Sophocles Quotes
Quotations and aphorisms by Sophocles:
A human being is only breath and shadow.
~Sophocles
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Men may know many things by seeing; but no prophet can see before the event, nor what end waits for him.
~Sophocles
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If we are to keep our democracy, there must be one commandment: 'Thou shalt not ration justice.'
~Sophocles
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Not to be born is, past all prizing, best.
~Sophocles
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War never takes a wicked man by chance, the good man always.
~Sophocles
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Old age and the passage of time teach all things.
~Sophocles
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Look and you will find it - what is unsought will go undetected.
~Sophocles
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A lie never lives to be old.
~Sophocles
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A man growing old becomes a child again.
~Sophocles
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You should not consider a man's age but his acts.
~Sophocles
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A day lays low and lifts up again all human things.
~Sophocles
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How sweet for those faring badly to forget their misfortunes even for a short time.
~Sophocles
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To him who is in fear everything rustles.
~Sophocles
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It's impossible to speak what it is not noble to do.
~Sophocles
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A wise man does not chatter with one whose mind is sick.
~Sophocles
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Without labor nothing prospers.
~Sophocles
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Our happiness depends on wisdom all the way.
~Sophocles
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A soul that is kind and intends justice discovers more than any sophist.
~Sophocles
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Much wisdom often goes with fewest words.
~Sophocles
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The rewards of virtue alone abide secure.
~Sophocles
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Do not grieve yourself too much for those you hate, nor yet forget them utterly.
~Sophocles
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Trust dies but mistrust blossoms.
~Sophocles
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The gods plant reason in mankind, of all good gifts the highest.
~Sophocles
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Even a poor man can receive honors.
~Sophocles
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No lie ever reaches old age.
~Sophocles
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I would prefer even to fail with honor than win by cheating.
~Sophocles
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What house, bloated with luxury, ever became prosperous without a woman's excellence?
~Sophocles
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Evil gains work their punishment.
~Sophocles
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How dreadful knowledge of the truth can be when there's no help in the truth.
~Sophocles
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One word frees us of all the weight and pain in life. That word is love.
~Sophocles
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God's dice always have a lucky roll.
~Sophocles
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You win the victory when you yield to friends.
~Sophocles
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Every man can see things far off but is blind to what is near.
~Sophocles
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Whoever thinks his friend more important than his country, I rate him nowhere.
~Sophocles
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All is disgust when a man leaves his own nature and does what is unfit.
~Sophocles
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Much speech is one thing, well-timed speech is another.
~Sophocles
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I see the state of all of us who live, nothing more than phantoms or a weightless shadow.
~Sophocles
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Whoever gets up and comes to grips with Love like a boxer is a fool.
~Sophocles
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For the dead there are no more toils.
~Sophocles
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I would rather miss the mark acting well than win the day acting basely.
~Sophocles
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Rather fail with honor than succeed by fraud.
~Sophocles
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No enemy is worse than bad advice.
~Sophocles
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Despair often breeds disease.
~Sophocles
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No one longs to live more than someone growing old.
~Sophocles
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For shameful deeds are taught by shameful deeds.
~Sophocles
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Children are the anchors that hold a mother to life.
~Sophocles
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Things gained through unjust fraud are never secure.
~Sophocles
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There is no sense in crying over spilt milk. Why bewail what is done and cannot be recalled?
~Sophocles
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It is the task of a good man to help those in misfortune.
~Sophocles
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Wisdom is the supreme part of happiness.
~Sophocles
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Evil counsel travels fast.
~Sophocles
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For death is not the worst, but when one wants to die and is not able even to have that.
~Sophocles
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To be doing good deeds is man's most glorious task.
~Sophocles
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If my body is enslaved, still my mind is free.
~Sophocles
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Fortune cannot aid those who do nothing.
~Sophocles
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Man is not constituted to take pleasure in the same things always.
~Sophocles
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Better not to exist than live basely.
~Sophocles
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To live without evil belongs only to the gods.
~Sophocles
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Enemies' gifts are no gifts and do no good.
~Sophocles
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There are some who praise a man free from disease; to me no man who is poor seems free from disease but to be constantly sick.
~Sophocles
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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.
~Sophocles
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For those whose wit becomes the mother of villainy, those it educates to be evil in all things.
~Sophocles
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Ignorant men don't know what good they hold in their hands until they've flung it away.
~Sophocles
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Foolishness is indeed the sister of wickedness.
~Sophocles
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No man loves the bearer of bad tidings.
~Sophocles
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It is the merit of a general to impart good news, and to conceal the truth.
~Sophocles
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It is best to live however one can be.
~Sophocles
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For the wretched one night is like a thousand; for someone faring well death is just one more night.
~Sophocles
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Always desire to learn something useful.
~Sophocles
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Not even Ares battles against necessity.
~Sophocles
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Not knowing anything is the sweetest life.
~Sophocles
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It was my care to make my life illustrious not by words more than by deeds.
~Sophocles
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Deem no man happy until he passes the edo fhis life without suffering grief.
~Sophocles
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Quick decisions are unsafe decisions.
~Sophocles
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Fortune raises up and fortune brings low both the man who fares well and the one who fares badly; and there is no prophet of the future for mortal men.
~Sophocles
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When trouble ends even troubles please.
