Plutarch - Man Quotes

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It is a thing of no great difficulty to raise objections against another man's oration,—nay, it is a very easy matter; but to produce a better in its place is a work extremely troublesome.

Plutarch

What is bigger than an elephant? But this also is become man's plaything, and a spectacle at public solemnities; and it learns to skip, dance, and kneel.

Plutarch

"And this," said Caesar, "you know, young man, is more disagreeable for me to say than to do."

Plutarch

Like the man who threw a stone at a bitch, but hit his step-mother, on which he exclaimed, "Not so bad!"

Plutarch

By the study of their biographies, we receive each man as a guest into our minds, and we seem to understand their character as the result of a personal acquaintance, because we have obtained from their acts the best and most important means of forming an opinion about them. "What greater pleasure could'st thou gain than this?" What more valuable for the elevation of our own character?

Plutarch

I, for my own part, had much rather people should say of me that there neither is nor ever was such a man as Plutarch, than that they should say, "Plutarch is an unsteady, fickle, froward, vindictive, and touchy fellow."

Plutarch

No man ever wetted clay and then left it, as if there would be bricks by chance and fortune.

Plutarch

The obligations of law and equity reach only to mankind; but kindness and beneficence should be extended to the creatures of every species, and these will flow from the breast of a true man, as streams that issue from the living fountain.

Plutarch

It is a difficult thing for a man to resist the natural necessity of mortal passions.

Plutarch

Poverty is never dishonourable in itself, but only when it is a mark of sloth, intemperance, extravagance, or thoughtlessness. When, on the other hand, it is the handmaid of a sober, industrious, righteous, and brave man, who devotes all his powers to the service of the people, it is the sign of a lofty spirit that harbours no mean thoughts

Plutarch

The measure of a man's life is the well spending of it, and not the length.

Plutarch

Certainly the people's insistence that their candidates should present themselves ungirt and without a tunic had nothing to do with any suspicion of bribery, for it was not until long afterwards that the abuse of buying and selling votes crept in and money began to play an important part in determining the elections. Later on, however, this process of corruption spread to the law courts and to the army, and finally, when even the sword became enslaved by the power of gold, the republic was subjected to the rule of the emperors. For it has rightly been said that the man who first offers banquets and bribes to the people is the first to destroy their liberties.

Plutarch

When Eudæmonidas heard a philosopher arguing that only a wise man can be a good general, "This is a wonderful speech," said he; "but he that saith it never heard the sound of trumpets."

Plutarch

The first man... ventured to call food and nourishment the parts that had a little before bellowed and cried, moved and lived. How could his eyes endure the slaughter when throats were slit and hides flayed and limbs torn from limb? How could his nose endure the stench? How was it that the pollution did not turn away his taste, which made contact with the sores of others and sucked juices and serums from mortal wounds?

Plutarch

Agesilaus being invited once to hear a man who admirably imitated the nightingale, he declined, saying he had heard the nightingale itself.

Plutarch

Friendship is the most pleasant of all things, and nothing more glads the heart of man.

Plutarch

There are two sentences inscribed upon the Delphic oracle, hugely accommodated to the usages of man's life: "Know thyself," 68 and "Nothing too much;" and upon these all other precepts depend.

Plutarch

One made the observation of the people of Asia that they were all slaves to one man, merely because they could not pronounce that syllable No.

Plutarch

Spintharus, speaking in commendation of Epaminondas, says he scarce ever met with any man who knew more and spoke less.

Plutarch

The man who is thought to have been the first to see beneath the surface of Caesar's public policy and to fear it, as one might fear the smiling surface of the sea.

Of cicero

Plutarch

The man who is completely wise and virtuous has no need of glory, except so far as it disposes and eases his way to action by the greater trust that it procures him.

Plutarch

When one told Plistarchus that a notorious railer spoke well of him, "I 'll lay my life," said he, "somebody hath told him I am dead, for he can speak well of no man living."

Plutarch

Nature without learning is like a blind man; learning without nature is like the maimed; practice without both these is incomplete. As in agriculture a good soil is first sought for, then a skilful husbandman, and then good seed: in the same way nature corresponds to the soil; the teacher to the husbandman; precepts and instruction to the seed.

Plutarch

As Meander says, "For our mind is God;" and as Heraclitus, "Man's genius is a deity."

Plutarch

Themistocles said to Antiphales, "Time, young man, has taught us both a lesson".

Plutarch