black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

It is men who make a city, not walls or ships.

Thucydides

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

Blame Dangerous Interest
We secure our friends not by accepting favours but by doing them.
THUCYDIDES

Acceptance Action Friendship Security
But the prize for courage will surely be awarded most justly to those who best know the difference between hardship and pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink from danger.
THUCYDIDES

Award Best Courage Dangerous Difference Hard Time Prize Temptation
Wars spring from unseen and generally insignificant causes, the first outbreak being often but an explosion of anger.
THUCYDIDES

Angry Break Reason See War
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
You should punish in the same manner those who commit crimes with those who accuse falsely.
THUCYDIDES

Commitment Crime Fake Punishment
Still hope leads men to venture; and no one ever yet put himself in peril without the inward conviction that he would succeed in his design.
THUCYDIDES

Design Hope Man Misery Success
The Thracian people, like the bloodiest of the barbarians, being ever most murderous when it has nothing to fear.
THUCYDIDES

Blood Fear Murder Nature People
We Greeks are lovers of the beautiful, yet simple in our tastes, and we cultivate the mind without loss of manliness.
THUCYDIDES

Beautiful Cultivate Loss Lover Man Simplicity
Knowledge without understanding is useless.
THUCYDIDES

Knowledge Understand Wasted
Few things are brought to a successful issue by impetuous desire, but most by calm and prudent forethought.
THUCYDIDES

Desire Issues Success Thinking
When will there be justice in Athens? There will be justice in Athens when those who are not injured are as outraged as those who are.
THUCYDIDES

Angry Hurt Injury Justice
It is a general rule of human nature that people despise those who treat them well, and look up to those who make no concessions.
THUCYDIDES

Concession Human Nature People Rule Treat
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
War is a matter not so much of arms as of money.
THUCYDIDES

Arms Money War

It is men who make a city, not walls or ships.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

It is men who make a city, not walls or ships.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Thucydides Quotes