All Quotes

"Feel the pain, let it go, and move on."

"Do good things today. It may not change the world but it changes you."

"Don't be afraid to go to the edge. Going to the edge is exciting, and jumping is doubly exciting."

"You cannot impose your faith. You cannot impose your parenting style. You cannot impose yourself on us."

"I want to remember, but I don't want to be obsessed by them."

"Non, La Harpe au Serpent n'a jamais ressemble; Le Serpent siffle, et La Harpe est sifflé."

"Chloé, belle et poète, a deux petits travers: Elle fait son visage et ne fait pas ses vers."

"Bon Dieu! l'aimable siècle où l'homme dit à l'homme, Soyons frères—ou je t'assomme."

"L'esprit est le dieu des instans, Le génie est le dieu des âges."

"L'hymen est une maladie Qui n'a qu'une remède, l'Amour."

"Le papillon est une fleur qui vole, La fleur un papillon fixé."

"Le plus fidèle traducteur Est celui qui semble moins l'être. Qui suit pas à pas son auteur, N'est qu'un valet qui suit son maître."

"Nous avons de si riches plaines, Et de si fertiles côteaux, Disait un Gascon de Bordeaux, Que si l'on y plantait des gaines, Il y pousserait des couteaux."

"Oh, le maudit bavard! oh, le sot érudit! Il dit tout ce qu'il sait, et ne sait ce qu'il dit."

"Rien n'est plus sot, Domergue, qu'un sot rire."

"Et c'est dans la première flamme Qu'est tout le nectar du baiser."

"L'aimable siècle où l'homme dit à l'homme, Soyons frères, ou je t'assomme."

"Man is the crowning of history and the realization of poetry, the free and living bond which unites all nature to that God who created it for Himself."

"Aye, think! Since time and life began, Your mind has only feared and slept; Of all the beasts they called you man Only because you toiled and wept."

"When the Spartans accused the Thebans of a long list of serious offences, he retorted, "These Thebans, however, have put a stop to your brevity of speech!""

"When somebody reported that the Athenians had sent an army, decked out with novel equipment, into the Pelopennese, he said, "Why should Antigenidas cry if Tellen has a new flute or two?" (Tellen was the worst of flute-players, and Antigenidas the best.)"

"Learning that his shield-bearer had received a great deal of money from a man who had been taken captive in the war, he said to him, "Give me back my shield, and buy yourself a tavern in which to spend the rest of your days ; for you will no longer be willing to face danger as before, now that you have become one of the rich and prosperous.""

"His indifference to money was put to the proof by Diomedon of Cyzicus; for he, at the request of , had undertaken to bribe Epaminondas. He accordingly came to Thebes with a large sum in gold, and, by a present of five talents, brought over Micythus, a young man for whom Epaminondas had then a great affection, to further his views. Micythus went to Epaminondas, and told him the cause of Diomedon's coming. But Epaminondas, in the presence of Diomedon, said to him, "There is no need of money in the matter; for if what the king desires is for the good of the Thebans, I am ready to do it for nothing; but if otherwise, he has not gold and silver enough to move me, for I would not accept the riches of the whole world in exchange for my love for my country.""

"Epaminondas is reported wittily to have said of a good man that died about the time of the battle of Leuctra, "How came he to have so much leisure as to die, when there was so much stirring?""

"He was so frugal in his manner of living that once, when he was invited to dinner by a neighbour, and found there an elaborate display of cake and pastry and other dishes, and perfumes as well, he left at once, saying, "I thought this was to be a meal and not a display of arrogance.""

"On the statue of Epaminondas is an inscription in elegiac verse relating among other things that he founded Messene, and that through him the Greeks won freedom. The elegiac verses are these: By my counsels was Sparta shorn of her glory, And holy received at last her children. By the arms of Thebe was Megalopolis encircled with walls, And all Greece won independence and freedom."

"Spintharus, speaking in commendation of Epaminondas, says he scarce ever met with any man who knew more and spoke less."

"I find so vast a distance betwixt Epaminondas, according to my judgment of him, and some that I know, who are yet men of good sense, that I could willingly enhance upon Plutarch, and say that there is more difference betwixt such and such a man than there is betwixt such a man and such a beast: and that there are as many and innumerable degrees of mind as there are cubits betwixt this and heaven."

"Of this virtue of his, he has, in my idea, given as ample proof as Alexander himself or Caesar: for although his warlike exploits were neither so frequent nor so full, they were yet, if duly considered in all their circumstances, as important, as bravely fought, and carried with them as manifest testimony of valour and military conduct, as those of any whatever."

