Aeschylus

From BillionQuotes

Æschylus (525 BC - 456 BC) Greek Playwright

Attributed

• Appearances are a glimpse of the unseen.

• Call no man happy till he is dead.
  • Variant: Only when man's life comes to its end in prosperity can one call that man happy.
  • Variant: Hold him alone truly fortunate who has ended his life in happy well-being.

• Death is better, a milder fate than tyranny.
  • Variant: Death is softer by far than tyranny.

• Every ruler is harsh whose laws is new.
  • Variant: The man whose authority is recent is always stern.

• God is not averse to deceit in a holy cause.

• God loves to help him who strives to help himself.
  • Variant: To the man who himself strives earnestly, God also lends a helping hand.
  • Variant: When one is willing and eager, the Gods join in.
  • Variant: When a man's willing and eager the gods join in.

• Happiness is a choice that requires effort at times.

• He who goes unenvied shall not be admired.

• His resolve is not to seem, but to be, the best.

• • Variant: To be rather than to seem.

• I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope.

• I think the slain care little if they sleep or rise again.

• I would far rather be ignorant than wise in the foreboding of evil.

• In every tyrant's heart there springs in the end this poison, that he cannot trust a friend.
  • Variant: For somehow this is tyranny's disease, to trust no friends.

• In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.
  • Historical Note: This was quoted by Robert F Kennedy in his speech announcing the assassination of Martin Luther King on 4 April 1968.

• In war, truth is the first casualty.

• It is a profitable thing, if one is wise, to seem foolish.

• It is always in season for old men to learn.

• It is easy when we are in prosperity to give advice to the afflicted.
  • Variant: It is an easy thing for one whose foot is on the outside of calamity to give advice and to rebuke the sufferer.

• Better to die on your feet than live on your knees.

• It is in the character of very few men to honor without envy a friend who has prospered.

• It is not the oath that makes us believe the man, but the man the oath.

• It is the nature of mortals to kick a fallen man.

• Necessity is stronger far than art.

• So, in the Libyan fable it is told That once an eagle, stricken with a dart, Said, when he saw the fashion of the shaft, "With our own feathers, not by others' hand Are we now smitten."

• The meaning I picked, the one that changed my life: Overcome fear, behold wonder.

• The reward of suffering is experience.
  • Variant: Wisdom comes alone through suffering.
  • Variant: By suffering comes wisdom.

• The wisest of the wise may err.

• There are times when fear is good. It must keep its watchful place at the heart's controls.

• There is no sickness worse for me than words that to be kind must lie.

• Time brings all things to pass.
  • Variant: Time as he grows old teaches all things.

• To be fortunate is God, and more than God to mortals.

• To be free from evil thoughts is God's best gift.

• When a match has equal partners then I fear not.

• Who, except the gods, can live time through forever without any pain?

• Words are the physicians of a mind diseased.

---

---

bs:Eshil

de:Aischylos el:Αισχύλος it:Eschilo pl:Ajschylos pt:Ésquilo sl:Aishilos