Verified Quotes
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Boethius, Roman statesman at the summit of power who was suddenly condemned on false charges and wrote The, gets quoted everywhere and sourced almost nowhere. The 16 quotes below are different: each one is checked word for word against the cited work, starting with Consolation of Philosophy, not copied from aggregator sites that pass misattributions along. The source is named under every line, so you can trace each quote back to the page it came from.
Read Boethius's full profile and how they reason →10 verified quotes
On feeling like your circumstances decide whether you are happy:
Nothing is miserable unless you think it so; and on the other hand, nothing brings happiness unless you are content with it.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On grieving a life that used to be better:
In every misfortune, the worst kind of unhappiness is once to have been happy.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On losing a job or title you thought was permanent:
I turn the wheel that spins. I delight to see the high come down and the low ascend.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On resenting a hardship instead of working with it:
Every fortune is good fortune to the man who bears it with equanimity.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On expecting the next raise to finally feel like enough:
Wealth, so far from extinguishing greed, has been known to increase it.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On building your sense of self on things you cannot control:
No man can ever truly be secure until he has been forsaken by Fortune.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On expecting a run of bad luck to be personal:
Slippery Fortune ever plays this game, as wave rolling after wave in the mighty deep.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On resisting a new stage of life instead of accepting it:
There is a fixed limit to all things that grow, and hastening as all things do to their ripening, they hasten also to decay.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On expecting a good relationship to never need work:
Do you think that anything remains unchanged that is subject to change?Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
On expecting a lucky streak to last forever:
For if she should stay for ever, she would no longer be Fortune.Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy
6 verified quotes
Looking back on a good season of life that has now ended:
How many pleasures are followed by sorrow when they are past!Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy
Deciding whether ambition has started to cost you your own character:
The condition of human nature is such, that it towers above the rest of creation so long as it recognizes its own nature, and it is transformed into brute beasts as soon as it forgets that nature.Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy
Reassessing a career built entirely on factors outside your control:
Anyone who has let himself become dependent on Fortune's favours has lost the right to complain, if they suddenly desert him.Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy
Deciding what actually matters when you zoom out on your whole life:
Eternity is the whole, simultaneous and perfect possession of unbounded life.Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy
Allowing yourself to grieve instead of pretending a hard season does not hurt:
I who once wrote songs with joyful zeal, am now forced by grief to turn to melancholy measures.Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy
Explaining a relationship choice that does not make sense to anyone else:
Who would give a law to lovers? Love is a greater law unto itself.Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy