WednesdayJan 28, 2026
Quotes: 53419 Authors: 9969
I am not what I was when dear Cinara was my queen.
Glory drags all men along, low as well as high, Bound captive at the wheels of her glittering car.
Man is never watchful enough against dangers that threaten him every hour.
Let your literary compositions be kept from the public eye for nine years at least.
Knowledge is the foundation and source of good writing.
Justice, though moving with tardy pace, has seldom failed to overtake the wicked in their flight.
It is of no consequence of what parents a man is born, so he be a man of merit.
It's a good thing to be foolishly gay once in a while.
Instruction enlarges the natural powers of the mind.
In laboring to be concise, I become obscure.
If matters go badly now, they will not always be so.
I am frightened at seeing all the footprints directed towards thy den, and none returning.
Humble things become the humble.
He is not poor who has the use of necessary things.
Poetry is like painting.
Happy and thrice happy are they who enjoy an uninterrupted union, and whose love, unbroken by any complaints, shall not dissolve until the last day.
Nothing is beautiful from every point of view.
For a man learns more quickly and remembers more easily that which he laughed at, than that which he approves and than that which he approves and reveres.
Fidelity is the sister of justice.
Excellence when concealed, differs but little from buried worthlessness.
Avoid greatness; in a cottage there may be more real happiness than kings or their favorites enjoy.
Anger is momentary madness.
Adversity reveals genius, prosperity conceals it.
A wise God shrouds the future in obscure darkness.
A well-prepared mind hopes in adversity And fears in prosperity.
Pale Death, with impartial foot, strikes at poor men's hovels and the towers of kings.
No need to despair under Teucer's leadership and protection.
I shall not altogether die.
The world flies and cannot be recalled.
He despises what he sought; and he seeks that which he lately threw away.
Time will bring to light whatever is hidden; it will cover up and conceal what is now shining in splendor.
When worthy Homer nods, I am offended.
You traverse the world in search of happiness, which is within the reach of every man. A contented mind confers it on all.
You are dealing with a work full of dangerous hazard, and you are venturing upon fires overlaid with treacherous ashes
Ye who write, choose a subject suited to your abilities.
Who then is free? The wise man who can command himself.
Who loves the golden mean is safe from the poverty of a tenement, is free from the envy of a palace.
When discord dreadful bursts her brazen bars, And shatters locks to thunder forth her wars.
What has this unfeeling age of ours left untried, what wickedness has it shunned?
What does it avail you, if of many thorns only one be removed?
What can be found equal to modesty, uncorrupt faith, the sister of justice, and undisguised truth?
Virtue, dear friend, needs no defense, The surest guard is innocence: None knew, till guilt created fear, What darts or poisoned arrows were.
Virtue knowing no base repulse, shines with untarnished honour; nor does she assume or resign her emblems of honor by the will of some popular breeze.
Money is a handmaiden, if thou knowest how to use it; A mistress, if thou knowest not.
To know all things is not permitted.
Nor has he spent his life badly who has passed it in privacy.
They change their sky, not their mind, who cross the sea. A busy idleness possesses us: we seek a happy life, with ships and carriages: the object of our search is present with us.
The sorrowful dislike the gay, and the gay the sorrowful.
The miser acquires, yet fears to use his gains.
The lofty pine is oftenest shaken by the winds; High towers fall with a heavier crash; And the lightning strikes the highest mountain.
The human race afraid of nothing, rushes on through every crime.
The envious man grows lean at the success of his neighbor.
The body oppressed by excesses, bears down the mind, and depresses to the earth any portion of the divine Spirit we had been endowed with.
That destructive siren, sloth, is ever to be avoided.
Suffering is but another name for the teaching of experience, which is the parent of instruction and the schoolmaster of life.
Strength, wanting judgment and policy to rule, overturneth itself.
Remember to preserve a calm soul amid difficulties.
Poverty urges us to do and suffer anything that we may escape from it, and so leads us away from virtue.
The more we deny ourselves, the more the gods supply our wants.
Virtue consists in avoiding vice, and is the highest wisdom.
There is a mean in all things; and, moreover, certain limits on either side of which right cannot be found.
