Ovid: Trending quotes

“Let your hook always be cast; in the pool where you least expect it, there will be fish.”
Casus ubique valet; semper tibi pendeat hamus Quo minime credas gurgite, piscis erit.

Ovid book Heroides

Book III, line 425
Ars Amatoria (The Art of Love)
Source: Heroides
Context: Chance is always powerful. Let your hook always be cast; in the pool where you least expect it, there will be fish.

Fish

“The cause is hidden. The effect is visible to all.”
Causa latet, vis est notissima

Ovid Metamorphoses

Variant translation: The cause is hidden; the effect is visible to all.
Book IV, 287
Metamorphoses (Transformations)
Variant: The cause is hidden, but the result is well known.

“Let others praise ancient times; I am glad I was born in these.”

Ovid

Time

“The essence of true friendship is to make allowance for another's little lapses.”

Ovid

Friendship , Friendship , For Friend , For Bestfriend

“Omnia mutantur, nihil interit (everything changes, nothing perishes).”

Ovid Metamorphoses

Variant: All things change; nothing perishes.
Source: Metamorphoses

Change

“All things change; nothing perishes.”

Ovid

Change

“The event proves well the wisdom of her [Phyllis'] course.”

Ovid book Heroides

Heroides (The Heroines)
Original: (la) Exitus acta probat.

The end proves the acts (were done), or the result is a test of the actions; Ovid's line 85 full translation:

Variant translations: The ends justify the means. All's well that ends well. NB: the end does not always equal the goal.

II, 85

Wisdom

“Carmina proveniunt animo deducta sereno.”

Ovid book Tristia

Poetry comes fine-spun from a mind at ease.
I, i, 39
Tristia (Sorrows)