Interesting Quotes by Sophocles
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Many are the wonders of the world, and none so wonderful as man.

You clearly hate to yield, but you will regret it when your anger has passed. Such natures are justly the hardest for themselves to bear.

War loves to seek its victims in the young.

It is only great souls that know how much glory there is in being good.

For most men friendship is a faithless harbor.

No greater evil can a man endure Than a bad wife, nor find a greater good Than one both good and wise; and each man speaks As judging by the experience of his life.

I should have praise and honor for what I have done: All these men here would praise me.
Were their lips not frozen shut with fear of you.
Ah the good fortune of kings. Licensed to say and do whatever the please. Antigone to Theben's king Creon.

What men have seen they know; But what shall come hereafter No man before the event can see, Nor what end waits for him.

To me no profitable speech sounds ill.

Ill-gotten gains work evil.

You drive me back down my desperation--that unclouded incurable never forgotten evil growing inside my life.

Having advanced to the limit of boldness, child, you have stumbled against the lofty pedestal of Justice.

Nobody loves life like an old man.

Fate has terrible power. You cannot escape it by wealth or war. No fort will keep it out, no ships outrun it.

The eyes of men love to pluck the blossoms from the faded flowers they turn away.

When an oath is taken ... the mind is more attentive; for it guards against two things, the reproach of friends and offence against the gods.

The truth is always the strongest argument.

To revive sorrow is cruel.

Yet I pity the poor wretch, though he's my enemy. He's yoked to an evil delusion, but the same fate could be mine. I see clearly: we who live are all phantoms, fleeing shadows.

Who seeks shall find.

Even the stout of heart shrink when they see the approach of death.

The sleep of a sick man has keen eyes. It is a sleep unsleeping.

Troubles hurt the most when they prove self-inflicted.

The only crime is pride.

The strongest iron, hardened in the fire, most often ends in scraps and shatterings.

Strike at a great man, and you will not miss.

Be a thrifty steward of thy goods.

Truly, to tell lies is not honorable; but when the truth entails tremendous ruin, to speak dishonorably is pardonable.

Remember, nothing succeeds without toil.

Man's worst ill is stubbornness of heart.

Stubbornness and stupidity are twins.

You see how when rivers are swollen in winter those trees that yield to the flood retain their branches, but those that offer resistance perish, trunk and all.

But when a god sends harm, no man can sidestep it, no matter how strong he may be.

What an ugly, loveless life for a girl.

There is an ancient saying, famous among men, that thou shouldst not judge fully of a man's life before he dieth, whether it should be called blest or wretched.

Men whose wit has been mother of villainy once have learned from it to be evil in all things.

Zeus detests above all the boasts of a proud tongue.

Fear? What has a man to do with fear? Chance rules our lives, and the future is all unknown. Best live as we may, from day to day.

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

Goodbye to the sun that shines for me no longer.

Ignorant men do not know what good they hold in their hands until they've flung it away.

Whom Jupiter would destroy he first drives mad.

Laziness is the mother of all evils.

I recommend...bread, meat, vegetables, and beer.

It has been hard, I know, my daughters, but one word alone wipes out all of the hardships: love.

The tyrant is a child of pride.

The end excuses any evil.

All concerns of men go wrong when they wish to cure evil with evil.

You must remember that no one lives a life free from pain and suffering.

Silence gives the proper grace to women.

When I have tried and failed, I shall have failed.

What do I care for life when you are dead?

Heaven never helps the man who will not help himself.

The happiest life consists of ignorance,
Before you learn how to grieve or rejoice.
-- SOPHOCLES (496-406 B.C.).

Wonders are many, and none is more wonderful than man; the power that crosses the white sea, driven by the stormy wind, making a path under surges that threaten to engulf him.

A wise player ought to accept his throws and score them, not bewail his luck.

Orestes beloved. as you die you destroy me. You have torn away the part of my mind where hope was .

We long to have again the vanished past, in spite of all its pain.

You are a woman marked for sorrow.

I have seen or heard of no other man whom destiny treated with such enmity as it did Philoktetes.

It is but sorrow to be wise when wisdom profits not.

Dark, dark! The horror of darkness, like a shroud, wraps me and bears me on through mist and cloud.

You don't know what kind of day you will have, until evening.

The soul that has conceived one wickedness can nurse no good thereafter.

There's nothing in the world so demoralizing as money.

Grief teaches the steadiest minds to waver.

A man, though wise, should never be ashamed of learning more, and must unbend his mind.

Kindness begets kindness evermore.

There was the girl, screaming like an angry bird,
When it finds its nest left empt and little ones gone. -- Sentry.

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

If we always helped one another, no one would need luck.

Chance never helps those who do not help themselves.

All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride.

The greatest griefs are those we cause ourselves.

One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life: that word is love.

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.

It's impossible to speak what it is not noble to do.

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

A fearful man is always hearing things.

To live without evil belongs only to the gods.

Much speech is one thing, well-timed speech is another.

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.

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

Man is not constituted to take pleasure in the same things always.

For shameful deeds are taught by shameful deeds.

All is disgust when a man leaves his own nature and does what is unfit.

Whoever thinks his friend more important than his country, I rate him nowhere.

Whoever gets up and comes to grips with Love like a boxer is a fool.

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.

No one who errs unwillingly is evil.

No treaty is ever an impediment to a cheat.

It's a terrible thing to speak well and be wrong.

Isn't it the sweetest mockery to mock our enemies?

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

There is a time when even justice brings harm.

There is nothing more hateful than bad advice.

For those whose wit becomes the mother of villainy, those it educates to be evil in all things.

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

When trouble ends even troubles please.