C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.
Seneca
A benefit consists not in what is done or given, but in the intention of the giver or doer.
A benefit is estimated according to the mind of the giver.
A good conscience fears no witnesses, 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!
A great fortune is a great slavery.
A great mind becomes a great fortune.
A hated government does not last long.
A hungry people listens not to reason, nor cares for justice, nor is bent by any prayers.
A large library is apt to distract rather than to instruct the learner; it is much better to be confined to a few authors than to wander at random over many.
A multitude of books distracts the mind.
A quarrel is quickly settled when deserted by one party; there is no battle unless there be two.
Accustom yourself to that which you bear ill, and you will bear it well.
Adverse fortune seldom spares men of the noblest virtues. No one can with safety expose himself often to dangers. The man who has often escaped is at last caught.
Alas for the folly of the loquacious!
All cruelty springs from weakness.
All I desire is, that my poverty may not be a burden to myself, or make me so to others; and that is the best state of fortune that is neither directly necessitous nor far from it. A mediocrity of fortune, with gentleness of mind, will preserve us from fear or envy; which is a desirable condition; for no man wants power to do mischief.
All that lies betwixt the cradle and the grave is uncertain.
Although a man has so well purged his mind that nothing can trouble or deceive him any more, yet he reached his present innocence through sin.
An avenging God closely follows the haughty.
An honest heart possesses a kingdom.
Anger is like a ruin, which, in falling upon its victim, breaks itself to pieces.
Anger is like rain which breaks itself whereon it falls.
As fate is inexorable, and not to be moved either with tears or reproaches, an excess of sorrow is as foolish as profuse laughter; while, on the other hand, not to mourn at all is insensibility.
As gratitude is a necessary and a glorious, so also is it an obvious, a cheap, and an easy virtue—so obvious that wherever there is life there is place for it, so cheap that the covetous man may be grateful without expense, and so easy that the sluggard may be so likewise without labor.
As the soil, however rich it may be, cannot be productive without culture, so the mind without cultivation can never produce good fruit.
As the world leads we follow.
Be not dazzled by beauty, but look for those inward qualities which are lasting.
Beauty is such a fleeting blossom, how can wisdom rely upon its momentary delight?
Constant exposure to dangers will breed contempt for them.
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.
Corporeal punishment falls far more heavily than most weighty pecuniary penalty.
Courage leads to heaven; fear, to death.
Death is a release from and an end of all pains.
Death is the wish of some, the relief of many, and the end of all. It sets the slave at liberty, carries the banished man home, and places all mortals on the same level, insomuch that life itself were a punishment without it.
Desperate evils generally make men safe.
Difficulties strengthen the mind, as well as labor does the body.
Dignity increases more easily than it begins.
Dissembling profiteth nothing; a feigned countenance, and slightly forged externally, deceiveth but very few.
Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness.
Elegance is not an ornament worthy of man.
Epicurus says “gratitude is a virtue that has commonly profit annexed to it.” And where is the virtue, say I, that has not? But still the virtue is to be valued for itself, and not for the profit that attends it.
Every delay is too long to one who is in a hurry.
Every monarch is subject to a mightier one.
Everything that exceeds the bounds of moderation has an unstable foundation.
Expediency often silences justice.
Eyes will not see when the heart wishes them to be blind. Desire conceals truth as darkness does the earth.
Fidelity bought with money is overcome by money.
Fortune can take away riches, but not courage.
Fortune cannot take away what she did not give.
Fortune dreads the brave, and is only terrible to the coward.
Fortune is gentle to the lowly, and heaven strikes the humble with a light hand.
Friendship always benefits, while love sometimes injures.
Frugality, when all is spent, comes too late.
God is not to be worshiped with sacrifices and blood; for what pleasure can He have in the slaughter of the innocent? but with a pure mind, a good and honest purpose. Temples are not to be built for Him with stones piled on high; God is to be consecrated in the breast of each.
Golden roofs break men’s rest.
Great men rejoice in adversity just as brave soldiers triumph in war.
Greatness stands upon a precipice, and if prosperity carries a man never so little beyond his poise, it overbears and dashes him to pieces.
Happy the man who can endure the highest and the lowest fortune. He, who has endured such vicissitudes with equanimity, has deprived misfortune of its power.
Hardly a man will you find who could live with his door open.
Haste trips up its own heels, fetters and stops itself.
