Related:

• To laugh, if but for an instant only, has never been granted to man before the fortieth day from his birth, and then it is looked upon as a miracle of precocity.
  -- Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD) -- Natural History, Book vii, Sect. 2...
• With man, most of his misfortunes are occasioned by man.
  -- Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD) -- Natural History, Book vii, Sect. 5...
• It is far from easy to determine whether she [Nature] has proved to him a kind parent or a merciless stepmother.
  -- Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD) -- Natural History, Book vii, Sect. 1...
• Why is it that we entertain the belief that for every purpose odd numbers are the most effectual?
  -- Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD) -- Natural History, Book xxviii, Sect. 23...
• Man alone at the very moment of his birth, cast naked upon the naked earth, does she abandon to cries and lamentations.
  -- Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD) -- Natural History, Book vii, Sect. 2...
• Indeed, what is there that does not appear marvellous when it comes to our knowledge for the first time?
  -- Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD) -- Natural History, Book vii, Sect. 6...
• The human features and countenance, although composed of but some ten parts or little more
  are so fashioned that among so many thousands of men there are no two in existence who cannot be distinguished from one another....
• It has become quite a common proverb that in wine there is truth.
  -- Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD) -- Natural History, Book xiv, Sect. 141...
• The best plan is, as the common proverb has it, to profit by the folly of others.
  -- Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD) -- Natural History, Book xviii, Sect. 31...