Palladas
All human must pay the debt of death, nor is there any mortal who knows whether he shall be alive to-morrow; learning this clearly, O man, make thee merry, keeping the wine-god close by thee for oblivion of death, and take thy pleasure with the Paphian while thou drawest thy ephemeral life; but all else give to Fortune's control.
Day by day we are born as night retires, no more possessing aught of our former life, estranged from our course of yesterday, and beginning to-day the life that remains. Do not then call thyself, old man, abundant in years; for to-day thou hast no share in what is gone.
Why vainly, O man, dost thou labour and disturb everything when thou art slave to the lot of thy birth? Yield thyself to it, strive not with Heaven, and, accepting thy fortune, be content with rest.
All life is a stage and a game: either learn to play it, laying by seriousness, or bear its pains.
Thou talkest much, O man, and thou art laid in earth after a little: keep silence, and while thou yet livest, meditate on death.
Pedartius
When not selected to be one of the Three Hundred (which was rated as the outstanding distinction in the state) he withdrew with a bright smile. Yet when summoned back by the ephors and asked what was making him cheerful, he said, "Because I congratulate the state on having three hundred citizens better than I."
Pericles
If then we prefer to meet danger with a light heart but without laborious training, and with a courage which is gained by habit and not enforced by law, are we not greatly the better for it?
And they are surely to be esteemed the bravest spirits who, having the clearest sense both of the pains and pleasures of life, do not on that account shrink from danger.
For even those who come short in other ways may justly plead the valor with which they have fought for their country; they have blotted out the evil with the good, and have benefited the state more by their public services than they have injured her by their private actions.
Wait for the wisest of all councilors, time.
Perictyone
A woman should be a harmony of thoughtfulness and temperance. Her soul should be zealous to acquire virtue so that she may be just, brave, prudent, frugal, and hating vain glory. Furnished with these virtues, when she becomes a wife, act worthily towards herself, her husband, her children and her family.
She should venerate the Gods, thereby hoping to achieve felicity, also by obeying the laws and sacred institutions of her country.
For no greater error or injustice can be committed by men than to act impiously towards their parents.
Phaedrus
Submit to the present evil, lest a greater one befall you.
Things are not always what they seem.
Come of it what may.
Pindar
War is sweet to those who have not tried it. The experienced man is frightened at the heart to see it advancing.
Blessed is he who has seen things and goes under the ground. He knows life's end. He knows what God has decreed.
Mistress of high achievement, O Lady Truth, do not let my understanding stumble across some jagged falsehood.
The days that are still to come are the wisest witnesses.
If any man hopes to do a deed without the knowledge of Zeus, he errs.
Do not peer too far.
The test of any man lies in action.
Seek not, my soul, the life of the immortals, but enjoy to the full the resources that are within my reach.
Creatures of a day, what is man? What is he not? Mankind is a dream of a shadow. But when God-given brightness comes, a radiant light rests on men, and a gentle life.
Words have a longer life than deeds.
Not every truth is the better for showing its face undisguised; and often silence is the wisest thing for a man to heed.
One race there is of men, one of Gods, but from one mother we both draw our breath.
It is not possible with mortal mind to search out the purposes of the Gods.
O bright and violet-crowned city, famed in song, bulwark of Greece, famous Athens the divine.
Unsung, the noblest deed will die.
What is God? Everything.
Custom is the ruler of all.
Plato
The kosmos is a single whole, comprised of many parts that are also wholes.
The ancients are better than we for they dwelled nearer to the Gods.
The soul of man is immortal and imperishable.
And that which you deem of no moment is the highest of all: that is whether you have a right idea of the Gods, whereby you may live your life well or ill.
We should think of the most authoritative part of the soul as a guardian spirit given by God that lifts us to our heavenly home.
Bodily exercise, when compulsory, does no harm to the body; but knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.
The price of apathy towards public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.
Even the Gods love their jokes.
