Quotes by Roman Authors - Page 14

No evil is without its compensation ... it is not the loss itself but the estimate of the loss that troubles us.
Marcus Annaeus Seneca
What greater evil could you wish a miser than long life?
Syrus Publilius
Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness.
Seneca
By-and-by never comes.
Saint Augustine
Indeed, the condition of human nature is just this; man towers above the rest of creation so long as he realizes his own nature, and when he forgets it, he sinks lower than the beasts. For other living things to be ignorant of themselves, is natural; but for man it is a defect.
Boethius
Acquittal of the guilty damns the judge.
Horace
A wise man will be master of his mind, a fool will be its slave.
Publilius Syrus
The only certainty is that nothing is certain.
Pliny the Elder
Salvation: to see each thing for what it is— its nature and its purpose.To do only what is right, say only what is true, without holding back.What else could it be but to live life fully— to pay out goodnesslike the rings of a chain, without the slightest gap.
Marcus Aurelius
Furthermore, as the body suffers the horrors of disease and the pangs of pain, so we see the mind stabbed with anguish, grief and fear. What more natural than that it should likewise have a share in death?
Titus Lucretius Carus
Loyalty is what we seek in friendship.
Cicero
And we, too, being called by His will to Christ Jesus, are not justified by ourselves, nor by our own wisdom, or understanding or godliness, or works which we have wrought in holiness of heart; but by that faith through which, from the beginning, Almighty God has justified all men; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
Clement of Rome
The heart is great which shows moderation in the midst of prosperity.
Marcus Annaeus Seneca
Time is a sort of river of passing events and strong is its current no sooner is a thing brought to sight than it is swept by and another takes its place and this too will be swept away.
Marcus Aurelius
I cannot find a faithful message-bearer," he wrote to his friend, the scholar Atticus. "How few are they who are able to carry a rather weighty letter without lightening it by reading.
Marcus Tullius Cicero
Love of bustle is not industry.
Seneca
That which is really beautiful has no need of anything; not more than law, not more than truth, not more than benevolence or modesty.
Marcus Aurelius
How unhappy is he who cannot forgive himself.
Publilius Syrus
As a rule, men worry more about what they can’t see than about what they can
Gaius Julius Caesar
Observe always that everything is the result of change, and get used to thinking that there is nothing Nature loves so well as to change existing forms and make new ones like them.
Marcus Aurelius
To do two things at once is to do neither.
Publilius Syrus
Every man is the architect of his own fortune.
Sallust
The drops of rain make a hole in the stone not by violence but by oft falling.
Lucretius
Add each day something to fortify you against poverty and death.
Marcus Annaeus Seneca
if we are wayfarers who want to return home, then we must see the world as a means of transportation (terestibus vel marinis vehiculis) and always remember to distinguish the means and ends.
Augustine of Hippo
¿Preguntas cúal es el fundamento de la sabiduría? No gozarte en cosas vanas.
Seneca
Lawyers are men who hire out their words and anger.
Martial
What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
Caius Terentius Varro
Seize the day and put the least possible trust in tomorrow.
Horace
He who cannot do what he wants must make do with what he can.
Terence
Man must be arched and buttressed from within else the temple wavers to dust.
Marcus Aurelius
A woman is always buying something.
Ovid
Journeying over many seas & through many countries I came dear brother to this pitiful leave-taking The last gestures by your gravesideThe futility of words over your quiet ashes.Life cleft us from each other Pointlessly depriving brother of brotherAccept then, our parents' customThese offerings, this leave-takingEchoing forever, brother, through a brother's tears
Catullus
One man meets an infamous punishment for that crime which confers a diadem upon another.
Juvenal
The political reputation of Servius rests upon his organization of society according to a fixed scale of rank and fortune. He originated the census, a measure of the highest utility to a state destined, as Rome was, to future preeminence; for by means of its public service, in peace as well as in war, could thence forward be regularly organized on the basis of property; every man's contribution could be in proportion to his means.
Livy
The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts ... take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.
Marcus Aurelius
A bad peace is worse than war.
Tacitus
For it is not needful, to use a common proverb, that one should drink up the ocean who wishes to learn that its water is salt.
Irenaeus of Lyons
He gives twice who gives promptly.
Publilius Syrus
Words need to be sown like seeds. No matter how tiny a seed may be, when in lands in the right sort of ground it unfolds its strength and from being minute expands and grows to a massive size.
Seneca
Charity is no substitute for justice withheld.
Augustine of Hippo
To them that ask where have you seen the Gods or how do you know for certain there are Gods that you are so devout in their worship? I answer: Neither have I ever seen my own soul and yet I respect and honor it.
Marcus Aurelius
Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore, seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand.
Augustine of Hippo
And do you know why we have not the power to attain this Stoic ideal? It is because we refuse to believe in our power. Nay, of a surety, there is something else which plays a part: it is because we are in love with our vices; we uphold them and prefer to make excuses for them rather than shake them off. We mortals have been endowed with sufficient strength by nature, if only we use this strength, if only we concentrate our powers and rouse them all to help us or at least not to hinder us. The reason is unwillingness, the excuse, inability.
Seneca
It has seemed to be more necessary to have regard to the weight of words rather than to their number.
Cicero
Let us cherish and love old age; for it is full of pleasure if one knows how to use it. Fruits are most welcome when almost over; youth is most charming at its close; the last drink delights the toper, the glass which souses him and puts the finishing touch on his drunkenness. Each pleasure reserves to the end the greatest delights which it contains. Life is most delightful when it is on the downward slope, but has not yet reached the abrupt decline.
Seneca
No wild beasts are so deadly to humans as most Christians are to each other.
Ammianus Marcellinus
this terror then and drakness of mind must be dispelled not by the rays of the sun and glittering shafts of day, but by the aspect and the law of nature; the warp whose design we shall begin with this first principle, nothing is ever gotten out of nothing by divine power.
Titus Lucretius Carus
Borrowing from Peter to pay Paul.
Cicero
It is not fit that I should give myself pain, for I have never intentionally given pain even to another.
Marcus Aurelius
Hope is patience with the lamp lit.
Tertullian
Una Salus Victis Nullam Sperare Salutem - (Latin - written 19 BC)The only hope for the doomed, is no hope at all...
Virgil
Perhaps someday it will be pleasant to remember even this.
Virgil
Nullus est liber tam malus ut non aliqua parte prosit - There is no book so bad that it is not profitable on some part.
Pliny the Younger
Let no one be willing to speak ill of the absent.
Propertius
The things you think about determine the quality of your mind.
Marcus Aurelius
In everything the middle course is best: all things in excess bring trouble to men.
Plautus
Some remedies are worse than the disease.
Syrus
The man who masters his own soul will forever be called conqueror of conquerors.
Plautus
Forget your woes when you see your friend.
Priscian