If a man's fortune does not fit him, it is like the shoe in the story; if too large it trips him up, if too small it pinches him.
Let the character as it began be preserved to the last; and let it be consistent with itself.
I court not the votes of the fickle mob.
In the same [hospitable] manner that a Calabrian would press you to eat his pears.
Not gods, nor men, nor even booksellers have put up with poets' being second-rate.
Death is the ultimate boundary of human matters.