Objective judgment, now at this very moment. Unselfish action, now at this very moment. Willing acceptance — now at this very moment — of all external events. That is all you need.
Comfort is the worst addiction.
Natural ability without education has more often raised a man to glory and virtue than education without natural ability.
Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under thy observation in life.
When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.
Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together, but do so with all your heart.
How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.
It is not the actions of others which trouble us (for those actions are controlled by their governing part), but rather it is our own judgments. Therefore remove those judgments and resolve to let go of your anger, and it will already be gone. How do you let go? By realizing that such actions are not shameful to you.
If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.
Our life is what our thoughts make it.
Reject your sense of injury and the injury itself disappears.
Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.
It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.
Perfection of character is this: to live each day as if it were your last, without frenzy, without apathy, without pretence.
When you arise in the morning think of what a privilege it is to be alive, to think, to enjoy, to love ...
The first rule is to keep an untroubled spirit. The second is to look things in the face and know them for what they are.
Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.
Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future too.
The best revenge is not to be like your enemy.