~Sophocles
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Silence is an ornament for women.
~Sophocles
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There is a point at which even justice does injury.
~Sophocles
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He who throws away a friend is as bad as he who throws away his life.
~Sophocles
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Now I see that going out into the testing ground of men it is the tongue and not the deed that wins the day.
~Sophocles
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If one begins all deeds well, it is likely that they will end well too.
~Sophocles
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The dice of Zeus always fall luckily.
~Sophocles
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A wise doctor does not mutter incantations over a sore that needs the knife.
~Sophocles
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Don't you know that silence supports the accuser's charge?
~Sophocles
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The keenest sorrow is to recognize ourselves as the sole cause of all our adversities.
~Sophocles
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Whoever grows angry amid troubles applies a drug worse than the disease and is a physician unskilled about misfortunes.
~Sophocles
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Gratitude to gratitude always gives birth.
~Sophocles
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But whoever gives birth to useless children, what would you say of him except that he has bred sorrows for himself, and furnishes laughter for his enemies.
~Sophocles
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Men should pledge themselves to nothing; for reflection makes a liar of their resolution.
~Sophocles
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Whoever neglects the arts when he is young has lost the past and is dead to the future.
~Sophocles
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Time alone reveals the just man; but you might discern a bad man in a single day.
~Sophocles
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Whoever thinks that he alone has speech, or possesses speech or mind above others, when unfolded such men are seen to be empty.
~Sophocles
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To give birth is a fearsome thing; there is no hating the child one has borne even when injured by it.
~Sophocles
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Best to live lightly, unthinkingly.
~Sophocles
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There is a time when even justice brings harm.
~Sophocles
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There is no greater evil for men than the constraint of fortune.
~Sophocles
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Hide nothing, for time, which sees all and hears all, exposes all.
~Sophocles
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A short saying often contains much wisdom.
~Sophocles
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Bear up, my child, bear up; Zeus who oversees and directs all things is still mighty in heaven.
~Sophocles
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There is some pleasure even in words, when they bring forgetfulness of present miseries.
~Sophocles
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There is nothing more hateful than bad advice.
~Sophocles
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A state is not a state if it belongs to one man.
~Sophocles
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Who seeks shall find.
~Sophocles
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Kindness is ever the begetter of kindness.
~Sophocles
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When a man has lost all happiness, he's not alive. Call him a breathing corpse.
~Sophocles
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Those whose life is long still strive for gain, and for all mortals all things take second place to money.
~Sophocles
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Men of ill judgment ignore the good that lies within their hands, till they have lost it.
~Sophocles
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All a man's affairs become diseased when he wishes to cure evils by evils.
~Sophocles
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Hush! Check those words. Do not cure ill with ill and make your pain still heavier than it is.
~Sophocles
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Reason is God's crowning gift to man.
~Sophocles
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There is no greater evil than anarchy.
~Sophocles
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But this is a true saying among men: the gifts of enemies are no gifts and profitless.
~Sophocles
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Profit is sweet, even if it comes from deception.
~Sophocles
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Alas, how quickly the gratitude owed to the dead flows off, how quick to be proved a deceiver.
~Sophocles
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There is no success without hardship.
~Sophocles
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It's a terrible thing to speak well and be wrong.
~Sophocles
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Money is the worst currency that ever grew among mankind. This sacks cities, this drives men from their homes, this teaches and corrupts the worthiest minds to turn base deeds.
~Sophocles
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It is terrible to speak well and be wrong.
~Sophocles
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There is an ancient saying among men that you cannot thoroughly understand the life of mortals before the man has died, then only can you call it good or bad.
~Sophocles
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Success is dependent on effort.
~Sophocles
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Not all things are to be discovered; many are better concealed.
~Sophocles
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No speech can stain what is noble by nature.
~Sophocles
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If you were to offer a thirsty man all wisdom, you would not please him more than if you gave him a drink.
~Sophocles
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I see that all of us who live are nothing but images or insubstantial shadow.
~Sophocles
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Wise thinkers prevail everywhere.
~Sophocles
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Whoever lives among many evils just as I, how can dying not be a source of gain?
~Sophocles
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Reverence does not die with mortals, nor does it perish whether they live or die.
~Sophocles
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The oaths of a woman I inscribe on water.
~Sophocles
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No treaty is ever an impediment to a cheat.
~Sophocles
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Wisdom outweighs any wealth.
~Sophocles
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In a just cause the weak will beat the strong.
~Sophocles
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Whoever understands how to do a kindness when he fares well would be a friend better than any possession.
~Sophocles
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It is a base thing for a man among the people not to obey those in command. Never in a state can the laws be well administered when fear does not stand firm.
~Sophocles
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No one who errs unwillingly is evil.
~Sophocles
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If you have done terrible things, you must endure terrible things; for thus the sacred light of injustice shines bright.
~Sophocles
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There is no witness so terrible and no accuser so powerful as conscience which dwells within us.
~Sophocles
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Isn't it the sweetest mockery to mock our enemies?
~Sophocles
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One who knows how to show and to accept kindness will be a friend better than any possession.
~Sophocles
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A word does not frighten the man who, in acting, feels no fear.
~Sophocles
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Not even old age knows how to love death.
~Sophocles
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