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All men carry about them that which is poyson to serpents: for if it be true that is reported, they will no better abide the touching with man's spittle than scalding water cast upon them: but if it happen to light within their chawes or mouth, especially if it come from a man that is fasting, it is present death.

— Pliny the Elder

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More quotes by Pliny the Elder

Why is it that we entertain the belief that for every purpose odd numbers are the most effectual?

Man alone at the very moment of his birth, cast naked upon the naked earth, does she [Nature] abandon to cries and lamentations.

It has become quite a common proverb that in wine there is truth.

When a building is about to fall down, all the mice desert it.

Indeed, what is there that does not appear marvelous when it comes to our knowledge for the first time? How many things, too, are looked upon as quite impossible until they have actually been effected?

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Pliny the Elder (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.