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Home  »  Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical  »  Pliny the Younger

C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.

Pliny the Younger

As a fresh wound shrinks from the hand of the surgeon, then gradually submits to and even calls for it; so a mind under the first impression of a misfortune shuns and rejects all comfort, but at length, if touched with tenderness, calmly and willingly resigns itself.

For however often a man may receive an obligation from you, if you refuse a request, all former favors are effaced by this one denial.

Generosity, when once set going, knows not how to stop; as the more familiar we are with the lovely form, the more enamored we become of her charms.

History ought to be guided by strict truth; and worthy actions require nothing more.

History, in whatever way it may be executed, is a great source of pleasure.

It is to me a peculiarly noble work rescuing from oblivion those who deserve immortality, and extending their renown at the same time that we advance our own.

Never do anything, concerning the rectitude of which you have a doubt.

No one has deceived the whole world, nor has the whole world ever deceived any one.

Our inquisitive disposition is excited by having its gratification deferred.

Prosperity tries the fortunate, adversity the great.

The erection of a monument is superfluous; the memory of us will last, if we have deserved it in our lives.

The happier the time, the quicker it passes.

The highest of characters, in my estimation, is his who is as ready to pardon the moral errors of mankind as if he were every day guilty of some himself; and at the same time as cautious of committing a fault as if he never forgave one.

The longest day soon comes to an end.

When a man is laboring under the pain of any distemper, it is then that he recollects there are gods, 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 not his attention.