For they had learned that true safety was to be found in long previous training, and not in eloquent exhortations uttered when they were going into action.
THUCYDIDESThree of the gravest failings, want of sense, of courage, or of vigilance.
More Thucydides Quotes
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Human nature is the one constant through human history. It is always there.
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History is Philosophy teaching by example.
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Don’t confuse meaning with truth.
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Hope is an expensive commodity. It makes better sense to be prepared.
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We Greeks believe that a man who takes no part in public affairs is not merely lazy, but good for nothing.
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Be convinced that to be happy means to be free and that to be free means to be brave. Therefore do not take lightly the perils of war.
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They are surely to be esteemed the bravest spirits who, having the clearest sense of both the pains and pleasures of life, do not on that account shrink from danger.
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For men naturally despise those who court them, but respect those who do not give way to them.
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I have written my work, not as an essay which is to win the applause of the moment, but as a possession for all time.
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And where the rewards for merit are greatest, there are found the best citizens.
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The strong do what they have to do and the weak accept what they have to accept.
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I am not blaming those who are resolved to rule, only those who show an even greater readiness to submit.
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When one is deprived of ones liberty, one is right in blaming not so much the man who puts the shackles on as the one who had the power to prevent him, but did not use it.
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Men do not rest content with parrying the attacks of a superior, but often strike the first blow to prevent the attack being made.
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Those who have experienced good and bad luck many times have every reason to be skeptical of successes.
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We must remember that one man is much the same as another, and that he is best who is trained in the severest school.
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And it is certain that those who do not yield to their equals, who keep terms with their superiors, and are moderate towards their inferiors, on the whole succeed best.
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Love of power, operating through greed and through personal ambition, was the cause of all these evils.
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The peoples of the Mediterranean began to emerge from barbarism when they learned to cultivate the olive and the vine.
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The cause of all these evils was the lust for power arising from greed and ambition; and from these passions proceeded the violence of parties once engaged in contention.
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Wars spring from unseen and generally insignificant causes, the first outbreak being often but an explosion of anger.
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Of all manifestations of power, restraint impresses men most.
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It is the habit of mankind to entrust to careless hope what they long for, and to use sovereign reason to thrust aside what they do not desire.
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The strength of an Army lies in strict discipline and undeviating obedience to its officers.
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People get into the habit of entrusting the things they desire to wishful thinking, and subjecting things they don’t desire to exhaustive thinking.
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Indeed it is generally the case that men are readier to call rogues clever than simpletons honest, and are ashamed of being the second as they are proud of being the first.
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