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One should aim not at being possible to understand, but at being impossible to misunderstand.

Quintilian

Without natural gifts technical rules are useless.
QUINTILIAN

Gift Natural Rule Technical
Though ambition in itself is a vice, yet it is often the parent of virtues.
QUINTILIAN

Ambition Parent Vice Virtue
As regards parents, I should like to see them as highly educated as possible, and I do not restrict this remark to fathers alone.
QUINTILIAN

Alone Education Father Myself Parents Possible Regard Restrict
When defeat is inevitable, it is wisest to yield.
QUINTILIAN

Defeat Protection Wisdom
Ambition is a vice, but it may be the father of virtue.
QUINTILIAN

Ambition Father Vice Virtue
A laugh costs too much when bought at the expense of virtue.
QUINTILIAN

Cost Expense Laughter Virtue
The gifts of nature are infinite in their variety, and mind differs from mind almost as much as body from body.
QUINTILIAN

Body Infinite Mindset Nature
For all the best teachers pride themselves on having a large number of pupils and think themselves worthy of a bigger audience.
QUINTILIAN

Audience Best Big Pride Teacher Worth
The mind is exercised by the variety and multiplicity of the subject matter, while the character is moulded by the contemplation of virtue and vice.
QUINTILIAN

Exercise Mindset Subject Vice Virtue
One should aim not at being possible to understand, but at being impossible to misunderstand.
QUINTILIAN

Goal Perspective Possible
Study depends on the goodwill of the student, a quality that cannot be secured by compulsion.
QUINTILIAN

Compulsion Goodness Secure Study
For comic writers charge Socrates with making the worse appear the better reason.
QUINTILIAN

Appearance Better Comic Reason Worst Writing
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.
QUINTILIAN

Kind Natural Oneself Separate Soul
When we cannot hope to win, it is an advantage to yield.
QUINTILIAN

Advantage Hope Protection Win
Usage is the best language teacher.
QUINTILIAN

Language One Liner Teacher
Nothing is more dangerous to men than a sudden change of fortune.
QUINTILIAN

Change Dangerous Fortune

One should aim not at being possible to understand, but at being impossible to misunderstand.

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One should aim not at being possible to understand, but at being impossible to misunderstand.

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