32 quotes
The man who is roused neither by glory nor by danger it is in vain to exhort; terror closes the ears of the mind.
Only a few prefer liberty, the majority seek nothing more than fair masters.
For the fame of riches and beauty is fickle and frail, while virtue is eternally excellent.
Bellum Catilinae (-44)
The glory of ancestors sheds a light around posterity; it allows neither their good nor bad qualities to remain in obscurity.
Get good counsel before you begin: and when you have decided, act promptly.
But assuredly Fortune rules in all things; she raises to eminence or buries in oblivion everything from caprice rather than from well-regulated principle.
To desire the same things and to reject the same things, constitutes true friendship.
By union the smallest states thrive, by discord the greatest are destroyed.
Covetous of the property of others and prodigal of his own.
Namque pauci libertatem, pars magna iustos dominos volunt.
The Romans assisted their allies and friends, and acquired friendships by giving rather than receiving kindness.
But experience has shown that to be true which Appius says in his verses, that every man is the architect of his own fortune.
As the blessings of health and fortune have a beginning, so they must also find an end. Everything rises but to fall, and increases but to decay.
The Cyclopaedia of Practical Quotations: English and Latin (1894)
Yet many human beings, resigned to sensuality and indolence, un-instructed and unimproved, have passed through life like travellers in a strange country.
Bellum Catilinae (-44)
It becomes all men, Senators, who deliberate on dubious matters, to be influenced neither by hatred, affection, anger, nor pity.
Bellum Catilinae (-44)
No one has become immortal by sloth; nor has any parent prayed that his children should live forever; but rather that they should lead an honorable and upright life.
For to like the same things and to dislike the same things, only this is a strong friendship.
Bellum Catilinae (-44)
Ambition prompted many to become deceitful; to keep one thing concealed in the breast, and another ready on the tongue; to estimate friendships and enmities, not by their worth, but according to interest; and to carry rather a specious countenance than an honest heart.
Bellum Catilinae (-44)
The very life which we enjoy is short.
Elegance is proper to women but toil to men