Epicurus

Epicurean philosophy

Ancient influential 138 sayings

Sayings by Epicurus

Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.

c. 300 BCE — Principal Doctrines
Strange & Unusual Confirmed

Death is nothing to us; for that which has been dissolved into its elements experiences no sensation, and that which has no sensation is nothing to us.

c. 300 BCE — Letter to Menoeceus
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

The wise man is not perturbed by the most disturbing things.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

We must, therefore, be careful how we choose our pleasures, and how we avoid our pains.

c. 300 BCE — Letter to Menoeceus
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

The greatest fruit of self-sufficiency is freedom.

c. 300 BCE — Principal Doctrines
Strange & Unusual Confirmed

Empty is the argument of the philosopher by which no human suffering is therapeutically treated.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

The time when you should most of all withdraw into yourself is when you are forced to be in a crowd.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Confirmed

The quantity of pleasure is to be judged by the quantity of pain it removes.

c. 300 BCE — Principal Doctrines
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

The wise man is not concerned with the quantity of life, but with its quality.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

We should look for someone to eat and drink with before looking for something to eat and drink.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

The magnitude of pleasure reaches its limit in the removal of all pain. When that state is present, pleasure can be varied, but it cannot be increased, nor can it be diminished, so long as it is not disturbed by pain.

c. 300 BCE — Principal Doctrines
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

A free man cannot acquire many possessions, because this is not an easy thing to do without at the same time becoming a slave to mobs or kings.

c. 300 BCE — Principal Doctrines
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

The greatest good is prudence; it is even more precious than philosophy itself.

c. 300 BCE — Letter to Menoeceus
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

Against all things it is possible to provide security, but as against death we all live in an unwalled city.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

The pleasure which is sought after by the many is not true pleasure, but only the absence of pain.

c. 300 BCE — Principal Doctrines
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

We should not pretend to be philosophers, but be philosophers in reality.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

The end of all our actions is to be free from pain and fear.

c. 300 BCE — Letter to Menoeceus
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

Live unknown.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments (Láthe biōsas, a central Epicurean maxim)
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable

It is better to be unhappy in a rational way than happy in an irrational way.

c. 300 BCE — Fragments
Strange & Unusual Unverifiable