Seneca The Younger Quotes

The comfort of having a friend may be taken away, but not that of having had one.

The great pilot can sail even when his canvass is rent.

Ignorance is the cause of fear.

True joy is a serene and sober motion; and they are miserably out so that take laughing for rejoicing; the seat of it is within, and there is no cheerfulness like the resolutions of a brave mind.

Expediency often silences justice.

He is not guilty who is not guilty of his own free will.

The voice is nothing but beaten air.

Epileptics know by signs when attacks are imminent and take precautions accordingly; we must do the same in regard to anger

Wisdom teaches us to do, as well as to talk; and to make our words and actions all of a colour.

He, who will not pardon others, must not himself expect pardon.

The first proof of a well-ordered mind is to be able to pause and linger within itself.

I am like a book, with pages that have stuck together for want of use: my mind needs unpacking and the truths stored within must be turned over from time to time, to be ready when occasion demands.

Let ease and rest at times be given to the weary.

The great blessings of mankind are within us and within our reach; but we shut our eyes, and, like people in the dark, we fall foul upon the very thing we search for, without finding it.

Persistent kindness conquers the ill-disposed.

Pleasure dies at the very moment when it charms us most.

If God adds another day to our life, let us receive it gladly.

Those vices [luxury and neglect of decent manners] are vices of men, not of the times. [Lat., Hominum sunt ista [vitia], non temporum.

Whatsoever has exceeded its proper limit is in an unstable position.

The mind, unless it is pure and holy, cannot see God.

Nature ever provides for her own exigencies.

The body is not a permanent dwelling, but a sort of inn which is to be left behind when one perceives that one is a burden to the host.

Behold a worthy sight, to which the God, turning his attention to his own work, may direct his gaze. Behold an equal thing, worthy of a God, a brave man matched in conflict with evil fortune.

That is never too often repeated, which is never sufficiently learned.

To the person who does not know where he wants to go there is no favorable wind.

In a moment the ashes are made, but a forest is a long time growing.

The tempest threatens before it comes; houses creak before they fall.

A crowd of fellow-sufferers is a miserable kind of comfort.

Fidelity bought with money is overcome by money.

Virtue hath no virtue if it be not impugned; then appeareth how great it is, of what value and power it is, when by patience it approveth what it works.

It is opportunity that makes the thief.

As fate is inexorable, and not to be moved either with tears or reproaches, an excess of sorrow is as foolish as profuse laughter; while, on the other hand, not to mourn at all is insensibility.

It is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man and the security of a god.

Most men ebb and flow in wretchedness between the fear of death and the hardship of life; they are unwilling to live, and yet they do not know how to die.

He robs present ills of their power who has perceived their coming beforehand.

Take away ambition and vanity, and where will be your heroes and patriots?

You must linger among a limited number of master-thinkers, and digest their works, if you would derive ideas which shall win firm hold in your mind.

The mind should be allowed some relaxation, that it may return to its work all the better for the rest.

The things that are essential are acquired with little bother; it is the luxuries that call for toil and effort.

Nothing is more hateful to wisdom than to much cunning.

In every good man a God doth dwell.

Call it Nature, Fate, Fortune; all these are names of the one and selfsame God.

Life is long if it is full.

God never repents of what He has first resolved upon.

No man finds it difficult to return to nature except the man who has deserted nature.

Crime when it succeeds is called virtue.

We have been born under a monarchy; to obey God is freedom.

It is safer to offend certain men than it is to oblige them; for as proof that they owe nothing they seek recourse in hatred.

There has not been any great talent without an element of madness. -Nullum magnum ingenium sine mixtura dementiae fuit

The pleasures of the palate deal with us like Egyptian thieves who strangle those whom they embrace.