Marcus Tullius Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicerowas a Roman philosopher, politician, lawyer, orator, political theorist, consul, and constitutionalist. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the Roman equestrian order, and was one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists...
NationalityRoman
ProfessionStatesman
truth self would-be
If the truth were self-evident, eloquence would be unnecessary.
Before beginning, prepare carefully.
art grace delight
For just as some women are said to be handsome though without adornment, so this subtle manner of speech, though lacking in artificial graces, delights us.
justice giving fairness
The aim of justice is to give everyone his due.
leisure dignity
Leisure with dignity.
thinking
Vivere est cogitare. (To think is to live)
men issues events
Crimes are not to be measured by the issue of events, but by the bad intentions of men.
virtue imitation pleasure
It is not a virtue, but a deceptive copy and imitation of virtue, when we are led to the performance of duty by pleasure as its recompense.
business house ornaments
My precept to all who build, is, that the owner should be an ornament to the house, and not the house to the owner.
faith men together
Nothing so cements and holds together all the parts of a society as faith or credit, which can never be kept up unless men are under some force or necessity of honestly paying what they owe to one another.
powerful men honorable-man
When a government becomes powerful it is destructive, extravagant and violent; it is an usurer which takes bread from innocent mouths and deprives honorable men of their substance, for votes with which to perpetuate itself.
reading entertainment vicissitudes
Nothing contributes to the entertainment of the reader more, than the change of times and the vicissitudes of fortune.
past trouble pleasant
It is pleasant to recall past troubles.
powerful past giving
As I give thought to the matter, I find four causes for the apparent misery of old age; first it withdraws us from active accomplishments; second, it renders the body less powerful; third, it deprives us of almost all forms of enjoyment; fourth, it