Apollonius Of Tyana

I delight to lodge in such temples as are not regularly kept closed. None of the gods reject me; they make me partner of their roof.

Just as an individual of pre-eminent worth transforms democracy into a monarchy of the best man, even so the rule of one man, if in all things it has an eye to the common welfare, is democracy.

A man must fortify himself and understand that a wise man who yields to laziness or anger or passion or love of drink, or who commits any other action prompted by impulse and inopportune, will probably find his fault condoned; but if he stoops to greed, he will not be pardoned, but render himself odious as a combination of all vices at once.

Never may a man prone to believe scandal be a despot or a popular leader! Under his guidance, democracy itself will be despotism.

If any man has left us for fear of Nero, I shall not account him a coward; but I shall hail as a philosopher any man who has been superior to this fear, and I shall teach him all I know.

If you have problems of conduct that are difficult and hard to settle, I will furnish you with solutions, for I not only know matters of practice and duty, but I even know them beforehand.

O ye gods, grant unto me to have little and to want nothing.

Do not consider that to be wealth which is hoarded away, for how is it better than sand gathered from the nearest heap? Nor that which comes in from men who groan at their taxes: for the gold that is wrung from tears is of base alloy and black.

I asked questions when I was a stripling, and it is not my business to ask questions now, but to teach people what I have discovered.

I asked certain rich men if they felt embittered. 'How could we not?' they said. So I asked them what caused this anguish. They blamed their wealth.

Virtue comes by nature, learning, and practice, and thanks to virtue, all of the aforesaid may deserve approval.

In my judgment, excellence and wealth are direct opposites, since when the one shrinks, the other grows, and when one grows, the other shrinks.