If I am to live longer, perhaps I must live out my old age, seeing and hearing less, understanding worse, coming to learn with more difficulty and to be more forgetful, and growing worse than those to whom I was once superior. Indeed, life would be unliveable, even if I did not notice the change. And if I see the change, how could life not be even more wretched and unpleasant?

You will know that the divine is so great and of such a nature that it sees and hears everything at once, is present everywhere, and is concerned with everythi…

Really, Ischomachus, I am disposed to ask: 'Does teaching consist in putting questions?' Indeed, the secret of your system has just this instant dawned upon me…

Crito, I owe a cock to Asclepius; will you remember to pay the debt?

If my life is to be prolonged now, I know that I must live out my old age, seeing worse, hearing less, learning with more difficulty, and forgetting more and m…

We tend to suffer from the illusion that we are capable of dying for a belief or theory. What Hagakure is insisting is that even in merciless death, a futile d…

The years like great black oxen tread the world, And God the herdsman goads them on behind, And I am broken by their passing feet.