By Aurus Marcelius
Do not compel others to think as you think, or to value what you value. To do so is to become a tyrant. Each soul has its own measure and its own time.
Consider the frog: when thrown into boiling water, it leaps away; but in water that warms little by little, it stays until death. So too with us—open violence we resist, but the slow corruption of habit we often do not perceive.
Remember: neither the possession of rights brings happiness, nor the loss of them brings misery. Happiness and misery are born within. The world can enslave or free the body, but not the mind that has disciplined itself.
Therefore, do not measure your worth by what surrounds you. Measure it only by what you have accomplished in yourself. This alone remains.
