Truth and ceremony are two things.
Nothing is evil which is according to nature.
The world is a living being - one nature, one soul. Keep that in mind.
For any particular thing, ask: What is it in itself? What is its nature?
When you find an unwillingness to rise early in the morning, endeavor to rouse your faculties, and act up to your kind, and consider that you have to do the business of a man; and that action is both beneficial and the end of your being.
From Alexander the Platonic, not frequently nor without necessity to say to any one, or to write in a letter, that I have no leisure; nor continually to excuse the neglect of duties required by our relation to those with whom we live, by alleging urgent occupations.