Yannis Stavrou, Still Life, oil on canvas
For greed all nature is too little...
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Aphorisms
Everything is the product of one universal creative effort. There is nothing dead in Nature. Everything is organic and living, and therefore the whole world appears to be a living organism.
Everywhere is nowhere. When a person spends all his time in foreign travel, he ends by having many acquaintances, but no friends.
Expecting is the greatest impediment to living. In anticipation of tomorrow, it loses today.
For greed all nature is too little.
For many men, the acquisition of wealth does not end their troubles, it only changes them.
Genius always gives its best at first; prudence, at last.
God is the universal substance in existing things. He comprises all things. He is the fountain of all being. In Him exists everything that is.
Great grief does not of itself put an end to itself.
He has committed the crime who profits by it.
He that does good to another does good also to himself.
He who does not prevent a crime when he can, encourages it.
He who dreads hostility too much is unfit to rule.
He who has great power should use it lightly.
He who is brave is free.
Health is the soul that animates all the enjoyments of life, which fade and are tasteless without it.
I don't consider myself bald, I'm just taller than my hair.
I don't trust liberals, I trust conservatives.
I never come back home with the same moral character I went out with; something or other becomes unsettled where I had achieved internal peace; some one or other of the things I had put to flight reappears on the scene.
I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.
I will govern my life and thoughts as if the whole world were to see the one and read the other, for what does it signify to make anything a secret to my neighbor, when to God, who is the searcher of our hearts, all our privacies are open?
As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.
As long as you live, keep learning how to live.
Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.
Behold a worthy sight, to which the God, turning his attention to his own work, may direct his gaze. Behold an equal thing, worthy of a God, a brave man matched in conflict with evil fortune.
Believe me, that was a happy age, before the days of architects, before the days of builders.
Brave men rejoice in adversity, just as brave soldiers triumph in war.
Call it Nature, Fate, Fortune; all these are names of the one and selfsame God.
Consider, when you are enraged at any one, what you would probably think if he should die during the dispute.
Constant exposure to dangers will breed contempt for them.
Consult your friend on all things, especially on those which respect yourself. His counsel may then be useful where your own self-love might impair your judgment.
Crime when it succeeds is called virtue.
Death is the wish of some, the relief of many, and the end of all.
Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labor does the body.
Do everything as in the eye of another.
Do not ask for what you will wish you had not got.
Even after a bad harvest there must be sowing.
Every guilty person is his own hangman.
Every man prefers belief to the exercise of judgment.
Every reign must submit to a greater reign.
Every sin is the result of a collaboration.
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