Inspirational Quotations

Inspirational Quotes by Terence (Roman Comic Dramatist)

Terence (c.195–159 BCE,) properly Publius Terentius Āfer, was a Roman comic playwright. As a translator and adapter of the Greek New Comedy, produced about 336–250 BCE, he gave near-perfect form and expression in Latin to the comedy of manners. He probably wielded a direct influence on Shakespeare.

Born in Carthage, now in Tunisia, Terence became the slave of the Roman senator Terentius Lucanus, who brought Terence to Rome, educated him, and liberated him.

Terence’s first play was the Andria (166 BCE; ‘The Girl from Andros.’) Its success introduced Terence to the most refined society of Rome and gained him the patronage of the statesmen Gaius Laelius and Scipio Aemilianus, the Younger. After spending some years in Rome, Terence went to Greece when he was 35. He never returned from the journey and died young. Of his family life, nothing is understood, except that he left a daughter and an expensive estate on the Appian Way, just outside Rome.

Contemporary scholars have been engrossed with the question of the extent to which Terence was an original writer, as opposed to a mere translator of his Greek models. Some scholars believe that Terence’s plays were not his work but were composed with the help of unidentified nobles.

Six of Terence’s comedies are still surviving: Andria (166 BCE,) Hecyra (165 BCE; ‘Mother-in-Law,’) Heauton Timoroumenos (163 BCE; ‘Sell-Tormentor,’) Eunuchus (161 BCE,) Phormio (161 BCE,) and Adelphi (160 BCE; ‘Brothers.’) They are Greek in origin and scene, and four of them are directly based on Greek dramatist Menander.

The influence of Terence on Roman education and the later European theatre was immense. His language was accepted as a standard of pure Latin, and his work was studied and discussed throughout antiquity. Many of his conventions and plot constructions were later used by Molière, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, and other European dramatists.

Several of Terence’s lines have become proverbial: quot homines, tot sententiae (‘as many opinions as there are people’) and fortīs fortuna adiuvat (‘fortune favours the brave,’) both from Phormio, and homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum puto (‘I am human, and I think nothing human is alien to me.’) from Heauton Timorumenos.

Prominent translations include Betty Radice’s The Brothers and Other Plays (1965) and Phormio and Other Plays (1967,) and Palmer Bovie’s The Complete Comedies of Terence: Modern Verse Translations (1974.)

More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Terence

When the mind is in a state of uncertainty the smallest impulse directs it to either side.
—Terence
Topics: Uncertainty

Of my friends, I am the only one I have left.
—Terence
Topics: Friendship

He who cannot do what he wants must make do with what he can.
—Terence
Topics: Acceptance, Realistic Expectations

I am a man, and whatever concerns humanity is of interest to me.
—Terence
Topics: Humanity

So many men, so many opinions.
—Terence
Topics: Opinions

That is true wisdom, to know how to alter one’s mind when occasion demands it.
—Terence
Topics: Wisdom

How often events, by chance, and unexpectedly, come to pass, which you had not dared even to hope for!
—Terence
Topics: Chance

You’re a wise person if you can easily direct your attention to what ever needs it.
—Terence
Topics: Focus, Concentration

When we are well, we all have good advice for those who are ill.
—Terence
Topics: Health

Nowadays those are rewarded who make right appear wrong.
—Terence
Topics: Appearance

Words gain credibility by deed.
—Terence
Topics: Getting Going, Procrastination, Inaction

Nothing is so difficult but that it may be found out by seeking.
—Terence

Of all mankind each loves himself the best.
—Terence
Topics: Self-love

Children should be led into the right paths, not by severity, but by persuasion.
—Terence
Topics: Children, Teachers, Teaching

What harsh judges fathers are to all young men!
—Terence
Topics: Father, Fathers

He makes a great mistake… who supposes that authority is firmer or better established when it is founded by force than that which is welded by affection.
—Terence
Topics: Authority

Walk in another’s shoes before judging them.Touch a person’s heart before trying to change their head.While there’s life, there’s hope.
—Terence
Topics: Character

My advice is to consult the lives of other men, as one would a looking-glass, and from thence fetch examples for imitation.
—Terence
Topics: Biography, Example

No man was ever so completely skilled in the conduct of life, as not to receive new information from age and experience.
—Terence
Topics: Age, Aging, Experience

To touch a sore is to renew one’s grief.
—Terence
Topics: Pain

I do not give money for just mere hopes.
—Terence
Topics: Chance

Fortune favors the bold.
—Terence
Topics: Luck, Fortune

What a grand thing it is to be clever and have common sense.
—Terence
Topics: Cleverness, Common Sense

Nothing is said which has not been said before.
—Terence
Topics: Plagiarism

While the mind is in doubt it is driven this way and that by a slight impulse.
—Terence
Topics: Mind, The Mind

It is possible that a man can be so changed by love as hardly to be recognized as the same person.
—Terence
Topics: Love

You believe easily that which you hope for earnestly.
—Terence
Topics: Belief

They are so knowing, that they know nothing.
—Terence
Topics: Knowledge

Many a time from a bad beginning great friendships have sprung up.
—Terence
Topics: Friends and Friendship

How unfair the fate which ordains that those who have the least should be always adding to the treasury of the wealthy.
—Terence
Topics: Justice

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