Quotes
Quotes to inspire and reflect
“Men are of little worth. Their brief lives last a single day. They cannot hold elusive pleasure fast; Ii melts away. All laurels wither; all illusions fade; Hopes have been phantoms, shade on air-built shade since time began.”
8
“Order your soul. Reduce your wants.”
26
“Men seek out retreats for themselves in the country, by the seaside, on the mountains… nowhere can a man find a retreat more peaceful or more free from trouble than his own soul.”
8
“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.”
13
“We must take a higher view of all things, and bear with them more easily: it better becomes a man to scoff at life than to lament over it.”
8
“Don’t allow yourself to be heard any longer griping about public life, not even with your own ears!”
10
“If it is not right, do not do it, if it is not true, do not say it.”
13
“How does it help…to make troubles heavier by bemoaning them?”
13
“If it’s endurable, then endure it, stop complaining.”
12
“The awake share a common world, but the asleep turn aside into private worlds.”
15
“It is essential that we not respond impulsively… take a moment before reacting, and you will find it easier to maintain control.”
17
“Deaths that are greater, greater portions gain.”
18
“Excess in anything becomes a fault.”
13
“Every hour, focus your mind attentively… on the performance of the task in hand, with dignity, human sympathy, benevolence and freedom, and leave aside all other thoughts. You will achieve this, if you perform each action as if it were your last.”
12
“Nothing, to my way of thinking, is a better proof of a well ordered mind than a man’s ability to stop just where he is and pass some time in his own company.”
11
“Don’t explain your philosophy. Embody it.”
17
“No man can have a peaceful life who thinks too much about lengthening it.”
11
“People are frugal in guarding their personal property; but as soon as it comes to squandering time they are most wasteful of the one thing in which it is right to be stingy.”
10
“The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.”
12
“Man is not worried by real problems so much as by his imagined anxieties about real problems.”
20
“External things are not the problem. It’s your assessment of them, which you can erase right now.”
9
“Today, I escaped from anxiety. Or, no; I discarded it, because it was within me, in my own perceptions—not outside.”
9
“Everything hangs on one’s thinking…a man is as unhappy as he has convinced himself he is.”
14
“Don’t be overheard complaining…not even to yourself.”
12
“Ask yourself at every moment, is this necessary?”
14
“You have to assemble your life yourself, action by action.”
18
“Recognize that if something is humanly possible, you can do it too.”
12
“Don’t hope that events will turn out the way you want, welcome events in whichever way they happen: this is the path to peace.”
18
“In your actions, don’t procrastinate. In your conversations, don’t confuse. In your thoughts, don’t wander. In your soul, don’t be passive or aggressive. In your life, don’t be all about business.”
11
“Kindness is unconquerable, so long as it is without flattery or hypocrisy. For what can the most insolent man do to you, if you contrive to be kind to him, and if you have the chance gently advise and calmly show him what is right…and point this out tactfully and from a universal perspective.”
13
“Have I done something for the common good? Then I share in the benefits.”
9
“Speak the truth as you see it. But with kindness. With humility.”
12
“No man is more unhappy than he who never faces adversity. For he is not permitted to prove himself.”
16
“Be tolerant with others and strict with yourself.”
8
“If someone succeeds in provoking you, realize that your mind is complicit in the provocation.”
23
I have about concluded that wealth is a state of mind, and that anyone can acquire a wealthy state of mind by thinking rich thoughts.
17
No man is rich enough to buy back his past.
8
Superfluous wealth can buy superfluities only.
10
Why is one man richer than another? Because he is more industrious, more persevering and more sagacious.
22
Probably the greatest harm done by vast wealth is the harm that we of moderate means do to ourselves when we let the vices of envy and hatred enter deep into our own natures.
18
A speculator is one who runs risks of which he is aware, and an investor is one who runs risks of which he is unaware.
22
That some should be rich shows that others may become rich, and hence is just encouragement to industry and enterprise.
7
A man who both spends and saves money is the happiest man, because he has both enjoyments.
9
When I caution you against becoming a miser, I do not therefore advise you to become a prodigal or a spendthrift.
14
He is not fit for riches who is afraid to use them.
13
Let me gain by you, and no matter whether you love me or not.
12
The secret point of money and power in America is neither the things that money can buy nor power for power’s sake but absolute personal freedom, mobility, privacy.
21
It requires a great deal of boldness and a great deal of caution to make a great fortune, and when you have got it, it requires 10 times as much wit to keep it.
12