No Man Is Free Who Is

From Letter 35 of the Epistulae Morales, where Seneca discusses the relationship between self-discipline and true freedom. The idea that liberty requires inner mastery was a defining tenet of Stoicism, traceable to the school's founder Zeno of Citium. Epictetus, himself a former slave, would later develop this theme extensively in his Discourses, arguing that even a person in chains can be free if they govern their own mind.