Quotes from Plutarch

For lack of rules (which the undisciplined sector of the young call freedom) 3 sets masters over one which are more tyrannical [D] than the teachers and trainers familiar from childhood – these masters are the desires, when they have broken out of prison, so to speak. Just

L'amicizia è animale da compagnia, non da gregge.

It is the hither accomplishment to use money well than to use arms; but not to need it is more noble than to use it.

Even if your life be bad do not live unknown, but be known, reform, repent; if you have virtue, be not utterly useless in life; if you are vicious, do not continue unreformed.

The mind is not a vessel that needs filling, but wood that needs kindling.

In fact Cleopatra was indebted to Fulvia for teaching Antony to obey a wife's authority, for by the time he met her he had already been quite broken in and schooled to accept the way of women.

It was for the most part by sacrifices, processions, and religious dances, which he himself appointed and conducted, and which mingled with their solemnity a diversion full of charm and a beneficent pleasure, that he won the people's favour and tamed their fierce and warlike tempers. At times, also, by heralding to them vague terrors from the god, strange apparitions of divine beings and threatening voices, he would subdue and humble their minds by means of superstitious fears.

common people, who, in any difficult crisis and great exigency, ever look for relief rather to strange and extravagant than to reasonable means

For the first step towards victory undoubtedly is to gain courage.

When someone asked Demaratus why the Spartans disgrace those who throw away their shields but not those who abandon their breastplates or helmets, he said that they put the latter on for their own sakes but the shield for the sake of the whole line.

It was a pleasure merely to hear the sound of her voice, with which, like an instrument of many strings, she could pass from one language to another; so that there were few of the barbarian nations that she answered by an interpreter.

In an harangue to the people, he said, with reference to these measures, that he had proscribed all he could think of, and as to those who now escaped his memory, he would proscribe them at some future time.

In a harangue to the people, he said, with reference to these measures, that he had proscribed all he could think of, and as to those who now escaped his memory, he would proscribe them at some future time.

For humans it is not at all possible to have the best thing of all or to have any share of the best nature—since the best thing for all men and women is not to be born. But the second best thing after this and the first available to mortals, is to die as soon as possible after being born." It is clear that he said this because the way that exists in death is better than the one in life.

I don't recall the beginning of what you said, and consequently I also don't grasp the middle sections, while the part at the end I don't approve of.

But a man cannot by writing a bill of divorce to his vice get rid of all trouble at once, and enjoy tranquillity by living apart.

Friends and kindred should be the good and virtuous [of all mankind], and that the vicious only should be accounted foreigners. Nor ... Greeks and barbarians should be distinguished by long garments, targets, scimitars, or turbans; but that the Grecians should be known by their virtue and courage, and the barbarians by their vices and their cowardice.

A human body in no way resembles those that were born for ravenousness; it hath no hawk's bill, no sharp talon, no roughness of teeth, no such strength of stomach or heat of digestion, as can be sufficient to convert or alter such heavy and fleshy fare.

In der Nacht waren sie der Gegenstand seiner Träume, und während des Tages trieb ihn der Eifer, seinem Vorbild ähnlich zu werden, hinaus und stachelte ihn zu dem Vorsatz an, die gleichen Taten zu verrichten.

And he used to say that sleep and sexual intercourse, more than any thing else, made him conscious that he was mortal, implying that both weariness and pleasure arise from one and the same natural weakness.

unrestricted

Leaders who allow themselves to be governed by reason will allow themselves to in turn govern their cities benevolently. The uneducated leader, on the other hand, is plagued by greed, paranoia, and a false sense of grandeur.

As Plato says: 'People cannot be good leaders, unless they have first been good servants.

Lycurgus did not regard sons as the peculiar property of their fathers, but rather as the common property of the state