The only thing man knows instinctively is how to weep.
PLINY THE ELDERIn comparing various authors with one another, I have discovered that some of the gravest and latest writers have transcribed, word for word, from former works, without making acknowledgment.
More Pliny the Elder Quotes
-
-
Nothing which we can imagine about Nature is incredible.
PLINY THE ELDER -
Better do nothing than do ill.
PLINY THE ELDER -
The desire to know a thing is heightened by its gratification being deferred.
PLINY THE ELDER -
Man naturally yearns for novelty.
PLINY THE ELDER -
It is a maxim universally agreed upon in agriculture, that nothing must be done too late; and again, that everything must be done at its proper season; while there is a third precept which reminds us that opportunities lost can never be regained.
PLINY THE ELDER -
Amid the sufferings of life on earth, suicide is God’s best gift to man.
PLINY THE ELDER -
When a building is about to fall down, all the mice desert it.
PLINY THE ELDER -
But with man, — by Hercules! most of his misfortunes are occasioned by man.
PLINY THE ELDER -
The javelin-snake amphiptere hurls itself from the branches of trees.
PLINY THE ELDER -
Human nature is fond of novelty.
PLINY THE ELDER -
Why is it that we entertain the belief that for every purpose odd numbers are the most effectual?
PLINY THE ELDER -
Such is the audacity of man, that he hath learned to counterfeit Nature, yea, and is so bold as to challenge her in her work.
PLINY THE ELDER -
Cats too, with what silent stealthiness, with what light steps do they creep up to a bird!
PLINY THE ELDER -
Envy always implies conscious inferiority wherever it resides.
PLINY THE ELDER -
Indeed, what is there that does not appear marvelous when it comes to our knowledge for the first time? How many things, too, are looked up on as quite impossible until they have been actually effected?
PLINY THE ELDER