Seneca the Younger Quotes
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You cannot escape necessities, but you can overcome them.
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What others think of us would be of little moment did it not, when known, so deeply tinge what we think of ourselves.
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He who would do great things should not attempt them all alone.
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That which we are not permitted to have we delight in; that which we can have is disregarded.
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The wise man lacked nothing but needed a great number of things, whereas the fool, on the other hand, needs nothing (for he does not know how to use anything) but lacks everything.
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The condition of all who are preoccupied is wretched, but most wretched is the condition of those who labor at preoccupations that are not even their own, who regulate their sleep by that of another, their walk by the pace of another, who are under orders in case of the freest things in the world-loving and hating. If these wish to know how short their life is, let them reflect how small a part of it is their own.
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Let us say what we feel, and feel what we say; let speech harmonize with life.
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Dangerous is wrath concealed. Hatred proclaimed doth lose its chance of wreaking vengeance.
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To wish to be well is a part of becoming well.
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Nobody will keep the thing he hears to himself, and nobody will repeat just what he hears and no more.
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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.
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They who have light in themselves will not revolve as satellites.
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Most people fancy themselves innocent of those crimes of which they cannot be convicted.
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All we see and admire today will burn in the universal fire that ushers in a new, just, happy world.
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So called pleasures, when they go beyond a certain limit, are but punishments.
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Let him who has granted a favour speak not of it; let him who has received one, proclaim it.
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It is the property of a great and good mind to covet, not the fruit of good deeds, but good deeds themselves, and to seek for a good man even after having met with bad men.
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Cato, being scurrilously treated by a low and vicious fellow, quietly said to him, "A contest between us is very unequal, for thou canst bear ill language with ease, and return it with pleasure; but to me it is unusual to hear, and disagreeable to speak it." There are none more abusive to others than they that lie most open to it themselves; but the humor goes round, and he that laughs at me today will have somebody to laugh at him tomorrow.
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It is the sign of a weak mind to be unable to bear wealth.
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We must take care to live not merely a long life, but a full one; for living a long life requires only good fortune, but living a full life requires character. Long is the life that is fully lived; it is fulfilled only when the mind supplies its own good qualities and empowers itself from within.
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God has not revealed all things to man and has entrusted us with but a fragment of His mighty work. But He who directs all things, who has established and laid the foundation of the world, who has clothed Himself with Creation, He is greater and better than that which He has wrought. Hidden from our eyes, He can only be reached by the spirit.
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We most often go astray on a well trodden and much frequented road.
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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.
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Sovereignty over any foreign land is insecure.