Philosophy is antipoetic. Philosophize about mankind and you brush aside individual uniqueness, which a poet cannot do without self-damage. Unless, f… - Robert Graves

The Governor of Syria, when he heard of this horrid act called a council of his staff to decide whether Mithridates should be avenged by a punitive expedition against his murderer, who now reigned in his stead; but the general opinion seemed to be that the more treacherous and bloody the behaviour of Eastern kings on our frontier, the better for us — the security of the Roman Empire resting on the mutual mistrust of our neighbours — and that nothing should be done.

Athenodorus used to stroke his beard slowly and rhythmically as he talked, and told me once that it was this that made it grow so luxuriantly. He said that invisible seeds of fire streamed off from his fingers, which were food for the hairs. This was a typical Stoic joke at the expense of Epicurean speculative philosophy.

A well chosen anthology is a complete dispensary of medicine for the more common mental disorders, and may be used as much for prevention as cure.