Book V, chapter 15, section 43; translated by Andrew P. Peabody
Tusculanae Disputationes – Tusculan Disputations (45 BC)
Context: Now since perturbations of mind create misery, while quietness of mind makes life happy, and since there are two kinds of perturbations, grief and fear having their scope in imagined evils, inordinate joy and desire in mistaken notions of the good, all being repugnant to wise counsel and reason, will you hesitate to call him happy whom you see relieved, released, free from these excitements so oppressive, and so at variance and divided among themselves? Indeed one thus disposed is always happy. Therefore the wise man is always happy.
Atque cum perturbationes animi miseriam, sedationes autem vitam efficiant beatam, duplexque ratio perturbationis sit, quod aegritudo et metus in malis opinatis, in bonorum autem errore laetitia gestiens libidoque versetur, quae omnia cum consilio et ratione pugnent, his tu tam gravibus concitationibus tamque ipsis inter se dissentientibus atque distractis quem vacuum solutum liberum videris, hunc dubitabis beatum dicere? atqui sapiens semper ita adfectus est; semper igitur sapiens beatus est.
“A wise man, therefore, proportions his belief to the evidence.”
Section X: Of Miracles; Part I. 87
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748)
Context: In our reasonings concerning matter of fact, there are all imaginable degrees of assurance, from the highest certainty to the lowest species of moral evidence. A wise man, therefore, proportions his belief to the evidence.
“Happy is that City that hath a wise man to govern it.”
The Sayings of the Wise (1555)
“A wise woman never yields by appointment. It should always be an unforeseen happiness.”
Source: De L'Amour (On Love) (1822), Ch. 60
“The wise man is joyful, happy and calm, unshaken, he lives on a plane with the gods.”
Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (Moral Letters to Lucilius), Letter LIX: On Pleasure and Joy
“A wise man does not wait to be given, but to always give first.”
“Death never takes the wise man by surprise, he is always ready to go.”
La mort ne surprend point le sage:
Il est toujours prêt à partir.
Book VIII (1678-1679), fable 1.
Fables (1668–1679)
