Marcus Tullius Cicero Quotes

“The name of peace is sweet and the thing itself good, but between peace and slavery there is the greatest difference.”

“Crimes are not to be measured by the issue of events, but by the bad intentions of men.”

“Freedom suppressed and again regained bites with keener fangs than freedom never endangered.”

“No man should so act as to make a gain out of the ignorance of another.”

“In all matters, before beginning, a diligent preparation should be made.”

“Economy is a great revenue.[Lat., Magnum vectigal est parsimonia.]”

“To live is to think.”

“When confronted by a hungry wolf, it is unwise to goad the beast, as Cato would have us do. But it is equally unwise to imagine the snarling animal a friend and offer your hand, as Pompey does." "Perhaps you would have us climb a tree!”

“The Intellect engages us in the pursuit of Truth. The Passions impel us to Action.”

“There is no castle so strong that it cannot be overthrown by money.”

“All men have a feeling, that they would rather you told them a civil lie than give them a point blank refusal.... If you make a promise, the thing is still uncertain, depends on a future day, and concerns but few people; but if you refuse you alienate people to a certainty and at once, and many people too.”

“Nothing so cements and holds together all the parts of a society as faith or credit, which can never be kept up unless men are under some force or necessity of honestly paying what they owe to one another.”

“A man would have no pleasures in discovering all the beauties of the universe, even in heaven itself, unless he had a partner to whom he might communicate his joys.”

“In our amusements a certain limit is to be placed that we may not devote ourselves to a life of pleasure and thence fall into immorality.”

“The foolishness of old age does not characterize all who are old, but only the foolish.”

“To know the laws is not to memorize their letter but to grasp their full force and meaning.”

“I depart from life as from an inn, and not as from my home.[Lat., Ex vita discedo, tanquam ex hospitio, non tanquam ex domo.]”

“They who dare to ask anything of a friend, by their very request seem to imply that they would do anything for the sake of that friend.”

“Wisdom is not only to be acquired, but enjoyed.”

“Nature has planted in our minds an insatiable longing to see the truth.”

“Time is the herald of truth.”

“There are gems of thought that are ageless and eternal.”

“History is the witness that testifies to the passing of time.”

“The master sometimes serves, and the servant sometimes is master.”

“I add this, that rational ability without education has oftener raised man to glory and virtue, than education without natural ability.”