If you hear that someone is speaking ill of you, instead of trying to defend yourself you should say: 'He obviously does not know me very well, since there are so many other faults he could have mentioned.'

No man is free who is not master of himself... Is freedom anything else than the power of living as we choose?

Men are disturbed not by the things that happen, but by their opinion of the things that happen.

Nothing great is produced suddenly, since not even the grape or the fig is. If you say to me now that you want a fig, I will answer to you that it requires time: let it flower first, then put forth fruit, and then ripen.

Books are the training weights of the mind.

You are but an appearance, and not absolutely the thing you appear to be.

It is unlikely that the good of a snail should reside in its shell: so is it likely that the good of a man should?