Ovid Quotes

What is deservedly suffered must be borne with calmness, but when the pain is unmerited, the grief is resistless.

I hate a woman who offers herself because she ought to do so, and cold and dry thinks of her sewing when making love.

Thus I am not able to exist either with you or without you; and I seem not to know my own wishes.

Perfer et obdura; dolor hic tibi proderit olim. Have patience and endure; this unhappiness will one day be beneficial.

We are slow to believe that which if believed would hurt our feelings.

Let the man who does not wish to be idle, fall in love.

The result proves the wisdom of the act.

In the make-up of human beings, intelligence counts for more than our hands, and that is our true strength.

Courage conquers all things: it even gives strength to the body.

Beauty is a fragile gift.

Love will enter cloaked in friendship's name.

He who has it in his power to commit sin, is less inclined to do so. The very idea of being able, weakens the desire.

Courage conquers all things.

All things may corrupt when minds are prone to evil.

If it were in my power, I would be wiser; but a newly felt power carries me off in spite of myself; love leads me one way, my understanding another.

We hate the hawk because he ever lives in battle.

When I was from Cupid's passions free, my Muse was mute and wrote no elegy.

A mind conscious of right laughs at the falsehoods of rumour. [Lat., Conscia mens recti famae mendacia risit.]

Spare the soul that feels a deadly wound.

We two are to ourselves a crowd.

The laws allow arms to be taken against an armed foe.

A burthen cheerfully borne becomes light

The wild boar is often held by a small dog. [Lat., A cane non magno saepe tenetur aper.]

Luck affects everything; let your hook always be cast.

I am dragged along by a strange new force. Desire and reason are pulling in different directions. I see the right way and approve it, but follow the wrong.

You will go most safely in the middle.

As the yellow gold is tried in fire, so the faith of friendship must be seen in adversity.

Simplicity is a jewel rarely found.

There is no such thing as pure pleasure; some anxiety always goes with it.

To be silent is but a small virtue; but it is a serious fault to reveal secrets.

The man who falls in love chill find plenty of occupation.

Love fed fat soon turns to boredom.

I attempt a difficult work; but there is no excellence without difficulty. [Lat., Ardua molimur; sed nulla nisi ardua virtus.]

He lives well who lives retired, and keeps His wants within the limits of his means.

People are slow to claim confidence in undertakings of magnitude.

Sleep, rest of things, O pleasing Deity, Peace of the soul, which cares dost crucify, Weary bodies refresh and mollify.

We can learn even from our enemies.

There is a certain pleasure in weeping; grief finds in tears both a satisfaction and a cure.

Love that is fed by jealousy dies hard.

The vulgar herd estimate friendship by its advantages. [Lat., Vulgus amicitias utilitate probat.]

Only the mind cannot be sent into exile.

Nor is there any law more just, than that he who has plotted death shall perish by his own plot.

Wind feeds the fire, and wind extinguishes: The flames are nourished by a gentle breeze, Yet, if it stronger grows, they sink and die.

You will hardly conquer, but conquer you must. [Lat., Male vincetis, sed vincite.]

All love is vanquished by a succeeding love.

Let others praise ancient times; I am glad I was born in these.

Enhance and intensify one's vision of that synthesis of truth and beauty which is the highest and deepest reality.

All human things hang on a slender thread, the strongest fall with a sudden crash.

Money nowadays is money; money brings office; money gains friends; everywhere the poor man is down. [Lat., In pretio pretium nunc est; dat census honores, Census amicitias; pauper ubique jacet.]

Those gifts are ever more precious which the giver has made precious.