Quote

speculation is carried on in safety, but, when it comes to action, fear causes failure.

Thucydides

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Thucydides
Historian
Causes
Fear
Comes
Action
Speculation
Carried
Safety
Failure

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Now the only sure basis of an alliance is for each party to be equally afraid of the other
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Men's indignation, it seems, is more exited by legal wrong than by violent wrong the first looks like being cheated by an equal, the second like being compelled by a superior.
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Knowledge without understanding is useless.
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The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Sparta, made war inevitable.
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For men naturally despise those who court them, but respect those who do not give way to them.
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I have written my work, not as an essay which is to win the applause of the moment, but as a possession for all time
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But the prize for courage will surely be awarded most justly to those who best know the difference between hardship and pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink from danger.
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In generosity we are equally singular, acquiring our friends by conferring, not by receiving, favours.
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For we both alike know that into the discussion of human affairs the question of justice enters only where the pressure of necessity is equal, and that the powerful exact what they can, and the weak grant what they must.
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I could have wished that the reputations of many brave men were not to be imperilled in the mouth of a single individual, to stand or fall according as he spoke well or ill. For it is hard to speak properly upon a subject where it is even difficult to convince your hearers that you are speaking the truth.
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The whole earth is the sepulchre of famous men.
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We secure our friends not by accepting favours but by doing them.
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Boasting and bravado may exist in the breast even of the coward, if he is successful through a mere lucky hit but a just contempt of an enemy can alone arise in those who feel that they are superior to their opponent by the prudence of their measures.
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The secret of happiness is freedom and the secret of freedom is courage.
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The superior gratification derived from the use and contemplation of costly and supposedly beautiful products is, commonly, in great measure a gratification of our sense of costliness masquerading under the name of beauty.
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Full of hopes beyond their power though not beyond their ambition.
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I think the two things most opposed to good counsel are haste and passion haste usaully goes hand in hand with folly, passion with coarseness and narrowness of mind.
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He passes through life most securely who has least reason to reproach himself with complaisance toward his enemies.
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