Lucretius - Life Quotes

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By protracting life, we do not deduct one jot from the duration of death.

Lucretius
Those vestiges of natures left behind
Which reason cannot quite expel from us
Are still so slight that naught prevents a man
From living a life even worthy of the gods.

Lucretius
Now come: that thou mayst able be to know
That minds and the light souls of all that live
Have mortal birth and death, I will go on
Verses to build meet for thy rule of life,
Sought after long, discovered with sweet toil.

Lucretius
Thus it comes
That earth, without her seasons of fixed rains,
Could bear no produce such as makes us glad,
And whatsoever lives, if shut from food,
Prolongs its kind and guards its life no more.

Lucretius
Thus the sum
Forever is replenished, and we live
As mortals by eternal give and take.
The nations wax, the nations wane away;
In a brief space the generations pass,
And like to runners hand the lamp of life
One unto other.

Lucretius
First, then, I say, that the mind, which we often call the intellect, in which is placed the conduct and government of life, is not less an integral part of man himself, than the hand, and foot, and eyes, are portions of the whole animal.

Lucretius
Were a man to order his life by the rules of true reason, a frugal substance joined to a contented mind is for him great riches; for never is there any lack of a little.

Lucretius
You may complete as many generations as you please during your life; none the less will that everlasting death await you.

Lucretius
And many kinds of creatures must have died,
Unable to plant out new sprouts of life.
For whatever you see that lives and breathes and thrives
Has been, from the very beginning, guarded, saved
By it's trickery for its swiftness or brute strength.
And many have been entrusted to our care,
Commended by their usefulness to us.
For instance, strength supports a savage lion;
Foxes rely on their cunning; deer their flight.

Lucretius
We can know there is nothing to be feared in death, that one who is not cannot be made unhappy, and that it matters not a scrap whether one might ever have been born at all, when death that is immortal has taken over one's mortal life.

Lucretius
O miserable minds of men! O blind hearts! In what darkness of life, in what great dangers ye spend this little span of years!

Lucretius
Thus the sum of things is ever being renewed, and mortals live dependent one upon another. Some nations increase, others diminish, and in a short space the generations of living creatures are changed and like runners pass on the torch of life.

Lucretius
Why dost thou not retire like a guest sated with the banquet of life, and with calm mind embrace, thou fool, a rest that knows no care?

Lucretius
Some races increase, others are reduced, and in a short while the generations of living creatures are changed and like runners relay the torch of life.

Lucretius
But if one should guide his life by true principles, man's greatest wealth is to live on a little with contented mind; for a little is never lacking.

Lucretius
Our life must once have end; in vain we fly
From following Fate; e'en now, e'en now, we die.

Lucretius
That fear of Acheron be sent packing which troubles the life of man from its deepest depths, suffuses all with the blackness of death, and leaves no delight clean and pure.

Lucretius
And life is given to none freehold, but it is leasehold for all.

Lucretius