One thing, however, I must premise, that without the assistance of natural capacity, rules and precepts are of no efficacy.
QUINTILIANA liar should have a good memory.
More Quintilian Quotes
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We excuse our sloth under the pretext of difficulty.
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The pretended admission of a fault on our part creates an excellent impression.
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Everything that has a beginning comes to an end.
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An evil-speaker differs from an evil-doer only in the want of opportunity.
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Ambition is a vice, but it may be the father of virtue.
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Where evil habits are once settled, they are more easily broken than mended.
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The obscurity of a writer is generally in proportion to his incapacity.
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A laugh costs too much when bought at the expense of virtue.
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Usage is the best language teacher.
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The soul languishing in obscurity contracts a kind of rust, or abandons itself to the chimera of presumption; for it is natural for it to acquire something, even when separated from any one.
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Verse satire indeed is entirely our own.
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It is the nurse that the child first hears, and her words that he will first attempt to imitate.
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He who speaks evil only differs from his who does evil in that he lacks opportunity.
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One should aim not at being possible to understand, but at being impossible to misunderstand.
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Though ambition in itself is a vice, yet it is often the parent of virtues.
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While we are making up our minds as to when we shall begin. The opportunity is lost.
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Suffering itself does less afflict the senses than the apprehension of suffering.
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Medicine for the dead is too late.
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By writing quickly we are not brought to write well, but by writing well we are brought to write quickly.
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Those who wish to appear learned to fools, appear as fools to the learned.
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Nature herself has never attempted to effect great changes rapidly.
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A man who tries to surpass another may perhaps succeed in equaling in not actually surpassing him, but one who merely follows can never quite come up with him: a follower, necessarily, is always behind.
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When defeat is inevitable, it is wisest to yield.
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A great part of art consists in imitation. For the whole conduct of life is based on this: that what we admire in others we want to do ourselves.
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Whilst we deliberate how to begin a thing, it grows too late to begin it.
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Men of quality are in the wrong to undervalue, as they often do, the practise of a fair and quick hand in writing; for it is no immaterial accomplishment.
QUINTILIAN