Aeschylus Quotes (163 Quotes)

God loves to help him who strives to help himself.

A prosperous fool is a grievous burden.

Only when man's life comes to end in prosperity can one call that man happy.

There is no disgrace in an enemy suffering ill at an enemy's hand, when you hate mutually.

I willingly speak to those who know, but for those who do not know I forget.

Bronze is the mirror of the form wine, of the heart.

Only when a man's life comes to its end in prosperity dare we pronounce him happy.

God's most lordly gift to man is decency of mind.

Bronze in the mirror of the form, wine of the mind.

Justice turns the scale, bringing to some learning through suffering.

The man whose authority is recent is always stern.

It is a light thing for whoever keeps his foot outside trouble to advise and counsel him that suffers.

The man who does ill must suffer ill.

Time as he grows old teaches many lessons.

Too few rejoice at a friend's good fortune.

For somehow this disease inheres in tyranny, never to trust one's friends.

Who holds a power but newly gained is ever stern of mood.

Drop, drop in our sleep, upon the heart sorrow falls, memory's pain, and to us, though against our very will, even in our own despite, comes wisdom by the awful grace of God. The above lines are from Edith Hamilton, translator, Three Greek Plays, p. 170 (1937). Other translations of this passage from Aeschylus vary. Robert F. Kennedy, delivering an extemporaneous eulogy to Martin Luther King, Jr., the evening of April 4, 1968, in Indianapolis, Indiana, said, 'Aeschylus wrote 'In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.' These words, lacking 'own,' have been used as one of the inscriptions at the Robert F. Kennedy gravesite in Arlington National Cemetery.

For only Zeus is free.

I know how men in exile feed on dreams.

Death is softer by far than tyranny.

Memory is the mother of all wisdom.

For the impious act begets more after it, like to the parent stock.

Be bold and boast, just like the cock beside the hen.

The anvil of justice is planted firm, and fate who makes the sword does the forging in advance.

Neither a life of anarchy nor one beneath a despot should you praise; to all that lies in the middle a god has given excellence.

It is an easy thing for one whose foot is on the outside of calamity to give advice and to rebuke the sufferer.

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

God lends a helping hand to the man who tries hard.

God always strives together with those who strive.

We must pronounce him fortunate who has ended his life in fair prosperity.

Destiny waits alike for the free man as well as for him enslaved by another's might.

A god implants in mortal guilt whenever he wants utterly to confound a house.

Self-will in the man who does not reckon wisely is by itself the weakest of all things.

God is not averse to deceit in a holy cause.

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

In the lack of judgment great harm arises, but one vote cast can set right a house.

Ask the gods nothing excessive.

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

Learning is ever in the freshness of its youth, even for the old.

The evils of mortals are manifold; nowhere is trouble of the same wing seen.

Happiness is a choice that requires effort at times.

Death is easier than a wretched life; and better never to have born than to live and fare badly.

Excessive fear is always powerless.

On me the tempest falls. It does not make me tremble. O holy Mother Earth, O air and sun, behold me. I am wronged.

Since long I've held silence a remedy for harm.

I pray for no more youth To perish before its prime That Revenge and iron-heated War May fade with all that has gone before Into the night of time. Senator Edward Kennedy quoted this passage in testimony before the Commission on Campus Unrest, July 15, 1970. Congressional Record, vol. 116, p. 24309.

For this is the mark of a wise and upright man, not to rail against the gods in misfortune.

Who apart from the gods is without pain for his whole lifetime's length?

Exiles feed on hope.