“Once Ibrahim bin Adham saw a stone with the inscription, "Turn me over and read!" When he did an inscription appeared: "You do not practice what you know. Why do you seek what you do not know?”

“he noticed an inscription written on the floor at the foot of a pile of bones: What you are, they once were. What they are, you will be.”

“Do you think the porter and the cook have no anecdotes, no experiences, no wonders for you? The walls of their minds are scrawled all over with thoughts. They shall one day bring a lantern and read the inscriptions.”

“Practice what you know, and it will help to make clear what now you do not know.”

“He...told me--that which is incomplete, seek completion. Yet...that which is complete, is no better than which is incomplete. Do you understand? Do you know...what that means?”

“You know yourself what you are worth in your own eyes; and at what price you will sell yourself. For men sell themselves at various prices. This is why, when Florus was deliberating whether he should appear at Nero's shows, taking part in the performance himself, Agrippinus replied, 'Appear by all means.' And when Florus inquired, 'But why do not you appear?' he answered, 'Because I do not even consider the question.' For the man who has once stooped to consider such questions, and to reckon up the value of external things, is not far from forgetting what manner of man he is.”