Marcus Tullius Cicero Art Quotations

Silence is one of the great arts of conversation.

Those things are better which are perfected by nature than those which are finished by art.

All the arts, which have a tendency to raise man in the scale of being, have a certain common band of union, and are connected, if I may be allowed to say so, by blood-relationship with one another.

For just as some women are said to be handsome though without adornment, so this subtle manner of speech, though lacking in artificial graces, delights us.

Let art, then, imitate nature, find what she desires, and follow as she directs. For in invention nature is never last, education never first; rather the beginnings of things arise from natural talent, and ends are reached by discipline.

It is certain that memory contains not only philosophy, but all the arts and all that appertain to the use of life.

Because all the sick do not recover, therefore medicine is not an art.

There is not only an art, but an eloquence in it.

Probabilities direct the conduct of the wise man.

When I consider the wonderful activity of the mind, so great a memory of what is past, and such a capacity of penetrating into the future: when I behold such a number of arts and sciences, and such a multitude of discoveries hence arising,--I believe and am firmly persuaded that a nature which contains so many things within itself cannot be mortal.

In all great arts, as in trees, it is the height that charms us; we care nothing for the roots or trunks, yet it could not be without the aid of these.

Let every man practice the art that he knows best.

All the arts of refinement have mutual kinship.

Not only is there an art in knowing a thing, but also a certain art in teaching it.

Art is born of the observation and investigation of nature.

Philosophy is true mother of the arts [of science].

Life is short, but art lives forever.

It is not enough merely possess virtue, as if it were an art; it should be practiced.

Things perfected by nature are better than those finished by art.