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"As the sun does not wait for prayers and incantations tob e induced to rise, but immediately shines and is saluted by all, so do you also not wait for clappings of hands and shouts of praise tob e induced to do good, but be a doer of good voluntarily and you will be beloved as much as the sun."
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"The malice thus becomes wholly real and the benevolence largely imaginary."

"We perhaps know more than we care to admit, keeping it down in the dark places of our memory-disavowed. When we eat factory-farmed meat we live, literally, on tortured flesh. Increasingly, that tortured flesh is becoming our own."

"One man thinks justice consists in paying debts, and has no measure in his abhorrence of another who is very remiss in this duty and makes the creditor wait tediously. But that second man has his own way of looking at things; asks himself Which debt must I pay first, the debt to the rich, or the debt to the poor? the debt of money or the debt of thought to mankind, of genius to nature? For you, O broker, there is not other principle but arithmetic. For me, commerce is of trivial import; love, faith, truth of character, the aspiration of man, these are sacred."

"The monks used to say that he was more drawn to those who were more sinful, and the greater the sinner the more he loved him."

"He did not see at the moment how foolish it was for two of them to go on alone, nor did the King. They were too angry to think clearly. But much evil came of their rashness in the end."

"The outcry against killing women, if you accept killing at all, is sheer sentimentality. Why is it worse to kill a woman than a man?"

"No one is without Christianity, if we agree on what we mean by the word. It is every individual's individual code of behavior, by means of which he makes himself a better human being than his nature wants to be, if he followed his nature only. Whatever its symbol-cross or crescent or whatever-that symbol is man's reminder of his duty inside the human race. Its various allegories are the charts against which he measures himself and learns to know what he is. It cannot teach man to be good as the textbook teaches him mathematics. It shows him how to discover himself, evolve for himself a moral code and standard within his capacities and aspirations, by giving him a matchless example of suffering and sacrifice and the promise of hope."
Explore more quotes by Epictetus

"When a youth was giving himself airs in the Theatre and saying, 'I am wise, for I have conversed with many wise men,' Epictetus replied, 'I too have conversed with many rich men, yet I am not rich!'."

"No greater thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen."

"I cannot call somebody 'hard-working' knowing only that they read and write. Even if 'all night long' is added, I cannot say it " not until I know the focus of all this energy."

"It is not he who reviles or strikes you who insults you, but your opinion that these things are insulting."

"Unless we place our religion and our treasure in the same thing, religion will always be sacrificed."

"It takes more than just a good looking body. You've got to have the heart and soul to go with it."

"Do not seek to bring things to pass in accordance with your wishes, but wish for them as they are, and you will find them."
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