"If you are praised, consider yourself a donkey. If you are blamed, consider yourself a donkey."

"It is better to starve to death in a calm and tranquil state than to live in abundance with vexation."

"Keep the prospect of death, exile and all such apparent tragedies before you every day – especially death – and you will never have an abject thought, or desire anything to excess."

"Don't just say you have read books. Show that through them you have learned to think more accurately, to be less of a slave to your passions, to be more tranquil and self-possessed. Speeches are one t…"

"What would it be like to be a sheep? To have no reason, no sense of shame, to be driven by instinct alone? It would be terrible, wouldn't it?"