Marcus Aurelius: “Strive to continue to be such as philosophy wished to make thee.”

Be cheerful also, and seek not external help nor the tranquillity which others give.

And the things which conduce in any way to the commodity of life, and of which fortune gives an abundant supply, he used without arrogance and without excusing himself; so that when he had them, he enjoyed them without affectation, and…

Begin the morning by saying to thyself, I shall meet with the busybody, the ungrateful, arrogant, deceitful, envious, unsocial.

From thence all things flow; and there is besides necessity, and that which is for the advantage of the whole universe, of which thou art a part.