Stoicism: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)

An omniscient observer could certainly have predicted how the deliberation would end, but Cicero himself could not; he didn’t have the kind of thorough self-knowledge that would have led him to predict his own behaviour

This rejection of a separate divine sphere marks another and very important difference between the Stoics and the Aristotelian/Platonic traditions. Stoics regarded the universe as a more radical unity, with the divine power that sustains it (something that both Plato and Aristotle believed in, unlike the atomists) not hived off into a distinct meta

the craftsman god is not all-powerful. Like any other craftworker, god has to make the best product that he can with the materials available to him. Recalcitrant matter means that, literally with the best will in the world, there are bound to be bad outcomes. That doesn’t mean that the world isn’t as good as it can be—the best of all possible world

In his version of this Stoic doctrine, the wise person will never strive for or aim unconditionally to retain anything that could not be reliably secured by his or her own efforts—and that is the improvement of his or her own character and intellectual condition.

even though my actions are causally determined, they are very much my own; personal agency is preserved.

beauty, consistency, and orderliness are even more worth preserving in the domain of deliberation and action,

For logical relations were held to be relations among contents (the sayables) as abstracted from their material hosts.

when the Roman republic was looked to as a source of political ideas Seneca and his Stoicism took on exceptional interest.

Even more than Epictetus, Seneca makes it clear that philosophical theorizing and debate, along with engaged problem solving, are essential to the ultimate goal of making human life better.