When a man is laboring under the pain of any distemper, it is then that he recollects there is a God, and that he himself is but a man. No mortal is then the object of his envy, his admiration, or his contempt; and, having no malice to gratify, the tales of slander excite him not.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Sickness
Envy always implies conscious inferiority wherever it resides.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Envy
Wine maketh the hand quivering, the eye watery, the night unquiet, lewd dreams, a stinking breath in the morning, and an utter forgetfulness of all things.
—Pliny the Elder
Most men are afraid of a bad name, but few fear their consciences.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Conscience
The enjoyments of this life are not equal to its evils.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Life and Living
In these matters the only certainty is that nothing is certain.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Certainty, Doubt, Uncertainty
Never do anything concerning the rectitude of which you have a doubt.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Doubt
It is generally much more shameful to lose a good reputation than never to have acquired it.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Reputation
Lust is an enemy to the purse, a foe to the person, a canker to the mind, a corrosive to the conscience, a weakness of the wit, a besotter of the senses, and, finally, a mortal bane to all the body.
—Pliny the Elder
Let honor be to us as strong an obligation as necessity is to others.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Honor
No man’s abilities are so remarkably shining as not to stand in need of a proper opportunity.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Opportunities
Hope is the pillar that holds up the world. Hope is the dream of a waking man.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Hope, Dreams
The master’s eye is the best fertilizer.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Farming
As in a man’s life, so in his studies, it is the most beautiful and humane thing in the world so to mingle gravity with pleasure, that the one may not sink into melancholy, nor the other rise up into wantonness.
—Pliny the Elder
As in our lives, so also in our studies, it is most becoming and most wise to temper gravity with cheerfulness, that the former may not imbue our minds with melancholy, nor the latter degenerate into licentiousness.
—Pliny the Elder
Our youth and manhood are due to our country, but our declining years are due to ourselves.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Age
He picked something valuable out of everything he read.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Reading
God has no power over the past except to cover it with oblivion.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Past
The happier the moment the shorter.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Happiness
Simple diet is best–for many dishes bring many diseases; and rich sauces are worse than even heaping several meats upon each other.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Eating
Indeed, what is there that does not appear marvelous when it comes to our knowledge for the first time? How many things, too, are looked up on as quite impossible until they have been actually effected?
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Possibilities
The depth of darkness to which you can descend and still live is an exact measure of the height to which you can aspire to reach.
—Pliny the Elder
Topics: Adversity
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) Roman Stoic Philosopher
Persius Roman Poet
Seneca the Elder (Marcus Annaeus Seneca) Roman Rhetorician
Petronius Roman Courtier
Lucan (Marcus Annaeus Lucanus) Roman Statesman, Poet
Cicero Roman Philosopher
Marcus Aurelius Emperor of Rome, Stoic Philosopher
Boethius Roman Statesman, Philosopher
Martial Ancient Roman Latin Poet
Pliny the Younger Roman Senator, Writer