Source-backed acceptance quotes about facing reality, limits and change without denial, with meanings, context and named sources.
A reviewed starting set about accepting reality, limits, change, mortality and what cannot be controlled while still choosing a useful response. The broader collection remains available for related resilience, grief, calm, letting go and present-moment material.
“Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well.”
Peace is sought by aligning desire with reality rather than requiring reality to obey preference, a central Stoic distinction between response and circumstance.
Enchiridion, section 8; Epictetus applies Stoic acceptance to events outside personal control.
“a magnanimous acceptance of privation or suffering for ourselves when it is the condition of good to others”
Eliot describes a form of acceptance that is active and relational rather than passive: willingly bearing a cost can become morally significant when that cost is genuinely required for another person’s good.
The Essays of George Eliot, essay VII, ‘Worldliness and Other-Worldliness: The Poet Young,’ around printed page 247, Project Gutenberg #28289. The frozen quote is a clause extracted from Eliot's longer enumeration of virtues grounded in human sympathy—neighbor's rights, participation in others' joys and sorrows, and accepting privation when it benefits others—inside her argument that such morality need not depend directly on belief in a future state. It remains Victorian literary/theological criticism rather than a complete empirical theory of altruism.
“Those things which a man cannot amend in himself or in others, he ought patiently to bear, until God shall otherwise ordain.”
The devotional advice separates attempted correction from patient endurance: when a fault cannot presently be changed, continued struggle to control it may need to give way to forbearance.
The Imitation of Christ, Book I, Chapter XVI, “Of bearing with the faults of others,” William Benham translation, Project Gutenberg #1653. The chapter advises patiently bearing what cannot presently be amended while also urging prayer and mutual forbearance; it remains Christian devotional counsel rather than permission to tolerate preventable harm.
“Seek not that the things which happen should happen as you wish.”
Peace becomes more possible when desire stops demanding that reality conform perfectly to preference before a useful response can begin.
Enchiridion, section VIII, George Long translation; the following clause advises wishing events to be as they are.
“Pass then through this little space of time conformably to nature, and end thy journey in content, just as an olive falls off when it is ripe, blessing nature who produced it, and thanking the tree on which it grew.”
Marcus joins mortality with thankfulness: a completed life is imagined as a ripe fruit that leaves without complaint while acknowledging the nature and conditions that made its growth possible.
Meditations, Book IV, section 48 in George Long’s public-domain translation, Project Gutenberg #6920/#15877 tradition. The olive image follows a reflection on the shortness of life and frames gratitude as part of accepting mortality rather than denying loss.
“Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change.”
Abrupt change can overwhelm the mind because adaptation requires time, making disruption painful even before its long-term consequences are understood.
Frankenstein; the narrator reflects on the psychological strain created by sudden changes in circumstances.
“Therefore the sufficiency of contentment is an enduring and unchanging sufficiency.”
Contentment supplies a form of enoughness that does not depend on continually acquiring more, making inward sufficiency less vulnerable to comparison and appetite.
Tao Teh King, chapter 46, James Legge translation; the statement follows warnings about ambition, discontent, and the wish to keep getting.
“Pour forth thy Fervours for a healthful Mind, Obedient Passions, and a Will resign'd;”
Johnson’s closing prayer prioritizes soundness of mind, governed passions and a will capable of acceptance over many external forms of success.
The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749), explicitly devotional closing movement, Wikisource first-edition scan leaf 41. “Pour forth thy Fervours for a healthful Mind, Obedient Passions, and a Will resign’d” belongs to Johnson’s concluding prayer for inward goods, patience and faith. “Healthful Mind” is preserved as historical religious-moral language and is not presented as modern medical or mental-health advice.
“I saw that that was life itself and that the meaning given to this life was truth, and I accepted it.”
The search for meaning ends here in acceptance of a lived framework Tolstoy regards as true, emphasizing that meaning is not merely an abstract proof but something embodied in life.
My Confession, Leo Wiener translation; the sentence belongs to Tolstoy’s account of accepting a meaning of life he believed was demonstrated in the lives of the people he had studied.
“The mind ought in all cases to be called away from the contemplation of external things to that of itself.”
Turning attention back toward the mind does not deny external events; it restores awareness of the judgments and responses that remain available when circumstances cannot be controlled.
