“A little too wise, they say, do ne’er live long.”
Act i. Sc. 1. Compare: "So wise so young, they say, do never live long", William Shakespeare, King Richard III, Act iii. Sc. 1.
The Phœnix (1603-4)
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
Thomas Middleton35
English playwright and poet 1580–1627Related quotes
“Believe me, wise men don't say ‘I shall live to do that’, tomorrow's life is too late; live today.”
Non est, crede mihi, sapientis dicere ‘Vivam’:
Sera nimis vita est crastina: vive hodie.
Martial book Epigrammata
I, 15.
Variant translations:
'I'll live to-morrow', 'tis not wise to say:
'Twill be too late to-morrow—live to-day.
Tomorrow will I live, the fool does say;
Today itself's too late; the wise lived yesterday.
Epigrams (c. 80 – 104 AD)
“The wise man will live as long as he ought, not as long as he can.”
Sapiens vivit quantum debet, non quantum potest.
Seneca the Younger (-4–65 BC) Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, and dramatist
Source: Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (Moral Letters to Lucilius), Letter LXX: On the proper time to slip the cable, Line 4.
“Say that I live, but in such wise that I would not live.”
Vivere me dices, sed sic ut vivere nolim
III, vii, 7; translation by Arthur Leslie Wheeler
Tristia (Sorrows)
“If thou canst not hold the golden mean, say and do too little rather than too much.”
John Lancaster Spalding (1840–1916) Catholic bishop
Source: Aphorisms and Reflections (1901), p. 178
“We live in an age that reads too much to be wise, and that thinks too much to be beautiful.”
Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray
Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray
Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher
Source: The Analects, Chapter VI
Robert Musil (1880–1942) Austrian writer
Wir haben nicht zuviel Verstand und zu wenig Seele, sondern wir haben zu wenig Verstand in den Fragen der Seele.
Helpless Europe (1922)