He grieves more than is necessary who grieves before it is necessary.
He is a fool who cannot be angry; but he is a wise man who will not.
He is greedy of life who is not willing to die when the world is perishing around him.
He is not guilty who is not guilty of his own free will.
He knows that the man is overcome ingloriously who is overcome without danger.
He must necessarily fear many, whom many fear.
He that by harshness of nature rules his family with an iron hand is as truly a tyrant as he who misgoverns a nation.
He that does good to another does good also to himself, not only in the consequence, but in the very act; for the consciousness of well-doing is in itself ample reward.
He that lays down precepts for the government of our lives and moderating our passions obliges human nature, not only in the present, but in all succeeding generations.
He that makes himself famous by his eloquence, justice or arms illustrates his extraction, let it be never so mean; and gives inestimable reputation to his parents. We should never have heard of Sophroniscus, but for his son, Socrates; nor of Ariosto and Gryllus, if it had not been for Xenophon and Plato.
He that visits the sick, in hopes of a legacy, let him be never so friendly in all other cases, I look upon him in this, to be no better than a raven, that watches a weak sheep only to peck out its eyes.
He that will do no good offices after a disappointment must stand still, and do just nothing at all. The plough goes on after a barren year; and while the ashes are yet warm, we raise a new house upon the ruins of a former.
He who begs timidly courts a refusal.
He who boasts of his descent, praises the deeds of another.
He who does not prevent a crime when he can, encourages it.
He who has injured thee was either stronger or weaker; if weaker, spare him; if stronger, spare thyself.
He who is sorry for having sinned is almost innocent.
He who tenders doubtful safety to those in trouble refuses it.
Home joys are blessed of heaven.
How great would be our peril if our slaves began to number us!
However wretched a fellow-mortal may be, he is still a member of our common species.
I am ashamed of my master and not of my servitude.
I know that nothing comes to pass but what God appoints; our fate is decreed, and things do not happen by chance, but every man’s portion of joy and sorrow is predetermined.
I will govern my life and my thoughts as if the whole world were to see the one and to 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?
I will have a care of being a slave to myself, for it is a perpetual, a shameful, and the heaviest of all servitudes; and this may be done by moderate desires.
If anger is not restrained, it is frequently more hurtful to us, than the injury that provokes it.
If I have lost anything it was incidental; and the less money, the less trouble; the less favor, the less envy,—nay, even in those cases which put us out of our wits, it is not the loss itself, but the estimate of the loss that troubles us.
If I only have will to be grateful, I am so.
If sensuality were happiness beasts were happier than men; but human felicity is lodged in the soul, not in the flesh.
If thou wishest to get rid of thy evil propensities, thou must keep far from evil companions.
If we desire to judge justly, we must persuade ourselves that none of us is without sin.
If wisdom were conferred with this proviso, that I must keep it to myself and not communicate it to others, I would have none of it.
If you are surprised at the number of our maladies, count our cooks.
If you devote your time to study, you will avoid all the irksomeness of this life; nor will you long for the approach of night, being tired of the day; nor will you be a burden to yourself, nor your society insupportable to others.
If you will fear nothing, think that all things are to be feared.
If you wish to be loved, love.
In the great inconstancy and crowd of events nothing is certain except the past.
Indolence is stagnation; employment is life.
It goes a great way towards making a man faithful to let him understand that you think him so, and he that does but so much as suspect that I will deceive him gives me a sort of right to cozen him.
It is a common thing to screw up justice to the pitch of an injury. A man may be over-righteous, and why not over-grateful, too? There is a mischievous excess that borders so close upon ingratitude that it is no easy matter to distinguish the one from the other; but, in regard that there is good-will in the bottom of it, however distempered; for it is effectually but kindness out of the wits.
It is a shameful and unseemly thing to think one thing and to speak another, but how odious to write one and to think another.
It is a world of mischief that may be done by a single example of avarice or luxury. One voluptuous palate makes many more.
It is another’s fault if he be ungrateful, but is mine if I do not give. To find one thankful man I will oblige a great many that are not so.
It is by the benefit of letters that absent friends are in a manner brought together.
It is dishonorable to say one thing and think another; how much more dishonorable to write one thing and think another.
It is easy in adversity to despise death; real fortitude has he who can dare to be wretched.
It is foolish to strive with what we cannot avoid; we are born subjects, and to obey God is perfect liberty; he that does this shall be free, safe and quiet; all his actions shall succeed to his wishes.
