WHEN any alarming news is brought you, always have it at hand that no news can be brought you concerning what is in your own choice. Can anyone bring you news that your opinions or desires are ill conducted? By no means; but that somebody is dead. What is that to you, then? That somebody speaks ill of you. And what is that to you, then?
EPICTETUS. DISCOURSES. Book iii. §18. ¶1.
AS for praise and commendation, view their mind and understanding, what estate they are in; what kind of things they fly, and what things they seek after: and that as in the sea-side, whatsoever was before to be seen, is by the continual succession of new heaps of sand cast up one upon another, soon hid and covered; so in this life, all former things by those which immediately succeed.
MARCUS AURELIUS. MEDITATIONS. Book vii. 22.
This selections reminds me of the old advice to 'consider the source.' What are their motivations? Is the information accurate? More importantly, are the values they attacht to information correct?
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