Quotes from The Hitopadesa

The interval is immense between corporeal qualifications and sciences: the body in a moment is extinct, but knowledge endureth to the end of time.

The man who listens not to the words of affectionate friends will give joy in the time of distress to his enemies.

The man who neither gives in charity nor enjoys his wealth, which every day increases, breathes, indeed, like the bellows of a smith, but cannot be said to live.

The potter forms what he pleases with soft clay, so a man accomplishes his works by his own act.

Through avarice a man loses his understanding, and by his thirst for wealth he gives pain to the inhabitants of both worlds.

To address a judicious remark to a thoughtless man is a mere threshing of chaff.

What a rich man gives and what he consumes, that is his real worth.