The truly good and wise man will bear all kinds of fortune in a seemly way, and will always act in the noblest manner that the circumstances allow.

Deferred joys purchased by sacrifice are always sweetest and most enduring.

A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.

Difficulties are things that show a person what they are.

Birds sing after a storm why shouldn't people feel as free to delight in whatever sunlight remains to them.

Our actions may be impeded... But there can be no impeding our intentions or our dispositions. Because we can accommodate and adapt. The mind adapts and converts to its own purposes the obstacle to our acting. The impeding to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.

So remember this principle when something threatens to cause you pain: the thing itself was no misfortune at all; to endure it and prevail is great good fortune.

You've seen that. Now look at this. Don't be disturbed. Uncomplicate yourself. Someone has done wrong … to himself. Something happens to you. Good. It was meant for you by nature, woven into the pattern from the beginning. Life is short. That's all there is to say. Get what you can from the present—thoughtfully, justly. Unrestrained moderation.

Fire feeds on obstacles.

And those who complain and try to obstruct and thwart things—they help as much as anyone. The world needs them as well.

This is not a misfortune but that to bear it like a brave man is good fortune.

We have various abilities, present in all rational creatures as in the nature of rationality itself. And this is one of them. Just as nature takes every obstacle, every impediment, and works around it—turns it to its purposes, incorporates it into itself—so, too, a rational being can turn each setback into raw material and use it to achieve its goal.