Echoes

I eat only what is enough to sustain my life. My food is bread, soup, an egg, and a little meat. And the amount I eat is no more than my body can easily digest.

A person should not eat until his stomach is full. Rather, he should eat until he has consumed approximately three quarters of his fill.

To lengthen thy life, lessen thy meals.

Everything in excess is opposed to nature.

The food which a temperate man leaves upon his plate is more beneficial than that which a glutton eats.

Abstinence is the nurse of the soul.

There are two sentences inscribed upon the Delphic oracle, hugely accommodated to the usages of man's life: "Know thyself," and "Nothing too much;" and upon these all other precepts depend.

As long as a person exercises, exerts himself greatly, does not eat to the point of being overly full, and keeps his bowels soft, illness will not come upon him and his strength will increase.

The stomach is not to be loaded, for there is nothing so hostile to thought as a full belly.

Those who are slaves to their appetites cannot preserve their reason, their memory, or their senses in their full vigour; for a full belly does not produce a fine mind.

An immoderate diet is unhealthy, but a temperate one preserves strength.

If you live according to nature, you will never be poor; if you live according to opinion, you will never be rich.

Frugality is founded on the principle that all riches have limits.

There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy.

Excessive eating is like a deadly poison to the body and is a principal cause of all illness.

If we could give every individual the right amount of nourishment and exercise, not too little and not too much, we would have found the safest way to health.

What does your conscience say? — You should become who you are.

Every man is, no doubt, by nature, first and principally recommended to his own care; and as he is fitter to take care of himself than of any other person, it is fit and right that it should be so.

Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.

Now I see the secret of the making of the best persons. It is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.

The five colors blind the eye. The five tones deafen the ear. The five flavors dull the taste. Racing and hunting madden the mind. Precious things lead one astray. Therefore the sage is guided by what he feels and not by what he sees. He lets go of that and chooses this.

Rather go to bed supperless than rise in debt.

Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influence of the earth.

We are here to add what we can to, not to get what we can from, Life.

Resolve your mental energy into abstraction, your physical energy into inaction. Allow yourself to fall in with the natural order of phenomena, without admitting the element of self,—and the empire will be governed.