I prefer a magistrate, whoever he may be, to anarchy; and I know no one more fit than Pompey to command in such great turmoil.
100-120 AD
What then are we ourselves? We are that which is essentially us, we are the principle to which nature has given the power to triumph over the passions.
c. 253-270 AD
All the vices, children of greed, introducing themselves at once into an empire, successively infect all its members, and finally plunge it into ruin.
1772
It is from the bringing together of all these impressions and the combinations we make of them [...] that the perception or individual idea of an object is formed for us.
1805
Marble cinerary urn in the form of a tree stump with leaves and grapes
ca. 1st century CE
[Workers] are only setting limits to the tyrannical usurpations of capital. Time is the field of human development.
1865
It often happens that we are esteemed in proportion as we esteem ourselves.
1746
The desire for reputation, far from deserving blame, seems inseparable from virtue, genius, talent, and a generous and elevated character.
1751
You will feel that you are in a devilishly precarious line of work for a timorous soul.
1741-1784
Madonna and Child with Saints and Angels
ca. 1350
The divisions of the sciences are not at all like different lines that coincide at a single point, but rather like the branches of a tree, which unite in a single trunk.
1623
Every time they take up arms, [nations] destroy a stock of wealth that they would have put into circulation [...].
1776
A man who has learned to divest himself even of his personality can travel the entire world without experiencing conflict.
4th century BC
The duty of the people to bear the abuse of the supreme power [...] is founded on this, that their resistance to the sovereign legislation must never be considered otherwise than as illegal.
1797
View of Toledo
ca. 1599–1600
We expressly forbid all persons [...] from interfering in such an establishment, or causing it any trouble or hindrance, under any pretext whatsoever.
1662
Before the storm is formed, one must relentlessly reach the port.
1636
Ignorance does not cure ills; do you intend to make a mystery to me of what must save this country?
1st Century AD
It is a great glory to die on an occasion which causes one to be universally lamented, praised, and regretted by all who have some human feeling.
1643-1649
Mother and Child by the Sea
1830
From time to time, the American steals himself away, as it were, and [...] tearing himself away for a moment from the petty passions that agitate his life [...], he suddenly enters an ideal world where everything is great, pure, and eternal.
1835-1840
The harshest and most difficult job in the world, in my opinion, is to be a King worthily.
1580
I drove out kings; you bring in tyrants. I gave you liberty [...]; you, who now possess it, do not want to keep it.
86-82 BC
Why make ourselves inferior to children? When they are left alone [...] they take shells and earth, and build houses [...]. In this way, they never lack for ways to pass the time.
c. 108 AD
Self-Portrait of an Unidentified Artist
1785
Creation [...] will appear as an undertaking of God to create creators, to unite to Himself beings worthy of His love.
1932
[The idea of God] can neither punish nor reward. This idea of punishments and rewards can only seduce the ignorant.
17th century
[...] all the power of the mind would depend immediately and solely on God alone[...]
1674-1675
Not every end is a goal. The end of the melody is not its goal; and yet, if the melody has not reached its end, it has not reached its goal. A symbol.
1879
The Organ Rehearsal
1885
Beauty [...] is the rightful commensuration of the limbs.
c. 1270
It [the division of labor] has often been accused of diminishing the individual by reducing him to the role of a machine.
1893
It is difficult to penetrate the depths of ancient history.
1764
[To see] an act once punished by death become indifferent to the law. This will be a gain for freedom, human dignity, and civilization.
1926
Pendant in the form of a fish
3900 BCE - 100 CE
[Matter] whose differences express more of this or that reality, is also more of a substance; and that whose differences express more of privation is more of non-being.
c. 350 B.C.E.
The great and unfortunate errors [...] on the matter of government, have arisen [...] from the fact that these different powers have been confounded.
1690
A truly celestial system whose solidity nothing on earth can ever alter!
1768
One day he told me: 'Now go.' [...] I went down it knowing nothing, my heart as if in pieces.
1942
Terracotta head of a youth
4th century BCE
Of the abuse of Government and its tendency to degenerate.
1762
Although organized bodies appear to us [...] as subject to a concept of finality, nothing authorizes us to regard this finality as objective.
1819
It is impossible to honor those one despises, nor to willingly obey those one hates and holds in horror.
c. 1552-1553
[Heroes], through their own valor and their own strength, accomplished greater deeds than [others] did with the immediate assistance of God.
1855
Gold lion-head pendant
2nd half of the 5th century BCE
Instead of a transmigration of the soul, there is transformation, envelopment or development, and finally a flux of the body of that soul.
1704
[...] the opinion in favour of the present system, which subordinates the weaker sex to the stronger, rests upon theory only; for there never has been trial made of any other, so that experience [...] cannot be pretended to have pronounced any verdict.
1869
Psychology (anthropology) will necessarily be the theology of the future.
1841
When one passes away with a healthy body and a soul full of tenderness, how could one not be an object of regret?
4th century BC
Still Life with Cheese
probably late 1870s