Of Peace of Mind, section XIV, Aubrey Stewart translation (1889), cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #64576 and Wikisource. Seneca turns attention away from external things toward the mind itself while discussing flexibility under changes of fortune; this is historical Stoic counsel, not modern clinical guidance.
“The readiness is all.”
The emphasis is not on controlling every outcome but on meeting what comes with preparedness and acceptance.
Act 5, Scene 2.
“What’s done cannot be undone.”
Some consequences cannot be reversed, so the practical question becomes how to respond now rather than how to erase the past.
Macbeth, Act V, Scene I, reviewed against the scan-backed 1918 Yale text. Lady Macbeth says 'What's done cannot be undone' during the sleepwalking scene; the dramatic context is guilt and psychological disintegration, not generic advice that consequences should simply be accepted.
“In a world where all is fleeting, change alone endures.”
Stability is temporary, so practical judgment requires expecting change rather than treating present arrangements as permanent.
Counsels and Maxims, T. Bailey Saunders translation, in a discussion of fortune and apparent stability.
“I knew it was much to be regretted, but still it was not to be helped.”
Pip recognizes that his changed ambitions separated him from a simpler life he now sees could have been better, yet he also acknowledges that the lost path cannot simply be restored by wishing.
Great Expectations (1861), global Chapter XVII / Volume I Chapter XVII in the Chapman & Hall three-volume first book edition. Pip tells Biddy that the simpler life he might have led at the forge was “much to be regretted,” then admits that his ambitions make that lost alternative impossible to restore. Verified against the scan-backed Wikisource Chapter XVII transcription and cross-checked with Project Gutenberg #1400. This remains Pip’s retrospective fictional narration and dialogue, not Dickens autobiography.
“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”
The verse places change inside a larger rhythm of seasons and purposes, making it useful for thinking about acceptance when one phase of life gives way to another.
Ecclesiastes 3:1 in the King James Version, opening the sequence of contrasting times and seasons.
“However mean your life is, meet it and live it; do not shun it and call it hard names.”
Thoreau asks for direct engagement with the life actually present rather than contempt for it because it falls short of wealth, status or imagined alternatives.
Walden, “Conclusion,” Project Gutenberg #205. The sentence opens a passage urging the reader to “Love your life, poor as it is” and noting that a quiet mind may live contentedly even in materially poor circumstances. It is not an argument that poverty or injustice should never be changed.
“Victory breeds hatred, for the conquered is unhappy. He who has given up both victory and defeat, he, the contented, is happy.”
The verse questions identity built around winning: contentment becomes more available when life is not constantly interpreted as a contest that somebody else must lose.
Dhammapada 201, Max Müller translation; the line appears in the chapter on happiness and contrasts competitive victory with contentment.
“That from which you are running is within you.”
Changing places cannot solve a conflict that is carried internally; the difficult work is changing judgment and character.
Letter 104 argues that travel cannot by itself cure inward restlessness.
“For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.”
Life continues forward despite attachment to what has already happened, so care for the past cannot make the present remain there.
The Prophet, “On Children”; Gibran contrasts parents’ memory of yesterday with children belonging to a life that moves forward.
“Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.”
Sorrow is acknowledged as real while being placed inside a larger horizon in which pain can change and joy can return.
Psalm 30:5 in the King James Version.
“Wintertime nighs; But my bereavement-pain It cannot bring again: Twice no one dies.”
Returning winter cannot recreate the first shock of bereavement, suggesting that repeated seasons may revisit memory without reproducing an earlier loss in exactly the same form.
“De Profundis I,” Poems of the Past and the Present (1901), Project Gutenberg #3168. The poem reflects on recurring seasons and a past bereavement; it does not prescribe a universal grief timetable.
“What then remains but well our pow'r to use, And keep good-humour still whate'er we lose?”
Within Clarissa’s speech, the practical response to inevitable loss is to use one’s capacities well and preserve composure rather than trying to make change impossible.
The Rape of the Lock, Canto V, lines 29–30 in Pope’s 1717 revision; spoken by Clarissa. Her speech was added in 1717, so the inherited 1714 source year is corrected to 1717. Clarissa’s counsel is immediately followed by the poem’s return to comic battle, preserving the satirical frame.
