You may be always victorious if you will never enter into any contest where the issue does not wholly depend upon yourself.
EpictetusWhoever wants to be free, therefore, let him not want or avoid anything that is up to others. Otherwise he will necessarily be a slave.
EpictetusYou will do the greatest service to the state if you shall raise, not the roofs of the houses, but the souls of the citizens: for it is better that great souls should dwell in small houses rather than for mean slaves to lurk in great houses.
Epictetus