Horatius > Quotes

“Pulvis et umbra sumus. (We are but dust and shadow.)”
― Horace, The Odes of Horace

“Carpe diem."

(Odes: I.11)”
― Horace, The Odes of Horace

“Begin, be bold, and venture to be wise.”
― Horace

“Ut haec ipsa qui non sentiat deorum vim habere is nihil omnino sensurus esse videatur."

If any man cannot feel the power of God when he looks upon the stars, then I doubt whether he is capable of any feeling at all.”
― Horace

“Rule your mind or it will rule you.”
― Horace

“Caelum non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt.
(They change their sky, not their soul, who rush across the sea.)”
― Horace, The Odes of Horace

“Happy the man, and happy he alone,
he who can call today his own:
he who, secure within, can say,
Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.

Be fair or foul, or rain or shine
the joys I have possessed, in spite of fate, are mine.
Not Heaven itself, upon the past has power,
but what has been, has been, and I have had my hour.”
― Horace

“Pactum serva" - "Keep the faith”
― Horace

“Live as brave men; and if fortune is adverse, front its blows with brave hearts”
― Horace

“he who is greedy is always in want”
― Horace

“Dimidium facti qui coepit habet: sapere aude" ("He who has begun is half done: dare to know!").”
― Horace

“Anger is a brief madness.”
― Horace

“Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which, in prosperous circumstances, would have lain dormant.”
― Horace

“wisdom is not wisdom when it is derived from books alone”
― Horace

“A picture is a poem without words.”
― Horace

“In love there are two evils: war and peace.”
― Horace

“Whatever advice you give, be brief.”
― Horace

“He who postpones the hour of living rightly is like the rustic who waits for the river to run out before he crosses.”
― Horace

“Once a word has been allowed to escape, it cannot be recalled.”
― Horace, The Epistles of Horace

“He will always be a slave who does not know how to live upon a little.”
― Horace

“The aim of the poet is to inform or delight, or to combine together, in what he says, both pleasure and applicability to life. In instructing, be brief in what you say in order that your readers may grasp it quickly and retain it faithfully. Superfluous words simply spill out when the mind is already full. Fiction invented in order to please should remain close to reality.”
― Horace, Epistolas Ad Pisones De Ars Poetica

“He who feared that he would not succeed sat still.”
― Horace

“Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.

(Pluck the day [for it is ripe], trusting as little as possible in tomorrow.)”
― Horace, The Odes of Horace

“Without love and laughter there is no joy; live amid love and laughter.”
― Horace

“He who has begun has half done. Dare to be wise; begin!”
― Horace

“Ira furor brevis est: animum rege: qui nisi paret imperat.

(Anger is a brief madness: govern your mind [temper], for unless it obeys it commands.)”
― Horace, The Odes of Horace

“Cease to ask what the morrow
will bring forth,
and set down as gain
each day that fortune grants.”
― Quintus Horatius Flaccus

“Quid rides? Mutato nomine et de te fabula narrator. [Why do you laugh ? Change only the name and this story is about you.]”
― Horace, The Satires of Horace

“Mingle a little folly with your wisdom; a little nonsense now and then is pleasant.”
― Horace

“Even as we speak, time speeds swiftly away.”
― Horace