Plutarch Quotes

I see the cure is not worth the pain.

...To the Dolphin alone, beyond all other, nature has granted what the best philosophers seek: friendship for no advantage

For there is no virtue, the honour and credit for which procures a man more odium from the elite than that of justice; and this, because more than any other, it acquires a man power and authority among the common people. For they only honour the valiant and admire the wise, while in addition they also love just men, and put entire trust and confidence in them.

It is wise to be silent when occasion requires, and better than to speak, though never so well.

An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.

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

The process may seem strange and yet it is very true. I did not so much gain the knowledge of things by the words, as words by the experience I had of things.

Character is inured habit.

Blinded as they are to their true character by self-love, every man is his own first and chiefest flatterer, prepared, therefore, to welcome the flatterer from the outside, who only comes confirming the verdict of the flatterer within.

Let us carefully observe those good qualities wherein our enemies excel us; and endeavor to excel them, by avoiding what is faulty, and imitating what is excellent in them.

Moral habits, induced by public practices, are far quicker in making their way into men's private lives, than the failings and faults of individuals are in infecting the city at large.

All men whilst they are awake are in one common world: but each of them, when he is asleep, is in a world of his own.

It is not histories I am writing, but lives; and in the most glorious deeds there is not always an indication of virtue or vice, indeed a small thing like a phrase or a jest often makes a greater revelation of a character than battles where thousands die.

He shall fare well who confronts circumstances aright.

Barba non facit philosophum

The ripeness of adolescence is prodigal in pleasures, skittish, and in need of a bridle.

Nature without learning is blind, learning apart from nature is fractional, and practice in the absence of both is aimless.

If I were not Alexander, I would be Diogenes.

Poverty is dishonorable, not in itself, but when it is a proof of laziness, intemperance, luxury, and carelessness; whereas in a person that is temperate, industrious, just and valiant, and who uses all his virtues for the public good, it shows a great and lofty mind.

We ought to give our friend pain if it will benefit him, but not to the extent of breaking off our friendship; but just as we make use of some biting medicine that will save and preserve the life of the patient. And so the friend, like a musician, in bringing about an improvement to what is good and expedient, sometimes slackens the chords, sometimes tightens them, and is often pleasant, but always useful.

For the mind does not require filling like a bottle, but rather, like wood, it only requires kindling to create in it an impulse to think independently and an ardent desire for the truth.

Time is the wisest of all counselors.

It is part of a good man to do great and noble deeds, though he risk everything.

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.

To find fault is easy; to do better may be difficult.

Abstruse questions must have abstruse answers.

The talkative listen to no one, for they are ever speaking. And the first evil that attends those who know not to be silent is that they hear nothing.

Those are greedy of praise prove that they are poor in merit.

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

There is no stronger test of a person's character than power and authority, exciting as they do every passion, and discovering every latent vice.

The flatterer's object is to please in everything he does; whereas the true friend always does what is right, and so often gives pleasure, often pain, not wishing the latter, but not shunning it either, if he deems it best.

Both Empedocles and Heraclitus held it for a truth that man could not be altogether cleared from injustice in dealing with beasts as he now does.

This excerpt is presented as reproduced by Copernicus in the preface to De Revolutionibus: "Some think that the earth remains at rest. But Philolaus the Pythagorean believes that, like the sun and moon, it revolves around the fire in an oblique circle. Heraclides of Pontus and Ecphantus the Pythagorean make the earth move, not in a progressive motion, but like a wheel in rotation from west to east around its own center."

Cato requested old men not to add the disgrace of wickedness to old age, which was accompanied with many other evils.

Distressed valor challenges great respect, even from an enemy.

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

When a man's eyes are sore his friends do not let him finger them, however much he wishes to, nor do they themselves touch the inflammation: But a man sunk in grief suffers every chance comer to stir and augment his affliction like a running sore; and by reason of the fingering and consequent irritation it hardens into a serious and intractable evil.

When malice is joined to envy, there is given forth poisonous and feculent matter, as ink from the cuttle-fish.

It is a true proverb, that if you live with a lame man, you will learn to limp.

Sometimes small incidents, rather than glorious exploits, give us the best evidence of character. So, as portrait painters are more exact in doing the face, where the character is revealed, than the rest of the body, I must be allowed to give my more particular attention to the marks of the souls of men.

It does not follow, that because a particular work of art succeeds in charming us, its creator also deserves our admiration.

It is no great wonder if in long process of time, while fortune takes her course hither and thither, numerous coincidences should spontaneously occur. If the number and variety of subjects to be wrought upon be infinite, it is all the more easy for fortune, with such an abundance of material, to effect this similarity of results.

Good birth is a fine thing, but the merit is our ancestors.

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

Someone praising a man for his foolhardy bravery, Cato, the elder, said, ''There is a wide difference between true courage and a mere contempt of life.

Pythagoras, when he was asked what time was, answered that it was the soul of this world.

Silence is an answer to a wise man.

A fool cannot hold his tongue.