It is when I struggle to be brief that I become obscure.
As a true translator you will take care not to translate word for word. Nec verbum verbo curabis reddere fidus interpres
Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which, in prosperous circumstances, would have lain dormant.
Anger is a short madness.
He who has begun his task has half done it; begin.
Brave men were living before Agamemnon.
I strive to be brief, and become obscure.
Brute force bereft of wisdom falls to ruin by its own weight. Vis consili expers mole ruit sua.
What are you laughing at? Just change the name and the joke's on you. Quid rides? Mutato nomine de te fabula narratur
Remember to keep a clear head in difficult times. Aequam memento rebus in arduis servare mentem
Have the courage to be wise.
Nothing is too high for the daring of mortals: we storm heaven itself in our folly.
Not all of me will die. Non omnia moriar
Don't despair. Nil desperandum
Limbs of a dismembered poet. Disiecti membra poetae
You may see me, fat and shining, with well-cared-for hide, ... a hog from Epicurus's herd.
Alas, the fleeting years slip by. Eheu fugaces labuntur anni
From the egg right to the apples. Ab ovo usque ad mala.
Golden mean. Auream mediocritatem
If you wish me to weep, you yourself must first feel grief. Si vis me flere, dolendum est Primum ipsi tibi
In the consulship of Plancus. Consule Planco
Keep quiet. Favete linguis
He possesses dominion over himself, and is happy, who can every day say, 'I have lived.' Tomorrow the heavenly Father may either involve the world in dark clouds, or cheer it with clear sunshine; he will not, however, render ineffectual the things which have already taken place.
He will always be a slave who does not know how to live upon a little.
Unaffected by manners. Simplex munditiis
Maecenas, born of monarch ancestors Maecenas atavis edite regibus
I have erected a monument more lasting than bronze. Exegi monumentum aere perennius
Happy the man, and happy he alone, He who can call today his own; He who secure within can say: Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.
In peace, as a wise man, he should make suitable preparation for war. In pace, ut sapiens, aptarit idonea bello.
In the presence of the people. Coram populo
He who feared he would not succeed sat still. Sedit qui timuit ne non succederet
To save a man's life against his will is the same as killing him.
Seize the day, put no trust in the morrow. Seize the day, trust as little as possible in tomorrow. Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero (Odes, I.xi.1)
Who has courage to say no again and again to desires, to despise the objects of ambition, who is a whole in himself, smoothed and rounded.
He's happy who, far away from business, like the races of men of old, tills his ancestral fields with his own oxen, unbound by any interest to pay.
Splendidly false. Splendide mendax
It is sweet to relax at the proper time. Dulce est desipere in loco
A word once let out of the cage cannot be whistled back again.
What forbids a laughing man from telling the truth? Ridentem dicere verum quid vetat?
While we talk, hostile time flies away. Dum loquimur invida aetas fugerit.
It is sweet and glorious to die for one's country. Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori
Joking aside, let us turn to serious matters. Amoto quaeramus seria ludo
To flee vice is the beginning of virtue, and the beginning of wisdom is to have got rid of folly.
Wars, the horror of mothers. Bella detesta matribus
Life grants nothing to us mortals without hard work.
It is your business, when the wall next door catches fire.
Nothing's beautiful from every point of view.
Whatever advice you give, be brief.
The covetous man is ever in want.
Pale death knocks with impartial foot at poor men's hovels and king's palaces. Pallida Mors Pale Death
Punishment closely follows guilt as its companion. Culpam poena premit comes
One must avoid that wicked temptress Laziness. Vitanda est improba siren desidia.
The same man will be loved when he is dead. Extinctus amabitur idem
The fellow is either mad or he is composing verses. Aut insanit homo, aut versus facit
There is a middle ground in things. Est modus in rebus
The irritable race of poets. Genus irritabile vatum
They change the sky, not their soul, who run across the sea. Caelum non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt
The things that please are those that are asked for again and again. Bis repetita placent
Now we must drink. Nunc est bibendum
The wolf attacks with his fang, the bull with his horn. Dente lupus, cornu taurus petit
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