“First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.”
“Imagine for yourself a character, a model personality, whose example you determine to follow, in private as well as in public.”
“If you would be a reader, read; if a writer, write.”
“Adopt new habits yourself: consolidate your principles by putting them into practice.”
“We should every night call ourselves to an account; What infirmity have I mastered today? What passions opposed? What temptation resisted? What virtue acquired? Our vices will abort of themselves if they be brought every day to the shrift.”
“Conduct yourself in all matters, grand and public or small and domestic, in accordance with the laws of nature. Harmonizing your will with nature should be your utmost ideal.”
“Whatever moral rules you have deliberately proposed to yourself. abide by them as they were laws, and as if you would be guilty of impiety by violating any of them. Don’t regard what anyone says of you, for this, after all, is no concern of yours.”
“As long as you live, keep learning how to live.”
“If you wish to make Pythocles an old man, filling his life to the full, do not add to his years, but subtract from his desires.”
“I never spend a day in idleness; I appropriate even a part of the night for study. I do not allow time for sleep but yield to it when I must, and when my eyes are wearied with waking and ready to fall shut, I keep them at their task.”