“The course of life is fixed, and nature admits of its being run but in one way, and only once.”
Each stage of life occurs only once, so wisdom includes accepting its appropriate strengths instead of endlessly trying to restore an earlier stage.
Cato on Old Age, Shuckburgh translation, in Cicero’s discussion of the distinctive advantages of each season of life.
“We must learn to suffer what we cannot evade; our life, like the harmony of the world, is composed of contrary things.”
Montaigne treats an imperfect mixture of pleasant and painful conditions as part of ordinary life: wisdom includes learning to live with what cannot be escaped instead of demanding a life made only of agreeable notes.
Essays of Montaigne, Book III, Chapter XIII, “Of Experience,” Charles Cotton translation; Project Gutenberg Volume 19 #3599 / Complete Essays #3600. Montaigne compares life’s unavoidable mixture of pleasant and painful conditions to harmony made from contrary tones.
“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.”
The quatrain turns irreversibility into an image of writing that cannot be erased: tears, intelligence and devotion cannot literally rewrite what has already entered the past.
Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, quatrain LI in Edward FitzGerald’s English rendering, Project Gutenberg #246. The famous English wording is FitzGerald’s creative translation and adaptation, so the record does not present it as a literal English sentence written by the historical Omar Khayyam.
“Only be at peace with self, live in the presence of God, in communion with Him, and leave the guidance of existence to those universal powers against whom thou canst do nothing!”
Amiel combines inward reconciliation with surrender of what cannot be controlled, describing peace as a practice of self-settlement, faith, and release rather than total command over events.
Amiel's Journal, entry dated July 16, 1848, in Mary Augusta Ward’s public-domain English translation of selections from Journal Intime.
“The past is never more than an experiment.”
Past conduct provides information rather than an unchangeable verdict; Bennett uses that distinction to argue that present habits can still be revised.
Mental Efficiency, “Breaking with the Past.” The sentence frames prior experience as material for correction rather than a permanent identity.
“Happy am I, though this has happened to me.”
The point is not denial of hardship but refusal to let an event dictate the whole evaluation of one’s life and character.
Meditations, Book IV; George Long translation, in the reflection on meeting misfortune without being crushed by it.
“Nothing is wretched, but thinking makes it so.”
Misfortune and judgment are separated: external circumstances can be painful, but the interpretation attached to them strongly influences whether a life is experienced as wholly ruined.
The Consolation of Philosophy, Book II, Chapter IV, H. R. James translation (Elliot Stock, 1897), printed page 60 in Project Gutenberg #14328. The retained catalog wording ‘Nothing is wretched, but thinking makes it so.’ is a frozen clause extract from James’s longer sentence beginning ‘So true is it that...’ in Lady Philosophy’s argument about Fortune, judgment and the instability of external circumstances. It remains late-antique philosophical consolation mediated by translation, not modern cognitive-science or clinical mental-health evidence.
“He who binds to himself a joy does the winged life destroy.”
Trying to possess a joyful moment permanently can damage it, while accepting impermanence allows experience to remain alive and free.
Short poem commonly titled “Eternity”; Blake contrasts grasping with the passing movement of joy.
“For grief indeed is love and grief beside.”
The sonnet treats grief as attachment plus the pain attached to what has been lost, refusing to separate sorrow cleanly from love.
Sonnets from the Portuguese, Sonnet XXXV, Project Gutenberg #2002. “For grief indeed is love and grief beside” occurs as the lyric speaker asks whether a new beloved can fill a place still occupied by family memory and bereavement. It remains intimate Victorian love poetry, not a clinical model or universal definition of grief.
“The supreme happiness of life consists in the conviction that one is loved; loved for one’s own sake—let us say rather, loved in spite of one’s self;”
Hugo’s narrator presents the felt certainty of being loved—including despite one’s imperfections—as an especially deep form of happiness.
Les Misérables, Project Gutenberg #135, in the represented Isabel F. Hapgood public-domain English translation. The sentence occurs in the narrator’s reflection on love and blindness; its English phrasing is translation-specific and belongs to the novel’s moral-religious rhetoric.
“We need never be ashamed of our tears.”
Tears are treated as an honest human response rather than evidence of weakness or failure of self-control.
