Sentences worth carrying
🎯 Read some of the most quoted lines ever written, in the original.
🗣️ Say these out loud
- Dum spiro, spero. 🔊 doom SPEE-ro, SPEH-ro While I breathe, I hope. Spiro gives 'respiration' and 'inspire' — to breathe in.
- Per aspera ad astra. 🔊 per AS-peh-ra ad AS-tra Through hardships to the stars. Astra → 'astronomy', 'astronaut', 'disaster' (a bad star).
- Scientia potentia est. 🔊 skee-EN-tee-ah po-TEN-tee-ah est Knowledge is power. Scientia = knowing → 'science'. Usually credited to Francis Bacon, who wrote in Latin.
- Festina lente. 🔊 fes-TEE-na LEN-teh Make haste slowly. The Emperor Augustus's favourite advice. Perhaps the best study advice ever given.
- Errare humanum est. 🔊 er-RA-reh hoo-MA-noom est To err is human. From Seneca. The full thought adds: but to persist in error is foolish.
- Alea iacta est. 🔊 A-leh-ah YAK-ta est The die is cast. Caesar at the Rubicon — the moment a decision cannot be unmade.
Read every line aloud twice before moving on. The mouth learns a language, not the eye.
🔍 How to read a Latin sentence
Do not read left to right. Find the verb first, usually at the end. Then find the doer (nominative). Then the done-to (accusative). Then fit the rest around them. This one habit turns Latin from a puzzle into a language.
- Puellam magister docet. → verb: docet (teaches). Doer: magister. Done-to: puellam. 'The teacher teaches the girl.'
- Try it on: Aquam agricola portat.
- The Romans wrote this way on purpose — the verb at the end keeps the listener waiting, which is why Latin oratory is dramatic.
🌍 Among the people
Many of these lines are mottoes: per aspera ad astra belongs to Kansas and to several air forces; dum spiro spero to South Carolina and to families across Europe.
🔁 Practise today
- Learn three of these by heart, with their meanings.
- Apply the verb-first method to five of the sentences in Lesson 1.
- Write your own motto in Latin using words from this course.
