45+ Boethius Quotes On Happiness, Marriage And Philosophy

Boethius was a 6th-century Roman philosopher, statesman, and theologian. He is best known for his Consolation of Philosophy, a philosophical treatise on fortune, death, and other issues, written while he was in prison awaiting execution. Boethius was a key figure in the final phase of the Roman Empire's classical tradition, and is known for his influence on medieval thought. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Boethius on happiness, marriage, philosophy.

Top 10 Boethius Quotes

1. Nothing is miserable unless you think it so; and on the other hand, nothing brings happiness unless you are content with it.
2. Who would give a law to lovers? Love is unto itself a higher law.
3. Nothing is miserable unless you think it is so.
4. Inconsistency is my very essence; it is the game I never cease to play as I turn my wheel in its ever changing circle, filled with joy as I bring the top to the bottom and the bottom to the top
5. One's virtue is all that one truly has, because it is not imperiled by the vicissitudes of fortune.
6. He who has calmly reconciled his life to fate, and set proud death beneath his feet, can look fortune in the face, unbending both to good and bad; his countenance unconquered.
7. Love has three kinds of origin, namely: suffering, friendship and love. A human love has a corporal and intellectual origin.
8. So nothing is ever good or bad unless you think it so, and vice versa. All luck is good luck to the man who bears it with equanimity.
9. No man can ever be secure until he has been forsaken by Fortune.
10. The completely simultaneous and perfect possession of unlimited life at a single moment.

Boethius Short Quotes

• A man content to go to heaven alone will never go to heaven.
• Music is part of us, and either ennobles or degrades our behavior.
• The good is the end toward which all things tend.
• In other living creatures the ignorance of themselves is nature, but in men it is a vice.
• He who has calmly reconciled his life to fate ... can look fortune in the face.
• A person is an individual substance of a rational nature.
• As far as possible, join faith to reason.
• I scarcely know the meaning of your question; much less can I answer it.
• Man is so constituted that he then only excels other things when he knows himself.
• Every man must be content with that glory which he may have at home.

Boethius Quotes About Happiness

For in all adversity of fortune the worst sort of misery is to have been happy. — Boethius

For in every ill-turn of fortune the most unhappy sort of unfortunate man is the one who has been happy — Boethius

Love binds people too, in matrimony's sacred bonds where chaste lovers are met, and friends cement their trust and friendship. How happy is mankind, if the love that orders the stars above rules, too, in your hearts. — Boethius

In every kind of adversity, the bitterest part of a man's affliction is to remember that he once was happy. — Boethius

In omni adversitate fortunæ, infelicissimum genus est infortunii fuisse felicem In every adversity of fortune, to have been happy is the most unhappy kind of misfortune. — Boethius

He who is virtuous is wise; and he who is wise is good; and he who is good is happy. — Boethius

Nothing is miserable but what is thought so, and contrariwise, every estate is happy if he that bears it be content. — Boethius

Whose happiness is so firmly established that he has no quarrel from any side with his estate of life? — Boethius

Boethius Famous Quotes And Sayings

It's my belief that history is a wheel. 'Inconstancy is my very essence,'? says the wheel. Rise up on my spokes if you like but don't complain when you're cast back down into the depths. Good times pass away, but then so do the bad. Mutability is our tragedy, but it's also our hope. The worst of times, like the best, are always passing away. — Boethius

Wretched men cringe before tyrants who have no power, the victims of their trivial hopes and fears. They do not realise that anger is hopeless, fear is pointless and desire all a delusion. He whose heart is fickle is not his own master, has thrown away his shield, deserted his post, and he forges the links of the chain that holds him. — Boethius

So it follows that those who have reason have freedom to will or not to will, although this freedom is not equal in all of them. [...] human souls are more free when they persevere in the contemplation of the mind of God, less free when they descend to the corporeal, and even less free when they are entirely imprisoned in earthly flesh and blood. — Boethius

Good men seek it by the natural means of the virtues; evil men, however, try to achieve the same goal by a variety of concupiscences, and that is surely an unnatural way of seeking the good. Don't you agree? — Boethius

And no renown can render you well-known: For if you think that fame can lengthen life By mortal famousness immortalized, The day will come that takes your fame as well, And there a second death for you awaits. — Boethius

You know when you have found your prince because you not only have a smile on your face but in your heart as well. Love puts the fun in together, the sad in apart, and the joy in a heart. Who would give a law to lovers? Love is unto itself a higher law. — Boethius

If there is anything good about nobility it is that it enforces the necessity of avoiding degeneracy. — Boethius

...Whose souls, albeit in a cloudy memory, yet seek back their good, but, like drunk men, know not the road home. — Boethius

Contemplate the extent and stability of the heavens, and then at last cease to admire worthless things. — Boethius

Give me Thy light, and fix my eyes on Thee! — Boethius

If there is a God, whence proceed so many evils? If there is no God, whence cometh any good? — Boethius

Music is so naturally united with us that we cannot be free from it - even if we so desired. — Boethius

I who once wrote songs with keen delight am now by sorrow driven to take up melancholy measures. Wounded Muses tell me what I must write, and elegiac verses bathe my face with real tears. Not even terror could drive from me these faithful companions of my long journey. Poetry, which was once the glory of my happy and flourishing youth, is still my comfort in this misery of my old age. — Boethius

Balance out the good things and the bad that have happened in your life and you will have to acknowledge that you are still way ahead. You are unhappy because you have lost those things in which you took pleasure? But you can also take comfort in the likelihood that what is now making you miserable will also pass away. — Boethius

Nunc fluens facit tempus,nunc stans facit aeternitatum.(The now that passes produces time, the now that remains produces eternity.) — Boethius

The science of numbers ought to be preferred as an acquisition before all others, because of its necessity and because of the great secrets and other mysteries which there are in the properties of numbers. All sciences partake of it, and it has need of none. — Boethius

All fortune is good fortune; for it either rewards, disciplines, amends, or punishes, and so is either useful or just. — Boethius

Life Lessons by Boethius

1. Boethius teaches us that true happiness can be found in understanding the divine order of the universe and accepting our place in it.
2. He also emphasizes the importance of free will and the power of reason to make wise choices.
3. Finally, Boethius encourages us to strive for excellence and to use our talents to serve our community and the greater good.