Sophocles Quotes

“A human being is only breath and shadow.”

“A lie never lives to be old.”

“A man growing old becomes a child again.”

“A soul that is kind and intends justice discovers more than any sophist.”

“A state is not a state if it belongs to one man.”

“A wise man does not chatter with one whose mind is sick.”

“Alas, how quickly the gratitude owed to the dead flows off, how quick to be proved a deceiver.”

“All a man's affairs become diseased when he wishes to cure evils by evils.”

“Always desire to learn something useful.”

“Best to live lightly, unthinkingly.”

“Children are the anchors that hold a mother to life.”

“Despair often breeds disease.”

“Enemies' gifts are no gifts and do no good.”

“Even a poor man can receive honors.”

“Foolishness is indeed the sister of wickedness.”

“For death is not the worst, but when one wants to die and is not able even to have that.”

“For the wretched one night is like a thousand; for someone faring well, death is just one more night.”

“Fortune cannot aid those who do nothing.”

“He who throws away a friend is as bad as he who throws away his life.”

“Hide nothing, for time, which sees all and hears all, exposes all.”

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

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

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

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

“If my body is enslaved, still my mind is free.”

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

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

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

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

“In a just cause the weak will beat the strong.”