Apollonius of Tyana
Apollonius of Tyana
Apollonius of Tyana, sometimes also called Apollonios of Tyana, was a Greek Neopythagorean philosopher from the town of Tyana in the Roman province of Cappadocia in Anatolia. Being a 1st-century orator and philosopher around the time of Jesus, he was compared with Jesus of Nazareth by Christians in the 4th century and by other writers in modern times...
NationalityGreek
ProfessionPhilosopher
cities race earth
In India, I found a race of mortals living upon the Earth, but not adhering to it, inhabiting cities, but not being fixed to them, possessing everything, but possessed by nothing
birth appearance seeming
There is no death of anyone, save in appearance, just as there is no birth of any, save only in seeming.
art healing long
Pythagoras said that the most divine art was that of healing. And if the healing art is most divine, it must occupy itself with the soul as well as with the body; for no creature can be sound so long as the higher part in it is sickly.
O ye gods, grant unto me to have little and to want nothing.
action anger fault himself impulse laziness love man odious render understand vices wise yields
A man must fortify himself and understand that a wise man who yields to laziness or anger or passion or love of drink, or who commits any other action prompted by impulse and inopportune, will probably find his fault condoned; but if he stoops to greed, he will not be pardoned, but render himself odious as a combination of all vices at once.
courage dying flee neither nor seek soldiers tactics time
As soldiers need not only courage but tactics also, so does a philosopher need not only courage and philosophy but discernment also, to tell what his right time of dying is - so that he neither seek it nor flee it.
human knowing truth understand wonder
You need not wonder at my knowing all human languages; for, to tell you the truth, I also understand all the secrets of human silence.
man perceive
It is a true man's part not to err, but it is also noble of a man to perceive his error.
commune time
It is at the time of dawn that we must commune with the gods.
best common individual monarchy rule transforms worth
Just as an individual of pre-eminent worth transforms democracy into a monarchy of the best man, even so the rule of one man, if in all things it has an eye to the common welfare, is democracy.
bad earth far good hear men nor pleasure send thou
O thou Sun, send me as far over the earth as is my pleasure and thine, and may I make the acquaintance of good men, but never hear anything of bad ones, nor they of me.
creates masters money plato principle rejoice
Plato said that virtue has no master. If a person does not honor this principle and rejoice in it, but is purchasable for money, he creates many masters for himself.
My ideal is for each to do what he knows and what he can.
laws men poor pray
I pray as follows: May justice reign, may the laws not be broken, may the wise men be poor, and the poor men rich, without sin.