It is not goodness to be better than the very worst.
It is often better not to see an insult than to avenge it.
It is only luxury and avarice that make poverty grievous to us; for it is a very small matter that does our business, and when we have provided against cold, hunger, and thirst, all the rest is but vanity and excess.
It is only the surprise and newness of the thing which makes that misfortune terrible which by premeditation might be made easy to us. For that which some people make light by sufferance, others do by foresight.
It is opportunity that makes the thief.
It is remarkable that Providence has given us all things for our advantage near at hand; but iron, gold, and silver, being both the instruments of blood and slaughter and the price of it, nature has hidden in the bowels of the earth.
It is the constant fault and inseparable ill quality of ambition never to look behind it.
It is the edge and temper of the blade that make a good sword, not the richness of the scabbard, and so it is not money or possessions that make men considerable, but virtue.
It is the mind that makes us rich and happy, in what condition soever we are, and money signifies no more to it than it does to the gods.
It is the practice of the multitude to bark at eminent men, as little dogs do at strangers.
It is the proof of a bad cause when it is applauded by the mob.
It is too late to be on our guard when we are in the midst of evils.
It is uncertain at what place death awaits thee. Wait thou for it at every place.
It passes in the world for greatness of mind, to be perpetually giving and loading people with bounties; but it is one thing to know how to give and another thing not to know how to keep. Give me a heart that is easy and open, but I will have no holes in it; let it be bountiful with judgment, but I will have nothing run out of it I know not how.
It was the saying of a great man, that if we could trace our descents, we should find all slaves to come from princes, and all princes from slaves; and fortune has turned all things topsy-turvy in a long series of revolutions; beside, for a man to spend his life in pursuit of a title, that serves only when he dies to furnish out an epitaph, is below a wise man’s business.
Know this, that he that is a friend of himself is a friend to all men.
Know thyself; this is the great object.
Lack of desire is the greatest riches.
Leisure without study is death, and the grave of a living man.
Let no man presume to give advice to others that has not first given good counsel to himself.
Let not the enjoyment of pleasures now within your grasp be carried to such excess as to incapacitate you from future repetition.
Let that please man which has pleased God.
Let the weary at length possess quiet rest.
Let us digest them; otherwise they enter our memory, but not our minds.
Let wickedness escape as it may at the bar, it never fails of doing justice upon itself; for every guilty person is his own hangman.
Levity of behavior is the bane of all that is good and virtuous.
Light griefs are plaintive, but great ones are dumb.
Many have reached their fate while dreading fate.
Many men provoke others to overreach them by excessive suspicion; their extraordinary distrust in some sort justifies the deceit.
Men learn while they teach.
Men practice war; beasts do not.
Men trust rather to their eyes than to their ears; the effect of precepts is therefore slow and tedious, whilst that of examples is summary and effectual.
Mercy often inflicts death.
Misfortunes, in fine, cannot be avoided; but they may be sweetened, if not overcome, and our lives made happy by philosophy.
Moderate pleasure relaxes the spirit, and moderates it.
Modesty once extinguished knows not how to return.
Money does all things for reward; some are pious and honest so long as they thrive upon it, but if the devil himself gives better wages, they soon change their party.
Most people fancy themselves innocent of those crimes of which they cannot be convicted.
Most powerful is he who has himself in his power.
Nature ever provides for her own exigencies.
Nature has given us the seeds of knowledge, not knowledge itself.
Nature has made us passive, and to suffer is our lot. While we are in the flesh every man has his chain and his clog; only it is looser and lighter to one man than to another, and he is more at ease who takes it up and carries it than he who drags it.
Necessity is stronger than duty.
No action will be considered as blameless unless the will was so; for by the will the act was dictated.
No age is shut against great genius.
No book can be so good, as to be profitable when negligently read.
No crime has been without a precedent.
No evil is without its compensation.
No evil propensity of the human heart is so powerful that it may not be subdued by discipline.
No man esteems anything that comes to him by chance; but when it is governed by reason, it brings credit both to the giver and receiver; whereas those favors are in some sort scandalous that make a man ashamed of his patron.
No man is born wise; but wisdom and virtue require a tutor; though we can easily learn to be vicious without a master.
