Seneca, De clementia 1.1.6

“No one can wear a mask for very long; affectation soon returns to true nature”

nemo enim potest personam diu ferre, ficta cito in naturam suam recidunt

Aristotle Politics 1253a 7-11

“It is clear that man is a political animal, more than every bee and herd animal: for nature makes nothing in vain and man alone of living things has reason.”

διότι δὲ πολιτικὸν ὁ ἄνθρωπος ζῷον πάσης μελίττης καὶ παντὸς ἀγελαίου ζῴου μᾶλλον, δῆλον. οὐθὲν γάρ, ὡς φαμέν, μάτην ἡ φύσις ποιεῖ·

Aristotle.

The Big Aristotle.

Sophocles, Fragment 873

Whoever does business with a tyrant is

That man’s slave, even if he starts out free.

 

ὅστις γὰρ ὡς τύραννον ἐμπορεύεται

κείνου ‘στι δοῦλος, κἂν ἐλεύθερος μόλῃ.

 

Sophocles?

 

Vergil, Aeneid 2.490

“fortunate he who could understand the causes of things”

felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas

Vergil who?

Xenophon, Memorabilia 2.6.23

τὸν δὲ φθόνον παντάπασιν ἀφαιροῦσι, τὰ μὲν ἑαυτῶν ἀγαθὰ τοῖς φίλοις οἰκεῖα παρέχοντες, τὰ δὲ τῶν φίλων ἑαυτῶν νομίζοντες.

 

Good men sweep aside all envy: they share their good possessions with their friends and have their friends’ goods as their own.

 

See the whole text here

Who is Xenophon?


Sallust, Catilinae coniuratio 20.4

“Wanting the same thing and also not wanting the same thing: this, ultimately, is true friendship”

idem velle atque idem nolle, ea demum firma amicitia est

(Catiline to his fellow conspirators)

More about Sallust.

Read the full text here.

Plato, Euthydemus 280a6

“Wisdom makes men lucky everywhere”

ἡ σοφία ἄρα πανταχοῦ τοὺς ἀνθρώπους εὐτυχεῖν

See the full text here

Cicero, Pro Sestio 143

“Let us spurn the rewards of today and look to future glory; let us deem best what is most honorable; let us hope for what we want, but bear what befalls us; finally, let us consider that even the bodies of brave men and great citizens are mortal; but that activity of the mind and the glory of virtue are for ever.”

praesentis fructus neglegamus, posteritatis gloriae serviamus; id esse optimum putemus quod erit rectissimum; speremus quae volumus, sed quod acciderit feramus; cogitemus denique corpus virorum fortium magnorum hominum esse mortale, animi vero motus et virtutis gloriam sempiternam

Homer, Iliad 22.304-5

“May I not die without a fight and without glory but after doing something big for men to come to learn about”

μὴ μὰν ἀσπουδί γε καὶ ἀκλειῶς ἀπολοίμην,

ἀλλὰ μέγα ῥέξας τι καὶ ἐσσομένοισι πυθέσθαι.

Hector prays to the gods before he faces Achilles and dies