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

I am human, and I think nothing of which is human is alien to me.
—Terence

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

I take it to be a principal rule of life, not to be too much addicted to any one thing.
—Terence
Topics: Occupation

Do not do what is already done.
—Terence

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

Human nature is so constituted, that all see, and judge better, in the affairs of other men, than in their own.
—Terence
Topics: Judgment, Prejudice

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

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

We are all of us the worse for too much liberty.
—Terence
Topics: Freedom

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

Their silence is praise enough.
—Terence
Topics: Praise

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

I am human and let nothing human be alien to me.
—Terence
Topics: Humanity, Humankind

There is nothing so easy but that it becomes difficult when you do it reluctantly.
—Terence
Topics: Difficulty, Attitude, Difficulties

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

Of my friends I am the only one left.
—Terence
Topics: Loneliness

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

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

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

I believe because it is impossible.
—Terence
Topics: Belief

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

Lovers quarrels are the renewal of love.
—Terence
Topics: Fighting, Fight, Quarrels

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

Riches get their value from the mind of the possessor; they are blessings to those who know how to use them, and curses to those who do not.
—Terence
Topics: Value

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

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

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

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

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

I hold this as a rule of life: Too much of anything is bad.
—Terence
Topics: Excess

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