From the public-domain record · 81,371 quotes
Founders, statesmen and world leaders — cited from their collected works.
The figures
And he also who is grieved or angry or afraid, + is dissatisfied because something has been or is or shall be of the things which are appointed by him who rules all things, and he is Law and assigns to every man what is fit.
He who flies from his master is a runaway; but the law is master, and he who breaks the law is a runaway.
What is my ruling faculty now to me? and of what nature am I now making it? and for what purpose am I now using it? is it void of understanding? is it loosed and rent asunder from social life? is it melted into and mixed with the poor…
Let this always be plain to thee, that this piece of land is like any other; and that all things here are the same with things on the top of a mountain, or on the sea-shore, or wherever thou choosest to be.
Either thou livest here and hast already accustomed thyself to it, or thou art going away, and this was thy own will; or thou art dying and hast discharged thy duty.
That is for the good of each thing, which the universal nature brings to each.
Look at everything that exists, and observe that it is already in dissolution and in change, and as it were putrefaction or dispersion, or that everything is so constituted by nature as to die.
Constantly contemplate the whole of time and the whole of substance, and consider that all individual things as to substance are a grain of a fig, and as to time the turning of a gimlet.
No longer talk at all about the kind of man that a good man ought to be, but be such.
Let me see, let them know a real man who lives according to nature.
To her who gives and takes back all, to nature, the man who is instructed and modest says, Give what thou wilt; take back what thou wilt.
Inquire of thyself as soon as thou wakest from sleep whether it will make any difference to thee if another does what is just and right.
He who follows reason in all things is both tranquil and active at the same time, and also cheerful and collected.
For it is best to reach this object, and if thou dost fail, let thy failure be in attempting this.
But if any other things oppose thee, go on according to thy powers with due consideration, keeping to that which appears to be just.
And if thou seest clear, go by this way content, without turning back; but if thou dost not see clear, stop and take the best advisers.
What need is there of suspicious fear, since it is in thy power to inquire what ought to be done?
Such a man has put off the body, and as he sees that he must, no one knows how soon, go away from among men and leave everything here, he gives himself up entirely to just doing in all his actions, and in everything else that happens he…
A spider is proud when it has caught a fly, and another when he has caught a poor hare, and another when he has taken a little fish in a net, and another when he has taken wild boars, and another when he has taken bears, and another when…
These fighters were the Bestiarri, some of whom may have been criminals; but even if they were, the exhibition was equally characteristic of the depraved habits of the spectators.
If, then, thou maintainest thyself in the possession of these names, without desiring to be called by these names by others, thou wilt be another person and wilt enter on another life.
