Quotes
Quotes about Man
Diogenes lighted a candle in the daytime, and went round saying, "I am looking for a man."
When asked what he would take to let a man give him a blow on the head, he said, "A helmet."
When a man reproached him for going into unclean places, he said, "The sun too penetrates into privies, but is not polluted by them."
Diogenes said once to a person who was showing him a dial, "It is a very useful thing to save a man from being too late for supper."
The Stoics also teach that God is unity, and that he is called Mind and Fate and Jupiter, and by many other names besides.
They also say that God is an animal immortal, rational, perfect, and intellectual in his happiness, unsusceptible of any kind of evil, having a foreknowledge of the universe and of all that is in the universe; however, that he has not the figure of a man; and that he is the creator of the universe, and as it were the Father of all things in common, and that a portion of him pervades everything.
It takes a wise man to discover a wise man.
Xenophanes speaks thus:--
And no man knows distinctly anything,
And no man ever will.
Tell your master that if there were as many devils at Worms as tiles on its roofs, I would enter.
One inch of joy surmounts of grief a span,
Because to laugh is proper to the man.
How shall I be able to rule over others, that have not full power and command of myself?
So much is a man worth as he esteems himself.
He freshly and cheerfully asked him how a man should kill time.
Plain as a nose in a man's face.
Man in sooth is a marvellous, vain, fickle, and unstable subject.
Accustom him to everything, that he may not be a Sir Paris, a carpet-knight, but a sinewy, hardy, and vigorous young man.
A wise man never loses anything, if he has himself.
Plato says, "'T is to no purpose for a sober man to knock at the door of the Muses;" and Aristotle says "that no excellent soul is exempt from a mixture of folly."
The only good histories are those that have been written by the persons themselves who commanded in the affairs whereof they write.
There is, nevertheless, a certain respect and a general duty of humanity that ties us, not only to beasts that have life and sense, but even to trees and plants.
Man is certainly stark mad; he cannot make a worm, and yet he will be making gods by dozens.
Why may not a goose say thus: "All the parts of the universe I have an interest in: the earth serves me to walk upon, the sun to light me; the stars have their influence upon me; I have such an advantage by the winds and such by the waters; there is nothing that yon heavenly roof looks upon so favourably as me. I am the darling of Nature! Is it not man that keeps and serves me?"
How many worthy men have we seen survive their own reputation!
Is it not a noble farce, wherein kings, republics, and emperors have for so many ages played their parts, and to which the whole vast universe serves for a theatre?
There is no man so good, who, were he to submit all his thoughts and actions to the laws, would not deserve hanging ten times in his life.
