Seneca the Younger Quotes
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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.
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An old man at school is a contemptible and ridiculous object.
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The rust of the mind is the destruction of genius.
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We gain so much by quickness, and lose so much by slowness.
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All that lies betwixt the cradle and the grave is uncertain.
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The proper amount of wealth is that which neither descends to poverty nor is far distant from it.
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He that visits the sick in hopes of a legacy, but is never so friendly in all other cases, I look upon him as being no better than a raven that watches a weak sheep only to peck out its eyes.
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All my life I have been seeking to climb out of the pit of my besetting sins and I cannot do it and I never will unless a hand is let down to draw me up.
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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.
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What should a wise person do when given a blow? Same as Cato when he was attacked; not fire up or revenge the insult., or even return the blow, but simply ignore it.
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Truth will never be tedious unto him that travelleth in the secrets of nature; there is nothing but falsehood that glutteth us.
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It is the superfluous things for which men sweat.
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He who comes to a conclusion when the other side is unheard, may have been just in his conclusion, but yet has not been just in his conduct.
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Live for thy neighbor if thou wouldst live for thyself.
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Set aside a certain number of days, during which you shall be content with the scantiest and cheapest fare, with course and rough dress, saying to yourself the while: " Is this the condition that I feared?"
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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.
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It is sometimes pleasant even to act like a madman.
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Precepts are the rules by which we ought to square our lives. When they are contracted into sentences, they strike the affections; whereas admonition is only blowing of the coal.
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Whom they have injured they also hate.
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It's unknown the place and uncertain the time where death awaits you; thus you must expect death to find you, every time, at every place.
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Nothing will ever please me, no matter how excellent or beneficial, if I must retain the knowledge of it to myself. . . . . . No good thing is pleasant to possess, without friends to share it.
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Dissembling profiteth nothing; a feigned countenance, and slightly forged externally, deceiveth but very few.
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Fear drives the wretched to prayer
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Our minds must relax: they will rise better and keener after rest. Just as you must not force fertile farmland, as uninterrupted productivity will soon exhaust it, so constant effort will sap our mental vigour, while a short period of rest and relaxation will restore our powers. Unremitting effort leads to a kind of mental dullness and lethargy.