Pliny the Younger, The lingering disorder of a friend of mine gave me occasion lately to reflect that we are never so good as when...

The following custom seems to me the wisest of their institutions next to the one lately praised. They have no physicians, but when a man is ill, they lay him in the public square, and the passers-by come up to him, and if they have ever had his disease themselves or have known any one who has suffered from it, they give him advice, recommending him to do whatever they found good in their own case, or in the case known to them; and no one is allowed to pass the sick man in si

“He,” (Nicia) said Hiero, “can never be either at the bath or at his meat but some public business interferes. Careless of his own and zealous for the public good, he scarcely ever goes to bed till after others have had their first sleep. So that his health is impaired and his body out of order, nor is he cheerful or affable with his friends, but loses them as well as his money in the service of the state, while other men gain friends by public speaking, enrich themselves, fa

Give up wanting to keep your husband, and nothing of what you want fails to happen. Give up wanting him to live with you at any cost. Give up wanting to remain in Corinth, and, in a word, give up wanting anything but what God wants. And who will prevent you, who will compel you? No one, any more than anyone prevents or compels Zeus.