Epicurus says that you should rather have regard to the company with whom you eat and drink, than to what you eat and drink.

He grieves more than is necessary who grieves before any cause for sorrow has arisen.

I am like a book, with pages that have stuck together for want of use: my mind needs unpacking and the truths stored within must be turned over from time to time, to be ready when occasion demands.

Now we are not merely to stick knowledge on to the soul: we must incorporate it into her; the soul should not be sprinkled with knowledge but steeped in it.

The place one's in, though, doesn't make any contribution to peace of mind: it's the spirit that makes everything agreeable to oneself.

A crowd of fellow-sufferers is a miserable kind of comfort.

Human society is like an arch, kept from falling by the mutual pressure of its parts