Horace Quotes

Captive Greece captured her rude conqueror

Bis repetita non placent

Nunc est bibendum!

My cares and my inquiries are for decency and truth, and in this I am wholly occupied.

Format enim Natura prius nos intus ad omnem
Fortunarum habitum, juvat, aut impellit ad iram,
Aut ad humum moerore gravi deducit, et angit.

The lofty pine is oftenest shaken by the winds;
High towers fall with a heavier crash;
And the lightning strikes the highest mountain.

Dulce est desipere in loco

Saepa stilum vertas, iterum quae digna legi sint scripturas. (Turn the stylus [to erase] often if you would write something worthy of being reread.)

Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.

carpe diem (seize the day)

Enjoy! Enjoy!

It is your concern when your neighbor's wall is on fire.

The aim of the poet is to inform or delight, or to combine together, in what he says, both pleasure and applicability to life. In instructing, be brief in what you say in order that your readers may grasp it quickly and retain it faithfully. Superfluous words simply spill out when the mind is already full. Fiction invented in order to please should remain close to reality.

Begin, be bold, and venture to be wise.

Moreover, you can’t stand so much as an hour of your own company
or spend your leisure properly; you avoid yourself like a truant
or fugitive, hoping by drink or sleep to elude Angst.
But it’s no good, for that dark companion stays on your heels

Tu ne quaesieris — scire nefas — quem mihi, quem tibi finem di dederint, Leuconoe, nec Babylonios temptaris numeros. Ut melius, quidquid erit, pati. . . . Spem longam reseces. Dum loquimur fugerit invida aetas. Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.