In the context of the expository movement of the course The hermeneutics of the subject, in which Michel Foucault sets out the process of the generalization of the care of the self in Hellenistic culture, this article seeks to discuss, from the philosopher’s perspective, the distinctions between the philosophical-moral principle of the «care of the self», which is situated within the history of the subject’s practices in relation to oneself, and the «paradigm of law», which, in turn, is characterized by the universality of prescriptions.