Aphorisms Epicuro

 

 

Aphorisms

Brief and doctrinal sentence that is proposed as a rule in a science or art.

 

 

Epicuro

 

Greece: 342 b.C. - 270 a.C.

 

 

1. Some men spend their whole lives getting themselves the proper things to live on, not realizing that at birth each of us was given a deadly brew to drink.

 2. Those who are in a hurry to make friends should not be approved; nor should you praise those who avoid friendship, because risks must be taken for it

. 3. We attach great value to our characters as if they were our own possessions whether or not we are virtuous and praised by other men. So, too, we must see the character of those around us if they are our friends.

 4. It is difficult for someone who does wrong not to be detected; and it is impossible for him to have confidence that he can always continue to hide the crime from him.

 5. It is possible to provide security against other afflictions, but as far as death is concerned, all men live in a city without walls

6.

Frankly, when studying nature, I prefer to speak of revelations about what is advantageous to all men, even if no one understands it, instead of conforming to popular opinion and thus earning the widespread praise of many.

 7. Most men are in a coma when they rest and crazy when they act.

 8. Need is an evil; but there is no need to continue living subject to necessity.

 9. Poverty, if measured by the natural purpose of life, is great wealth; but wealth, if not limited, is great poverty.

 10. Nobody chooses a thing knowing that it is bad; but when it appears to be good in contrast to a greater evil, he takes the bait and is caught.

11. Do not harm what you have by wishing for what you do not have, but remember that what you have today was once among the things you only longed for.

12. We should not resist nature but submit to it. We will satisfy it if we satisfy the necessary desires and also those desires of the body that do not cause us harm, while severely rejecting those that are harmful.

13. We should not see the young man as happy, but the old man whose life has been fortunate. The young man at the top of his power is often baffled by fortune and removed from his course; but the old man has anchored himself in age as in a bay and keeps certain and happy memories of the achievements that once he had only dreamed of.

 14. We do not need so much the help of our friends as the confidence of their help in need.

 15. If the sight, association and exchange disappear, the passion of love ends.

 16. All pain is easy to dismiss; for intense pain is brief and the suffering that long-lasting physical pain brings is light.

 17. One must presume that long and short arguments contribute to the same end.

 18. One becomes an old man on the day he has forgotten his past blessings.

 

With affection,

Ruben