"The Greeks have done him the honour, without contradiction, to pronounce him the greatest man of their nation; and to be the first of Greece, is easily to be the first of the world. As to his knowledge, we have this ancient judgment of him, "That never any man knew so much, and spake so little as he"; for he was of the Pythagorean sect; but when he did speak, never any man spake better; an excellent orator, and of powerful persuasion."

"'Tis true that I look upon his obstinate poverty, as it is set out by his best friends, as a little too scrupulous and nice; and this is the only feature, though high in itself and well worthy of admiration, that I find so rugged as not to desire to imitate, to the degree it was in him."

"This was a soul of a rich composition: he married goodness and humanity, nay, even the tenderest and most delicate in the whole school of philosophy, to the roughest and most violent human actions. Was it nature or art that had intenerated that great courage of his, so full, so obstinate against pain and death and poverty, to such an extreme degree of sweetness and compassion? Dreadful in arms and blood, he overran and subdued a nation invincible by all others but by him alone; and yet in the heat of an encounter, could turn aside from his friend and guest. Certainly he was fit to command in war who could so rein himself with the curb of good nature, in the height and heat of his fury, a fury inflamed and foaming with blood and slaughter. ‘Tis a miracle to be able to mix any image of justice with such violent actions: and it was only possible for such a steadfastness of mind as that of Epaminondas therein to mix sweetness and the facility of the gentlest manners and purest innocence."

"Relaxation and facility, methinks, wonderfully honour and best become a strong and generous soul. Epaminondas did not think that to take part, and that heartily, in songs and sports and dances with the young men of his city, were things that in any way derogated from the honour of his glorious victories and the perfect purity of manners that was in him."

"He was so great a lover of truth, that he would not tell a falsehood even in jest."

"He bore poverty so easily, that he received nothing from the state but glory. He did not avail himself of the means of his friends to maintain himself; but he often used his credit to relieve others, to such a degree that it might be thought all things were in common between him and his friends; for when any one of his countrymen had been taken by the enemy, or when the marriageable daughter of a friend could not be married for want of fortune, he used to call a council of his friends, and to prescribe how much each should give according to his means; and when he had made up the sum required, he brought the man who wanted it to those who contributed, and made them pay it to the person himself, in order that he, into whose hands the sum passed, might know to whom he was indebted, and how much to each."

"Would you end war? Create great Peace."

"To be a god First I must be a god-maker: We are what we create."

"His eloquence shone most at Sparta (when he was ambassador before the battle of Leuctra), where, when the ambassadors from all the allies had met, Epaminondas, in a full assembly of the embassies, so clearly exposed the tyranny of the Lacedaemonians, that he shook their power by that speech not less than by the battle of Leuctra; for he was at that time the cause (as it afterwards appeared) that they were deprived of the support of their allies."

"Epameinondas, however, was carried back to camp still living, and the physicians were summoned, but when they declared that undoubtedly as soon as the spear-point should be drawn from his chest, death would ensue, with supreme courage he met his end. For first summoning his armour-bearer he asked him if he had saved his shield. On his replying yes and placing it before his eyes, he again asked, which side was victorious. At the boy's answer that the Boeotians were victorious, he said, "It is time to die," and directed them to withdraw the spear point. His friends present cried out in protest, and one of them said: "You die childless, Epameinondas," and burst into tears. To this he replied, "No, by Zeus, on the contrary I leave behind two daughters, Leuctra and Mantineia, my victories." Then when the spear point was withdrawn, without any commotion he breathed his last."

"I have more confidence in the charity which begins in the home and diverges into a large humanity, than in the worldwide philanthropy which begins at the outside of our horizon to converge into egotism."

"As the rolling stone gathers no moss, so the roving heart gathers no affections."

"A man may be as much a fool from the want of sensibility as the want of sense."

"The true purpose of education is to cherish and unfold the seed of immortality already sown within us; to develop, to their fullest extent, the capacities of every kind with which the God who made us has endowed us."

"Piety in art—poetry in art—Puseyism in art—let us be careful how we confound them."

"He that seeks popularity in art closes the door on his own genius: as he must needs paint for other minds, and not for his own."

"Reputation is but a synonyme of popularity: dependent on suffrage, to be increased or diminished at the will of the voters."

"Reputation being essentially contemporaneous, is always at the mercy of the Envious and the Ignorant. But Fame, whose very birth is posthumous, and which is only known to exist by the echo of its footsteps through congenial minds, can neither be increased nor diminished by any degree of wilfulness."

"Fame has no necessary conjunction with praise: it may exist without the breath of a word: it is a recognition of excellence which must be felt but need not be spoken. Even the envious must feel it: feel it, and hate it in silence."

"The only competition worthy a wise man is with himself."

"Les hommes font les lois. Les femmes font les mœurs."