The greatest enjoyment is experienced when there is no concern for its duration.
~ Wu Hsin
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Quotes
Fundamentally
What is this, fundamentally? What is its nature and substance, its reason for being? What is it doing in the world? How long is it here for?
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Well enough alone
Some take nothing into account, and others want to take account for everything. They are always talking importance, always taking things too seriously, turning them into debate and mystery. Few bothersome things are important enough to bother with. It is folly to take to heart what you should turn your back on. Not the least of life’s rules is to leave well enough alone.
~ Baltasar Gracián
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The art of living
Philosophy does not promise to secure anything external for man, otherwise it would be admitting something that lies beyond its proper subject-matter. For as the material of the carpenter is wood, and that of statuary bronze, so the subject-matter of the art of living is each person’s own life.
~ Epictetus
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Personal drama
The greatest crime is the overlooking of who you really are in favor of the story of who you think you are. This preoccupation with your personal drama is the cloud that masks the sun.
~ Wu Hsin
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Complaining
Don’t be overheard complaining about life at court. Not even to yourself.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Already knowing
The most difficult subjects can be explained to the most slow-witted man if he has not formed any idea of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without a shadow of doubt, what is laid before him.
~ Leo Tolstoy
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Perfection of character
Perfection of character: To live your last day, every day, without frenzy, or sloth, or pretense.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Better left alone
Many see the trees but not the forest, or bark up the wrong tree, speaking endlessly, reasoning uselessly, without going to the pith of the matter. They go round and round, tiring themselves and us, and never get to what is important. This happens to people with confused minds who do not know how to clear away the brambles. They waste time and patience on what it would be better to leave alone, and later there is no time for what they left.
~ Baltasar Gracián
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Right or wrong
Then the only proper response for me to make is this: You are much mistaken, my friend, if you think that any man worth his salt cares about the risk of death and doesn’t concentrate on this alone: whether what he’s doing is right or wrong, and his behavior a good man’s or a bad one’s.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Contentment
The man of contentment seeks nothing that he doesn’t have and understands that whatever he has isn’t his to own
~ Wu Hsin
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Thoughts like this
To watch the courses of the stars as if you revolved with them. To keep constantly in mind how the elements alter into one another. Thoughts like this wash off the mud of life below.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Being valuable
Today’s society is characterized by achievement orientation, and consequently it adores people who are successful and happy and, in particular, it adores the young. It virtually ignores the value of all those who are otherwise, and in so doing blurs the decisive difference between being valuable in the sense of dignity and being valuable in the sense of usefulness.
~ Viktor Frankl
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Each existing only briefly
Nature takes substance and makes a horse. Like a sculpture with wax. And then melts it down and uses the material for a tree. Then for a person. Then for something else. Each existing only briefly. It does the container no harm to be put together, and none to be taken apart.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Express it
The person who says he knows what he thinks but cannot express it usually does not know what he thinks.
~ Mortimer Adler
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You have the option
Everywhere, at each moment, you have the option:
~ Marcus Aurelius
– to accept this event with humility
– to treat this person as he should be treated
– to approach this thought with care, so that nothing irrational creeps in.
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Perfection
[I] will not be better than Socrates; but if I am not worse, that is enough for me. I shall never be a Milo, and yet I do not neglect my body; nor a Croesus, and yet I do not neglect my property: Nor, in general, do we cease to take pains in any area, because we despair of arriving at the highest degree of perfection.
~ Epictetus
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Application and capacity
Application and capacity. Eminence requires both. When both are present, eminence outdoes itself. The mediocre people who apply themselves go further than the superior people who don’t. Work makes worth.
~ Baltasar Gracián
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Your assignment, complete
Consider all that you’ve gone through, all that you’ve survived. And that the story of your life is done, your assignment complete. How many good things have you seen? How much pain and pleasure have you resisted? How many honors have you declined? How many unkind people have you been kind to?
~ Marcus Aurelius
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To be free
The attachment to beliefs is the greatest shackle. To be free is to know that one does not know.
~ Wu Hsin
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