make of them should be constant.
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A vulgar man, in any ill that happens to him, blames others; a novice in philosophy blames himself; and a philosopher blames neither, the one nor the other.
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Does a man reproach thee for being proud or ill-natured, envious or conceited, ignorant or detracting? Consider with thyself whether his reproaches are true. If they are not, consider that thou art not the person whom he reproaches, but that he reviles an imaginary being, and perhaps loves what thou really art, though he hates what thou appearest to be.
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Pain or pleasure? I say pleasure.
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True instruction is this: -to learn to wish that each thing should come to pass as it does. And how does it come to pass? As the Disposer has disposed it. Now He has disposed that there should be summer and winter, and plenty and dearth, and vice and virtue, and all such opposites, for the harmony of the whole. (26).
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I have to die. If it is now, well then I die now; if later, then now I will take my lunch, since the hour for lunch has arrived - and dying I will tend to later.
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If you set your heart upon philosophy, you must straightway prepare yourself to be laughed at and mocked by many who will say Behold a philosopher arisen among us! or How came you by that brow of scorn? But do you cherish no scorn, but hold to those things which seem to you the best, as one set by God in that place. Remember too, that if you abide in those ways, those who first mocked you, the same shall afterwards reverence you; but if you yield to them, you will be laughed at twice as much as before.
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It is the act of an ill-instructed man to blame others for his own bad condition; it is the act of one who has begun to be instructed, to lay the blame on himself; and of one whose instruction is completed, neither to blame another, nor himself. (5) tr. George Long (1888).
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Whoever is going to listen to the philosophers needs a considerable practice in listening.
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Cowardice, the dread of what will happen.
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When one maintains his proper attitude in life, he does not long after externals.
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I must die. Must I then die lamenting? I must be put in chains. Must I then also lament? I must go into exile. Does any man then hinder me from going with smiles and cheerfulness and contentment?
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No man is free who is not master of himself... Is freedom anything else than the power of living as we choose?
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Caretake this moment. Immerse yourself in its particulars. Respond to this person, this challenge, this deed. Quit evasions. Stop giving yourself needless trouble. It is time to really live; to fully inhabit the situation you happen to be in now.
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Give yourself fully to your endeavors. Decide to construct your character through excellent actions and determine to pay the price of a worthy goal. The trials you encounter will introduce you to your strengths.
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Don’t consent to be hurt and you won’t be hurt – this is a choice over which you have control.
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Ruin and recovering are both from within.
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Nothing great is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig. I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.
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'My brother ought not to have treated me thus.' True: but he must see to that. However he may treat me, I must deal rightly by him. This is what lies with me, what none can hinder. (97).