To seek what is impossible is madness: and it is impossible that the bad should not do something of this kind.
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To seek what is impossible is madness: and it is impossible that the bad should not do something of this kind.
Deem not life a thing of consequence. For look at the yawning void of the future, and at that other limitless space, the past.
Either all things proceed from one intelligent source and come together as in one body, and the part ought not to find fault with what is done for the benefit of the whole; or there are only atoms, and nothing else than a mixture and dispersion. Why, then, art thou disturbed? Say to this ruling faculty, Art thou dead, art thou corrupted, art thou playing the hypocrite, art thou become a beast, dost thou herd and feed with the rest?
The lot assigned to every man is suited to him, and suits him to itself.
Consider that everything is opinion, and opinion is in thy power.
As for life, it is a battle and a sojourning in a strange land; but the fame that comes after is oblivion.
Retire into thyself. The rational principle which rules has this nature, that it is content with itself when it does what is just, and so secures tranquility.
Yet living and dying, honour and dishonour, pain and pleasure, riches and poverty, and so forth are equally the lot of good men and bad. Things like these neither elevate nor degrade; and therefore they are no more good than they are evil.
Why dost thou not pray... to give thee the faculty of not fearing any of the things which thou fearest, or of not desiring any of the things which thou desirest, or not being pained at anything, rather than pray that any of these things should not happen or happen?
Look to the essence of a thing, whether it be a point of doctrine, of practice, or of interpretation.