Seneca the Younger Quotes

Remember, not one penny can we take with us into the unknown land.

I persist on praising not the life I lead, but that which I ought to lead. I follow it at a mighty distance, crawling

The greatest man is he who chooses right with the most invincible resolution.

The greatest power of ruling consists in the exercise of self-control.

Desultory reading is delightful, but to be beneficial, our reading must be carefully directed.

Other men's sins are before our eyes; our own are behind our backs.

Freedom is not being a slave to any circumstance, to any constraint, to any chance; it means compelling Fortune to enter the lists on equal terms.

No choice maxims - we Stoics don't practice that kind of window dressing.

The worse a person is the less he feels it.

A large library is apt to distract rather than to instruct the learner; it is much better to be confined to a few authors than to wander at random over many.

What need is there to weep over parts of life? The whole of it calls for tears.

One of the most beautiful qualities of true friendship is to understand and to be understood.

The greater part of progress is the desire to progress.

The most happy ought to wish for death.

The philosopher: he alone knows how to live for himself. He is the one, in fact, who knows the fundamental thing: how to live.

If you are bent on assuming a pose and never reveal yourself to anyone frankly, in the fashion of many who live a false life that is all made up for show; for it is torturous to be constantly watching oneself and be fearful of being caught out of our usual role. And we are never free from concern if we think that every time anyone looks at us he is always taking-our measure; for many things happen that strip off our pretence against our will, and, though all this attention to self is successful, yet the life of those who live under a mask cannot be happy and without anxiety.

Bear in mind that you commit a crime by injuring even a wicked brother.

It is better to have useless knowledge than to know nothing.

Long is the road to learning by precepts, but short and successful by examples.

Let the man, who would be grateful, think of repaying a kindness, even while receiving it.

It is the practice of the multitude to bark at eminent men, as little dogs do at strangers.

Four things does a reckless man gain who covets his neighbor's wife - demerit, an uncomfortable bed, thirdly, punishment, and lastly, hell.

The mind is a matter over every kind of fortune; itself acts in both ways, being the cause of its own happiness and misery.

A favor is to a grateful man delightful always; to an ungrateful man only once.

Drunkenness is nothing but a self-induced state of insanity.

If you judge, investigate.

Life is the fire that burns and the sun that gives light. Life is the wind and the rain and the thunder in the sky. Life is matter and is earth, what is and what is not, and what beyond is in Eternity.

This is the difference between us Romans and the Etruscans: We believe that lightning is caused by clouds colliding, whereas they believe that clouds collide in order to create lightning. Since they attribute everything to gods, they are led to believe not that events have a meaning because they have happened, but that they happen in order to express a meaning.

Men can be divided into 2 groups: one that goes ahead and achieves something, and one that comes after and criticizes.

The wise man then followed a simple way of life-which is hardly surprising when you consider how even in this modern age he seeks to be as little encumbered as he possibly can.

Trifling trouble find utterance; deeply felt pangs are silent.

The wise man lives as long as he should, not just as long as he likes.

In my own time there have been inventions of this sort, transparent windows tubes for diffusing warmth equally through all parts of a building short-hand, which has been carried to such a perfection that a writer can keep pace with the most rapid speaker. But the inventing of such things is drudgery for the lowest slaves; philosophy lies deeper. It is not her office to teach men how to use their hands. The object of her lessons is to form the soul.

Abstinence is easier than temperance.

The whole discord of this world consists in discords.

Religion worships God, while superstition profanes that worship.

But it is a pretty thing to see what money will do!

Every man prefers belief to the exercise of judgment.

There is nothing that Nature has made necessary which is more easy than death; we are longer a-coming into the world than going out of it; and there is not any minute of our lives wherein we may not reasonably expect it. Nay, it is but a momen'ts work, the parting of soul and body. What a shame is it then to stand in fear of anything so long that is over so soon!

Live among others as if God beheld you; speak to God as if others were listening.

There is this blessing, that while life has but one entrance, it has exits innumerable, and as I choose the house in which I live, the ship in which I will sail, so will I choose the time and manner of my death.

If wisdom were offered me with the proviso that I should keep it shut up and refrain from declaring it, I should refuse. There's no delight in owning anything unshared.

Modesty once extinguished knows not how to return.

It takes the whole of life to learn how to live, and - even more surprising - it takes the whole of life to learn how to die.

So live with men as if God saw you and speak to God, as if men heard you.

Truth never perishes.

What is true belongs to me!

Such as the chain of causes we call Fate, such is the chain of wishes: one links on to another; the whole man is bound in the chain of wishing for ever.