The Consolations Of Philosophy Quotes
"Pleasure is the beginning and the goal of a happy life."
"Of all the things that wisdom provides to help one live one’s entire life in happiness, the greatest by far is the possession of friendship."
"Before you eat or drink anything, consider carefully who you eat or drink with rather than what you eat or drink: for feeding without a friend is the life of a lion or a wolf."
"Plain dishes offer the same pleasure as a luxurious table, when the pain that comes from want is taken away."
"Nothing satisfies the man who is not satisfied with a little."
"The possession of the greatest riches does not resolve the agitation of the soul nor give birth to remarkable joy."
"It is to pleasure that we have recourse, using the feeling as our standard for judging every good."
"When measured by the natural purpose of life, poverty is great wealth; limitless wealth, great poverty."
"Real value is generated not by theatres and baths and perfumes and ointments, but by natural science."
"Luxurious foods and drinks in no way produce freedom from harm and a healthy condition in the flesh."
"One must regard wealth beyond what is natural as of no more use than water to a container that is full to overflowing."
"The man who alleges that he is not yet ready for philosophy or that the time for it has passed him by, is like the man who says that he is either too young or too old for happiness."
"I owe my life to [philosophy], and that is the least of my obligations to it."
"There is nothing dreadful in life for the man who has truly comprehended that there is nothing terrible in not living."
"What is no trouble when it arrives is an idle worry in anticipation."
"We are not afraid to utter the words kill, thieve, or betray; but those others we only dare to mutter through our teeth."
"The genital activities of mankind are so natural, so necessary and so right."
"Our bowels and I never fail to keep our rendezvous."
"Every man calls barbarous anything he is not accustomed to."
"In the friendship which I am talking about, souls are mingled and confounded in so universal a blending that they efface the seam which joins them together so that it cannot be found."
"There is nothing certain but uncertainty, nothing more miserable and more proud than man."
"Booksellers are the most valuable destination for the lonely, given the numbers of books that were written because authors couldn’t find anyone to talk to."
"Our life consists partly in madness, partly in wisdom: whoever writes about it merely respectfully and by rule leaves more than half of it behind."
"The wisest man that ever was, when asked what he knew, replied that the one thing he did know was that he knew nothing."
"Ancient philosophers had believed that our powers of reason could afford us a happiness and greatness denied to other creatures."
"One man’s honest, unguarded portrait of himself enables us to feel less singular about sides of ourselves that have gone unmentioned in normal company."
"If man were wise, he would gauge the true worth of anything by its usefulness and appropriateness to his life."
"Only that which makes us feel better may be worth understanding."
"We ought to find out not who understands most but who understands best."
"The problem with our education has not been to make us good and wise, but learned."
"It has not taught us to seek virtue and to embrace wisdom: it has impressed upon us their derivation and their etymology."
"What matters most is what we put last: 'Has he become better and wiser?'"
"We work merely to fill the memory, leaving the understanding and the sense of right and wrong empty."
"I gladly come back to the theme of the absurdity of our education: its end has not been to make us good and wise, but learned."
"If our souls do not move with a better motion and if we do not have a healthier judgement, then I would just as soon that a pupil spend his time playing tennis."
"There are more books on books than on any other subject: all we do is gloss each other."
"The greatest gift that mankind has ever been given."
"In the eyes of people who are seeing us for the first time, usually we are nothing more than a single individual trait."
"What disturbs and renders unhappy the age of youth is the hunt for happiness on the firm assumption that it must be met with in life."
"He who knows how to breathe the air of my writings knows that it is an air of heights, a robust air."
"In the mountains of truth you will never climb in vain: either you will get up higher today or you will exercise your strength so as to be able to get up higher tomorrow."
"To climb as high into the pure icy Alpine air as a philosopher ever climbed, up to where all the mist and obscurity cease."
"Philosophy, as I have hitherto understood and lived it, is a voluntary living in ice and high mountains."
"This is not Switzerland but something quite different, at least much more southern – I would have to go to the high plateaux of Mexico to find anything similar."
"Only thoughts which come from walking have any value."
"The most savage forces beat a path, and are mainly destructive; but their work was nonetheless necessary, in order that later a gentler civilization might raise its house."
"Every pain is an indistinct signal that something is wrong, which may engender either a good or bad result depending on the sagacity and strength of mind of the sufferer."
"We must learn to suffer whatever we cannot avoid. Our life is composed, like the harmony of the world, of discords as well as of different tones, sweet and harsh."
"If only we were fruitful fields, we would at bottom let nothing perish unused and see in every event, thing and man welcome manure."
"Human, All Too Human: In the mountains of truth you will never climb in vain."