Plutarch Quotes
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Were it only to learn benevolence to humankind, we should be merciful to other creatures.
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Lamentation is the only musician that always, like a screech-owl, alights and sits on the roof of any angry man.
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Fate, however, is to all appearance more unavoidable than unexpected.
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Rome was in the most dangerous inclination to change on account of the unequal distribution of wealth and property, those of highest rank and greatest spirit having impoverished themselves by shows, entertainments, ambition of offices, and sumptuous buildings, and the riches of the city having thus fallen into the hands of mean and low-born persons. So that there wanted but a slight impetus to set all in motion, it being in the power of every daring man to overturn a sickly commonwealth.
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We ought not to treat living creatures like shoes or household belongings, which when worn with use we throw away.
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Eat not thy heart; which forbids to afflict our souls, and waste them with vexatious cares.
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The saying of old Antigonus, who when he was to fight at Andros, and one told him, 'The enemy's ships are more than ours,' replied, 'For how many then wilt thou reckon me?'
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Education and study, and the favors of the muses, confer no greater benefit on those that seek them than these humanizing and civilizing lessons, which teach our natural qualities to submit to the limitations prescribed by reason, and to avoid the wildness of extremes.
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Alexander esteemed it more kingly to govern himself than to conquer his enemies.
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Lycurgus being asked why he, who in other respects appeared to be so zealous for the equal rights of men, did not make his government democratical rather than oligarchical, "Go you," replied the legislator, "and try a democracy in your own house.
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He said they that were serious in ridiculous matters would be ridiculous in serious affairs.
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When he was wounded with an arrow in the ankle, and many ran to him that were wont to call him a god, he said smiling, 'That is blood, as you see, and not, as Homer saith, ‘such humour as distils from blessed gods.''
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Demosthenes told Phocion, 'The Athenians will kill you some day when they once are in a rage.' 'And you,' said he, 'if they are once in their senses.'
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Wickedness frames the engines of her own torment. She is a wonderful artisan of a miserable life.
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Learn to be pleased with everything...because it could always be worse, but isn't!
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King Agis said, "The Lacedaemonians are not wont to ask how many, but where the enemy are."
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Among real friends there is no rivalry or jealousy of one another, but they are satisfied and contented alike whether they are equal or one of them is superior.
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I had rather men should ask why my statue is not set up, than why it is.
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Scilurus on his death-bed, being about to leave four-score sons surviving, offered a bundle of darts to each of them, and bade them break them. When all refused, drawing out one by one, he easily broke them,-thus teaching them that if they held together, they would continue strong; but if they fell out and were divided, they would become weak.
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Prosperity has this property, it puffs up narrow Souls, makes them imagine themselves high and mighty, and look down upon the World with Contempt; but a truly noble and resolved Spirit appears greatest in Distress, and then becomes more bright and conspicuous.
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Talkativeness has another plague attached to it, even curiosity; for praters wish to hear much that they may have much to say.
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Learn to be pleased with everything, with wealth so far as it makes us beneficial to others; with poverty, for not having much to care for; and with obscurity, for being unenvied.
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When he was in great prosperity, and courted by many, seeing himself splendidly served at his table, he turned to his children and said: 'Children, we had been undone, if we had not been undone'.
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Character is simply habit long continued.