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Speculation is carried on in safety, but, when it comes to action, fear causes failure.

Thucydides

Amassing of wealth is an opportunity for good deeds, not hubris.
THUCYDIDES

Action Goodness Opportunity Wealth
Men’s indignation, it seems, is more exited by legal wrong than by violent wrong; the first looks like being cheated by an equal, the second like being compelled by a superior.
THUCYDIDES

Equality Exit Legal Man Superior Violence
We secure our friends not by accepting favours but by doing them.
THUCYDIDES

Acceptance Action Friendship Security
Men do not rest content with parrying the attacks of a superior, but often strike the first blow to prevent the attack being made.
THUCYDIDES

Attack Man Prevent Rest Superior
The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Sparta, made war inevitable.
THUCYDIDES

Alarm Growth Power War
It is men who make a city, not walls or ships.
THUCYDIDES

Infrastructure Man Wall
I think the two things most opposed to good counsel are haste and passion; haste usaully goes hand in hand with folly, passion with coarseness and narrowness of mind.
THUCYDIDES

Goodness Hands Mindset Passion Thinking
Love of power, operating through greed and through personal ambition, was the cause of all these evils.
THUCYDIDES

Ambition Evil Love Operation Personal Power Reason
What made the war inevitable was the growth of Athenian power and the fear which this caused in Sparta.
THUCYDIDES

Fear Growth Reason War
We know that there can never be any solid friendship between individuals, or union between communities that is worth the name, unless the parties be persuaded of each others honesty
THUCYDIDES

Community Each Other Friendship Honesty Name Party Solid Worth
The peoples of the Mediterranean began to emerge from barbarism when they learned to cultivate the olive and the vine.
THUCYDIDES

Beginning Cultivation Learning People
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.
THUCYDIDES

Brave Dangerous Happiness Pain Spirit
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.
THUCYDIDES

Desire Habit Hope Kind Man Reason
The whole earth is the sepulchre of famous men.
THUCYDIDES

Earth Fame Famous Man Place
Of the gods we believe, and of men we know, that by a necessary law of their nature they rule wherever they can.
THUCYDIDES

Believe God Law Man Nature Necessary Rule
Now the only sure basis of an alliance is for each party to be equally afraid of the other.
THUCYDIDES

Afraid Basis Equality Fear Party

Speculation is carried on in safety, but, when it comes to action, fear causes failure.

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Speculation is carried on in safety, but, when it comes to action, fear causes failure.

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Popular Authors

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