Seneca

Quotes

We should conduct ourselves not as if we ought to live for the body, but as if we could not live without it.
It is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man and the security of a god.
Fear keeps pace with hope. Nor does their so moving together surprise me; both belong to a mind in suspense, to a mind in a state of anxiety through looking into the future. Both are mainly due to projecting our thoughts far ahead of us instead of adapting ourselves to the present. Thus it is that foresight, the greatest blessing humanity has been given, is transformed into a curse.
I require myself not to be equal to the best, but to be better then the bad.
truth never perishes (Veritas numquam perit)
Time heals what reason cannot.
Fate rules the affairs of mankind with no recognizable order.
What need is there to weep over parts of life? The whole of it calls for tears.
We should every night call ourselves to an account: What infirmity have I mastered today? What passions opposed? What temptation resisted? What virtue acquired?
When ever the speech is corrupted so is the mind.
Every man prefers belief to the exercise of judgement.
There is nothing so bitter that a patient mind cannot find some solace in it.
It better befits a man to laugh than to lament over it.
Consult your friend on all things, especially on those which respect yourself. His counsel may then be useful where your own self-love might impair your judgment.
He who boasts of his ancestry is praising the deeds of another.
Nothing is as certain as that the vices of leisure are gotten rid of by being busy.
Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labor does the body.
Most powerful is he who has himself in his own power.
Enjoy present pleasures in such a way as not to injure future ones.
Live among men as if God beheld you; speak to God as if men were listening.
While the fates permit, live happily; life speeds on with hurried step, and with winged days the wheel of the headlong year is turned.
Let tears flow of their own accord: their flowing is not inconsistent with inward peace and harmony.
One should count each day a separate life.
It is easier to exclude harmful passions than to rule them, and to deny them admittance than to control them after they have been admitted.
Toil to make yourself remarkable by some talent or other.
The spirit in which a thing is given determines that in which the debt is acknowledged; it's the intention, not the face-value of the gift, that's weighed.
Everything may happen. (Omnio fieri possent.)
It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that things are difficult.
What difference does it make how much you have? What you do not have amounts to much more.
If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable.
Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten.
Nothing is so bitter that a calm mind cannot find comfort in it.
While we are postponing, life speeds by.
Anger, if not restrained, is frequently more hurtful to us that injury that provokes it.
It is another's fault if he be ungrateful, but it is mine if I do not give. To find one thankful man, I will oblige a great many that are not so.
I will govern my life and thoughts as if the whole world were to see the one and read the other, for what does it signify to make anything a secret to my neighbor, when to God, who is the searcher of our hearts, all our privacies are open?
To see a man fearless in dangers. untainted with lusts, happy in adversity, composed in a tumult, and laughing at all those things which are generally either coveted or feared, all men must acknowledge that this can be from nothing else but a beam of divinity that influences a mortal body.
There is a noble manner of being poor and who does not know it will never be rich.
Most powerful is he who has himself in his power.
We are so vain as to set the highest value upon those things to which nature has assigned the lowest place. What can be more coarse and rude in the mind than the precious metals, or more slavish and dirty than the people that dig and work them? And yet they defile our minds more than our bodies, and make the possessor fouler than the artificer of them. Rich men, in fine, are only the greater slaves.
The greatest loss of time is delay and expectation, which depend upon the future. We let go the present, which we have in our power, and look forward to that which depends upon chance, and so relinquish a certainty for an uncertainty.
Wisdom does not show itself so much in precept as in life - in firmness of mind and a mastery of appetite. It teaches us to do as well as to talk; and to make our words and actions all of a color.
We should every night call ourselves to an account; What infirmity have I mastered today? What passions opposed? What temptation resisted? What virtue acquired? Our vices will abort of themselves if they be brought every day to the shrift.
A good conscience fears no witness, but a guilty conscience is solicitous even in solitude. If we do nothing but what is honest, let all the world know it. But if otherwise, what does it signify to have nobody else know it, so long as I know it myself? Miserable is he who slights that witness.
There is nothing in the world so much admired as a man who knows how to bear unhappiness with courage.
What once were vices are manners now.
It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.
The best ideas are common property.
Men do not care how nobly they live, but only how long, although it is within the reach of every man to live nobly, but within no man's power to live long.
It is quality rather than quantity that matters.
You can tell the character of every man when you see how he receives praise.
It is better, of cours, to know useless things than to know nothing.
Fire is the test of gold; adversity, of strong men.
There is no great genius without some touch of madness.
The comfort of having a friend may be taken away, but not that of having had one.
It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that they are difficult.
There is no great genius free from some tincture of madness.
If we let things terrify us, life will not be worth living.
I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.
"Just as I shall select my ship when I am about to go on a voyage, or my house when I propose to take a residence, so I shall choose my death when I am about to depart from life. "
He will live ill who does not know how to die well.
If a man does not know to what port he is steering, no wind is favourable to him.
If virtue precede us every step will be safe.
It is a denial of justice not to stretch out a helping hand to the fallen; that is the common right of humanity.
It is a great thing to know the season for speech and the season for silence.
It is a youthful failing to be unable to control one's impulses.
It is pleasant at times to play the madman.
It is rash to condemn where you are ignorant.
It is the sign of a weak mind to be unable to bear wealth.
It should be our care not so much to live a long life as a satisfactory one.
Many things have fallen only to rise higher.
No one can wear a mask for very long.
Not to feel one's misfortunes is not human, not to bear them is not manly.
I do not distinguish by the eye, but by the mind, which is the proper judge.
One hand washes the other.
(Manus Manum Lavet)
Speech is the mirror of the mind.
(Imago Animi Sermo Est)
The arts are the servant; wisdom its master.
The first step towards amendment is the recognition of error.
The mind is slow to unlearn what it learnt early.
The most onerous slavery is to be a slave to oneself.
The path of precept is long, that of example short and effectual.
To be always fortunate, and to pass through life with a soul that has never known sorrow, is to be ignorant of one half of nature.
Unjust dominion cannot be eternal.
We most often go astray on a well trodden and much frequented road.
Wealth is the slave of a wise man. The master of a fool.
Where reason fails, time oft has worked a cure.
Delay not; swift the flight of fortune's greatest favours.
What does reason demand of a man? A very easy thing--to live in accord with his nature.
Life without the courage for death is slavery.
All art is an imitation of nature.
An unpopular rule is never long maintained.
As was his language so was his life.
Be not too hasty either with praise or blame; speak always as though you were giving evidence before the judgement-seat of the Gods.
Be silent as to services you have rendered, but speak of favours you have received.
Dangerous is wrath concealed. Hatred proclaimed doth lose its chance of wreaking vengeance.
Desultory reading is delightful, but to be beneficial, our reading must be carefully directed.
He who spares the wicked injures the good.
Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labour the body.
Where the speech is corrupted, the mind is also.
To be feared is to fear: no one has been able to strike terror into others and at the same time enjoy peace of mind.
Nothing deters a good man from doing what is honourable.
Without an adversary prowess shrivels. We see how great and efficient it really is only when it shows by endurance what it is capable of.
The greatest remedy for anger is delay.