Cicero - Man Quotes

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To be ignorant of what happened before you were born is to be ever a child. For what is man's lifetime unless the memory of past events is woven with those of earlier times?

Cicero
Not to know what happened before you were born is to be a child forever. For what is the time of a man, except it be interwoven with that memory of ancient things of a superior age?

Cicero
For every man's nature is concealed with many folds of disguise, and covered as it were with various veils. His brows, his eyes, and very often his countenance, are deceitful, and his speech is most commonly a lie.

Cicero
It is besides necessary that whoever is brave should be a man of great soul.

Cicero
Death is dreadful to the man whose all is extinguished with his life; but not to him whose glory never can die.

Cicero
This is the part of a great man, after he has maturely weighed all circumstances, to punish the guilty, to spare the many, and in every state of fortune not to depart from an upright, virtuous conduct.

Cicero
There is a certain virtue in every good man, which night and day stirs up the mind with the stimulus of glory, and reminds it that all mention of our name will not cease at the same time with our lives, but that our fame will endure to all posterity.

Cicero
If a man should ascend alone into heaven and behold clearly the structure of the universe and the beauty of the stars, there would be no pleasure for him in the awe-inspiring sight, which would have filled him with delight if he had had someone to whom he could describe what he had seen.

Cicero
It is graceful in a man to think and to speak with propriety, to act with deliberation, and in every occurrence of life to find out and persevere in the truth. On the other hand, to be imposed upon, to mistake, to falter, and to be deceived, is as ungraceful as to rave or to be insane.

Cicero
He does not seem to me to be a free man who does not sometimes do nothing.

Cicero
A careful physician... before he attempts to administer a remedy to his patient, must investigate not only the malady of the man he wishes to cure, but also his habits when in health, and his physical constitution.

Cicero
From this followed the corollary, that many sensations are probable, that is, though not amounting to a full perception they are yet possessed of a certain distinctness and clearness, and so can direct the conduct of the wise man.

Cicero
Can you also, Lucullus, affirm that there is any power united with wisdom and prudence which has made, or, to use your own expression, manufactured man? What sort of a manufacture is that? Where is it exercised? When? Why? How?

Cicero
It is not only arrogant, but it is profligate, for a man to disregard the world's opinion of himself.

Cicero
The more peculiarly his own a man's character is, the better it fits him.

Cicero
For there is assuredly nothing dearer to a man than wisdom, and though age takes away all else, it undoubtedly brings us that.

Cicero
Natural ability without education has more often raised a man to glory and virtue than education without natural ability.

Cicero
For of all gainful professions, nothing is better, nothing more pleasing, nothing more delightful, nothing better becomes a well-bred man than agriculture.

Cicero
The distinguishing property of man is to search for and to follow after truth.

Cicero
If a man aspires to the highest place, it is no dishonor to him to halt at the second, or even at the third.

Cicero
Above all, the search after truth and its eager pursuit are peculiar to man. And so, when we have leisure from the demands of business cares, we are eager to see, to hear, to learn something new, and we esteem a desire to know.

Cicero
Friendship is nothing else than entire fellow feeling as to all things human and divine with mutual good-will and affection; and I doubt whether anything better than this, wisdom alone excepted, has been given to man.

Cicero
There is said to be hope for a sick man, as long as there is life.

Cicero
While there are two ways of contending, one by discussion, the other by force, the former belonging properly to man, the latter to beasts, recourse must be had to the latter if there be no opportunity for employing the former.

Cicero
Give me a young man in whom there is something of the old, and an old man with something of the young: guided so, a man may grow old in body, but never in mind.

Cicero
Every one is least known to himself, and it is very difficult for a man to know himself.

Cicero
Of all nature's gifts to the human race, what is sweeter to a man than his children?

Cicero
Take from a man his reputation for probity, and the more shrewd and clever he is, the more hated and mistrusted he becomes.

Cicero