Three Latin words. A grammar that rewards scrutiny. A meaning that has outlived empires.
Ad maiora semper translates literally as “towards greater things always.” The phrase breaks cleanly: ad, the preposition indicating direction; maiora, the neuter plural of maior (greater, larger, more significant); semper, the adverb meaning always or throughout. Together they form an imperative of aspiration – not a command to others, but a declaration of intent. The English word “mayor” descends directly from maior, the comparative form of magnus (great), which tells you something about how deeply this root is embedded in European institutional language.
No Single Author, Many Roman Voices
Ad maiora semper is not a quotation from any named ancient text. It is a compound expression, assembled from the building blocks of classical Latin rhetoric, and its individual components appear across the works of multiple Roman writers.
Cicero used the phrase “ad maiora” repeatedly. In Philippicum II he wrote “sed nimis multa de nugis: ad maiora veniamus” – “but too much about trifles: let us move on to greater things.” In De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum (Book I, section 6) the fuller passage reads: “Quamobrem ad maiora nos natura genuit et excitavit” – “therefore nature has produced and stimulated us to greater things.” Cicero’s argument, drawn from Stoic philosophy, held that the human soul is oriented toward expansion and achievement by its very constitution.
Seneca, writing in Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium, used the construction “ad maiora te quaeso accinge” – “I beg you, prepare yourself for greater things.” His version carries the imperative weight that the modern phrase inherits. Horace, in the Odes, wrote “ad maiora rerum principia tendo” – “I strive towards the greater principles of things.” Virgil’s Aeneid contains the related formulation “sic itur ad astra” – “thus one journeys to the stars” – which became the basis for the modern phrase per aspera ad astra (“through hardships to the stars”), itself a favourite motto of air forces worldwide, including the Royal Canadian Air Force and the Brazilian Air Force Academy.
The parent expression “ad maiora natus sum” – “I was born for greater things” – was attributed across classical sources to figures ranging from Cicero to Seneca, though no single text pins the words to one mouth. The Jesuits later adopted the closely related “Ad Maiorem Dei Gloriam” (AMDG) – “for the greater glory of God” – as their official motto under Ignatius of Loyola in the sixteenth century, extending the ad maiora construction into religious institutional life.
Grammar Worth Noting
The word maiora is the neuter plural accusative comparative of maior. In Latin, comparative adjectives in the neuter plural frequently function substantively – that is, “greater things” rather than “greater” as a bare adjective. The construction ad + accusative expresses motion toward, giving the phrase its directional energy. Placing semper at the end, as in the modern usage, mirrors the Latin tendency to position temporal adverbs for emphasis at the close of a clause. The variant word order “semper ad maiora” places semper at the front, which is the more traditional Latin arrangement for adverbs of time, as seen in “semper fidelis” (always faithful), the motto of the United States Marine Corps. Both orderings are grammatically correct; the choice between them is a matter of rhetorical emphasis.
Institutional Adoption
The phrase and its variants appear in the mottos and traditions of institutions across several centuries. The University of Padua, founded in 1222, uses ad maiora in its institutional identity. The University of Santo Tomas in Manila – the oldest existing university in Asia, established in 1611 – traces its Dominican intellectual heritage through the ad maiora tradition. West Point School in Darjeeling uses “semper ad maiora” as its official motto, translating it as “strive for higher attainments.” The phrase has been adopted by Rotary Club International in various capacities and appears on the insignia of several European military and educational bodies.
In Italian academic culture, “ad maiora semper” functions as a standard congratulatory formula at graduation ceremonies, used to address newly qualified graduates as they move beyond their studies. The expression carries the implication that the degree is a beginning, not an endpoint – consistent with the Stoic philosophical foundations from which the phrase ultimately derives.
The Broader Family
Ad maiora semper belongs to a family of Latin expressions that English has absorbed as motivational language. Carpe diem, from Horace’s Odes I.11, urges the listener to “pluck the day” – a horticultural metaphor for enjoying what is ripe and present, mistranslated in popular culture as “seize the day.” Veni, vidi, vici – Caesar’s terse dispatch after the Battle of Zela in 47 BC – compresses conquest into three beats. In vino veritas, attributed to Pliny the Elder, locates truth in drunkenness. Per aspera ad astra provides the aspirational vertical counterpart to ad maiora‘s forward momentum.
What distinguishes ad maiora semper from these cousins is its temporal scope. Carpe diem addresses the present moment. Veni, vidi, vici records a completed event. Ad maiora semper projects indefinitely – it is not about today or tomorrow but about the permanent orientation of a life or an institution toward improvement. The semper at its close converts a philosophical position into a programme.
UK English Note
In British usage, the phrase is typically rendered without a full stop and capitalised only at the beginning when used in running text, or in all capitals when inscribed. The Latin itself does not change between British and American English conventions, but the institutional contexts in which it appears – Sandhurst traditions, Oxbridge college heraldry, Commonwealth military culture – give it a particular resonance in the United Kingdom. The phrase appears on plaques, regimental colours, and academic certificates across the British Isles and the Commonwealth – a linguistic inheritance shaped by the Roman Catholic educational tradition that influenced British public schooling for centuries.
The Latin maior gave English the word “major” and its opposite “minor,” through the comparative form. Every time someone says “majority” or “mayor,” they are using a word shaped by the same root that makes maiora mean what it means. The language of Roman ambition did not survive the fall of Rome by accident. It survived because the institutions that inherited Roman culture – the Church, the universities, the militaries – needed words for the project of perpetual improvement. Ad maiora semper provided exactly that. As with many motivational phrases that endure across centuries, its power lies in compression: three words that encode an entire philosophy of forward motion. The impulse to inscribe such short beautiful phrases on buildings, medals, and letterheads reflects a human need to give permanent form to transient feeling – to make aspiration legible beyond the moment of its arising.
