Quotes from Epictetus

If you wish it, you are free; if you wish it, you'll find fault with no one, you'll cast blame on no one, and everything that comes about will do so in accordance with your own will and that of God.

He who is discontented with what he has, and with what has been granted to him by fortune, is one who is ignorant of the art of living, but he who bears that in a noble spirit, and makes reasonable use of all that comes from it, deserves to be regarded as a good man.

It has been ordained that there be summer and winter, abundance and dearth, virtue and vice, and all such opposites for the harmony of the whole, and (Zeus) has given each of us a body, property, and companions.

Conduct yourself in all matters, grand and public or small and domestic, in accordance with the laws of nature. Harmonizing your will with nature should be your utmost ideal.

For what else is tragedy than the portrayal in tragic verse of the sufferings of men who have attached high value to external things?

Protect what belongs to you at all costs; don't desire what belongs to another.

In literature, too, it is not great achievement to memorize what you have read while not formulating an opinion of your own.

Let whatever appears to be the best be to you an inviolable law. And if any instance of pain or pleasure, glory or disgrace, be set before you, remember that now is the combat, now the Olympiad comes on, nor can it be put off; and that by one failure and defeat honor may be lost or—won.

For if we had any sense, what else should we do, both in public and in private, than sing hymns and praise the deity, and recount all the favours that he has conferred!

But to be hanged—is that not unendurable? Even so, when a man feels that it is reasonable, he goes off and hangs himself.

And the way to be free is to let go of anything that is not within your control.

You'd have a better chance persuading someone to change their sexual orientation than reaching people who have rendered themselves so deaf and blind.