Stoic Quotes on Virtue
The good or ill of a man lies within his own will.
Epictetus
(Discourses - Book I, 108)
Virtue is the health of the soul.
What is the goal of virtue, after all, except a life that flows smoothly?
Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.
Freedom is the name of virtue: Slavery, of vice…. None is a slave whose acts are free.
Only attend to yourself, and resolve to be a good man in every act that you do.
Living virtuously is equal to living in accordance with one's experience of the actual course of nature.
I say that virtue is more valuable than wealth to the same degree that eyes are more valuable than fingernails.
Don't behave as if you are destined to live forever. What's fated hangs over you. As long as you live and while you can, become good now.
Men do not care how nobly they live, but only how long, although it is within the reach of every man to live nobly, but within no man's power to live long.
One ought to seek out virtue for its own sake, without being influenced by fear or hope, or by any external influence. Moreover, that in that does happiness consist.
What is your art? To be good. And how is this accomplished well except by general principles, some about the nature of the universe, and others about the proper constitution of man?
The soul that companies with Virtue is like an ever-flowing source. It is a pure, clear, and wholesome draught; sweet, rich, and generous of its store; that injures not, neither destroys.
Withdraw into yourself, as far as you can. Associate with those who will make a better man of you. Welcome those whom you yourself can improve. The process is mutual; for men learn while they teach.
When you wish to delight yourself, think of the virtues of those who live with you; for instance, the activity of one, the modesty of another, the liberality of a third, and some other good quality of a fourth.
If virtue promises happiness, prosperity and peace, then progress in virtue is progress in each of these for to whatever point the perfection of anything brings us, progress is always and approach toward it.
He who has equipped himself for the whole of life does not need to be advised concerning each separate thing, because he is now trained to meet his problem as a whole; for he knows not merely how he should live with his wife or his son, but how he should live aright.
He who is running a race ought to endeavor and strive to the utmost of his ability to come off victor; but it is utterly wrong for him to trip up his competitor, or to push him aside. So in life it is not unfair for one to seek for himself what may accrue to his benefit; but it is not right to take it from another.
What wouldst thou be found doing when overtaken by Death? If I might choose, I would be found doing some deed of true humanity, of wide import, beneficent and noble. But if I may not be found engaged in aught so lofty, let me hope at least for this - what none may hinder, what is surely in my power - that I may be found raising up in myself that which had fallen; learning to deal more wisely with the things of sense; working out my own tranquillity, and thus rendering that which is its due to every relation of life….
Quotes by Ancient Stoics
- Zeno of Citium »
- Aristo of Chios »
- Cleanthes »
- Chrysippus »
- Seneca the Younger »
- Gaius Musonius Rufus »
- Epictetus »
- Hierocles »
- Marcus Aurelius »
