Quintilian quotes - page 3

History is written for the purpose of narration and not in order to give proof. (Quintilian)
To say the truth, whatever improvement private study may produce, there is still a peculiar advantage attendant on our appearance in the forum, where the light is different and there is an appearance of real responsibility quite different from the fictitious cases of the schools. If we estimate the two separately, practice without learning will be of more avail than learning without practice. View quote
Quintilian
Nature herself, indeed, seems to have given music to us as a benefit, to enable us to endure labors with greater facility, for musical sounds cheer even the rower; and it is not only in those works in which the efforts of many, while some pleasing voice leads them, conspire together that music is of avail, but the toil even of people at work by themselves finds itself soothed by song, however rude. View quote
Quintilian
However many things we may have done, we are yet to a certain degree fresh for that which we are going to begin. Who, on the contrary, would not be stupified if he were to listen to the same teacher of any art, whatever it might be, through the whole day? But by change a person will be recruited, as is the case with respect to food, by varieties of which the stomach is re-invigorated and is fed with several sorts less unsatisfactorily than with one. View quote
Quintilian
For the mind is all the easier to teach before it is set. View quote
Quintilian
As regards parents, I should like to see them as highly educated as possible, and I do not restrict this remark to fathers alone. View quote
Quintilian
To my mind the boy who gives least promise is one in whom the critical faculty develops in advance of the imagination. View quote
Quintilian
It is worth while too to warn the teacher that undue severity in correcting faults is liable at times to discourage a boy's mind from effort. View quote
Quintilian
It is the nurse that the child first hears, and her words that he will first attempt to imitate. View quote
Quintilian
Without natural gifts technical rules are useless. View quote
Quintilian
Verse satire indeed is entirely our own. (Quintilian)
Write quickly and you will never write well; write well, and you will soon write quickly. View quote
Quintilian
The learned understand the reason of art; the unlearned feel the pleasure. View quote
Quintilian
Usage is the best language teacher. View quote
Quintilian
A religion without mystics is a philosophy. View quote
Quintilian
The obscurity of a writer is generally in proportion to his incapacity. View quote
Quintilian
To swear, except when necessary, is becoming to an honorable man. View quote
Quintilian
A laugh, if purchased at the expense of propriety, costs too much. View quote
Quintilian