Seneca

No untroubled day has ever dawned for me.

— Seneca

The good things of prosperity are to be wished; but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired.

— Seneca

Fire is the test of gold; adversity, of strong men.

— Seneca

Brave men rejoice in adversity, just as brave soldiers triumph in war.

— Seneca

The bravest sight in the world is to see a great man struggling against adversity.

— Seneca

Consult your friend on all things, especially on those which respect yourself. His counsel may then be useful where your own self-love might impair your judgment.

— Seneca

As for old age, embrace and love it. It abounds with pleasure if you know how to use it. The gradually declining years are among the sweetest in a man's life, and I maintain that, even when they have reached the extreme limit, they have their pleasure still.

— Seneca

There is nothing more despicable than an old man who has no other proof than his age to offer of his having lived long in the world.

— Seneca

Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness.

— Seneca

It is the constant fault and inseparable evil quality of ambition, that it never looks behind it.

— Seneca

Those who boast of their descent, brag on what they owe to others.

— Seneca

No one is better born than another, unless they are born with better abilities and a more amiable disposition.

— Seneca

He who boasts of his descent, praises the deed of another.

— Seneca

Anger: an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.

— Seneca

The greatest remedy for anger is delay.

— Seneca

The deferring of anger is the best antidote to anger.

— Seneca

Anger is like those ruins which smash themselves on what they fall.

— Seneca

Nothing is so wretched or foolish as to anticipate misfortunes. What madness is it to be expecting evil before it comes.

— Seneca

The mind that is anxious about the future is miserable.

— Seneca

There are more things to alarm us than to harm us, and we suffer more often in apprehension than reality.

— Seneca

There are no greater wretches in the world than many of those whom people in general take to be happy.

— Seneca

It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.

— Seneca

Believe me, that was a happy age, before the days of architects, before the days of builders.

— Seneca

All art is an imitation of nature.

— Seneca

We never reflect how pleasant it is to ask for nothing.

— Seneca

It's the admirer and the watcher who provoke us to all the inanities we commit.

— Seneca

Calamity is virtue's opportunity.

— Seneca

A quarrel is quickly settled when deserted by one party; there is no battle unless there be two.

— Seneca

Happy the man who can endure the highest and the lowest fortune. He, who has endured such vicissitudes with equanimity, has deprived misfortune of its power.

— Seneca

Conversation has a kind of charm about it, an insinuating and insidious something that elicits secrets just like love or liquor.

— Seneca

He that does good to another does good also to himself.

— Seneca

Courage leads to heaven; fear leads to death.

— Seneca

Let us train our minds to desire what the situation demands.

— Seneca

It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that they are difficult.

— Seneca

Fortune can take away riches, but not courage.

— Seneca

The pressure of adversity does not affect the mind of the brave man. It is more powerful than external circumstances.

— Seneca

There is nothing in the world so much admired as a man who knows how to bear unhappiness with courage.

— Seneca

Crime when it succeeds is called virtue.

— Seneca

He has committed the crime who profits by it.

— Seneca

One crime has to be concealed by another.

— Seneca

Constant exposure to dangers will breed contempt for them.

— Seneca

A punishment to some, to some a gift, and to many a favor.

— Seneca

Death is the wish of some, the relief of many, and the end of all.

— Seneca

The final hour when we cease to exist does not itself bring death; it merely of itself completes the death-process. We reach death at that moment, but we have been a long time on the way.

— Seneca

Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labor does the body.

— Seneca

No evil propensity of the human heart is so powerful that it may mot be subdued by discipline.

— Seneca

Disease is not of the body but of the place.

— Seneca

Economy is too late when you are at the bottom of your purse.

— Seneca

Sovereignty over any foreign land is insecure.

— Seneca

No evil is without its compensation. The less money, the less trouble; the less favor, the less envy. Even in those cases which put us out of wits, it is not the loss itself, but the estimate of the loss that troubles us.

— Seneca

The road to learning by precept is long, but by example short and effective.

— Seneca

It is quality rather than quantity that matters.

— Seneca

Even if it is to be, what end do you serve by running to distress?

— Seneca

Do everything as in the eye of another.

— Seneca

If thou art a man, admire those who attempt great things, even though they fail.

— Seneca

Fate leads the willing, and drags along the reluctant.

— Seneca

Fate rules the affairs of men, with no recognizable order.

— Seneca

The fates lead the willing, and drag the unwilling.

— Seneca

Where the fear is, happiness is not.

— Seneca

A person's fears are lighter when the danger is at hand.

— Seneca

We are more often frightened than hurt; and we suffer more from imagination than from reality.

— Seneca

A foolishness is inflicted with a hatred of itself.

— Seneca

He who is brave is free.

— Seneca

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.

— Seneca

Friendship always benefits; love sometimes injures.

— Seneca

Those that are a friend to themselves are sure to be a friend to all.

— Seneca

It is the superfluous things for which men sweat.

— Seneca

A gift consists not in what is done or given, but in the intention of the giver or doer.

— Seneca

There is no delight in owning anything unshared.

— Seneca

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.

— Seneca

The pleasures of the palate deal with us like the Egyptian thieves, who strangle those whom they embrace.

— Seneca

If a man does not know what port he is steering for, no wind is favorable to him.

— Seneca

If a man knows not what harbor he seeks, any wind is the right wind.

— Seneca

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.

— Seneca

Nothing is void of God, his work is everywhere his full of himself.

— Seneca

There is as much greatness of mind in acknowledging a good turn, as in doing it.

— Seneca

It is another's fault if he be ungrateful, but it is mine if I do not give. To find one thankful man, I will oblige a great many that are not so.

— Seneca

See how many are better off than you are, but consider how many are worse.

— Seneca

It is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man and the security of a god.

— Seneca

For greed all nature is too little.

— Seneca

The display of grief makes more demands than grief itself. How few men are sad in their own company.

— Seneca

Nothing becomes so offensive so quickly as grief. When fresh it finds someone to console it, but when it becomes chronic, it is ridiculed, and rightly.

— Seneca

True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears but to rest satisfied with what we have, which is sufficient, for he that is so wants nothing. The great blessings of mankind are within us and within our reach. A wise man is content with his lot, whatever it may be, without wishing for what he has not.

— Seneca

Anger, if not restrained, is frequently more hurtful to us than the injury that provokes it.

— Seneca

No one can be despised by another until he has learned to despise himself.

— Seneca

Who can hope for nothing, should despair for nothing.

— Seneca

Whatever is well said by another, is mine.

— Seneca

Most men ebb and flow in wretchedness between the fear of death and the hardship of life; they are unwilling to live, and yet they do not know how to die.

— Seneca

A happy life is one which is in accordance with its own nature.

— Seneca

It is often better not to see an insult than to avenge it.

— Seneca

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.

— Seneca

If you would judge, understand.

— Seneca

If you judge, investigate.

— Seneca

May be is very well, but Must is the master. It is my duty to show justice without recompense.

— Seneca

Wherever there is a human being there is an opportunity for kindness

— Seneca

The foremost art of kings is the ability to endure hatred.

— Seneca

He is a king who fears nothing, he is a king who desires nothing!

— Seneca

It is more fitting for a man to laugh at life than to lament over it.

— Seneca

No one is laughable who laughs at himself.

— Seneca

He who dreads hostility too much is unfit to rule.

— Seneca