You may be always victorious if you will never enter into any contest where the issue does not wholly depend upon yourself.

When you see a man honored above others, or mighty in power, or otherwise in high repute, look to it that you esteem him not blessed, being rapt-away by the phantasm. For if Good, in its essence, be in those things which depend upon ourselves, then there is no place for jealousy or envy, and you yourself will not wish to be a general, or a prince, or a consul—but to be free. And to this there is but one way — disdain of the things that not up ourselves.