Boethius Quotes on Mind
Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius was a 5th and 6th-century Roman senator, consul, and philosopher, one of the last representatives of classical learning in the Latin West and a foundational figure of medieval philosophy. This page collects quotes attributed to Boethius on the topic of mind, drawn from across the philosopher's works.
Quotes
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Attributed to Boethius:
“Music is so naturally united with us that we cannot be free from it even if we so desired.”
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Attributed to Boethius:
“Nothing is miserable unless you think it so; and on the other hand, nothing brings happiness unless you are content with it.”
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Attributed to Boethius:
“He who knows himself was first his own knower.”
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“When she [ Philosophy ] saw that the Muses of poetry were present by my couch giving words to my lamenting, she was stirred a while; her eyes flashed fiercely, and said she, "Who has suffered these seducing mummers to approach this sick man? Never do they support those in sorrow by any healing remedies, but rather do ever foster the sorrow by poisonous sweets. These are they who stifle the fruit-bearing harvest of reason with the barren briars of the passions: they free not the minds of men from disease, but accustom them thereto." Prose I, lines 7-9; translation by W.V. Cooper”
Quae ubi poeticas Musas uidit nostro assistentes toro fletibusque meis uerba dictantes, commota paulisper ac toruis inflammata luminibus: Quis, inquit, has scenicas meretriculas ad hunc aegrum permisit accedere, quae dolores eius non modo nullis remediis fouerent, uerum dulcibus insuper alerent uenenis? Hae sunt enim quae infructuosis affectuum spinis uberem fructibus rationis segetem necant homin