Tacitus Quotes

Men are not only prone to forget benefits; they even hate those who have obliged them, and cease to hate those who have injured them. The necessity of revenging an injury, or of recompensing a benefit seems a slavery to which they are unwilling to submit.

I am convinced by a sad experience that it is natural to avoid those to whom we have been too much obliged, and that uncommon generosity causes neglect rather than gratitude.

He who has conferred a benefit on anyone from motives of love or honor will feel pain, if he sees that the benefit is received without gratitude.

Take gifts with a sigh: most men give to be paid.

The nature of man is such that people consider themselves put under an obligation as much by the benefits they confer as by those they receive.

Benefits received are a delight to us as long as we think we can requite them; when that possibility is far exceeded, they are repaid with hatred instead of gratitude.

You find in some a sort of graceless modesty, that makes them ashamed to requite an obligation.

Too great haste to repay an obligation is a kind of ingratitude.

Most people return small favors, acknowledge medium ones and repay greater ones - with ingratitude.

Great indebtedness does not make men grateful, but vengeful; and if a little charity is not forgotten, it turns into a gnawing worm.

There is nothing so fleeting as the memory of benefits received.

It is the nature of men to be bound by the benefits they confer as much as by those they receive.

The man who has received a benefit ought always to remember it, but he who has granted it ought to forget the fact at once.

There are always a few people you do a lot for, and a few who do a lot for you, but they're not the same people.

This is the law of benefits between men; the one ought to forget at once what was given, and the other ought never to forget what he has received.

The person, whom you favored with a loan, if he be a good man, will think himself in your debt after he has paid you.

If our friends do us a service, we think they owe it to us by their title of friend. We never think that they do not owe us their friendship.

It is no tragedy to do ungrateful people favors, but it is unbearable to be indebted to a scoundrel.

There is a pleasure in meeting the glance of a person whom we have lately laid under some obligations.

gratitude, n. A sentiment lying midway between a benefit received and a benefit expected.

A word of wisdom to you, akribos, you need to learn to accept gifts. (Catera) There’s no such thing as a gift. If I were to take that from you, sooner or later you would ask a favor from me in return. Nothing in life is ever truly given without expectation. (Acheron)

When men receive favours from someone they expected to do them ill, they are under a greater obligation to their benefactor.

Debt is not just a money thing. It's about owing and being owed. Money is just one thing you can exchange. You can exchange good deeds, you can exchange revenge, you can exchange murders.

You cannot ensure the gratitude of others for a favour conferred upon them in the way which is most agreeable to yourself.

We are never quits with those who oblige us," was Dantes' reply; "for when we do not owe them money, we owe them gratitude.