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.
THUCYDIDESWar is a matter not so much of arms as of money.
More Thucydides Quotes
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Of all manifestations of power, restraint impresses men most.
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Knowledge without understanding is useless.
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Remember that this greatness was won by men with courage, with knowledge of their duty, and with a sense of honor in action.
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The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Sparta, made war inevitable.
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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.
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Speculation is carried on in safety, but, when it comes to action, fear causes failure.
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It is a common mistake in going to war to begin at the wrong end, to act first, and wait for disasters to discuss the matter.
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So little trouble do men take in the search after truth; so readily do they accept whatever comes first to hand.
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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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Right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.
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Hope, danger’s comforter.
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In a democracy, someone who fails to get elected to office can always console himself with the thought that there was something not quite fair about it.
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When a man finds a conclusion agreeable, he accepts it without argument, but when he finds it disagreeable, he will bring against it all the forces of logic and reason.
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Most people, in fact, will not take the trouble in finding out the truth, but are much more inclined to accept the first story they hear.
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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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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
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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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I have often before now been convinced that a democracy is incapable of empire.
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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.
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We Greeks are lovers of the beautiful, yet simple in our tastes, and we cultivate the mind without loss of manliness.
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Stories happen to those who tell them.
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We secure our friends not by accepting favours but by doing them.
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Self-control is the chief element in self-respect, and respect of self, in turn, is the chief element in courage.
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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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You should punish in the same manner those who commit crimes with those who accuse falsely.
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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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