"Observe the movements of the stars as if you were running their courses with them, and let your mind constantly dwell on the changes of the elements into each other. Such imaginings wash away the filth of life on the ground."
"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 soul becomes dyed with the colour of its thoughts."
"What we cannot bear removes us from life; what remains can be borne."
"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."
"Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future too."