In each separate thing that you do consider the matters which come first, and those which follow after, and only then approach the thing itself. - Epictetus

Do not try to seem wise to others. If you want to live a wise life, live it on your own terms and in your own eyes.

Friends, wait for God. When He gives the signal, and releases you from this service, then depart to Him. But for the present, endure to dwell in the place wherein He has assigned you your post. Short indeed is the time of your habitation, and easy to those that are thus minded. What tyrant, what robber, what tribunals have any terrors for those who thus esteem the body and all that belong to it as of no account?

For sheep don’t throw up the grass to show the shepherds how much they have eaten; but, inwardly digesting their food, they outwardly produce wool and milk. Thus, therefore, do you likewise not show theorems to the unlearned, but the actions produced by them after they have been digested.