Pausanias is no enthusiast. He is a cold man, who observes coldly, who writes coldly...
1765-1769
Between chastity and sensuality there is not necessarily an opposition; every good marriage, every serious passion of the heart is above this opposition.
1887
One of the most considerable [laws] [...] is the law of continuity [...]. However, it serves not only for examination, but also as a very fertile principle of invention.
1697
Health, as the identical state, forgets itself, for in it one is not concerned with the body; the difference from the body only begins in sickness.
1841
Buckle
3900 BCE - 100 CE
You will find that you have more of that for which you are better than him.
c. 108 AD
This great collective idea of all Bodies designated by the term Universe is as much a single idea as that of the smallest particle of Matter in the World.
1689
The true consists in being what it is and in not being what it is not; the false in being what it is not and in not being what it is.
c. 1270
Without God we can neither exist nor be conceived [...] we know him and can know him only through himself, and consequently much better than we know ourselves.
c. 1660
Bronze handle of a hydria (water jar)
4th century BCE
Are we born without ideas? We are also born without taste. One can therefore regard them as acquisitions due to the situations in which one finds oneself.
1772
The obligatory Credo of all the just and all the good can be formulated thus: 'I believe in a metaphysics'.
1819
The mystery of Christ or of the personal God.
1841
The essential limitation of concepts is [...] that all things, as objects of experience only, are necessarily subject to [these] concepts.
1783
Marble forepart of a left sandaled foot
1st or 2nd century CE
It was necessary for eternal wisdom to finally make itself perceptible to instruct men who question only their senses.
1674-1675
From peace emanate the speculations of the great Sages and the actions of the great kings; non-intervention brings fame; abstraction raises one above all.
4th century BC
However, who can be sure of what goes on in the hearts of kings, and of what determines their will?
1746
What idea can one form of a god who punishes millions of men for having been ignorant of secret laws, which he himself only published stealthily [...]?
1766
Marble bust of a youth
ca. 140 CE
God has always been painted with a long beard in the Greek and Latin Churches.
1764
All things have sympathy for one another through their irrational life.
c. 253-270 AD
What is culture? The training of attention.
1957
There enters into our composition something of the character of the turtledove, though allied with that of the wolf and the serpent.
1751
Limestone statuette of a male votary
probably mid-6th century BCE
I call natural the needs that are a consequence of our conformation, and artificial the needs that we owe to habit.
1776
Their nature is much easier to conceive when we see them gradually come into being in this way, than when we consider them only as already made.
1637
[...] misfortune [...] often makes even the most moderate characters bold and unjust.
100-120 AD
Whenever a great mind takes life too seriously, [...] it would perhaps be a sign of an even greater mind to dismiss these contradictions with a smile [...].
1926
Entrance to a Village
ca. 1665
The multitude believes more in persons than in things, and [...] is more persuaded by the authority of the speaker than by the reasons he gives.
c. 1552-1553
...with what frightening speed [...] the most peaceful souls attune themselves [...] to civil wars, and how the taste for violence and contempt for human life suddenly spread.
1893
The best way to succeed is not to aim for success too early, [...] [studies], by developing the whole intelligence, give it enough breadth to contain everything, enough strength to undertake anything.
1882
[Eloquence] is a tool that is only used in sick States, like medicine.
1580
The Night-Hag Visiting Lapland Witches
1796
To have a right is to have something which society ought to guarantee me the possession of.
1861
To its [history's] faith are committed the examples of our ancestors, the vicissitudes of things, the foundations of civil prudence [...].
1623
A great citizen must always be ready to combat anything that could bring turmoil to the State.
54-51 BC
In man, the most elevated thing is a vast and luminous intelligence, the principle of his best-conducted operations [...].
1636
Bronze cinerary urn with lid
ca. 500 BCE
The desire for life being unlimited, one is directly led to desire means to satisfy it which are also unlimited.
c. 350 BCE
One must know when to doubt, when to be certain, and when to submit.
1670
I wept, I sighed, I desired a happiness of which I had no idea, and of which I felt the deprivation.
1782-1789
[...] one meets one's destiny by trying to avoid it.
1st century AD
Christ Shown to the People
1510–15
Would you then prefer to see me die justly rather than unjustly?
4th century BC
In each of us, there exist two beings [...]. One is the individual being [...]. The other is the social being. To constitute this latter being in each of us is the end of education.
1922
Such is, in fact, the nature of men, that they become as attached by the services they render as by those they receive.
1513
Our judgments are never false except through the imperfection of our memories.
1805
Wall painting on red ground: candelabrum, from the imperial villa at Boscotrecase
last decade of the 1st century BCE