Epictetus — "For it is not death or pain that is to be feared, but the fear of pain or death."
For it is not death or pain that is to be feared, but the fear of pain or death.
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More from Epictetus
"The greatest good is that which is chosen in spite of fear."
"No man can rob us of our will."
"If a man has a bad smell, he is not to blame for it, but his clothes. If a man is ill, he is not to blame for it, but his body. If a man is a fool, he is not to blame for it, but his mind."
"You will never do anything in this life worth remembering unless you give up the hope of being remembered."
"If you are kissed by a beautiful woman, or boy, do not say, 'I am fortunate,' but 'I have been kissed by a beautiful woman.'"
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.