Marcus Tullius Cicero
For every man's nature is concealed with many folds of disguise, and covered as it were with various veils. His brows, his eyes, and very often his countenance, are deceitful, and his speech is most commonly a lie.Collection: Lying
To teach is a necessity, to please is a sweetness, to persuade is a victory.Collection: Victory
As fire when thrown into water is cooled down and put out, so also a false accusation when brought against a man of the purest and holiest character, boils over and is at once dissipated, and vanishes.Collection: Character
It is the act of a bad man to deceive by falsehood.Collection: Men
An agreement of rash men (a conspiracy).Collection: Men
No one was ever great without some portion of divine inspiration.Collection: Inspirational
Art is born of the observation and investigation of nature.Collection: Art
History is the teacher of lifeCollection: Teacher
From all sides there is equally a way to the lower world.Collection: World
There is no praise in being upright, where no one can, or tries to corrupt you.Collection: Honor
He who obeys with modesty appears worthy of being some day a commander.Collection: Modesty
Death darkens his eyes, and unplumes his wings, Yet the sweetest song is the last he sings: Live so, my Love, that when death shall come, Swan-like and sweet it may waft thee home.Collection: Sweet
For if that last day does not occasion an entire extinction, but a change of abode only, what can be more desirable? And if it, on the other hand, destroys and absolutely puts an end to us, what can be preferable to having a deep sleep fall on us in the midst of the fatigues of life and, being thus overtaken, to sleep to eternity?Collection: Life
Let arms yield to the toga, let the [victor's] laurel yield to the [orator's] tongue.Collection: Peace
For a courageous man cannot die dishonorably, a man who has attained the consulship cannot die before his time, a philosopher cannot die wretchedly.Collection: Death
Who does not know history's first law to be that an author must not dare to tell anything but the truth? And its second that he must make bold to tell the whole truth? That there must be no suggestion of partiality anywhere in his writings? Nor of malice?Collection: Truth
If the oarsmen of a fast-moving ship suddenly cease to row, the suspension of the driving force of the oars doesn't prevent the vessel from continuing to move on its course. And with a speech it is much the same. After he has finished reciting the document, the speaker will still be able to maintain the same tone without a break, borrowing its momentum and impulse from the passage he has just read out.Collection: Moving
In fact the whole passion ordinarily termed love (and heaven help me if I can think of any other term to apply to it) is of such exceeding triviality that I see nothing that I think comparable with it.Collection: Love
Nothing is so difficult to believe that oratory cannot make it acceptable, nothing so rough and uncultured as not to gain brilliance and refinement from eloquence.Collection: Believe
This seems to be advanced as the surest basis for our belief in the existence of gods, that there is no race so uncivilized, no one in the world so barbarous that his mind has no inkling of a belief in gods.Collection: Race
What is impossible by the nature of things is not confirmed by any law.Collection: Nature
Just what is the civil law? What neither influence can affect, nor power break, nor money corrupt: were it to be suppressed or even merely ignored or inadequately observed, no one would feel safe about anything, whether his own possessions, the inheritance he expects from his father, or the bequests he makes to his children.Collection: Children
Peace is so beneficial that the word itself is pleasant to hear.Collection: Pleasant
The devil finds work for idle hands to do. Better to reign in the hell than serve in heaven. We are in bondage to the law in order that we may be free.Collection: Hands
In a disturbed mind, as in a body in the same state, health can not exist.Collection: Mind
Can there be greater foolishness than the respect you pay to people collectively when you despise them individually?Collection: Respect
That which is usually called dotage is not the weak point of all old men, but only of such as are distinguished by their levity.Collection: Men
The mansion should not be graced by its master, the master should grace the mansion.Collection: Confidence
If a man aspires to the highest place, it is no dishonor to him to halt at the second, or even at the third.Collection: Men
According to the law of nature it is only fair that no one should become richer through damages and injuries suffered by another.Collection: Law
Man is his own worst enemy.Collection: Men
But in every matter the consensus of opinion among all nations is to be regarded as the law of nature.Collection: Law
Justice is the crowning glory of the virtues.Collection: Justice
Victory is by nature insolent and haughty.Collection: Nature
Nature ordains that a man should wish the good of every man, whoever he may be, for this very reason that he is a man.Collection: Men
Hours and days and months and years go by; the past returns no more, and what is to be we cannot know; but whatever the time gives us in which we live, we should therefore be content.Collection: Past
Frugality includes all the other virtues.Collection: Money
Care must be taken that the punishment does not exceed the offence.Collection: Taken
What is becoming is honest, and whatever is honest must always be becoming.Collection: Honesty
The shifts of fortune test the reliability of friends.Collection: Friendship
Old age by nature is rather talkative.Collection: Age
It is easy to distinguish between the joking that reflects good breeding and that which is coarse-the one, if aired at an apposite moment of mental relaxation, is becoming in the most serious of men, whereas the other is unworthy of any free person, if the content is indecent or the expression obscene.Collection: Men
The precepts of the law are these: to live honestly, to injure no one, and to give everyone else his due.Collection: Trust
He removes the greatest ornament of friendship who takes away from it respect.Collection: Friendship