We are certainly in a common class with the beasts; every action of animal life is concerned with seeking bodily pleasure and avoiding pain.
We both exist and know that we exist, and rejoice in this knowledge.
A marriage without children is the world without the sun.
The human race is inquisitive about other people's lives, but negligent to correct their own.
The rich are like beasts of burden, carrying treasure all day, and at the night of death unladen; they carry to their grave only the bruises and marks of their toil.
I had a clear idea about what time is till I was asked to explain it and ceased to understand it altogether as soon as I began explaining it.
How can the past and future be, when the past no longer is, and the future is not yet? As for the present, if it were always present and never moved on to become the past, it would not be time, but eternity.
It is no advantage to be near the light if the eyes are closed.
Where love is, what can be wanting? Where it is not, what can possibly be profitable?
To be under pressure is inescapable. Pressure takes place through all the world; war, siege, the worries of state. We all know men who grumble under these pressures and complain. They are cowards. They lack splendour. But there is another sort of man who is under the same pressure but does not complain, for it is the friction which polishes him. It is the pressure which refines and makes him noble
I count myself one of the number of those who write as they learn and learn as they write.
It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels.
Will is to grace as the horse is to the rider.
You have enemies. For who can live on this earth without them? Take heed to yourselves: love them. In no way can your enemy so hurt you by his violence, as you hurt yourself if you love him not.
Everyone who observes himself doubting observes a truth, and about that which he observes he is certain; therefore he is certain about a truth. Everyone therefore who doubts whether truth exists has in himself a truth on which not to doubt.... Hence one who can doubt at all ought not to doubt the existence of truth.
If we tread our vices under our feet, we make of them a ladder by which to rise to higher things.
Moral character is assessed not by what a man knows but by what he loves
To dye oneself with paints in order to have a rosier or a paler complexion is a lying counterfeit.
An apt and true reply was given to Alexander the Great by a pirate who had been seized. For when that king had asked the man what he meant by keeping hostile possession of the sea, he answered with bold pride. "What thou meanest by seizing the whole earth; but because I do it with a petty ship, I am called a robber, whilst thou who dost it with a great fleet art styled emperor."
Truth is not private property.
O Master, make me chaste, but not yet!
No eulogy is due to him who simply does his duty and nothing more.
Yet we must say something when those who say the most are saying nothing.
I will not live an instant that I do not live in love. Whoever loves does all things without suffering, or, suffering, loves his suffering.
The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.
To withhold forgiveness is to take poison and expect the unforgiven to die.
When large numbers of people share their joy in common, the happiness of each is greater because each adds fuel to the other's flame.
The verdict of the world is conclusive.
Be always displeased at what thou art, if thou desirest to attain to what thou art not.
Why is it that we remember with difficulty and without difficulty forget? Learn with difficulty and without difficulty remain ignorant?
Your wisdom should be without pride.
We are too weak to discover the truth by reason alone
It’s not in the book or in the writer that readers discern the truth of what they read; they see it in themselves, if the light of truth has penetrated their minds.
Peace in society depends upon peace in the family.
Education is the food of youth, the delight of old age, the ornament of prosperity, the refuge and comfort of adversity, and the provocation to grace in the soul.
Just as it is agreed that we all wish to be happy, so it is that we all wish to be wise, since no one without wisdom is happy.
Every city is a living body.
Love and say it with your life.
Teach correctly... Find delight in contemplation.
Free curiosity has greater power to stimulate learning than rigorous coercion. Nevertheless, the free ranging flux of curiosity is channeled by discipline under Your Law.
I was looking for something to love, for I was in love with loving, and I hated security and a smooth way, free from snares.
Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility.
He that is jealous is not in love.
Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being in love which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident.
Temperance is a disposition that restrains our desires for things which it is base to desire.
Why is it that man desires to be made sad, beholding doleful and tragical things, which yet himself would by no means suffer?
Love is ever new because it never groweth old.
You aspire to great things? Begin with the little ones.
Once for all, then, a short precept is given thee: Love, and do what thou wilt: whether thou hold thy peace, through love hold thy peace; whether thou cry out, through love cry out; whether thou correct, through love correct; whether thou spare, through love do thou spare: let the root of love be within, of this root can nothing spring but what is good.
It is not the being seen of men that is wrong, but doing these things for the purpose of being seen of men. The problem with the hypocrite is his motivation.
Any woman who does not give birth to as many children as she is capable is guilty of murder.
If the future and the past really exist, where are they?
The good man, though a slave, is free; the wicked, though he reigns, is a slave, and not the slave of a single man, but- what is worse - the slave of as many masters as he has vices.
Be always displeased with what you are if you wish to be what you are not. Always add, always walk, always proceed. Neither stand still nor go back nor deviate.
The cost of obedience is small compared with the cost of disobedience.
If you are silent, be silent out of love. If you speak, speak out of love.
Do not believe yourself healthy. Immortality is health; this life is a long sickness.
When we read a book, our most essential trait - imagination - is given the opportunity to soar.
I was not yet in love, yet I loved to love...I sought what I might love, in love with loving.
War should we waged without love of violence, cruelty, or enmity.
