Plutarch Quotes

it is useful, or rather it is necessary, not to be indifferent about acquiring the works of earlier writers, but to make a collection of these, like a set of tools in farming. For the corresponding tool of education is the use of books, and by their means it has come to pass that we are able to study knowledge at its source.

As geographers, Sosius, crowd into the edges of their maps parts of the world which they do not know about, adding notes in the margin to the effect, that beyond this lies nothing but sandy deserts full of wild beasts, unapproachable bogs, Scythian ice, or a frozen sea, so, in this work of mine, in which I have compared the lives of the greatest men with one another, after passing through those periods which probable reasoning can reach to and real history find a footing in, I might very well say of those that are farther off, beyond this there is nothing but prodigies and fictions, the only inhabitants are the poets and inventors of fables; there is no credit, or certainty any farther.

anger does not, as Melanthius says, — Displace the mind, and then act dismal things; but it absolutely turns the mind out of doors, and bolts the door against it; and, like those who burn their houses and themselves within them, it makes all things within full of confusion, smoke, and noise, so that the soul can neither see nor hear any thing that might relieve it. Wherefore sooner will an empty ship in a storm at sea admit of a pilot from without, than a man tossed with anger and rage listen to the advice of another, unless he have his own reason first prepared to entertain it.

... man by nature is not a wild or unsocial creature, neither was he born so, but makes himself what he naturally is not, by vicious habit; and that again on the other side, he is civilized and grows gentle by a change of place, occupation, and manner of life, as beasts themselves that are wild by nature, become tame and tractable by housing and gentler usage...

For kings indeed we have, who wear the marks and assume the titles of royalty, but as for the qualities of their minds, they have nothing by which they are to be distinguished from their subjects.

For they either believe their colleagues to be their equals and so they fight against them; or they believe them to be superior and so they envy them; or they believe them inferior and so they despise them. We must, however, pay court to the colleague who is superior, make the inferior better, and honor the equal.

This may show us how dangerous it is to incur the hostility of a city that is mistress of eloquence and song.

Általában úgy van az, a fáradságos munkát is könnyebben elviseljük, ha valaki szemmel láthatóan azon igyekszik, hogy megossza velünk: így a munkát nem érezzük reánk kényszerített fáradtságnak. A római katona akkor a legboldogabb, ha a hadvezér ugyanazt a kenyeret eszi, amit ő, közönséges tábori ágyon alszik, vele együtt ássa az árkot, veri be a cölöpöt, mikor sáncot készítenek. Nem is a kitüntetéseket vagy pénzjutalmakat osztogató tisztjeikért rajonganak kiváltképpen; azokat szeretik inkább, akik fáradalmakban és veszélyekben osztozkodnak velük. Az effajta tiszthez jobban ragaszkodnak, mint az olyan elnéző emberhez, aki nem bánja, ha könnyebben veszik a dolgot.

Philip being arbitrator betwixt two wicked persons, he commanded one to fly out of Macedonia and the other to pursue him.

After the battle in Pharsalia, when Pompey was fled, one Nonius said they had seven eagles left still, and advised to try what they would do. "Your advice," said Cicero, "were good if we were to fight jackdaws."

And yet,” said he, “how can a man take care of his own horse or furbish up his spear and helmet, if he is unaccustomed to using his hands on his own dear person? Know ye not,” said he, “that the end and object of conquest is to avoid doing the same thing as the conquered?

Anaxagoras is said to have predicted that if the heavenly bodies should be loosened by some slip or shake, one of them might be torn away, and might plunge and fall down to earth; and he said that none of the stars was in its original position; for being of stone, and heavy, their shining light is caused by friction with the revolving aether, and they are forced along in fixed orbits by the whirling impulse which gave them their circular motion, and this was what prevented them from falling to our earth in the first place, when cold and heavy bodies were separated from universal matter.

We ought indeed to shrink from and feel shame at what is base; but the nature which is over-cautious to avoid blame may be gentle and kindly, but cannot be great.

Good fortune will elevate even petty minds, and gives them the appearance of a certain greatness and stateliness, as from their high place they look down upon the world; but the truly noble and resolved spirit raises itself, and becomes more conspicuous in times of disaster and ill fortune...

And, to say truly, the greatest benefit that learning bringeth unto men is this: that it teacheth men that be rough and rude of nature, by compass and rule of reason, to be civil and courteous, and to like better the mean state than the higher.