Great Expectations (1861), global Chapter XIX / Volume I Chapter XIX in the Chapman & Hall three-volume first book edition. As Pip leaves the village and breaks into tears, the retrospective narrator says that “we need never be ashamed of our tears” before reflecting on ingratitude toward Joe. Verified against the scan-backed Wikisource Chapter XIX transcription and cross-checked with Project Gutenberg #1400. The passage remains literary reflection on Pip’s remorse rather than modern clinical or grief-treatment evidence.
“He that is down needs fear no fall; He that is low, no pride; He that is humble ever shall Have God to be his guide.”
The shepherd boy’s song presents lowliness as freedom from the anxieties attached to status and pride, joining humility with contentment inside Bunyan’s Christian pilgrimage allegory.
The Pilgrim’s Progress, Part II, Valley of Humiliation, represented by Project Gutenberg #39452, the Jesse Lyman Hurlbut-edited Every Child Can Read edition that includes the Part II episode. Mr. Great-heart and the pilgrims see a shepherd boy feeding his father's sheep and hear him sing ‘He that is down needs fear no fall...’; the song is followed by Great-heart's praise of the boy's heart's-ease. The previous #131 fallback does not contain this represented Part II passage, so the evidence layer moves to #39452. The stanza remains embedded Christian-allegorical character song rather than Bunyan autobiography or secular clinical advice about humility.
“A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the LORD directeth his steps.”
Planning has value while remaining limited; the verse holds intention and humility about outcomes together.
Proverbs 16:9 in the King James Version.
“Thou must be like a promontory of the sea, against which though the waves beat continually, yet it stands.”
The image recommends steadiness under repeated pressure: external disturbance can arrive continuously without requiring inner collapse.
Meditations, Book IV, section XL, Meric Casaubon translation represented by Project Gutenberg #2680. The promontory image recommends steadiness under repeated disturbance. The frozen catalog wording shortens the represented witness after “yet it”: Gutenberg reads “yet it both itself stands, and about it are those swelling waves stilled and quieted.” This remains translation-mediated Roman Stoic moral philosophy, not a modern clinical resilience finding.
“The greatest hindrance to living is expectancy, which depends upon the morrow and wastes to-day.”
Excessive dependence on tomorrow steals attention from the only time available for action, making postponement itself a way of wasting life.
On the Shortness of Life, chapter IX.
“Have this thought ever present with thee, when thou losest any outward thing, what thou gainest in its stead.”
Loss is not automatically the whole story; the instruction asks what freedom, clarity, experience, or other value may accompany what has been given up.
The Golden Sayings of Epictetus, saying XXVII, Hastings Crossley translation.
“Do you ask what is the proper limit to wealth? It is, first, to have what is necessary, and, second, to have what is enough.”
Seneca gives wealth a stopping rule: secure necessities, then recognize sufficiency instead of allowing desire to expand without limit.
Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 2.
“No man can have a peaceful life who thinks too much about lengthening it.”
An obsession with extending life can undermine the peace of the life already present, because fear of ending displaces attention from living.
Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 4.
“There is no fire like passion; there is no losing throw like hatred; there is no pain like this body; there is no happiness higher than rest.”
Rest here means a deeper release from agitating passions and hatred, not merely physical inactivity; the verse places inward quiet above the disturbances it has just named.
Dhammapada 202 in Max Müller’s translation; “rest” belongs to the Buddhist religious context of release and should be read within that framework.
“Love has no age, no limit, and no death.”
Irene answers an older man’s skepticism by insisting that love is not confined by age and does not simply vanish when a person or relationship passes away.
Indian Summer of a Forsyte, represented in Project Gutenberg #2594. Irene says the line to old Jolyon while speaking about her dead lover; it is emotionally charged fictional dialogue, and the surrounding conversation immediately gives old Jolyon a more ironic response.
“On the occasion of every accident that befalls you, remember to turn to yourself and inquire what power you have for turning it to use.”
Instead of beginning with what an event has taken away, the practice asks which capacity—endurance, restraint, patience, or judgment—can still be exercised.
Enchiridion, section X, George Long translation; Epictetus gives examples such as endurance under pain and patience under abuse.
