Great Throughts Treasury

"How sweet for those faring badly to forget their misfortunes even for a short time."

"How dreadful knowledge of the truth can be when there's no help in the truth."

"How terrible-- to see the truth when the truth is only pain to him who sees!"

"Hush! Check those words. Do not cure ill with ill and make your pain still heavier than it is."

"I am ashamed, my friends, if ye deem me too impatient for my oft complaining; but, since a hard constraint forces me to this, bear with me. How indeed could any woman of noble nature refrain, who saw the calamities of a father's house, as I see them by day and night continually, not fading, but in the summer of their strength? I, who, first, from the mother that bore me have found bitter enmity; next, in mine own home I dwell with my father's murderers; they rule over me, and with them it rests to give or to withhold what I need."

"I am the child of Fortune, the giver of good, and I shall not be shamed. She is my mother; my sisters are the Seasons; my rising and my falling match with theirs. Born thus, I ask to be no other man than that I am."

"I am Fortune's child, not man's; her mother face hath ever smiled above me, and my brethren of the sky, the changing Moons, have changed me low and high. There is my lineage true, which none shall wrest from me; who then am I to fear this quest?"

"I do not hate - that I love, I am in the world."

"I didn't say yes. I can say no to anything I say vile, and I don't have to count the cost. But because you said yes, all that you can do, for all your crown and your trappings, and your guards?all that your can do is to have me killed."

"I do not feel love for love only with words... Do not die with me or you do yours an act you did not put your hand."

"I do not think your proclamations have such strength that allowed a deadly transgress the unwritten and immutable laws of the gods."

"I have been a stranger here in my own land: All my life."

"I have nothing but contempt for the kind of governor who is afraid, for whatever reason, to follow the course that he knows is best for the State; and as for the man who sets private friendship above the public welfare - I have no use for him either."

"I know not, but strained silence, so I deem, is no less ominous than excessive grief."

"I see that all of us who live are nothing but images or insubstantial shadow."

"I have no love for a friend who loves in words alone."

"I have no desire to suffer twice, in reality and then in retrospect."

"I will never reveal my dreadful secrets, or rather, yours."

"I was born to join in love, not hate - that is my nature."

"I will not wound myself nor thee. Why seek to trap and question me? I will not speak."

"I see the state of all of us who live, nothing more than phantoms or a weightless shadow."

"I was born to share love, not hate, said Antigone. Go then, and share your love for the dead, responds Creon."

"I would rather miss the mark acting well than win the day acting basely."

"I will suffer nothing as great as death without glory."

"I would prefer even to fail with honor than to win by cheating."

"If I am young, then you should look not to age but to deeds."

"If I am not an erring seer and one who fails in wisdom, justice, that hath sent the presage, will come, triumphant in her righteous strength,- will come ere long, my child, to avenge. There is courage in my heart, through those new tidings of the dream that breathes comfort. Not forgetful is thy sire, the lord of Hellas; not forgetful is the two-edged axe of bronze that struck the blow of old, and slew him with foul cruelty."

"If I am Sophocles, I am not mad; and if I am mad, I am not Sophocles."

"I, for one, prize less the name of king than deeds of kingly power; and so would all who learn in wisdom?s school."

"If it were possible to heal sorrow by weeping and to raise the dead with tears, gold were less prized than grief."

"If everything is well in early."

"If it were possible to cure evils by lamentation and to raise the dead with tears, then gold would be a less valuable thing than weeping."

"If my body is enslaved, still my mind is free."

"If one should say, this is the handiwork of some inhuman power, who could blame his judgment? But, ye pure and awful gods, forbid, forbid that I should see that day! May I be blotted out from living men ere such a plague spot set on me its brand!"

"If one begins all deeds well, it is likely that they will end well too."

"If we are to keep our democracy, there must be one commandment: Thou shalt not ration justice."

"If the person has so outrageous things in secret, you will not fall garlanded a shame."

"If only the curse fall on top of all the bad guys, but specifically on the person who commits the rough sinning does not befit his stature."

"If you are out of trouble, watch for danger."

"If you have done terrible things, you must endure terrible things; for thus the sacred light of injustice shines bright."

"Ignorant men don't know what good they hold in their hands until they've flung it away."

"If you were to offer a thirsty man all wisdom, you would not please him more than if you gave him a drink."

"In a just cause it is right to be confident."

"If you try to cure evil with evil you will add more pain to your fate."

"In a just cause the weak o'ercome the strong."

"In darkness one may be ashamed of what one does, without the shame of disgrace"

"In a just cause the weak will beat the strong."

"In his autumn before the winter comes man?s last mad surge of youth."

"In time you will know this well: For time, and time alone, will show the just man, though scoundrels are discovered in a day."

"In the ills of men there is none sorer than necessity."