Quote collection
777 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"To my great-grandfather I owed the advice to dispense with the education of the schools and have good masters at home instead - and to realize that no expense should be grudged for this purpose."
"Receive the gifts of fortune without pride, and part with them without reluctance."
"Accept whatever comes to you woven in the pattern of your destiny, for what could more aptly fit your needs?"
"If any man can convince me and bring home to me that I do not think or act aright, gladly will I change; for I search after truth, by which man never yet was harmed. But he is harmed who abideth on still in his deception and ignorance."
"Men exist for the sake of one another."
"You should banish any thoughts of how you may appear to others."
"Practice really hearing what people say. Do your best to get inside their mind."
"Whatever may happen to you was prepared for you from all eternity; and the implication of causes was from eternity spinning the thread of your being."
"Do what you will. Even if you tear yourself apart, most people will continue doing the same things."
"Is your cucumber bitter? Throw it away. Are there briars in your path? Turn aside. That is enough. Do not go on and say, "Why were things of this sort ever brought into this world?" neither intolerable nor everlasting - if thou bearest in mind that it has its limits, and if thou addest nothing to it in imagination. Pain is either an evil to the body (then let the body say what it thinks of it!)-or to the soul. But it is in the power of the soul to maintain its own serenity and tranquility. . . ."
"Consider, for example, and you will find that almost all the transactions in the time of Vespasian differed little from those of the present day. You there find marrying and giving in marriage, educating children, sickness, death, war, joyous holidays, traffic, agriculture, flatterers, insolent pride, suspicions, laying of plots, longing for the death of others, newsmongers, lovers, misers, men canvassing far the consulship and for the kingdom; yet all these passed away, and are nowhere."
"Do not think that what is hard for you to master is humanly impossible; but if a thing is humanly possible, consider it to be within your reach."
"That which comes after ever conforms to that which has gone before."
"Each thing is of like form from everlasting and comes round again in its cycle..."
"When jarred, unavoidably, by circumstance revert at once to yourself and don't lose the rhythm more than you can help. You'll have a better grasp of harmony if you keep going back to it."
"You have to assemble your life yourself - action by action."
"Nothing is evil which is according to nature."
"Stop whatever you're doing for a moment and ask yourself: Am I afraid of death because I won't be able to do this anymore?"
"We ought to do good to others as simply as a horse runs, or a bee makes honey, or a vine bears grapes season after season without thinking of the grapes it has borne."
"He who eats my bread, does my will."