Plutarch Quotes

If you light upon an impertinent talker, that sticks to you like a bur, to the disappointment of your important occasions, deal freely with him, break off the discourse, and pursue your business.

If Nature be not improved by instruction, it is blind; if instruction be not assisted by Nature, it is maimed; and if exercise fail of the assistance of both, it is imperfect.

King Agis said, "The Lacedæmonians are not wont to ask how many, but where the enemy are."

Solon being asked, namely, what city was best to live in. That city, he replied, in which those who are not wronged, no less than those who are wronged, exert themselves to punish the wrongdoers.

Anaximander says that men were first produced in fishes, and when they were grown up and able to help themselves were thrown up, and so lived upon the land.

When a man's struggle begins within oneself, the man is worth something.

Nothing exists in the intellect that has not first gone through the senses.

It is circumstance and proper measure that give an action its character, and make it either good or bad.

The crowns of kings do not prevent those who wear them from being tormented sometimes by violent headaches.

That we may consult concerning others, and not others concerning us.

He is a fool who leaves things close at hand to follow what is out of reach.

From Themistocles began the saying, "He is a second Hercules."

Our nature holds so much envy and malice that our pleasure in our own advantages is not so great as our distress at others'.

Most people do not understand until old age what Plato tells them when they are young.

Demosthenes, when taunted by Pytheas that all his arguments "smelled of the lamp," replied, "Yes, but your lamp and mine, my friend, do not witness the same labours.

Aristodemus, a friend of Antigonus, supposed to be a cook's son, advised him to moderate his gifts and expenses. "Thy words," said he, "Aristodemus, smell of the apron.

When Eudæmonidas heard a philosopher arguing that only a wise man can be a good general, "This is a wonderful speech," said he; "but he that saith it never heard the sound of trumpets.

Books delight to the very marrow of one's bones. They speak to us, consult with us, and join with us in a living and intense intimacy.

Nor is drunkenness censured for anything so much as its intemperate and endless talk.

To conduct great matters and never commit a fault is above the force of human nature.

There is no perfecter endowment in man than political virtue.

Talkativeness has another plague attached to it, even curiosity; for praters wish to hear much that they may have much to say.

Hesiod might as well have kept his breath to cool his pottage.

An old doting fool, with one foot already in the grave.

When men are arrived at the goal, they should not turn back.

After he routed Pharnaces Ponticus at the first assault, he wrote thus to his friends: "I came, I saw, I conquered.

One made the observation of the people of Asia that they were all slaves to one man, merely because they could not pronounce that syllable No.

To Harmodius, descended from the ancient Harmodius, when he reviled Iphicrates [a shoemaker's son] for his mean birth, "My nobility," said he, "begins in me, but yours ends in you.

The conduct of a wise politician is ever suited to the present posture of affairs. Often by foregoing a part he saves the whole, and by yielding in a small matter secures a greater.

Children ought to be led to honorable practices by means of encouragement and reasoning, and most certainly not by blows and ill treatment.

Alexander esteemed it more kingly to govern himself than to conquer his enemies.

The old proverb was now made good, "the mountain had brought forth a mouse.

Friendship is the most pleasant of all things, and nothing more glads the heart of man.

Lampis, the sea commander, being asked how he got his wealth, answered, "My greatest estate I gained easily enough, but the smaller slowly and with much labour.

When one told Plistarchus that a notorious railer spoke well of him, "I'll lay my life," said he, "somebody hath told him I am dead, for he can speak well of no man living.'

These Macedonians are a rude and clownish people; they call a spade a spade.

Once when Phocion had delivered an opinion which pleased the people, he turned to his friend and said, "Have I not unawares spoken some mischievous thing or other?"

Concerning the dead nothing but good shall be spoken. [Lat., De mortuis nil nisi bonum.]

A physician, after he had felt the pulse of Pausanias, and considered his constitution, saying, "He ails nothing," "It is because, sir," he replied, "I use none of your physic."

Children are to be won to follow liberal studies by exhortations and rational motives, and on no account to be forced thereto by whipping.

Justice makes the life of such as are in prosperity, power and authority the life of a god, and injustice turns it to that of a beast.

Grief is natural; the absence of all feeling is undesirable, but moderation in grief should be observed, as in the face of all good or evil.

There is no debt with so much prejudice put off as that of justice.

The most glorious exploits do not always furnish us with the clearest discoveries of virtue or vice in men.

A soldier told Pelopidas, "We are fallen among the enemies." Said he, "How are we fallen among them more than they among us?"

The saying of old Antigonus, who when he was to fight at Andros, and one told him, "The enemy's ships are more than ours," replied, "For how many then wilt thou reckon me?

Politics is not like an ocean voyage or a military campaign... something which leaves off as soon as reached. It is not a public chore to be gotten over with. It is a way of life.

The great god Pan is dead.

Archimedes had stated, that given the force, any given weight might be moved; and even boasted that if there were another earth, by going into it he could remove this.

If I were not Alexander, I would be Diogenes.