Epictetus Quotes
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Neither the victories of the Olympic Games nor those achieved in battles make the man happy. The only victories that make him happy are those achieved against himself. Temptations and tests are combats. You have beaten one, two, many times; still fight. If you defeat at last you will be happy your entire life, as if you have always defeated.
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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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Survey and test a prospective action before undertaking it. Before you proceed, step back and look at the big picture, lest you act rashly on raw impulse.
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Learn to distinguish what you can and can't control. Within our control are our own opinions, aspirations, desires and the things that repel us. They are directly subject to our influence.
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Be careful to leave your sons well instructed rather than rich, for the hopes of the instructed are better than the wealth of the ignorant.
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We are not to lead events, but to follow them.
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No living being is held by anything so strongly as its own needs.
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When you are offended at any man's fault, turn to yourself and study your own failings. Then you will forget your anger.
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It is your own convictions which compels you; that is, choice compels choice.
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Everything has two handles,-one by which it may be borne; another by which it cannot.
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He is free who lives as he wishes to live; who is neither subject to compulsion nor to hindrance, nor to force; whose movements to action are not impeded, whose desires attain their purpose, and who does not fall into that which he would avoid.
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What will the world be quite overturned when you die?
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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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Nothing truly stops you. Nothing truly holds you back. For your own will is always within your control.
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Against specious appearances we must set clear convictions, bright and ready for use. When death appears as an evil, we ought immediately to remember that evils are things to be avoided, but death is inevitable.
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If what charms you is nothing but abstract principles, sit down and turn them over quietly in your mind: but never dub yourself a Philosopher.
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Never in any case say I have lost such a thing, but I have returned it. Is your child dead? It is a return. Is your wife dead? It is a return. Are you deprived of your estate? Is not this also a return?
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If a man has reported to you, that a certain person speaks ill of you, do not make any defense (answer) to what has been told you: but reply, The man did not know the rest of my faults, for he would not have mentioned these only. (33) tr. George Long (1888).
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It is better to advise than upbraid, for the one corrects the erring; the other only convicts them.
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What disturbs people, these are not things, but the judgments relating to things.
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When we name things correctly, we comprehend them correctly, without adding information or judgements that aren't there. Does someone bathe quickly? Don't say be bathes poorly, but quickly. Name the situation as it is, don't filter it through your judgments. Give your assent only to that which is actually true.
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If you think you control things that are in the control of others, you will lament. You will be disturbed and you will blame both gods and men.
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If one oversteps the bounds of moderation, the greatest pleasures cease to please.
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Yet God hath not only granted these faculties, by which we may bear every event without being depressed or broken by it, but like a good prince and a true father, hath placed their exercise above restraint, compulsion, or hindrance, and wholly without our own control.