If this is neither my own badness, nor an effect of my own badness, and the common weal is not injured, why am I troubled about it? And what is the harm to the common weal?
In one way an arrow moves, in another way the mind. The mind indeed, both when it exercises caution and when it is employed about inquiry, moves straight onward not the less, and to its object.
Men despise one another and flatter one another; and men wish to raise themselves above one another, and crouch before one another.
Neither in thy actions be sluggish nor in thy conversation without method, nor wandering in thy thoughts, nor let there be in thy soul inward contention nor external effusion, nor in life be so busy as to have no leisure.
Neither in writing nor in reading wilt thou be able to lay down rules for others before thou shalt have first learned to obey rules thyself.
People generally despise where they flatter, and cringe to those they would gladly overtop; so that truth and ceremony are two things.
Severally on the occasion of everything that thou doest, pause and ask thyself, if death is a dreadful thing because it deprives thee of this.
The healthy eye ought to see all visible things and not to say, I wish for green things; for this is the condition of a diseased eye.
The perfection of moral character consists in this, in passing every day as the last, and in being neither violently excited nor torpid nor playing the hypocrite.
They know not how many things are signified by the words stealing, sowing, buying, keeping quiet, seeing what ought to be done; for this is not effected by the eyes, but by another kind of vision.
Think of the country mouse and of the town mouse, and of the alarm and trepidation of the town mouse.
If it’s time for you to go, leave willingly – as you would to accomplish anything that can be done with grace and honor.
Each of us lives only now, this brief instant. The rest been lived already, or is impossible to see. The span we live is small – small as the corner of the earth in which we live it.
If it’s in your control, why do you do it? If it’s in someone else’s control, then who are you blaming? Atoms? The gods? Stupid either way. Blame no one. Set people straight, if you can. If not, just repair the damage.
Everything is here for a purpose, from horses to vine shoots. What’s surprising about that? Even the sun will tell you, “I have a purpose,” and the other goods as well.
Each of us needs what nature gives us, when nature gives us.
It is the duty of men to love even those who injure them.
When you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning, remember that your defining characteristic-what defines a human being-is to work with others.
He who pays no attention to what his neighbor does, says or thinks, preferring to concentrate on making his own actions appropriate and justifiable, better uses his time.
We are born for cooperation.