Philosophy as a Way of Life Quotes

“مَعيبٌ أن تتأذى من هذه الأشياء مثلما هو معيب أن تشكو من رشاش ماءٍ نالك في الحمام ، أو من أنك دُفعتَ في زحام ، أو تلوثتَ في بركة وحل صغيرة . يحدث الشيء نفسه في الحياة مثلما يحدث في الحمامات وفي الزحام وفي الطريق.. الحياة ليست شيئا رقيقا
-من رسالة سينكا إلى لوسيليوس”
― عادل مصطفى, Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault

“Wie Kierkegaard nur Christ ist durch das Bewusstsein, es nicht zu sein, ist Sokrates nur durch das Bewusstsein weise, dass er es nicht ist.”
― Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault

“With respect to Stoicism, Hadot has described four features that constitute the universal Stoic attitude. They are, first, the Stoic consciousness of "the fact that no being is alone, but that we make up part of a Whole, constituted by the totality of human beings as well as by the totality of the cosmos"; second, the Stoic "feels absolutely serene, free, and invulnerable to the extent that he has become aware that there is no other evil but moral evil and that the only thing that counts is the purity of moral consciousness"; third, the Stoic
"believes in the absolute value of the human person," a belief that is "at the origin of the modern notion of the 'rights of man'"; finally, the Stoic exercises his concentration "on the present instant, which consists, on the one hand, in living as if we were seeing the world for the first and for the last time, and, on the other hand, in being conscious that, in this lived presence of the instant, we have access to the totality of time and of the world." 17 Thus, for Hadot, cosmic consciousness, the purity of moral consciousness, the recognition of the equality and absolute value of human beings, and the concentration on the present instant represent the universal Stoic attitude.
The universal Epicurean attitude essentially consists, by way of "a certain discipline and reduction of desires, in returning from pleasures mixed with pain and suffering to the simple and pure pleasure of existing.”
― Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault

“Alte Wahrheiten ..., denn es gibt Wahrheiten, deren Sinn alle Generationen der Menschheit nicht auszuschöpfen vermögen; nicht, dass sie schwer zu verstehen wären - sie sind im Gegenteil äußerst einfach, erwecken sogar oft den Anschein der Banalität -, um aber ihren Sinn genau zu verstehen, muss man sie leben, muss man sie immer wieder neu erfahren.”
― Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault

“Die Sorge, welche uns im Hinblick auf die Zukunft zerreißt, verbirgt uns den unvergleichlichen Wert der einfachen Tatsache unserer Existenz.”
― Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault