[...] the best general became useless if his troops were not submissive and obedient; thinking that the virtue of obedience, as much as that of command, requires [...] a generous nature [...].
100-120 AD
What did it serve him to have conquered an entire world, since he lost the privilege of great men, which is to know how to command oneself.
1636
We get angry more readily with friends than with strangers, because we feel we are more entitled to receive good from them than not.
329-323 BC
Ulysses is true wisdom, which, without being captivated by material charms [...], turns all its desires towards the heavens.
c. 253-270 AD
Limestone funerary cippus
ca. 2nd–3rd century CE
The human understanding loses itself in trying to sound and control all things to the very end.
1580
It is not a question for [the rulers] to contract but to obey, and in taking on the functions the State imposes on them, they are only fulfilling their duty as Citizens.
1762
However, the heart is empty, it is full of boredom [...] while the mind, deprived of the objects that alone can occupy and nourish it, is absorbed in the darkest melancholy.
1742
In democratic countries, a man, however opulent, is almost always discontented with his fortune, because he finds himself less rich than his father was and fears that his sons will be less so than himself.
1835-1840
Cymbal
7000 BCE - 330 CE
The philosophy of 'clear and distinct' ideas [...] freed modern thought from the yoke of authority to admit no other mark of truth than evidence.
1915
Value judgments are always intuitive and admit of no proof; discursive reason only intervenes to define them and put them in order [...].
1932-1942
It is not need, it is not desire—no, it is the love of power that is the demon of men. Give them everything [...] they will remain unhappy and capricious, for the demon waits and waits, it wants to be satisfied.
1881
[The spirit of the Sage is] superior to heaven, to earth, to all beings, dwells in a body to which it is not attached, [...] and knows everything through global knowledge in its motionless unity.
4th century BC
The Calm Sea
1869
Here is a very clear example of the errors into which one falls [...] when speaking of an art whose principles one does not know.
1746
Entire layers of the bourgeois class are thrown into the working class. Competition among workers therefore increases [...].
1849
[...] one should not exclude from civil society Pagans, nor Mohammedans, nor Jews, because of the religion they profess.
1686
Experience provides no universal conclusion.
1772
Madame Bergeret de Frouville as Diana
1756
Properly speaking, we cannot have a real memory of a simple and pure sensation: nor can we truly make it known to another who has not experienced it.
1805
Man will never rise to virtue if he thinks that death is an evil.
63-64 AD
As for drugs, whether from Apothecaries or from Empirics, I hold them in such low esteem that I would never dare advise anyone to use them.
1643-1649
We lack the sense of architecture and the feeling for it. Other senses and other feelings have developed within us, stifling that one.
1926
Marble grave relief with a funerary banquet and departing warriors
2nd century BCE
When the possessors of a privilege make concessions to those who are deprived of it, it is rarely for any other reason than because the latter acquire the power to extort them.
1869
For my part, I will state clearly the substance of my thought and show clearly what the matter is.
1670
One can affirm of a thing what one clearly conceives to be contained in the idea of that thing.
1707
Paganism sacrificed bodies, whereas Christianity sacrifices souls.
1842-1845
Stucco relief panel
2nd half of 1st century CE
The moral part of education is undoubtedly the most important and the most neglected part.
1772
To see a million men serve miserably, with their necks under the yoke, not constrained by a greater force, but [...] enchanted and charmed by the name of one man alone.
c. 1552-1553
To accomplish great things, one must live as if one were never to die.
1747
Give folly all that it desires, it will believe it still does not have enough: wisdom, on the contrary, always content with what it presently possesses, never murmurs at its lot.
45 BC
The Golden Age
1605
All faith is [...] a conviction that is subjectively sufficient, but accompanied by the consciousness of its objective insufficiency. It is thus opposed to knowing.
1786
[This establishment] provides [opportunities] to those who will be employed in this activity; for example to a number of laborers [...] who, in the winter season, can find no work to earn their living.
1662
When one passes away with a body full of health and a soul full of tenderness, how could one not be an object of regret?
4th century BC
All saints are therefore lights; but it is by believing in Jesus Christ that they are enlightened by him, from whom one cannot be separated without falling back into darkness.
1263-1264
Limestone statuette of a temple girl
3rd century BCE–1st century CE
Give to faith what belongs to faith.
1623
As soon as a man's life is in danger, no one has the right to think of their own safety anymore.
1840
It must be admitted that there are very sweet pleasures, and they come at a good price.
1741-1784
Men love to change their master in the hope of improving their lot; but [...] experience shows them that they were mistaken and have only worsened their situation.
1513
Abner's Messenger before David; The Queen of Sheba Bringing Gifts to Solomon; The Annunciation
ca. 1480
Trade in Asia was no longer conducted except with a sword in hand; and each nation of our West sent out in turn merchants, soldiers, and priests.
1764
A social fact can only be called normal for a given social species, in relation to a given phase of its development.
1895
The evil is not in dying, but in dying shamefully.
c. 108 AD
The simplicity of God's ways [...] properly applies to the means, while on the contrary, variety, richness, or abundance applies to the ends or effects.
1686
Rustic Interior
1632