“As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.”

“Men do not care how nobly they live, but only for how long, although it is within the reach of every man to live nobly, but within no man’s power to live long.”

“It should be our care not so much to live a long life as a satisfactory one.”

“What difference does it make how much is laid away in a man's safe or in his barns, how many head of stock he grazes or how much capital he puts out at interest, if he is always after what is another's and only counts what he has yet to get, never what he has already? You ask what is the proper limit to a person's wealth? First, having what is essential, and second, having what is enough.”

“Life is like a play: it's not the length, but the excellence of the acting that matters.”

“It does not matter how many books you have, but how good the books are which you have.”

“I wish Lucilius you had been so happy as to have taken this resolution long ago I wish we had not deferred to think of an happy life till now we are come within light of death But let us delay no longer”