Marcus Fabius Quintilian Quotes


"While we are examining into everything we sometimes find truth where we least expected it."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Truth)

"The perfection of art is to conceal art."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Art, Perfection)

"To swear, except when necessary, is becoming to an honorable man."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Man)

"The prosperous can not easily form a right idea of misery."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Idea, Misery, Right)

"Those who wish to appear wise among fools, among the wise seem foolish."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Fools)

"Though ambition in itself is a vice, yet it is often the parent of virtues."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Ambition, Vice)

"Vain hopes are like certain dreams of those who wake."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Dreams)

"We excuse our sloth under the pretext of difficulty."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Difficulty)

"Where evil habits are once settled, they are more easily broken than mended."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Evil, Habits)

"While we are making up our minds as to when we shall begin. the opportunity is lost."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Opportunity)

"The gifts of nature are infinite in their variety, and mind differs from mind almost as much as body from body."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Nature, Body, Gifts, Infinite, Mind, Variety)

"Everything that has a beginning comes to an end."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Beginning, End)

"We must form our minds by reading deep rather than wide."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Deep, Reading)

"He who speaks evil only differs from his who does evil in that he lacks opportunity."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Opportunity, Evil)

"A laugh costs too much when bought at the expense of virtue."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Virtue)

"A laugh, if purchased at the expense of propriety, costs too much."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
"Whilst we deliberate how to begin a thing, it grows too late to begin it."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
"Fear of the future is worse than one's present fortune."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Fear, Fortune, Future, Present)

"Forbidden pleasures alone are loved immoderately; when lawful, they do not excite desire."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Desire, Forbidden)

"For it would have been better that man should have been born dumb, nay, void of all reason, rather than that he should employ the gifts of Providence to the destruction of his neighbor."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Destruction, Dumb, Gifts, Man, Providence, Reason)

"God, that all-powerful Creator of nature and architect of the world, has impressed man with no character so proper to distinguish him from other animals, as by the faculty of speech."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Nature, God, Character, Animals, Man, Speech, World)

"That which prematurely arrives at perfection soon perishes."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Perfection)

"In almost everything, experience is more valuable than precept."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Experience)

"It is fitting that a liar should be a man of good memory."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Man, Memory)

"It seldom happens that a premature shoot of genius ever arrives at maturity."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Genius, Maturity)

"Men, even when alone, lighten their labors by song, however rude it may be."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Men, May, Song)

"Nothing is more dangerous to men than a sudden change of fortune."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Change, Men, Fortune, Nothing)

"Our minds are like our stomaches; they are whetted by the change of their food, and variety supplies both with fresh appetite."
- Marcus Fabius Quintilian
(Related: Change, Food, Appetite, Variety)