"Niccolo Machiavelli" (1987)
Source: The Prince (1513), Ch. 15
Context: Many have imagined republics and principalities which have never been seen or known to exist in reality; for how we live is so far removed from how we ought to live, that he who abandons what is done for what ought to be done, will rather bring about his own ruin than his preservation.
“Men do not care how nobly they live, but only how long, although it is within the reach of every man to live nobly, but within no man's power to live long.”
Nemo quam bene vivat sed quam diu curat, cum omnibus possit contingere ut bene vivant, ut diu nulli.
Source: Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (Moral Letters to Lucilius), Letter XXII: On the futility of half-way measures, Line 17.
Original: (it) Molti si sono immaginate Repubbliche e Principati, che non si sono mai visti nè cognosciuti essere in vero; perchè egli è tanto discosto da come si vive, a come si doveria vivere, che colui che lascia quello che si fa per quello che si doveria fare, impara piuttosto la rovina, che la preservazione sua.
Source: The Prince (1513), Ch. 15; translated by W. K. Marriot
“Jochum had said, "You keep asking the universe 'How ought I to live?'”
But it can't answer."
Page 406.
Stepping Westward (1965)
“The end of Religion is not to teach us how to die, but how to live….”
Source: Agnes Grey
James Truslow Adams; sometimes rendered : "There are two educations. One should teach us how to make a living and the other how to live".
Misattributed
To "Be" or to "DO" Forum, Jun 1929; VOL. LXXXI, NO. 6
Misattributed
Context: There are obviously two educations. One should teach us how to make a living and the other how to live. Surely these should never be confused in the mind of any man who has the slightest inkling of what culture is. For most of us it is essential that we should make a living... In the complications of modern life and with our increased accumulation of knowledge, it doubtless helps greatly to compress some years of experience into far fewer years by studying for a particular trade or profession in an institution; but that fact should not blind us to another—namely, that in so doing we are learning a trade or a profession, but are not getting a liberal education as human beings.
