Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
A man should remove not only unnecessary acts, but also unnecessary thoughts, for then superfluous activity will not follow.
Be not as one that hath ten thousand years to live; death is nigh at hand: while thou livest, while thou hast time, be good.
Today I escaped all circumstance, or rather I cast out all circumstance, for it was not outside me, but within my judgements.
Waste not the remnant of thy life in those imaginations touching other folk, whereby thou contributest not to the common weal.
Deem not life a thing of consequence. For look at the yawning void of the future, and at that other limitless space, the past.
Direct thy attention to what is said. Let thy understanding enter into the things that are doing and the things which do them.
My city and state are Rome. But as a human being? The world. So for me, "good" can only mean what's good for both communities.
Live your life as if you are ready to say goodbye to it at any moment, as if the time left for you were some pleasant surprise.
Do not expect Plato's ideal republic; be satisfied with even the smallest step forward, and consider this no small achievement.
Only to the rational animal is it given to follow voluntarily what happens; but simply to follow is a necessity imposed on all.
There is no man so fortunate that there shall not be by him when he is dying some who are pleased with what is going to happen.
Consider when thou art much vexed or grieved, that man's life is only a moment, and after a short time we are all laid out dead.
Your time has a limit set to it. Use it, then, to advance your enlightenment; or it will be gone, and never in your power again.
Accustom yourself not to be disregarding of what someone else has to say: as far as possible enter into the mind of the speaker.
"Begin the morning by saying to thyself, I shall meet with the busy-body, the ungrateful, arrogant, deceitful, envious, unsocial
In the same degree in which a man's mind is nearer to freedom from all passion, in the same degree also is it nearer to strength.
Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together, but do so with all your heart.
Be like the rocky headland on which the waves constantly break. It stands firm, and round it the seething waters are laid to rest.
...the sole thing of which any man can be deprived is the present; since this is all he owns, and nobody can lose what is not his.
All things are in the act of change; thou thyself in ceaseless transformation and partial decay, and the whole universe with thee.
But this is altogether a mark of the most common sort of men, for it is in your power whenever you choose to retire into yourself.
This is moral perfection: to live each day as though it were the last; to be tranquil, sincere, yet not indifferent to one's fate.
Men despise one another and flatter one another; and men wish to raise themselves above one another, and crouch before one another.
Let thy chief fort and place of defense be a mind free from passions. A stronger place and better fortified than this, hath no man.
Take full account of what Excellencies you possess, and in gratitude remember how you would hanker after them, if you had them not.
All those things at which thou wishest to arrive by a circuitous road, thou canst have now, if thou dost not refuse them to thyself.
To live each day as though one's last, never flustered, never apathetic, never attitudinizing - here is the perfection of character.
Find joy in simplicity, self-respect, and indifference to what lies between virtue and vice. Love the human race. Follow the divine.
Reflect often upon the rapidity with which all existing things, or things coming into existence, sweep past us and are carried away.
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.
That which is really beautiful has no need of anything; not more than law, not more than truth, not more than benevolence or modesty.
Do not act as if you were going to live ten thousand years. Death hangs over you. While you live, while it is in your power, be good.
The universal order and the personal order are nothing but different expressions and manifestations of a common underlying principle.
At day's first light have in readiness, against disinclination to leave your bed, the thought that "I am rising for the work of man."
Even the stoics agree that certainty is very hard to come at; that our assent is worth little, for where is infallibility to be found?
People generally despise where they flatter, and cringe to those they would gladly overtop; so that truth and ceremony are two things.
Remember: Matter: how tiny your share of it. Time: how brief and fleeting your allotment of it. Fate: how small a role you play in it.
Keep constantly in mind in how many things you yourself have witnessed changes already. The universe is change, life is understanding.
There is change in all things. You yourself are subject to continual change and some decay, and this is common to the entire universe.
There is but one thing of real value - to cultivate truth and justice, and to live without anger in the midst of lying and unjust men.
You are making an inopportune rejection of what Nature has given you today, if all your mind is set on what men will say of you tomorrow.
All things are changing; and thou thyself art in continuous mutation and in a manner in continuous destruction and the whole universe to.
Is any man afraid of change? Why what can take place without change? What then is more pleasing or more suitable to the universal nature?
Your days are numbered. Use them to throw open the windows of your soul to the sun. If you do not, the sun will soon set, and you with it.
Consider how many do not even know your name, and how many will soon forget it, and how those who now praise you will presently blame you.
The greatest part of what we say and do is really unnecessary. If a man takes this to heart, he will have more leisure and less uneasiness.
Everything that happens either happens in such a way as you are formed by nature to bear it, or as you are not formed by nature to bear it.
Where life is possible at all, a right life is possible; life in a palace is possible; therefore even in a palace a right life is possible.
Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.
Everything is in a state of metamorphosis. Thou thyself art in everlasting change and in corruption to correspond; so is the whole universe.