“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.”

It is from the greatest dangers that the greatest glory is to be won.

We Greeks are lovers of the beautiful, yet simple in our tastes, and we cultivate the mind without loss of manliness.

Human nature is the one constant through human history. It is always there.

War is a matter not so much of arms as of money.

The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Sparta, made war inevitable.

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

The whole earth is the sepulchre of famous men.

The Thracian people, like the bloodiest of the barbarians, being ever most murderous when it has nothing to fear.

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

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

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.

The secret of freedom, courage.

Of all manifestations of power, restraint impresses men most.

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.

Those who have experienced good and bad luck many times have every reason to be skeptical of successes.

So little trouble do men take in the search after truth; so readily do they accept whatever comes first to hand.

We must see that we are afraid of the thing we most desire, and so we live a mediocre life, never bringing to consummation the primary impulse of our heart.

I’m a normal human being. I don’t have any desire to change my body as a result of having had two kids. That’s a good thing, isn’t it?

If you have the desire and passion to do something, and it’s within God’s will, you will achieve it.

Angels, living light most glorious! Beneath the Godhead in burning desire in the darkness and mystery of creation you look on the eye of your God never taking your fill: What glorious pleasures take shape within you!

There’s a starting place. And that starting place for everyone is ambition. We’re all scared of that word today because they made it bad in the late ’80s. As if desire is not a good thing.

Every man desires to live long, but no man wishes to be old.

Where desire ends up causing suffering is when it fixates.

I write pretty much every day, but I don’t have any desire to publish anything.