Epictetus — "It is a universal law — have no illusion — that every creature alive is attached…"
It is a universal law — have no illusion — that every creature alive is attached to nothing so much as to its own self-interest.
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More from Epictetus
"Seek not that the things which happen should happen as you wish; but wish the things which happen to be as they are, and you will have a tranquil flow of life."
"Never say about anything, 'I have lost it,' but only 'I have given it back.' Is your child dead? It is given back. Is your wife dead? She is given back. Is your estate taken from you? Is not this also…"
"Whoever is not content with what he has, would not be content with what he wishes to have."
"To receive benefits is to lose liberty."
"There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will."
About Epictetus (c. 50-135 CE)
Greek Stoic philosopher and former slave whose Discourses (recorded by his student Arrian) shaped Marcus Aurelius and the modern Stoic revival. Closely associated with Seneca (earlier Roman Stoic) and Marcus Aurelius (his student-by-text on the imperial throne). For an intellectual contrast, see Epicurus, Greek philosopher of pleasure-as-tranquility — the Stoic-Epicurean rivalry was the central philosophical debate of the Hellenistic and Roman world for 400 years — Epicurean materialist hedonism is the precise alternative the Stoic discipline-of-acceptance was built against.
The standard scholarly entry points to Epictetus's work: A.A. Long (UC Berkeley, Classics) — Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life (2002); Pierre Hadot (Collège de France) — Philosophy as a Way of Life (1995); Anthony R. Birley (Manchester, Roman historian) — Marcus Aurelius (1987) — the standard biography of Epictetus's most famous student. These are the works graduate seminars cite when teaching Epictetus.