Tacitus Quotes
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When men are full of envy they disparage everything, whether it be good or bad.
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Necessity reforms the poor, and satiety reforms the rich.
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Men are more ready to repay an injury than a benefit, because gratitude is a burden and revenge a pleasure.
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Auctor nominis eius Christus,Tiberio imperitante, per procuratorem Pontium Pilatum, supplicio affectus erat. Christ, the leader of the sect, had been put to death by the procurator Pontius Pilate in the reign of Tiberius.
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No one would have doubted his ability to reign had he never been emperor.
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Old things are always in good repute, present things in disfavor.
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Abuse if you slight it, will gradually die away; but if you show yourself irritated, you will be thought to have deserved it.
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A bad peace is even worse than war.
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The sciences throw an inexpressible grace over our compositions, even where they are not immediately concerned; as their effects are discernible where we least expect to find them.
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In a state where corruption abounds, laws must be very numerous.
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Great empires are not maintained by timidity.
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He (Tiberius) was wont to mock at the arts of physicians, and at those who, after thirty years of age, needed counsel as to what was good or bad for their bodies.
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Et maiores vestros et posteros cogitate.
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We see many who are struggling against adversity who are happy, and more although abounding in wealth, who are wretched.
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Flattery labors under the odious charge of servility.
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No one in Germany laughs at vice, nor do they call it the fashion to corrupt and to be corrupted.
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Cruelty is fed, not weakened, by tears.
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Those in supreme power always suspect and hate their next heir.
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Auferre, trucidare, rapere, falsis nominibus imperium; atque, ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
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…ibi boni mores valent quam alibi bonae leges. 2
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Even the bravest men are frightened by sudden terrors.
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Then there is the usual scene when lovers are excited with each other, quarrels, entreaties, reproaches, and then fondling reconcilement.
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War will of itself discover and lay open the hidden and rankling wounds of the victorious party.
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All enterprises that are entered into with indiscreet zeal may be pursued with great vigor at first, but are sure to collapse in the end.