TITUS LUCRETIUS CARUS QUOTES III

Roman poet & philosopher (c. 99 BC - c. 55. BC)

We know that many conditions must be satisfied
If a species is to last and reproduce itself:
First there must be food for it, and then a channel
Through which the genetic particles in the limbs
Can find a way out; and the female must fit the male;
There must be organs which can give mutual pleasure.

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura

Tags: sex


Why dost thou not retire like a guest sated with the banquet of life, and with calm mind embrace, thou fool, a rest that knows no care?

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura


Nature impelled men to make sounds with their tongues
And they found it useful to give names to things
Much for the same reason that we see children now
Have recourse to gestures because they cannot speak
And point their fingers at things which appear before them.

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura

Tags: language


By protracting life, we do not deduct one jot from the duration of death.

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura


For as children tremble and fear everything in the blind darkness, so we in the light sometimes fear what is no more to be feared than the things children in the dark hold in terror and imagine will come true. This terror therefore and darkness of mind must be dispelled not by the rays of the sun and glittering shafts of day, but by the aspect and law of nature.

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura

Tags: fear


All things around, convulsed with violent thunder, seem to tremble, and the mighty walls of the capacious world appear at once to have started and burst asunder.

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura


What once sprung from the earth sinks back into the earth.

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura


For there is a VOID in things; a truth which it will be useful for you, in reference to many points, to know; and which will prevent you from wandering in doubt.

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura