HKB
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Often appears with: temperance and self-mastery · education and the training of the young · wrestling metaphor · will, choice, and freedom · vows after conversion · truth and deceit · troy and ulysses examples · repentance and divine grace · renunciation of worldly pleasure · reason and the intellect · preparation for death · moral infirmities of the soul
Usually: exhortation (4) · the test or trial (3) · argument (2) · reflection (2) · list or catalogue (1) · curiosity (1) · praise (1) · reverence (1) · skepticism (1)
“Unless you light your lamp ere dawn and read Some wholesome book that high resolves may breed, You'll find your sleep go from you, and will toss Upon your pillow, envious, lovesick, cross.” Horace, The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry of Horace · precept
“Where good fortune enters, envy lays siege to her and attacks her, and when she departs sorrow and regret remain behind.” Leonardo da Vinci, Thoughts on Art and Life · insight
“Fire destroys falsehood,--that is to say, sophistry,--and rehabilitates truth, scattering the darkness.” Leonardo da Vinci, Thoughts on Art and Life · insight
“When thou art wrathful, know that not this single evil hath happened to thee, but that thou hast increased the aptness to it, and, as it were, poured oil upon the fire.” Epictetus (trans. T. W. Rolleston), The Teaching of Epictetus · insight
After conversion, Augustine praises God for breaking his bonds and describes how freely he no longer desires worldly pleasures; he also resolves to stop speaking as a rhetoric teacher and waits until the vintage vacation passes.
O Lord, I am Thy servant; I am Thy servant, and the son of Thy handmaid: Thou hast broken my bonds in sunder. I will offer to Thee the sacrifice of praise. Let my heart and my tongue praise Thee; yea, let all my bones say, O Lord, who is like unto Thee? Let them say, and answer Thou me, and say unto my soul, I am thy salvation. Who am I, and what am I? What evil have not been either my deeds, or if not my deeds, my w…
Horace explains why Homer’s poetry teaches better than prose, compares Trojan conflict with Ulysses’ endurance, then urges readers to wake, read, and address life’s problems rather than postponing reform.
what helps, what hurts, he shows Better in verse than Crantor does in prose. The reason why I think so, if you'll spare A moment from your business, I'll declare. The tale that tells how Greece and Asia strove In tedious battle all for Paris' love, Talks of the passions that excite the brain Of mad-cap kings and peoples not more sane. Antenor moves to cut away the cause Of all their sufferings: does he gain applause…
A sequence of proverbs treats envy and fortune, the relation of beauty to goodness, discipline and risk, and the ethics of art and truth—emphasizing persistence, self-rule, and the limits of empty fame.
Where good fortune enters, envy lays siege to her and attacks her, and when she departs sorrow and regret remain behind. When beauty exists side by side with ugliness, the one seems more powerful, owing to the presence of the other. He who walks straight rarely falls. O miserable race of man! of how many things you make yourself the slave for the sake of money! The worst evil which can befall the artist is that h…
Epictetus teaches that one should train the self for virtue by focusing inward—condemning bad habits, wrestling again after setbacks, and ordering life like acting a role in a play.
CLXI Keep death and exile daily before thine eyes, with all else that men deem terrible, but more especially Death. Then wilt thou never think a mean though, nor covet anything beyond measure. CLXII As a mark is not set up in order to be missed, so neither is such a thing as natural evil produced in the World. CLXIII Piety toward the Gods, to be sure, consists chiefly in thinking rightly concerning them—that the…
He explains habit as repeated practice: spiritual capacities strengthen or weaken through corresponding acts, so restraint from wrath and other vices must be trained day by day to destroy the aptitude.
ON HABIT. 1. Every skill and faculty is maintained and increased by the corresponding acts; as, the faculty of walking by walking, of running by running. If you will read aloud well, then do it constantly; if you will write, then write. But when you have not read aloud for thirty days together, but done something else, you shall see the result. Thus, if you have lain down for ten days, then rise up and endeavor to w…