“To be in the world and yet not of the world is the highest perfection, the most blessed peace, is to achieve the greatest victory.”
Allen defines peace as freedom from being inwardly ruled by surrounding pressures, presenting self-command and spiritual detachment as a deeper victory than external conquest.
The Way of Peace; Allen contrasts inward spiritual independence with being carried along by the impulses and conflicts of the surrounding world.
“All say, “How hard it is that we have to die”—a strange complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.”
The dark joke reverses the usual complaint about mortality by suggesting that having lived through life already gives people experience of difficulty, making death an oddly chosen final grievance.
Pudd’nhead Wilson, Chapter X epigraph; the mortality line is immediately followed by the anger maxim.
“Do no violence to yourself, respect in yourself the oscillations of feeling.”
Self-respect here means refusing to force inner life into an artificial uniformity; changing feelings can be observed and treated with patience instead of self-aggression.
Amiel's Journal, entry dated April 28, 1852, in Mary Augusta Ward’s public-domain translation; Amiel counsels patience with the movement of feeling.
“Tho’ much is taken, much abides.”
Loss and limitation are acknowledged without allowing them to erase what remains possible or valuable.
Ulysses, near the close of the poem.
“You have been engrossed, life hastens by; meanwhile death will be at hand, for which, willy nilly, you must find leisure.”
Busyness cannot postpone mortality, so a schedule filled with other people’s demands still has to confront the same finite end as a deliberately chosen life.
On the Shortness of Life, Chapter VIII; Seneca contrasts unnoticed busyness with death, the event for which everyone eventually has to make room.
“If these wish to know how short their life is, let them reflect how small a part of it is their own.”
The felt shortness of life is linked with how little of it remains under one’s own direction after obligations and borrowed priorities consume the rest.
On the Shortness of Life, Chapter XIX; Seneca closes by asking the engrossed to measure how much of their lifetime was actually their own.
“Take away thy opinion, and then there is taken away the complaint, “I have been harmed.””
The statement asks whether part of suffering is sustained by the story attached to an event rather than by the event alone.
Meditations, Book IV, in George Long’s translation.
“Very little indeed is necessary for living a happy life.”
The line challenges the assumption that a good life requires constant accumulation or ideal circumstances.
Meditations, Book VII, in George Long’s translation.
“Fortune has often in the past got the upper hand of you, and yet you have not surrendered, but have leaped up and stood your ground still more eagerly.”
Past recovery is evidence of present capacity: being struck down by fortune is different from surrendering to it.
Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 13, section 3, Richard M. Gummere translation.
“Some things torment us more than they ought; some torment us before they ought; and some torment us when they ought not to torment us at all.”
The sentence separates real difficulty from the extra burden created by exaggeration, anticipation, and unnecessary mental rehearsal.
Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 13, section 5, Richard M. Gummere translation.
“It is likely that some troubles will befall us; but it is not a present fact.”
Possible future trouble is acknowledged without being treated as present reality, preserving attention for what is actually happening now.
Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 13, section 10, Richard M. Gummere translation.
“When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.”
Grief is connected to former delight: the pain of loss can reveal how much value, affection, or meaning the lost relationship once carried.
The Prophet, “On Joy and Sorrow.”
“The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways—I to die, and you to live.”
The closing sentence accepts the separation between life and death without claiming certainty about which condition is ultimately better.
Apology, final paragraph in Jowett’s translation; Socrates closes after the jury has sentenced him to death.
“Let the dead Past bury its dead!”
The poem rejects living backward and immediately redirects attention toward action available in the present.
A Psalm of Life, in the stanza beginning “Trust no Future.”
“Begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life.”
Seneca argues against postponing life into an imagined future and asks the reader to treat the present day as complete enough for deliberate living.
Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 101.
“Take therefore no thought for the morrow.”
The teaching redirects attention from imagined future trouble toward responsibilities that actually belong to today.
Matthew 6:34 in the King James Version; the opening sentence is quoted here.
“The real loneliness is living among all these kind people who only ask one to pretend!”
Wharton separates physical solitude from social isolation: Ellen feels most alone when acceptance depends on hiding what she actually thinks and has experienced.