No man is nobler born than another, unless he is born with better abilities and a more amiable disposition. They who make such a parade with their family pictures and pedigrees, are, properly speaking, rather to be called noted or notorious than noble persons. I thought it right to say this much, in order to repel the insolence of men who depend entirely upon chance and accidental circumstances for distinction, and not at all on public services and personal merit.
No one becomes guilty by fate.
No possession is gratifying without a companion.
No time is too short for the wicked to injure their neighbors.
Nobody has ever found the gods so much his friends that he can promise himself another day.
Not be who has little, but he who wishes for more, is poor.
Nothing is more common than for great thieves to ride in triumph when small ones are punished. But let wickedness escape as it may, at the law it never fails of doing itself justice; for every guilty person is his own hangman.
O Fortune, that enviest the brave, what unequal rewards thou bestowest on the righteous!
Of what consequence is it that anything should be concealed from man? Nothing is hidden from God; He is present in our minds and comes into the midst of our thoughts. Comes, do I say?—as if He were ever absent!
Old age is an incurable disease.
One alleviation in misfortune is to endure and submit to necessity.
One crime is concealed by the commission of another.
Opportunity has hair in front; behind she is bald. If you seize her by the forelock, you may hold her; but if suffered to escape, not Jupiter himself can catch her again.
Other men’s sins are before our eyes, our own are behind our back.
Our lives are either spent in doing nothing at all, or in doing nothing to the purpose, or in doing nothing that we ought to do. We are always complaining that our days are few, and acting as though there would be no end to them.
Philosophy alone makes the mind invincible, and places us out of the reach of fortune, so that all her arrows fall short of us.
Philosophy does not regard pedigree; she did not receive Plato as a noble, but she made him so.
Philosophy is the art and law of life, and it teaches us what to do in all cases, and, like good marksmen, to hit the white at any distance.
Philosophy is the health of the mind.
Poison is drunk out of golden cups.
Power exercised with violence has seldom been of long duration, but temper and moderation generally produce permanence in all things.
Praise thyself never.
Precepts are like seeds; they are little things which do much good; if the mind which receives them has a disposition, it must not be doubted that his part contributes to the generation, and adds much to that which has been collected.
Precepts are the rules by which we ought to square our lives.
Precepts or maxims are of great weight; and a few useful ones at hand do more toward a happy life than whole volumes that we know not where to find.
Prosperity asks for fidelity; adversity exacts it.
Reading nourisheth the wit; and when it is wearied with study, it refresheth it, yet not without study.
Real improvement is of slow growth only.
Religion worships God, while superstition profanes that worship.
Remember, not one penny can we take with us into the unknown land.
Resistance to oppression is second nature.
Revenge is an inhuman word.
Self-denial is the best riches.
Servitude seizes on few, but many seize on her.
Shame may restrain what law does not prohibit.
Shun no toil to make yourself remarkable by some talent or other; yet do not devote yourself to one branch exclusively. Strive to get clear nations about all. Give up no science entirely; for science is but one.
Silence is learned by the many misfortunes of life.
Some pretend want of power to make a competent return; and you shall find in others a kind of graceless modesty, that makes a man ashamed of requiting an obligation, because it is a confession that he has received one.
Sometimes death is a punishment; often a gift; it has been a favor to many.
Speech is the index of the mind.
Study rather to fill your mind than your coffers; knowing that gold and silver were originally mingled with dirt, until avarice or ambition parted them.
Success consecrates the foulest crimes.
Take away ambition and vanity, and where will be your heroes and patriots?
Take from men ambition and vanity and you will have neither heroes nor patriots.
Teach the art of living well.
That comes too late that comes for the asking.
That which is given with pride and ostentation is rather an ambition than a bounty.
The ascent from earth to heaven is not easy.
The expression of truth is simplicity.
The fates lead the willing, and drag the unwilling.
The first petition that we are to make to Almighty God is for a good conscience, the next for health of mind, and then of body.
The fortune of war is always doubtful.
The great blessings of mankind are within us, and within our reach, but we shut our eyes, and, like people in the dark, we fall foul upon the very thing we search for, without finding it.
The greater part of mankind are angry with the sinner and not with the sin.
The greatest chastisement that a man may receive who hath outraged another, is to have done the outrage; and there is no man who is so rudely punished as he that is subject to the whip of his own repentance.
The greatest loss of time is delay and expectation, which depends 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.
The greatest man is he who chooses right with the most invincible resolution.
