Marcus Tullius Cicero Quotes

For there is but one essential justice which cements society, and one law which establishes this justice. This law is right reason, which is the true rule of all commandments and prohibitions. Whoever neglects this law, whether written or unwritten, is necessarily unjust and wicked.

I look upon the pleasure which we take in a garden as one of the most innocent delights in human life. . . It gives us a great insight into the contrivance and wisdom of Nature, and suggests innumerable subjects for meditation.

Time obliterates the fictions of opinion and confirms the decisions of nature.

We learn nothing from history except that we learn nothing from history.

Time is the herald of truth.

But if you should take the bond of goodwill out of the universe no house or city could stand, nor would even the tillage of the fields abide. If that statement is not clear, then you may understand how great is the power of friendship and of concord from a consideration of the results of enmity and disagreement. For what house is so strong, or what state so enduring that it cannot be utterly overthrown by animosities and division?

In honorable dealing you should consider what you intended, not what you said or thought.

In so far as the mind is stronger than the body, so are the ills contracted by the mind more severe than those contracted by the body.

There is not a moment without some duty.

For out of such an ungoverned populace one is usually chosen as a leader, someone bold and unscrupulous who curries favor with the people by giving them other men's property. To such a man the protection of public office is given, and continually renewed. He emerges as a tyrant over the very people who raised him to power.

It is the act of a bad man to deceive by falsehood.

An agreement of rash men (a conspiracy).

No one has leave to sin.

When trying a case [the famous judge] L. Cassius never failed to inquire "Who gained by it?" Man's character is such that no one undertakes crimes without hope of gain.

Next to God we are nothing. To God we are Everything.

The diligent farmer plants trees, of which he himself will never see the fruit.

A mind without instruction can no more bear fruit than can a field, however fertile, without cultivation.

Peace is freedom in tranquility.

The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living.

O philosophy, you leader of life.

Exercise and temperance can preserve something of our early strength even in old age.

Lay down this rule of friendship: neither ask nor consent to do what is wrong. The plea, 'for friendship's sake,' is a discreditable one, and should not be admitted for a moment. We should ask from friends and do for friends only what is good.

For there is assuredly nothing dearer to a man than wisdom, and though age takes away all else, it undoubtedly brings us that.

According to the law of nature it is only fair that no one should become richer through damages and injuries suffered by another.

Would that I could discover truth as easily as I can uncover falsehood.

A youth of sensuality and intemperance delivers over to old age a worn-out body.

Nor am I ashamed, as some are, to confess my ignorance of those matters with which I am unacquainted.

The roots of knowledge are bitter, but its fruit are sweet.

When time and need require, we should resist with all our might, and prefer death to slavery and disgrace.

For just as some women are said to be handsome though without adornment, so this subtle manner of speech, though lacking in artificial graces, delights us.

Kindness is produced by kindness.

There is nothing god cannot do.

In men of the highest character and noblest genius there is to be found an insatiable desire for honor, command, power, and glory.

Politicians are not born; they are excreted.

A bureaucrat is the most despicable of men, though he is needed as vultures are needed, but one hardly admires vultures whom bureaucrats so strangely resemble. I have yet to meet a bureaucrat who was not petty, dull, almost witless, crafty or stupid, an oppressor or a thief, a holder of little authority in which he delights, as a boy delights in possessing a vicious dog. Who can trust such creatures?

Nature has circumscribed the field of life within small dimensions, but has left the field of glory unmeasured.

Friendship was given by nature to be an assistant to virtue, not a companion in vice.

Every word that is unnecessary only pours over the side of a brimming mind.

Laws are silent in time of war.

A man has no enemy worse than himself.

Few are those who wish to be endowed with virtue rather than to seem so.

No one sees what is before his feet: they scan the tracks of heaven.

Wisdom is not only to be acquired, but enjoyed.

The authority of those who teach is often an obstacle to those who want to learn.

I wonder that a soothsayer doesn't laugh whenever he sees another soothsayer.

Like readily consorts with like.

The best Armour of Old Age is a well spent life preceding it; a Life employed in the Pursuit of useful Knowledge, in honourable Actions and the Practice of Virtue; in which he who labours to improve himself from his Youth, will in Age reap the happiest Fruits of them; not only because these never leave a Man, not even in the extremest Old Age; but because a Conscience bearing Witness that our Life was well-spent, together with the Remembrance of past good Actions, yields an unspeakable Comfort to the Soul

There is in superstition a senseless fear of God.