“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.”

Wars spring from unseen and generally insignificant causes, the first outbreak being often but an explosion of anger.

Love of power, operating through greed and through personal ambition, was the cause of all these evils.

The secret of happiness is freedom and the secret of freedom is courage.

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

We Greeks believe that a man who takes no part in public affairs is not merely lazy, but good for nothing.

knowing the secret of happiness to be freedom, and the secret of freedom a brave heart, not idly to stand aside from the enemy’s onset.

For so remarkably perverse is the nature of man that he despises whoever courts him, and admires whoever will not bend before him.

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.

Those who really deserve praise are the people who, while human enough to enjoy power, nevertheless pay more attention to justice than they are compelled to do by their situation.

Hope is an expensive commodity. It makes better sense to be prepared.

What made the war inevitable was the growth of Athenian power and the fear which this caused in Sparta.

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.

You shouldn’t feel sorry for the lifestyle you haven’t tasted, but for the one you are about to lose.

Concessions to adversaries only end in self reproach, and the more strictly they are avoided the greater will be the chance of security.

Three of the gravest failings, want of sense, of courage, or of vigilance.

Amassing of wealth is an opportunity for good deeds, not hubris.

Authenticity and sincerity were the most important unifying principles of all these apparently different essays.

Writers read essays and serious thinkers and serious readers… that is a small population.

Life is not a multiple choice test, it’s an open-book essay exam.

Every essay – the subject matter of every essay – is ultimately about the essayist; him or herself. That ultimately, every essayist is writing about his or her view of the world.

Life isn’t like coursework, baby. It’s one damn essay crisis after another.

There’s a Washington standard of casually putting things off the record. It’s really gone too far. I don’t know an easy way to turn it back.

I like English, and I like writing essays, and that kind of stuff.

Writing essays and teaching composition have helped me immensely in writing poetry, because they’ve forced me to focus on the structure of ideas.