The law of the pleasure in having done anything for another is, that the one almost immediately forgets having given, and the other remembers eternally having received.
The man who can be compelled knows not how to die.
The man who has learned to triumph over sorrow wears his miseries as though they were sacred fillets upon his brow; and nothing is so entirely admirable as a man bravely wretched.
The manner of saying or of doing anything goes a great way in the value of the thing itself. It was well said of him that called a good office that was done harshly, and with an ill-will, a stony piece of bread; it is necessary for him that is hungry to receive it, but it almost chokes a man in the going down.
The mind is never right but when it is at peace within itself; the soul is in heaven even while it is in the flesh, if it be purged of its natural corruptions, and taken up with divine thoughts, and contemplations.
The mind is the master over every kind of fortune: itself acts in both ways, being the cause of its own happiness and misery.
The mind is the proper judge of the man.
The mind that is anxious about the future is miserable.
The miserable are sacred.
The most happy ought to wish for death.
The most imperious masters over their own servants are at the same time the most abject slaves to the servants of others.
The origin of all mankind was the same; it is only a clear and good conscience that makes a man noble, for that is derived from heaven itself.
The pleasures of eating deal with us like Egyptian thieves, who strangle those whom they embrace.
The road by precepts is tedious, by example, short and efficacious.
The sovereign good of man is a mind that subjects all things to itself and is itself subject to nothing; such a man’s pleasures are modest and reserved, and it may be a question whether he goes to heaven, or heaven comes to him; for a good man is influenced by God Himself, and has a kind of divinity within him.
The state of that man’s mind who feels too intense an interest as to future events, must be most deplorable.
The sun shines even on the wicked.
The sure way to wickedness is always through wickedness.
The swift hour flies on double wings.
The time that precedes punishment is the severest part of it.
The velocity with which time flies is infinite, as is most apparent to those who look back.
The way to wickedness is always through wickedness.
The world is the mighty temple of the gods.
The wretched hasten to hear of their own miseries.
There are more people abusive to others than lie open to abuse themselves; but the humor goes round, and he that laughs at me to-day will have somebody to laugh at him to-morrow.
There are no greater wretches in the world than many of those whom people in general take to be happy.
There is a noble manner of being poor, and who does not know it will never be rich.
There is as much greatness of mind in the owning of a good turn as in the doing of it; and we must no more force a requital out of season than be wanting in it.
There is more heroism in self-denial than in deeds of arms.
There is no day without sorrow.
There is no grace in a benefit that sticks to the fingers.
There is no great genius free from some tincture of madness.
There is no greater punishment of wickedness than that it is dissatisfied with itself and its deeds.
There is none made so great but he may both need the help and service, and stand in fear of the power and unkindness, even of the meanest of mortals.
There is nothing in the world so much admired as a man who knows how to bear unhappiness with courage.
There is nothing more disgraceful than that an old man should have nothing to produce as a proof that he has lived long except his years.
There is nothing so wretched or foolish as to anticipate misfortunes. What madness is it in expecting evil before it arrives?
There is nothing that we can properly call our own but our time, and yet everybody fools us out of it who has a mind to do it. If a man borrows a paltry sum of money, there must needs be bonds and securities, and every common civility is presently charged upon account. But he who has my time thinks he owes me nothing for it, though it be a debt that gratitude itself can never repay.
They who have light in themselves will not revolve as satellites.
This body is not a home, but an inn; and that only for a short time.
This day which thou fearest so much, and which thou callest thy last, is the birthday of an eternity.
Those things on which philosophy has set its seal are beyond the reach of injury; no age will discard them or lessen their force, each succeeding century will add somewhat to the respect in which they are held; for we look upon what is near us with jealous eyes, but we admire what is further off with less prejudice. The wise man’s life, therefore, includes much; he is not hedged in by the same limits which confine others; he alone is exempt from the laws by which mankind is governed; all ages serve him like a god. If any time be past he recalls it by his memory; if it be present he uses it, if it be future he anticipates it; his life is a long one because he concentrates all times into it.
Time hath often cured the wound which reason failed to heal.
Time is the greatest remedy for anger.
To die without fear of death is to be desired.
To give and to lose is nothing; but to lose and to give still is the part of a great mind.
To make another person hold his tongue, be you first silent.
To things which you bear with impatience you should accustom yourself, and, by habit you will bear them well.
Trifling trouble find utterance; deeply felt pangs are silent.
