Epictetus Quotes

237 Sourced Quotes

It is better by assenting to truth to conquer opinion, than by assenting to opinion to be conquered by truth.

Epictetus
You ought to choose both physician and friend, not the most agreeable, but the most useful.

Epictetus
It is no easy thing for a principle to become a man's own unless each day he maintains it and works it out in his life.

Epictetus
It is hard to combine and unite these two qualities, the carefulness of one who is affected by circumstances, and the intrepidity of one who heeds them not. But it is not impossible: else
were happiness also impossible.

Epictetus
What is yours is to play the assigned part well. But to choose it belongs to someone else

Epictetus
Nothing outside the will can hinder or harm the will; it can only harm itself. If then we accept this, and, when things go amiss, are inclined to blame ourselves, remembering that judgment alone can disturb our peace and constancy, I swear to you by all the gods that we have made progress.

Epictetus
If I can acquire money and also keep myself modest and faithful and magnanimous, point out the way, and I will acquire it.

Epictetus
When any person treats you ill or speaks ill of you, remember that he does this or says this because he thinks it is his duty. It is not possible, then, for him to follow that which seems right to you, but that which seems right to himself.

Epictetus
To a reasonable creature, that alone is insupportable which is unreasonable; but everything reasonable may be supported.

Epictetus
Fight against yourself, recover yourself to decency, to modesty, to freedom. And, in the first place, condemn your actions; but when you have condemned them, do not despair of yourself. For both ruin and recovery are from within.

Epictetus
As in walking it is your great care not to run your foot upon a nail, or to tread awry, and strain your leg; so let it be in all the affairs of human life, not to hurt your mind or offend your judgment. And this rule, if observed carefully in all your deportment, will be a mighty security to you in your undertakings.

Epictetus
We should not have either a blunt knife or a freedom of speech which is ill-managed.

Epictetus
I have to die. If it is now, well then I die now; if later, then now I will take my lunch, since the hour for lunch has arrived - and dying I will tend to later.

Epictetus
As it is pleasant to see the sea from the land, so it is pleasant for him who has escaped from troubles to think of them.

Epictetus
From now on practice saying to everything that appears unpleasant: You are merely an appearance and NOT what you appear to be.

Epictetus
Wherever any one is against his will, that is to him a prison.

Epictetus
A soul which is conversant with virtue is like an ever flowing source, for it is pure and tranquil and potable and sweet and communicative (social) and rich and harmless and free from mischief.

Epictetus
And be silent for the most part, or else make only the most necessary remarks, and express these in few words. But rarely, and when occasion requires you to talk, talk, indeed, but about no ordinary topics. Do not talk about gladiators, or horseraces, or athletes, or things to eat or drink - topics that arise on all occasions; but above all, do not talk about people, either blaming, or praising, or comparing them.

Epictetus
Contentment, as it is a short road and pleasant, has great delight and little trouble.

Epictetus
It is the part of an uneducated person to blame others where he himself fares ill; to blame himself is the part of one whose education has begun; to blame neither another nor his own self is the part of one whose education is already complete.

Epictetus
And have you not received faculties which will enable you to bear all that happens to you? Have you not received greatness of spirit? Have you not received courage? Have you not received endurance?

Epictetus
When we act pugnaciously, and injuriously, and angrily, and rudely, to what level have we degenerated? To the level of the wild beasts. Well, the fact is that some of us are wild beasts of a larger size, while others are little animals, malignant and petty.

Epictetus
When our friends are present we ought to treat them well; and when they are absent, to speak of them well.

Epictetus
No man is free who is not master of himself... Is freedom anything else than the power of living as we choose?

Epictetus
Never say about anything, "I have lost it," but only "I have given it back." Is your child dead? It has been given back. Is your wife dead? She has been returned.

Epictetus
It is my business, to manage carefully and dexterously whatever happens

Epictetus
If a person had delivered up your body to some passer-by, you would certainly be angry. And do you feel no shame in delivering up your own mind to any reviler, to be disconcerted and confounded?

Epictetus
You can be invincible, if you enter into no contest in which it is not in your power to conquer.

Epictetus
Truth is a thing immortal and perpetual, and it gives to us a beauty that fades not away in time, nor does it take away the freedom of speech which proceeds from justice; but it gives to us the knowledge of what is just and lawful, separating from them the unjust and refuting them.

Epictetus
When therefore we are hindered, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never attribute it to others, but to ourselves; that is, to our own principles. An uninstructed person will lay the fault of his own bad condition upon others. Someone just starting instruction will lay the fault on himself. Some who is perfectly instructed will place blame neither on others nor on himself.

Epictetus