Epictetus — "Men are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of them."
Men are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of them.
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More from Epictetus
"What need is there to weep over parts of life? The whole of it calls for tears."
"To make a good man, you must first make a good citizen."
"Freedom is not procured by a full enjoyment of what is desired, but by controlling the desire."
"The greater the difficulty, the more glory in surmounting it."
"If you want to be rich, do not heap up riches, but diminish your desires."
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.