Ovid
Ovid
Publius Ovidius Naso, known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace with whom he is often ranked as one of the three canonical poets of Latin literature. The Imperial scholar Quintilian considered him the last of the Latin love elegists. He enjoyed enormous popularity, but, in one of the mysteries of literary history, he was sent by Augustus into exile...
NationalityRoman
ProfessionPoet
middle
You will be safest in the middle.
pure
Pure women are only those who have not been asked.
long clouded ifs
So long as you are secure you will count many friends; if your life becomes clouded you will be alone.
art philosophy believe
It is expedient that there should be gods, and, since it is expedient, let us believe that gods exist.
art philosophy history
If the art is concealed, it succeeds.
art boys oxen
From high Meonia's rocky shores I came, Of poor decsent, Acoetes is my name, My sire was measly born: no oxen ploughed, His fruitful fields, nor in his pastures lowed, His whole estate within the waters lay' With lines and hooks he caught the finny prey; His art was all his livelehood, which he Thus with his dying lips bequeathed to me: In streams, my boy, and rivers take thy chance; There swims', said he, Thy whole inheritance.
mind conscious rectitude
The mind, conscious of rectitude, laughed to scorn the falsehood of report.
men may causes
In an easy cause any man may be eloquent.
cry pleasure certain
There is a certain pleasure in weeping.
causes results known
The cause is hidden, but the result is known. [Lat., Causa latet: vis est notissima.]
brave favour and-love
Fortune and love favour the brave. [Lat., Audentem Forsque Venusque juvant.]
lasts firsts ultima
Thou beginnest better than thou endest. The last is inferior to the first. [Lat., Coepisti melius quam desinis. Ultima primis cedunt.]
writing years agamemnon
Writings survive the years; it is by writings that you know Agamemnon, and those who fought for or against him. [Lat., Scripta ferunt annos; scriptis Agamemnona nosti, Et quisquis contra vel simul arma tulit.]
writing giving dumb
This letter gives me a tongue; and were I not allowed to write, I should be dumb. [Lat., Praebet mihi littera linguam: Et, si non liceat scribere, mutus ero.]