The Age of Innocence, Book I, Chapter IX, Project Gutenberg #541. Countess Ellen Olenska tells Newland Archer that “The real loneliness” is living among kind people who ask one to pretend after explaining that her relatives will help only on condition that unpleasant truths remain unheard. It remains fictional character dialogue inside Wharton’s critique of social convention rather than a universal sociological finding.
“We must turn out what we can; we must do our endeavor and care nothing at all when the unthinking reproach us for not turning out Gobelins.”
Within the dialogue’s deterministic framework, the practical conclusion is to use one’s actual capacities fully without measuring every effort against another person’s exceptional gifts.
What Is Man?, Old Man concluding the Shakespeare/Gobelin comparison; “Gobelins” refers to elaborate tapestry and functions as the contrast with an ordinary sewing-machine.
“Everything has its limit—iron ore cannot be educated into gold.”
The metaphor distinguishes growth from limitless transformation: training can develop capacities, but the dialogue also insists that development occurs within constraints.
What Is Man?, opening machine-and-metal analogy; the Old Man uses iron and gold to argue for limits within his deterministic model of human development.
“Do not act as if thou wert going to live ten thousand years.”
Mortality is used to challenge postponement: limited time makes present conduct more important than fantasies of an indefinitely extended future.
Meditations, Book IV, section 17, in George Long’s translation.
“Men are disturbed not by the things which happen, but by the opinions about the things.”
Epictetus separates an event from the judgment placed on it, making interpretation a practical point of leverage.
Enchiridion 5 in George Long’s translation; the passage distinguishes events from the opinions that disturb us.
“The present offers only one day at a time, and each by minutes.”
Life is experienced in small units rather than as the abstract total of one’s expected lifespan, making attention to ordinary minutes consequential.
On the Shortness of Life, Chapter X; Seneca contrasts the small present with the recoverable memory of past days.
“Yet nothing sets us free from these alternations of hope and fear so well as always fixing some limit to our successes.”
Seneca links tranquility with limits: endless ambition keeps hope and fear alternating, while defining enough can reduce dependence on uncertain future gains.
Of Peace of Mind, section X, Aubrey Stewart translation (1889), cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #64576 and Wikisource. Seneca argues that voluntarily setting limits to success can interrupt the repeated alternation of hope and fear and prevent ambition from expanding without bounds.
“The present time is short, the future is doubtful, the past is certain.”
Seneca divides time into three conditions and gives the present special urgency because it is both available and quickly passing.
On the Shortness of Life, Chapter X; opening distinction between past, present and future.
“To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning.”
Mourning is not erased, but the imagery turns toward restoration, exchanging signs of loss for beauty and joy as a picture of renewed life.
Isaiah 61:3, King James Version; the verse describes consolation for mourners through a sequence of restorative exchanges.
“So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, which moves To that mysterious realm,”
Bryant turns the poem’s long meditation on universal mortality into an appeal to live in a way that makes eventual death less degrading or fearful.
“Thanatopsis,” represented in Project Gutenberg #29700. These lines begin the poem’s closing counsel after its extended description of death and nature; the language is poetic and spiritual rather than clinical end-of-life guidance.
“’Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all.”
Love can remain worth having even when it ends in loss, because avoiding grief by avoiding attachment would also remove the relationship itself.
In Memoriam A.H.H., Canto XXVII, closing stanza; represented by the Wikisource canto transcription and independently visible on printed page 44 / scan leaf 64 of a public-domain edition. Tennyson's 'loved and lost' conclusion belongs to the elegy's grief for Arthur Hallam and its argument that love remains valuable despite bereavement; it is poetry, not a clinical grief prescription.
Quotations about the self can point in opposite directions: accept yourself, change yourself, trust yourself, question yourself. The tension is part of the subject rather than a problem to hide.
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“Silent it will glide on.”
On the Shortness of Life · c. 49Read meaning & context →“Remember that thou art an actor in a play.”
Enchiridion · c. 125Read meaning & context →“Happy am I, though this has happened to me.”
Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus · c. 170Read meaning & context →“Take therefore no thought for the morrow.”
King James Bible — Matthew 6:34 · 1611Read meaning & context →“Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.”
The Prophet · 1923Read meaning & context →“Everything has its limit—iron ore cannot be educated into gold.”
What Is Man? · 1906Read meaning & context →
