Seneca the Younger Quotes
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To make a commencement requires a mental effort.
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In every good man a God doth dwell.
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Such as the chain of causes we call Fate, such is the chain of wishes: one links on to another; the whole man is bound in the chain of wishing for ever.
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A man's ability cannot possibly be of one sort and his soul of another. If his soul be well-ordered, serious and restrained, his ability also is sound and sober. Conversely, when the one degenerates, the other is contaminated.
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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.
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We are all sinful. Therefore whatever we blame in another we shall find in our own bosoms.
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It is medicine, not scenery, for which a sick man must go searching.
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He who forbids not sin when he may, commands it
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I have withdrawn not only from men, but from affairs, especially my own affairs; I am working for later generations, writing down some ideas that may be of assistance to them.
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On entering a temple we assume all signs of reverence. How much more reverent then should we be before the heavenly bodies, the stars, the very nature of God!
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Pleasure dies at the very moment when it charms us most.
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Brother, the Great Spirit has made us all. . . . .
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They lose the day in expectation of the night, and the night in fear of the dawn.
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Why do people not confess vices? It is because they have not yet laid them aside. It is a waking person only who can tell their dreams.
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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.
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The mind makes the nobleman, and uplifts the lowly to high degree.
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That poverty is no disaster is understood by everyone who has not yet succumbed to the madness of greed and luxury that turns everything topsy-turvy.
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What difference does it make how much there is laid away in a man's safe or in his barns, how many head of stock he grazes or how much capital he puts out at interest, if he is always after what is another's and only counts what he has yet to get, never what he has already. You ask what is the proper limit to a person's wealth? First, having what is essential, and second, having what is enough.
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We learn not for life but for the debating-room.
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The voice of flattery affects us after it has ceased, just as after a concert men find some agreeable air ringing in their ears to the exclusion of all serious business.
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On him does death lie heavily, who, but too well known to all, dies to himself unknown.
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So live with an inferior as you would wish a superior to live with you.
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Watch over yourself. Be your own accuser, then your judge; ask yourself grace sometimes, and, if there is need, impose upon yourself some pain.
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The fates lead the willing, and drag the unwilling.