Seneca Quotes

Besides, he who is feared, fears also; no one has been able to arouse terror and live in peace of mind.

Aliquando enim et vivere fortiter facere est

qui genus iactat suum, aliena laudat.

Should I be surprised that dangers which have always surrounded me should at last attack me? A great part of mankind, when about to sail, do not think of a storm.

Sera parsimonia in fundo est.

Associate with those who will make a better man of you.

And we cannot change this order of things; but what we can do is to acquire stout hearts, worthy of good men, thereby courageously enduring chance and placing ourselves in harmony with Nature.

Ignis aurum probat, miseria fortes uiros.

The cause of anger is the belief that we are injured; this belief, therefore, should not be lightly entertained. We ought not to fly into a rage even when the injury appears to be open and distinct: for some false things bear the semblance of truth. We should always allow some time to elapse, for time discloses the truth.

Do you desire another case? Take that of the younger Marcus Cato, with whom Fortune dealt in a more hostile and more persistent fashion. But he withstood her, on all occasions, and in his last moments, at the point of death, showed that a brave man can live in spite of Fortune, can die in spite of her. His whole life was passed either in civil warfare, or under a political regime which was soon to breed civil war.

ars prima regni est posse invidiam pati.

quae fuit durum pati, meminisse dulce est.

So many rich men are stricken before our eyes with sudden poverty yet it never occurs to us that our own wealth also rests on just as slippery a footing.

Is it for this purpose that we are strong—that we may have light burdens to bear?

qualis quisque sit scies, si quemadmodum laudet, quemadmodum laudetur aspexeris.