Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
One of the most beautiful qualities of true friendship is to understand and to be understood.
If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable.
We are more often frightened than hurt; and we suffer more from imagination than from reality.
A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.
Sometimes even to live is an act of courage.
It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that they are difficult.
Not how long, but how well you have lived is the main thing.
Wherever there is a human being, there is an opportunity for a kindness.
True happiness is... to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future.
It is a rough road that leads to the heights of greatness.
Life, if well lived, is long enough.
A man who suffers before it is necessary, suffers more than is necessary.
As long as you live, keep learning how to live.
As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.
Life's like a play: it's not the length, but the excellence of the acting that matters.
He who is brave is free.
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.
Love in its essence is spiritual fire.
The bravest sight in the world is to see a great man struggling against adversity.
All art is but imitation of nature.
The day which we fear as our last is but the birthday of eternity.
While we are postponing, life speeds by.
A gift consists not in what is done or given, but in the intention of the giver or doer.
Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labor does the body.
The wish for healing has always been half of health.
All cruelty springs from weakness.
It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.
A sword never kills anybody; it is a tool in the killer's hand.
For greed all nature is too little.
Brave men rejoice in adversity, just as brave soldiers triumph in war.
Luck is a matter of preparation meeting opportunity.
If a man knows not what harbor he seeks, any wind is the right wind.
Our plans miscarry because they have no aim. When a man does not know what harbor he is making for, no wind is the right wind.
Most powerful is he who has himself in his own power.
Death is the wish of some, the relief of many, and the end of all.
The greatest remedy for anger is delay.
No man was ever wise by chance.
If you wished to be loved, love.
It is quality rather than quantity that matters.
In war there is no prize for runner-up.
Nothing is so wretched or foolish as to anticipate misfortunes. What madness is it to be expecting evil before it comes.
The less we deserve good fortune, the more we hope for it.
No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness.
A great fortune is a great slavery.
The things hardest to bear are sweetest to remember.
A physician is not angry at the intemperance of a mad patient, nor does he take it ill to be railed at by a man in fever. Just so should a wise man treat all mankind, as a physician does his patient, and look upon them only as sick and extravagant.
We should give as we would receive, cheerfully, quickly, and without hesitation; for there is no grace in a benefit that sticks to the fingers.
Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.
We should every night call ourselves to an account: what infirmity have I mastered today? what passions opposed? what temptation resisted? what virtue acquired? Our vices will abate of themselves if they be brought every day to the shrift.
