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When tremendous dangers are involved, no one can be blamed for looking to his own interest.

Thucydides

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
It is useless to attack men who could not be controlled even if conquered, while failure would leave us in an even worse position.
THUCYDIDES

Attack Conquer Control Failure Man Position Worst
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
Knowledge without understanding is useless.
THUCYDIDES

Knowledge Understand Wasted
They whose minds are least sensitive to calamity, and whose hands are most quick to meet it, are the greatest men and the greatest communities.
THUCYDIDES

Calm Community Greatness Hands Man Mindset Sensitive
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.
THUCYDIDES

Essay Moments Myself Possession Time Win Writing
Wars spring from unseen and generally insignificant causes, the first outbreak being often but an explosion of anger.
THUCYDIDES

Angry Break Reason See War
The secret of happiness is freedom and the secret of freedom is courage.
THUCYDIDES

Courage Freedom Happiness Secret
The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Sparta, made war inevitable.
THUCYDIDES

Alarm Growth Power War
I have often before now been convinced that a democracy is incapable of empire.
THUCYDIDES

Capable Democracy Empire
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
An avowal of poverty is no disgrace to any man; to make no effort to escape it is indeed disgraceful.
THUCYDIDES

Effort Escape Grace Man Poverty
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.
THUCYDIDES

Ambition Content Engagement Evil Lust Party Power Rise Violence
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.
THUCYDIDES

Blame Himself Liberty Power Prevent Right
So little trouble do men take in the search after truth; so readily do they accept whatever comes first to hand.
THUCYDIDES

Acceptance Hands Man Search Trouble Truth
The whole earth is the sepulchre of famous men.
THUCYDIDES

Earth Fame Famous Man Place

When tremendous dangers are involved, no one can be blamed for looking to his own interest.

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When tremendous dangers are involved, no one can be blamed for looking to his own interest.

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