Lucius Annaeus Seneca Quotes

It is a rough road that leads to the heights of greatness.

One of the most beautiful qualities of true friendship is to understand and to be understood.

The day which we fear as our last is but the birthday of eternity.

In war there is no prize for runner-up.

It is another's fault if he be ungrateful, but it is mine if I do not give. To find one thankful man, I will oblige a great many that are not so.

The bravest sight in the world is to see a great man struggling against adversity.

He who is brave is free.

No one can be happy who has been thrust outside the pale of truth. And there are two ways that one can be removed from this realm: by lying, or by being lied to.

Anger, if not restrained, is frequently more hurtful to us than the injury that provokes it.

The wish for healing has always been half of health.

Shall I tell you what the real evil is? To cringe to the things that are called evils, to surrender to them our freedom, in defiance of which we ought to face any suffering.

While we are postponing, life speeds by.

All art is but imitation of nature.

The less we deserve good fortune, the more we hope for it.

The deferring of anger is the best antidote to anger.

If thou art a man, admire those who attempt great things, even though they fail.

No man was ever wise by chance.

A large part of mankind is angry not with the sins, but with the sinners.

To be able to endure odium is the first art to be learned by those who aspire to power.

For many men, the acquisition of wealth does not end their troubles, it only changes them.

The display of grief makes more demands than grief itself. How few men are sad in their own company.

The first step in a person's salvation is knowledge of their sin.

In war, when a commander becomes so bereft of reason and perspective that he fails to understand the dependence of arms on Divine guidance, he no longer deserves victory.

What nature requires is obtainable, and within easy reach. It is for the superfluous we sweat.

Great grief does not of itself put an end to itself.

Success is not greedy, as people think, but insignificant. That is why it satisfies nobody.

A person's fears are lighter when the danger is at hand.

It makes a great deal of difference whether one wills not to sin or has not the knowledge to sin.

Every reign must submit to a greater reign.

Consult your friend on all things, especially on those which respect yourself. His counsel may then be useful where your own self-love might impair your judgment.

Believe me, that was a happy age, before the days of architects, before the days of builders.

I don't trust liberals, I trust conservatives.

Health is the soul that animates all the enjoyments of life, which fade and are tasteless without it.

Success consecrates the most offensive crimes.

Anger is like those ruins which smash themselves on what they fall.

If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable.

Brave men rejoice in adversity, just as brave soldiers triumph in war.

If you wished to be loved, love.

A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.

For greed all nature is too little.

Life's like a play: it's not the length, but the excellence of the acting that matters.

Wisdom does not show itself so much in precept as in life - in firmness of mind and a mastery of appetite. It teaches us to do as well as to talk and to make our words and actions all of a color.

True happiness is... to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future.

As long as you live, keep learning how to live.

Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful.

We are more often frightened than hurt and we suffer more from imagination than from reality.

Everywhere is nowhere. When a person spends all his time in foreign travel, he ends by having many acquaintances, but no friends.