Lucretius Quotes

Time changes the nature of the whole world; Everything passes from one state to another And nothing stays like itself.

We plainly perceive that the mind strengthens and decays with the body.

The greatest wealth is to live content with little, for there is never want where the mind is satisfied.

Fear was the first thing on Earth to create gods.

Never trust the calm sea when she shows her false alluring smile.

No matter how difficult a task may look.. Persistence and steady action will get you through

The water hollows out the stone, not by force but drop by drop.

Look at a man in the midst of doubt & danger and you will learn in his hour of adversity what he really is.

It is great wealth to a soul to live frugally with a contented mind.

Why shed tears that you must die? For if your past life has been one of enjoyment, and if all your pleasures have not passed through your mind, as through a sieve, and vanished, leaving not a rack behind, why then do you not, like a thankful guest, rise cheerfully from life's feast, and with a quiet mind go take your rest.

You alone govern the nature of things. Without you nothing emerges into the light of day, without you nothing is joyous or lovely.

The old must always make way for the new, and one thing must be built out of the ruins of another. There is no murky pit of hell awaiting anyone.

And life is given to none freehold, but it is leasehold for all.

Nothing can be created out of nothing.

Life is one long struggle in the dark.

If God can do anything he can make a stone so heavy that even he can't lift it. Then there is something God cannot do, he cannot lift the stone. Therefore God does not exist.

Our life must once have end; in vain we fly From following Fate; e'en now, e'en now, we die.

Fear is the mother of all gods ... Nature does all things spontaneously, by herself, without the meddling of the gods.

Certainly it was no design of the atoms to place themselves in a particular order, nor did they decide what motions each should have. But atoms were struck with blows in many ways and carried along by their own weight from infinite times up to the present. They have been accustomed to move and to meet in all manner of ways. For this reason, it came to pass that being spread abroad through a vast time and trying every sort of combination and motion, at length those come together that produce great things, like earth and sea and sky and the generation of living creatures.

Poor humanity, to saddle the gods with such a responsibility and throw in a vindictive temper. What griefs they hatch for themselves, what festering sores for us, what tears for our prosperity! This is not piety, this oft-repeated show of bowing a veiled head before a graven image; this bustling to every altar; this kow-towing and prostration on the ground with palms outspread before the shrines of the gods; this deluging of vow on vow. True piety lies rather in the power to contemplate the universe with a quiet mind.

We notice that the mind grows with the body, and with it decays.

Such are the heights of wickedness to which men are driven by religion.

To none is life given in freehold; to all on lease.

Constant dripping hollows out a stone.

Too often in time past, religion has brought forth criminal and shameful actions... How many evils has religion caused?