Francesco Petrarca

Five great enemies of peace inhabit with us: Avarice, Ambition, Envy, Anger, and Pride. If these were to be banished, we should infallibly enjoy perpetual peace.

Books have a peculiar charm, and they are the only things that can give us a taste of eternity.

I am not what I was; I am not what I am; I am not what I shall be.

Rarely do great beauty and great wisdom go together.

The shortest way to arrive at glory is to be what you wish to be thought to be.

A good death does honor to a whole life.

The greater the man, the greater the danger.

Sleep is the image of death.

Where there is no love, there is no joy.

The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.

I would rather be a man of letters than a king.

The human mind is so constructed that it is always in motion, and if it has no worthy object to occupy it, it will create one for itself.

No man is free who is not master of himself.

It is better to be alone than in bad company.

The love of glory is the last garment which even the wise put off.

Posterity will judge me.

The path to virtue is narrow and difficult, but the path to vice is broad and easy.

My life is a dream, and I am the dreamer.

The true nobility is in the soul, not in the blood.

Time flies, and we are carried along with it.