Thucydides - Men Quotes

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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
Indeed it is generally the case that men are readier to call rogues clever than simpletons honest, and are ashamed of being the second as they are proud of being the first.

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

Thucydides
I could have wished that the reputations of many brave men were not to be imperilled in the mouth of a single individual, to stand or fall according as he spoke well or ill. For it is hard to speak properly upon a subject where it is even difficult to convince your hearers that you are speaking the truth.

Thucydides
The Peloponnesian War turns out to be no dry chronicle of abstract cause and effect. No, it is above all an intense, riveting, and timeless story of strong and weak men, of heroes and scoundrels and innocents too, all caught in the fateful circumstances of rebellion, plague, and war that always strip away the veneer of culture and show us for what we really are.

Thucydides
Remember that this greatness was won by men with courage, with knowledge of their duty, and with a sense of honor in action.

Thucydides
For men can endure to hear others praised only so long as they can severally persuade themselves of their own ability to equal the actions recounted: when this point is passed, envy comes in and with it incredulity.

Thucydides
Indeed men too often take upon themselves in the prosecution of their revenge to set the example of doing away with those general laws to which all can look for salvation in adversity, instead of allowing them to subsist against the day of danger when their aid may be required

Thucydides
We must march against the enemy, and teach him that he must go and get what he wants by attacking someone who will not resist him, but that men whose glory it is to be always ready to give battle for the liberty of their own country, and never unjustly to enslave that of others, will not let him go without a struggle.

Thucydides
If it had not been for the pernicious power of envy, men would not so have exalted vengeance above innocence and profit above justice... in these acts of revenge on others, men take it upon themselves to begin the process of repealing those general laws of humanity which are there to give a hope of salvation to all who are in distress.

Thucydides
Men make the city, and not walls or ships without men in them.

Thucydides
As for democracy, the men of sense among us knew what it was, and I perhaps as well as any, as I have more cause to complain of it; but there is nothing new to be said of a patent absurdity-meanwhile we did not think it safe to alter it under the pressure of your hostility.

Thucydides
Of all manifestations of power, restraint impresses men most.

Thucydides
For men naturally despise those who court them, but respect those who do not give way to them.

Thucydides
When men are once checked in what they consider their special excellence, their whole opinion of themselves suffers more than if they had not at first believed in their superiority, the unexpected shock to their pride causing them to give way more than their real strength warrants; and that is probably now the case with the Athenians.

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

Thucydides
Of the gods we believe, and of men we know, that by a necessary law of their nature they rule wherever they can.

Thucydides
Great is the glory of the woman who occasions the least talk among men, whether of praise or of blame.

Thucydides
In peace and prosperity states and individuals have better sentiments, because they do not find themselves suddenly confronted with imperious necessities; but war takes away the easy supply of daily wants and so proves a rough master that brings most men's characters to a level with their fortunes

Thucydides