“Most honorable are services rendered to the State; even if they do not go beyond words, they are not to be despised.”

To hope for safety in flight, when you have turned away from the enemy the arms by which the body is defended, is indeed madness. In battle those who are most afraid are always in most danger; but courage is equivalent to rampart.

Not by vows nor by womanish prayers is the help of the gods obtained; success comes through vigilance, energy, wise counsel.

Among intellectual pursuits, one of the most useful is the recording of past events.

Few men desire liberty; most men wish only for a just master.

Necessity makes even the timid brave.

In battle it is the cowards who run the most risk; bravery is a rampart of defense.

The renown which riches or beauty confer is fleeting and frail mental excellence is a splendid and lasting possession.

Poor Britons, there is some good in them after all – they produced an oyster.

Of the cosmic Gods some make the world be, others animate it, others harmonize it, consisting as it does of different elements; the fourth class keep it when harmonized.

It is a law of human nature that in victory even the coward may boast of his prowess, while defeat injures the reputation even of the brave.

We employ the mind to rule, the body to serve.

To desire the same things and to reject the same things, constitutes true friendship.

Of the bodies in the cosmos, some imitate mind and move in orbits; some imitate soul and move in a straight line, fire and air upward, earth and water downward.

They envy the distinction I have won; let them therefore, envy my toils, my honesty, and the methods by which I gained it.

In my opinion, he only may be truly said to live and enjoy his being who is engaged in some laudable pursuit, and acquires a name by some illustrious action, or useful art.

The very life which we enjoy is short.

There is a story of an Oxford student who once remarked, “I despise all Americans, but have never met one I didn’t like.”

To my disappointment I now realized that to know all is not to forgive all. It is to despise everybody.

Foolish the doctor who despises the knowledge acquired by the ancients.

Of all our infirmities, the most savage is to despise our being.

If you value a man’s regard, strive with him. As to liking, you like your newspaper – and despise it.

We do not despise all those who have vices, but we do despise those that have no virtue.

First of all, Mets fans despise me.

Genius can never despise labour.