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He who writes distichs, wishes, I suppose, to please by brevity. But, tell me, of what avail is their brevity, when there is a whose book full of them?

Martial

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Martial
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More quotes by Martial

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To-morrow I will live, the fool does say To-day itself's too late, the wise lived yesterday.
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The present joys of life we doubly taste, By looking back with pleasure to the past.
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Virtue extends our days: he lives two lives who relives his past with pleasure.
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You puff the poets of other days, The living you deplore. Spare me the accolade: your praise Is not worth dying for.
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A novice always behaves with propriety.
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She grieves sincerely who grieves unseen.
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The shameless Chloe placed on the tombs of her seven husbands the inscription, The work of Chloe. How could she have expressed herself more plainly?
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Hidden evils are most dreaded.
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Red-haired, black-lipped, club-footed, and blink-eyed if you're a good man, you're a wonder!
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Life is not living, but living in health.
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Man loves malice, but not against one-eyed men nor the unfortunate, but against the fortunate and proud.
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Some are good, some are middling, the most are bad.
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The bee is enclosed, and shines preserved, in a tear of the sisters of Phaeton, so that it seems enshrined in its own nectar. It has obtained a worthy reward for its great toils we may suppose that the bee itself would have desired such a death.
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This I ask, is it not madness to kill thyself in order to escape death? [Lat., Hic rogo non furor est ne moriare mori?]
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You're obstinate, pliant, merry, morose, all at once. For me there's no living with you, or without you.
Martial
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Remember, cobbler, to keep to your leather. [Lat., Memento, in pellicula, cerdo, tenere tuo.]
Martial
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While an ant was wandering under the shade of the tree of Phaeton, a drop of amber enveloped the tiny insect thus she, who in life was disregarded, became precious by death.
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There is nothing more contemptible than a bald man who pretends to have hair.
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I seem to you cruel and too much addicted to gluttony, when I beat my cook for sending up a bad dinner. If that appears to you too trifling a cause, say for what cause you would have a cook flogged.
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If you are poor now, Aemilianus, you will always be poor. Riches are now given to none but the rich.
Martial