Pliny the Elder Quotes

53 Sourced Quotes

So that it is far from easy to judge whether she has proved a kind parent to man or a harsh step-mother.
On nature

Pliny the Elder
It is asserted that the dogs keep running when they drink at the Nile, for fear of becoming a prey to the voracity of the crocodile.

Pliny the Elder
In comparing various authors with one another, I have discovered that some of the gravest and latest writers have transcribed, word for word, from former works, without making acknowledgment.

Pliny the Elder
It is a maxim universally agreed upon in agriculture, that nothing must be done too late; and again, that everything must be done at its proper season; while there is a third precept which reminds us that opportunities lost can never be regained.

Pliny the Elder
Indeed, what is there that does not appear marvelous when it comes to our knowledge for the first time? How many things, too, are looked upon as quite impossible until they have actually been effected?

Pliny the Elder
Cincinnatus was ploughing his four jugera of land upon the Vaticanian Hill,—the same that are still known as the Quintian Meadows,—when the messenger brought him the dictatorship, finding him, the tradition says, stripped to the work.

Pliny the Elder
Why is it that we entertain the belief that for every purpose odd numbers are the most effectual?

Pliny the Elder
Man is the only one that knows nothing, that can learn nothing without being taught. He can neither speak nor walk nor eat, and in short he can do nothing at the prompting of nature only, but weep.

Pliny the Elder
The brain is the highest of the organs in position, and it is protected by the vault of the head; it has no flesh or blood or refuse. It is the citadel of sense-perception.

Pliny the Elder
When a building is about to fall down, all the mice desert it.

Pliny the Elder
It is generally admitted that the absent are warned by a ringing in the ears, when they are being talked about.

Pliny the Elder
The best plan is, as the common proverb has it, to profit by the folly of others.

Pliny the Elder
Bears when first born are shapeless masses of white flesh a little larger than mice, their claws alone being prominent. The mother then licks them gradually into proper shape.

Pliny the Elder
The world, and whatever that be which we call the heavens, by the vault of which all things are enclosed, we must conceive to be a deity, to be eternal, without bounds, neither created nor subject at any time to destruction. To inquire what is beyond it is no concern of man; nor can the human mind form any conjecture concerning it.

Pliny the Elder
Everything is soothed by oil, and this is the reason why divers send out small quantities of it from their mouths, because it smooths every part which is rough.

Pliny the Elder
[Pliny] always said that there was no book so bad that some good could not be got out of it.

Pliny the Elder
Such is the audacity of man, that he hath learned to counterfeit Nature, yea, and is so bold as to challenge her in her work.

Pliny the Elder
It is ridiculous to suppose that the great head of things, whatever it be, pays any regard to human affairs.

Pliny the Elder
Man alone at the very moment of his birth, cast naked upon the naked earth, does she [Nature] abandon to cries and lamentations.

Pliny the Elder
The most disgraceful cause of the scarcity [of remedies] is that even those who know them do not want to point them out, as if they were going to lose what they pass on to others.

Pliny the Elder
Always act in such a way as to secure the love of your neighbour.

Pliny the Elder
It is far from easy to determine whether she [Nature] has proved to man a kind parent or a merciless stepmother.

Pliny the Elder
It [the earth] alone remains immoveable, whilst all things revolve round it.

Pliny the Elder