Martial Quotes

102–104

Marcus Valerius Martialis (March, between 38 and 41 CE–between 102 and 104 CE) was born at Bilbilis, a small town in the north-east of Spain (Hispania). He is commonly known in the English speaking world as Martial.

Poets
Satirists

Random Martial quote

106 quotes

You will always be poor, if you are poor, Aemilianus. Wealth is given to-day to none save the rich.

Epigrams (104)

Lycoris has buried all the female friends she had, Fabianus: would she were the friend of my wife!

I'm what I seem; not any dyer gave,
But nature dyed this colour that I have.

Stop abusing my verses, or publish some of your own.

Epigrams (104)

You ask for lively epigrams, and propose lifeless subjects. What can I do, Cæcilianus? You expect Hyblæn or Hymethian honey to be produced, and yet offer the Attic bee nothing but Corsican thyme?

Such are thou and I: but what I am thou canst not be; what thou art any one of the multitude may be.

Thou art the cause, O reader, of my dwelling on lighter topics, when I would rather handle serious ones.

To-morrow I will live, the fool does say;
To-day itself's too late, the wise lived yesterday.

Who gives to friends so much from Fate secures,
That is the only wealth for ever yours.

A good man doubles the length of his existence; to have lived so as to look back with pleasure on our past existence is to live twice.

You put fine dishes on your table, Olus, but you always put them on covered. This is ridiculous; in the same way I could put fine dishes on my table.

You admire, Vacerra, only the poets of old and praise only those who are dead. Pardon me, I beseech you, Vacerra, if I think death too high a price to pay for your praise.

'Tis degrading to undertake difficult trifles; and foolish is the labour spent on puerilities.

Epigrams (104)

He who prefers to give Linus the half of what he wishes to borrow, rather than to lend him the whole, prefers to lose only the half.

See how the mountain goat hangs from the summit of the cliff; you would expect it to fall; it is merely showing its contempt for the dogs.

You complain, friend Swift, of the length of my epigrams, but you yourself write nothing. Yours are shorter.

Epigrams (104)

You importune me, Tucca, to present you with my books. I shall not do so; for you want to sell, not to read, them.

You pursue, I fly; you fly, I pursue; such is my humor. What you wish, Dondymus, I do not wish, what you do not wish, I do.

The bee enclosed and through the amber shown
Seems buried in the juice which was his own.

Epigrams (104)

He who refuses nothing...will soon have nothing to refuse.

Epigrams (104)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Martial (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.