At the touch of love everyone becomes a poet.
Man is a biped without feathers.
Is that which is holy loved by the Gods because it is holy, or is it holy because it is loved by the Gods?
The particular learning which leads you throughout your life to hate what should be hated and love what should be loved will rightly be called education.
The only writing that really brings profit is engraving on man's soul justice and goodness and nobility.
A slave is an embarrassing possession. Many a man has found his slaves better in every way than his brothers or his sons.
Lust is a powerful snare for falling into evil.
As long as you are able to add another's light to your own, then do it.
Evil people look for people's faults, ignoring their good qualities, just as flies look for rotten parts of a body, ignoring the wholesome.
He is not a consummate sage who rejoices at the wealth of the world, or sorrows at anything of its misfortunes.
The best way to get revenge on another is by becoming better oneself.
An ignorant young man asked Plato, "How did you manage to learn so much?" Plato replied, "By burning more oil than you have drunk wine."
Place intelligence on your right and truth on your left, and you will be safe all your life and remain free.
It behooves a ruler to start rectifying himself before he starts rectifying his citizenry, lest he be in the situation of one who wants to straighten a crooked shadow before straightening the rod of which it is the shadow.
The time of a tyrannical ruler is shorter than the time of a just one, because the tyrant is a spoiler and the just one a restorer - spoiling something is always quicker than restoring something.
When you admonish a wrongdoer, do so gently, that it may not lead to open hostility.
Most virtues start out disagreeable, but end up sweet.
Plautus
He who dies for virtues' sake does not perish.
Pliny the Elder
The only certainty is that nothing is certain.
Plutarch
It was for the sake of others that I first began to write biographies, but I find myself continuing to do it for my own. The virtues of these great men serve me as a sort of looking-glass in which I may see how to adorn and adjust my own life. I can compare it to nothing but living daily with them ... turning my thoughts happily and calmly to the noble.
Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are pure, whatsover things are lovely, if there be any virtue and if there be any praise, think on these things.
Moral good is a stimulus; it is no sooner seen than it inspires an impulse to follow it.
The truly noble and reasoned spirit becomes more evident in times of disaster.
Such an unsociable, solitary thing is power.
Those who are great produce nothing little.
Myths are to be tenderly treated and interpreted in a spirit at once pious and philosophic.
Every man is able to turn his mind easily upon what he thinks is good. It is a duty to contemplate the best.
God is not a ventriliquist.
Atheism denies God, but superstition wrongs him. I had rather have it said that there not and never had been such a fellow as Plutarch, than that he was fickle and vindictive and would pay you out for not calling on him.
Life and death are only the prelude to the Great Initiation. We are like those being initiated into Mysteries. At first they wander along tortuous ways and through wearisome mazes, which end in a shuddering passage through darkness full of terror. But then a clear shining light comes to meet you; pure meadows receive you; there is song and dance and holy apparitions.
About that which you have heard, dear heart, that the soul once departed from the body vanishes and feels nothing, I know that you give no belief to such assertions because of those sacred and faithful promises given in the Mysteries of Dionysos which we who are of that brotherhood know. We hold it firmly for an undoubted truth that our soul is incorruptible and immortal. We are to think of the dead that they pass to a better place and a happier condition. Let us behave ourselves accordingly, outwardly by an ordered life, while within all should be pure, wise, incorruptible.
If a man persists on the path of excellence, he will be able to hear this spiritual speech which fills the air but can be heard only by those whose souls are pure.
Let your life be centered in the sphere of the little things.
By all means, enter public life. You may have no wars to wage, no tyrants to put down, no alliances to consolidate. The utmost you may be able to hope for is to abolish some petty abuse, fight some bad custom, revive some charitable foundation, repair an aqueduct, rebuild a temple, adjust a tax. But they are all duties worth doing.
He who is faithful in that which is least may be fulfilling life's highest demands.
