If a person gave your body to any stranger he met on his way, you would certainly be angry. And do you feel no shame in handing over your own mind to… - Epictetus

Seeing that our birth involves the blending of these two things — the body, on the one hand, that we share with animals, and, on the other hand, rationality and intelligence, that we share with the gods — most of us incline to this former relationship, wretched and dead though it is, while only a few to the one that is divine and blessed.

Is it not the same distance to God everywhere?

Is the child or wife of another dead? There is no one who would not say, “This is an accident of mortality.” But if anyone’s own child happens to die, it is immediately, “Alas! how wretched am I!” It should be always remembered how we are affected on hearing the same thing concerning others.