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“Supprime donc en toi toute aversion pour ce qui ne dépend pas de nous et, cette aversion, reporte-la sur ce qui dépend de nous et n’est pas en accord avec la nature. Quant au désir, pour le moment, supprime-le complètement. Car si tu désires une chose qui ne dépend pas de nous, tu ne pourras qu’échouer, sans compter que tu te mettras dans l’impossibilité d’atteindre ce qui est à notre portée et qu’il est plus sage de désirer. Borne-toi à suivre tes impulsions, tes répulsions, mais fais-le avec légèreté, de façon non systématique et sans effort excessif.”

“Dès qu’une image viendra te troubler l’esprit, pense à te dire : « Tu n’es qu’image, et non la réalité dont tu as l’apparence. » Puis, examine-la et soumets-la à l’épreuve des lois qui règlent ta vie : avant tout, vois si cette réalité dépend de nous ou n’en dépend pas; et si elle ne dépend pas de nous, sois prêt à dire : « Cela ne me regarde pas. »”

“Ce qui trouble les hommes, ce ne sont pas les choses, ce sont les opinions qu'ils en ont.”

“Pour être vainqueur aux Jeux olympiques, il faut se donner pleinement.”

“Ni les victoires de Jeux Olympiques, ni celles que l'on remporte dans les batailles, ne rendent l'homme heureux. Les seules qui le rendent heureux sont celles qu'il remporte sur lui-même. Les tentations et les épreuves sont des combats. Tu as été vaincu une fois, deux fois, plusieurs fois; combats encore. Si tu es enfin vainqueur, tu seras heureux toute ta vie, comme celui qui as toujours vaincu.”

“Je suis une partie de tout, comme l'heure est une partie du jour.”

“Whatever moral rules you have deliberately proposed to yourself abide by them as they were laws, and as if you would be guilty of impiety by violating any of them. Don't regard what anyone says of you, for this, after all, is no concern of yours. How long, then, will you put off thinking yourself worthy of the highest improvements and follow the distinctions of reason? You have received the philosophical theorems, with which you ought to be familiar, and you have been familiar with them. What other master, then, do you wait for, to throw upon that the delay of reforming yourself?… Let whatever appears to be the best be to you an inviolable law.”

“You have not stirred my spirit. For what can I see in you to stir me, as a spirited horse will stir a judge of horses? Your body? That you maltreat. Your dress? That is luxurious. Your behavior, your look?—Nothing whatsoever.”

“Freedom is the name of virtue: Slavery, of vice…. None is a slave whose acts are free.”

“Of pleasures, those which occur most rarely give the most delight.”

“Who is there whom bright and agreeable children do not attract to play and creep and prattle with them?”

“Two principles we should always have ready — that there is nothing good or evil save in the will; and that we are not to lead events, but to follow them.”

“Remember that you ought to behave in life as you would at a banquet. As something is being passed around it comes to you; stretch out your hand, take a portion of it politely. It passes on; do not detain it. Or it has not come to you yet; do not project your desire to meet it, but wait until it comes in front of you. So act toward children, so toward a wife, so toward office, so toward wealth.”

“Have this thought ever present with thee, when thou losest any outward thing, what thou gainest in its stead; and if this be the more precious, say not, I have suffered loss.”

“You are a little soul, carrying a corpse.”

“When we are invited to a banquet, we take what is set before us; and were one to call upon his host to set fish upon the table or sweet things, he would be deemed absurd. Yet in a word, we ask the Gods for what they do not give; and that, although they have given us so many things!”

“It is the act of an ill-instructed man to blame others for his own bad condition; it is the act of one who has begun to be instructed, to lay the blame on himself; and of one whose instruction is completed, neither to blame another, nor himself.”

“For what constitutes a child?—Ignorance. What constitutes a child?—Want of instruction; for they are our equals so far as their degree of knowledge permits.”

“The first and most necessary topic in philosophy is that of the use of moral theorems, such as, "We ought not to lie;" the second is that of demonstrations, such as, "What is the origin of our obligation not to lie;" the third gives strength and articulation to the other two, such as, "What is the origin of this is a demonstration." For what is demonstration? What is consequence? What contradiction? What truth? What falsehood? The third topic, then, is necessary on the account of the second, and the second on the account of the first. But the most necessary, and that whereon we ought to rest, is the first. But we act just on the contrary. For we spend all our time on the third topic, and employ all our diligence about that, and entirely neglect the first.”

“Kings and tyrants have armed guards wherewith to chastise certain persons, though they be themselves evil. But to the Cynic conscience gives this power—not arms and guards.”

“Give me by all means the shorter and nobler life, instead of one that is longer but of less account!”

“If what the philosophers say be true,—that all men's actions proceed from one source; that as they assent from a persuasion that a thing is so, and dissent from a persuasion that it is not, and suspend their judgment from a persuasion that it is uncertain,—so likewise they seek a thing from a persuasion that it is for their advantage.”

“To the rational being only the irrational is unendurable, but the rational is endurable.”

“Reason is not measured by size or height, but by principle.”

“Let not another's disobedience to Nature become an ill to you; for you were not born to be depressed and unhappy with others, but to be happy with them. And if any is unhappy, remember that he is so for himself; for God made all men to enjoy felicity and peace.”

“Seemeth it nothing to you, never to accuse, never to blame either God or Man? to wear ever the same countenance in going forth as in coming in? This was the secret of Socrates: yet he never said that he knew or taught anything… Who amongst you makes this his aim? Were it indeed so, you would gladly endure sickness, hunger, aye, death itself.”

“And are all profited by what they hear, or only some among them? So that it seems that there is an art of hearing as well as one of speaking.”

“O slavish man! will you not bear with your own brother, who has God for his Father, as being a son from the same stock, and of the same high descent? But if you chance to be placed in some superior station, will you presently set yourself up for a tyrant?”

“The materials of action are variable, but the use we make of them should be constant.”

“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.”

“It is not reasonings that are wanted now; for there are books stuffed full of stoical reasonings.”

“The soul that companies with Virtue is like an ever-flowing source. It is a pure, clear, and wholesome draught; sweet, rich, and generous of its store; that injures not, neither destroys.”

“What is the first business of one who practices philosophy? To get rid of self-conceit. For it is impossible for anyone to begin to learn that which he thinks he already knows.”

“These reasonings are unconnected: "I am richer than you, therefore I am better"; "I am more eloquent than you, therefore I am better." The connection is rather this: "I am richer than you, therefore my property is greater than yours;" "I am more eloquent than you, therefore my style is better than yours." But you, after all, are neither property nor style.”

“Upon all occasions we ought to have these maxims ready at hand:
Conduct me, Jove, and you, O Destiny,
Wherever your decrees have fixed my station. ~ Cleanthes.

I follow cheerfully; and, did I not,
Wicked and wretched, I must follow still
Whoever yields properly to Fate, is deemed
Wise among men, and knows the laws of heaven. ~ Euripides, Frag. 965.”