True friends are the whole world to one another; and he that is a friend to himself is also a friend to mankind. Even in my studies the greatest delight I take is of imparting it to others; for there is no relish to me in the possessing of anything without a partner.
True joy is a serene and sober motion; and they are miserably out that take laughing for rejoicing; the seat of it is within, and there is no cheerfulness like the resolutions of a brave mind.
Truth hates delays.
Truth will never be tedious unto him that travelleth in the secrets of nature; there is nothing but falsehood that glutteth us.
Vice is contagious, and there is no trusting the sound and the sick together.
Virtue hath no virtue if it be not impugned; then appeareth how great it is, of what value and power it is, when by patience it approveth what it works.
Virtue is shut out from no one; she is open to all, accepts all, invites all, gentlemen, freedmen, slaves, kings, and exiles; she selects neither house nor fortune; she is satisfied with a human being without adjuncts.
Virtue is that perfect good, which is the complement of a happy life; the only immortal thing that belongs to mortality.
Virtue with some is nothing but successful temerity.
Virtue withers away if it has no opposition.
Watch over yourself. Be your own accuser, then your judge; ask yourself grace sometimes, and, if there is need, impose upon yourself some pain.
We are all sinful. Therefore whatever we blame in another we shall find in our own bosoms.
We are as answerable for what we give as for what we receive; nay, the misplacing of a benefit is worse than the not receiving of it; for the one is another person’s fault, but the other is mine.
We are at best but stewards of what we falsely call our own; yet avarice is so insatiable that it is not in the power of liberality to content it.
We are born to lose and to perish, to hope and to fear, to vex ourselves and others; and there is no antidote against a common calamity but virtue; for the foundation of true joy is in the conscience.
We are members of one great body. Nature planted in us a mutual love, and fitted us for a social life. We must consider that we were born for the good of the whole.
We are sure to get the better of fortune if we do but grapple with her.
We become wiser by adversity; prosperity destroys our appreciation of the right.
We have lost morals, justice, honor, piety and faith, and that sense of shame which, once lost, can never be restored.
We have suffered lightly, if we have suffered what we should weep for.
We pardon familiar vices.
We pray for trifles without so much as a thought of the greatest blessings; and we are not ashamed, many times, to ask God for that which we should blush to own to our neighbor.
We should every night call ourselves to an account: What infirmity have I mastered to-day? what passion opposed? what temptation resisted? what virtue acquired? Our vices will abate of themselves if they be brought every day to the shrift.
We should give as we would receive, cheerfully, quickly and without hesitation; for there is no grace in a benefit that sticks to the fingers.
We sought therefore to amend our will, and not to suffer it through despite to languish long time in error.
What a vile and abject thing is man if he do not raise himself above humanity.
What if a man save my life with a draught that was prepared to poison me? The providence of the issue does not at all discharge the obliquity of the intent. And the same reason holds good even in religion itself. It is not the incense, or the offering that is acceptable to God, but the purity and devotion of the worshipper.
What is death but a ceasing to be what we were before? We are kindled, and put out, we die daily; nature that begot us expels us, and a better and safer place is provided for us.
What madness is it for a man to starve himself to enrich his heir, and so turn a friend into an enemy! For his joy at your death will be proportioned to what you leave him.
What once were vices, are now the manners of the day.
What reason could not avoid has often been cured by delay.
Whatever begins, also ends.
Whatever fortune has raised to a height, she has raised only that it may fall.
Whatever we give to the wretched, we lend to fortune.
When God has once begun to throw down the prosperous. He overthrows them altogether: such is the end of the mighty.
When once ambition has passed its natural limits, its progress is boundless.
When thou hast profited so much that thou respectest even thyself, thou mayst let go thy tutor.
Wherever the speech is corrupted the mind is also.
Wherever there is a human being there is an opportunity for a kindness.
While you look at what is given, look also at the giver.
Why does no man confess his vices? Because he is yet in them; it is for a waking man to tell his dream.
Why is there no man who confesses his vices? It is because he has not yet laid them aside. It is a waking man only who can tell his dreams.
Wisdom comes to no one by chance.
With parsimony a little is sufficient; and without it nothing is sufficient; whereas frugality makes a poor man rich.
Wouldst thou subject all things to thyself? Subject thyself to reason.
You find in some a sort of graceless modesty, that makes them ashamed to requite an obligation.