Quotes
Quotes about End
After he routed Pharnaces Ponticus at the first assault, he wrote thus to his friends: "I came, I saw, I conquered."
The measure of a man's life is the well spending of it, and not the length.
There are two sentences inscribed upon the Delphic oracle, hugely accommodated to the usages of man's life: "Know thyself," and "Nothing too much;" and upon these all other precepts depend.
To one commending an orator for his skill in amplifying petty matters, Agesilaus said, "I do not think that shoemaker a good workman that makes a great shoe for a little foot."
Agesilaus was very fond of his children; and it is reported that once toying with them he got astride upon a reed as upon a horse, and rode about the room; and being seen by one of his friends, he desired him not to speak of it till he had children of his own.
Spintharus, speaking in commendation of Epaminondas, says he scarce ever met with any man who knew more and spoke less.
If what the philosophers say be true,--that all men's actions proceed from one source; that as they assent from a persuasion that a thing is so, and dissent from a persuasion that it is not, and suspend their judgment from a persuasion that it is uncertain,--so likewise they seek a thing from a persuasion that it is for their advantage.
The images of twenty of the most illustrious families--the Manlii, the Quinctii, and other names of equal splendour--were carried before it [the bier of Junia]. Those of Brutus and Cassius were not displayed; but for that very reason they shone with pre-eminent lustre.
Think on this doctrine,--that reasoning beings were created for one another's sake; that to be patient is a branch of justice, and that men sin without intending it.
All things are the same,--familiar in enterprise, momentary in endurance, coarse in substance. All things now are as they were in the day of those whom we have buried.
The happiness and unhappiness of the rational, social animal depends not on what he feels but on what he does; just as his virtue and vice consist not in feeling but in doing.
He said that men ought to remember those friends who were absent as well as those who were present.
He used to say that it was better to have one friend of great value than many friends who were good for nothing.
Like sending owls to Athens, as the proverb goes.
That the gods superintend all the affairs of men, and that there are such beings as dæmons.
Bion insisted on the principle that "The property of friends is common."
He was once asked what a friend is, and his answer was, "One soul abiding in two bodies."
The question was once put to him, how we ought to behave to our friends; and the answer he gave was, "As we should wish our friends to behave to us."
He used to teach that God is incorporeal, as Plato also asserted, and that his providence extends over all the heavenly bodies.
It was a favourite expression of Theophrastus that time was the most valuable thing that a man could spend.
All things are in common among friends.
When Zeno was asked what a friend was, he replied, "Another I."
Believe me, a thousand friends suffice thee not;
In a single enemy thou hast more than enough.
A faithful and good servant is a real godsend; but truly 't is a rare bird in the land.
Send them home as merry as crickets.
