Top 180 Plautus Quotes (2026 Update)
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101. “Property is unstable, and youth perishes in a moment. Life itself is held in the grinning fangs of Death, Yet men delay to obtain release from the world. Alas, the conduct of mankind is surprising.”

— Plautus

102. “All men love themselves.”

— Plautus

103. “If anything is spoken in jest, it is not fair to turn it to earnest.”

— Plautus

104. “Good courage in a bad affair is half of the evil overcome.”

— Plautus

105. “He who rushes headlong into love will fare worse than if he had cast himself from a precipice.”

— Plautus

106. “It is not fair to treat as serious that which is only said in joke.”

— Plautus

107. “The poor man who enters into a partnership with one who is rich makes a risky venture.”

— Plautus

108. “We only appreciate the comforts of life in their loss.”

— Plautus

109. “If you are wise, be wise; keep what goods the gods provide you.”

— Plautus

110. “He that is in love, faith, if he be hungry, is not hungry at all.”

— Plautus

111. “Your piping-hot lie is the best of lies.”

— Plautus

112. “He who falls in love meets a worse fate than he who leaps from a rock.”

— Plautus

113. “Bad conduct soils the finest ornament more than filth.”

— Plautus

114. “It is sheer folly to take unwilling hounds to the chase.”

— Plautus

115. “Men understand the worth of blessings only when they have lost them.”

— Plautus

116. “Even the whole of life is not sufficient for thorough learning.”

— Plautus

117. “Woman is certainly the daughter of Delay personified!”

— Plautus

118. “I esteem death a trifle, if not caused by guilt.”

— Plautus

119. “If you want to do something, do it!”

— Plautus

120. “It is much easier to begin than to end.”

— Plautus

121. “To snatch the worm from the trap.”

— Plautus

122. “Because those, who twit others with their faults, should look at home.”

— Plautus

123. “In grasping at uncertainties we lost that which is certain.”

— Plautus

124. “Wine is a cunning wrestler.”

— Plautus

125. “Drink, live like the Greeks, eat, gorge.”

— Plautus

126. “To ask that which is unjust at the hands of the just, is an injustice in itself; to expect that which is just from the unjust, is simple folly.”

— Plautus

127. “Disgrace is immortal, and living even when one thinks it dead.”

— Plautus

128. “Courage is what preserves our liberty, safety, life, and our homes and parents, our country and children. Courage comprises all things.”

— Plautus

129. “For nobody is curious, who isn’t malevolent.”

— Plautus

130. “Good things soon find a purchaser.”

— Plautus

131. “The sea is certainly common to all.”

— Plautus

132. “Whatever disgrace we may have deserved, it is almost always in our power to re-establish our character.”

— Plautus

133. “It is wretched business to be digging a well just as thirst is mastering you.”

— Plautus

134. “That’s a miserable and cursed word, to say I had, when what I have is nothing.”

— Plautus

135. “I much prefer a compliment, even if insincere, to sincere criticism.”

— Plautus

136. “It is best to know the worst at once.”

— Plautus

137. “That which you know, know not; and that which you see, see not.”

— Plautus

138. “No blessing lasts forever.”

— Plautus

139. “A man with courage has every blessing.”

— Plautus

140. “It is not without a purpose when a rich man greets a poor one with kindness.”

— Plautus

141. “Worthy things happen to the worthy.”

— Plautus

142. “If you strike the goads with your fists, your hands suffer most.”

— Plautus

143. “It is difficult to whistle and drink at the same time.”

— Plautus

144. “It is customary these days to ignore what should be done in favour of what pleases us.”

— Plautus

145. “Find me a reasonable lover against his weight in gold.”

— Plautus

146. “To make any gain some outlay is necessary.”

— Plautus

147. “Things unhoped for happen oftener than things we desire.”

— Plautus

148. “Feast to-day makes fast to-morrow. Lat.”

— Plautus

149. “Laws are subordinate to custom.”

— Plautus

150. “How great in number are the little minded men.”

— Plautus