If you will scrutinize and open yourself up you will find a storehouse of evils and maladies, not entering from abroad, but homegrown, springing from vice, plenteous in poisons. Wickedness frames the engines of her own torment. She is a wonderful artisan of the wicked life.
Boeotia, where great Thebes once flourished, is mute now, altogether desolate and forlorn. My home town is a poor little place, where I remain willingly so that it should not become even less.
It is not the abundance of wine or the feasting of meat that makes the joy of festivals, but the good hope and the belief that the God is present in his kindness and graciously accepts what is offered.
Pompey
More worship the rising than the setting sun.
A dead man cannot bite.
Porphyry
At the moment of death the soul must be as it is during the Mysteries; free from any blemish, passion, envy, or anger.
Praxilla
The most beautiful thing I leave behind is the light of the sun, the next is the shining stars and the face of the moon. And also ripe cucumbers and apples and pears.
Cultivate the brave.
Despise the company of cowards. There is little favor from them.
Proclus
Wherever there is number, there is beauty.
Protragoras
Man is the measure of all things.
Claudius Ptolemy
Mortal though I be, yea ephemeral, if but a moment I gaze up to the night's starry domain of heaven, then no longer on earth I stand; I touch the Creator and my lively spirit drinketh immortality.
Pythagoras
Abstain from eating animal flesh.
Abstain from beans.
Never sacrifice without barley.
When it thunders, touch the ground.
First honor the Immortal Gods, as the law demands; then reverence thy oaths, and then the illustrious heroes; then venerate the divinities under the earth, due rites performing; then honor your parents, and all of your kindred.
Never forget that death is appointed to all.
Do not neglect the health of the body.
What is most just? Sacrifice. What is most wise? Number. What is most helpful? Medicine. What is most fine? Harmony. What is most powerful? Wisdom. What is most good? Happiness. What is most truly said? That men are wretched.
In a right-angled triangle, the square on the hypotenuse is equal to the squares on the other two sides.
All things are comprised of number.
And one day when Pythagoras passed a puppy that was being whipped they say he took pity on it and and made this remark: "Stop, do not beat it; for it is the soul of a dear friend - I recognized it when I heard the voice."
Lack of cultivation is the cause of every evil.
Prefer being defeated but just to being victorious but unjust.
Fathers are the cause of life, but the wise are the cause of wholesome life.
The world is a series of changes, somtimes in your favor and sometimes against you: so when you are in change, do good; and when you are overruled, bear it.
Pythagoras wanted to admonish the people and censure them for their neglect of knowledge, so he climbed up onto a high place and cried, "O community of people!" Then when they had gathered, Pythagoras said, "I didn't call you - I called only people.
It is impossible for anything of the noble, lofty divine sciences to be firmly rooted in a soul while it is filled with squalor, since like appeals only to like.
Hold yourselves to these three things, as to the law: abandon anger and importunity, avoid overconsumption, and do not sleep excessively.
Don't brag about what you did today, for you don't know what tomorrow will bring.
It is not enough for virtue to exist in the soul without emerging into action by effort. And effort is in training, by means of study, the irascible part of the self that is not submissive to order, so that the self may acquire education, skill, and aspiration for what is best.
Don't even entertain the notion of something that is not right to do.
One whose face is comely but whose morals are bad is like a vessel that is gold but contains vinegar.
If you will not take pains for knowledge, you will suffer the distress of ignorance.
When there is no firewood, fire goes out; and when no one is quarelsome, arguments end.
Just as faces are not alike, hearts are not alike.
Not everything that is pleasureable is beneficial, but everything that is beneficial is pleasureable.
There is no taking back something you have already said or done, so be wary before that.
Life is like a festival; just as some come to the festival to compete, some to ply their trade, but the best people come as spectators, so in life the slavish men go hunting after for fame or gain, the philosophers for the truth.
Copyright 2002 Sannion
All Rights Reserved
Posted with permission
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