- The logos that governs the Universe is not evil unto itself nor can it do anything evil or be hurt by evil.
Look in, let not either the proper quality, or the true worth of anything pass thee, before thou hast fully apprehended it.
- The mind is that which is roused and directed by itself. It makes of itself what it chooses. It makes what it chooses of its own experience.
Perceptions like that—latching onto things and piercing through them, so we see what they really are.
That’s what we need to do all the time—all through our lives when things lay claim to our trust—to lay them bare and see how pointless they are, to strip away the legend that encrusts them.
Pride is a master of deception: when you think you’re occupied in the weightiest business, that’s when he has you in his spell.
- The simple minded easily attribute simple things as magical. The more technical admire things that are guided by order and rationality. The truly rational focus on their own minds — to avoid all selfishness and illogic, to work with others to achieve that goal.
To do (and not do) what we were designed for. That’s the goal of all trades, all arts, and what each of them aims at: that the thing they create should do what it was designed to do. […] If you can’t stop prizing a lot of other things, then you’ll never be free because you’ll always be envious and jealous.
Not to assume it’s impossible because you find it hard. But to recognize that if it’s humanly possible, you can do it too
- Forgive ignorance. Respond to malice with vigilance and not hatred.
We need to excuse what our sparring partners do, and just keep our distance—without suspicion or hatred
If anybody shall reprove me and shall make it apparent unto me, that in either opinion or action of mine I do err, I will most gladly retract. For it is the truth that I seek after, by which I am sure that never any man was hurt, and as sure, that he is hurt that continueth in any error or ignorance whatsoever.
- Considering the miracle of life that is evident within us, it is no surprise that the Universe is rich and complex.
- The responsibility of the rational is to show people the way forward. When people are drawn to what they think is good for them, respond through education.
If in this kind of life, thy body be able to hold out, it is a shame that thy soul should faint first and give over.
Awaken; return to yourself. Now, no longer asleep, knowing they were only dreams, clear-headed again, treat everything around you as a dream
- Stress is not bad if it simply is a part of the human experience. One can find happiness even without pleasant things, and one can feel pleasure without living a happy (virtuous) life.
- Even bad things ultimately spring from the Universe and all its laws.
You take things you don’t control and define them as “good” or “bad.” And so of course when the “bad” things happen, or the “good” ones don’t, you blame the gods and feel hatred for the people responsible—or those you decide to make responsible. Much of our bad behavior stems from trying to apply those criteria. If we limited “good” and “bad” to our own actions, we’d have no call to challenge God, or to treat other people as enemies.
All beings work to one goal, whether they are willing or unwilling, conscious or unconscious. Make up your mind who you’ll choose to work with. The force that directs all things will make good use of you regardless—will put you on its payroll and set you to work. But make sure it’s not the job Chrysippus speaks of: the bad line in the play, put there for laughs.
- Embrace the Universe’s will. For:
- If the Fate has made a path for you, then it surely must be for the best since the gods, cosmic beings, would not wish harm on an individual human.
- If Fate has not been laid out by the gods, then surely they have considered the general welfare of nature.
- And if gods don’t exist, then we can still choose to do what benefits us and others based on what our nature requires.
Whatever is beneficial for a man is so for other men also, beneficial in the sense of all things naturally good.
One thing there is, and that only, which is worth our while in this world, and ought by us much to be esteemed; and that is according to truth and righteousness, meekly and lovingly to converse with false, and unrighteous men.
- Nothing is as encouraging as when virtues are visibly embodied around us.
You accept the limits placed on your body. Accept those placed on your time.
Ambition means tying your well-being to what other people say or do.
Self-indulgence means tying it to the things that happen to you.
Sanity means tying it to your own actions.
- Practice empathy. Read between the lines of what people say.
No man can hinder thee to live as thy nature doth require. Nothing can happen unto thee but what the common good of Nature doth require.
What manner of men they be whom they seek to please, and what to get, and by what actions: How soon time will cover and bury all things, and how many it hath already buried.