Ancient Romans Quotes

Soon dinner will run into bed-time, and we shall all eat reclining like the ancient Romans
about whose digestion, you know, I have often wondered. Whether a dose of rhubabrb might have made a difference to Nero or Caligula is a question you might ponder, my dear, next time you go through your Tacitus. ~ Jude Morgan

Later bad things will be said about Stalin; he'll be called a tyrant and his reign of terror will be denounced. But for the people of Eduard's generation he will remain the supreme leader of the people of the Union at the most tragic moment in their history; the man who defeated the Nazis and proved himself capable of a sacrifice worthy of the ancient Romans: the Germans had captured his son, Lieutenant Yakov Dzhugashvili, while the Russians had captured Field Marshal Paulus, one of the top military leaders of the Reich, at Stalingrad. When the German High Command proposed an exchange, Stalin responded with disdain that he didn't exchange field marshals for simple lieutenants. Yakov committed suicide by throwing himself on the electrified barbed wire fence of his prison camp. * ~ Emmanuel Carrere

And this totally normal conversation unspools from there, covering the basics: family, siblings, school, favorite composers, favorite movies, favorite wood (for carving puppets), the prehistory of the sandwich, and whether the ancient Romans got their togas caught in the spokes of their unicycles ~ Laini Taylor

When the ancient Romans would conquer a new place or a new people, they would leave the language and the customs in tact – they would even let the conquered people rule themselves in most cases, appointing a governor to maintain a foothold in the region." Wilson leaned against the whiteboard as he spoke, his posture relaxed, his hands clasped loosely."This was part of what made Rome so successful. They didn't try to make everyone Romans in the process of conquering them. When I went to Africa with the Peace Corp, a woman who worked with the Corp said something to me that I have often thought about since. She told me 'Africa is not going to adapt to you. You are going to have to adapt to Africa.' That is true of wherever you go, whether it's school or whether it's in the broader world. ~ Amy Harmon

The Ancient Romans did not regard acts of genius to emanate from within an individual - but rather saw it as a collaboration between a spirit of creativity and a human being. So it could be that sometimes an individual had that power, that divine inspiration, or other times not. The spirit might have moved on to some other lucky soul. ~ Liz Garbus

We see the pernicious effects of luxury in the ancient Romans, who immediately found themselves poor as soon as this vice got footing among them. ~ Joseph Addison

Although prefabrication has a long history - the ancient Romans shipped pre-cut stone columns, pediments, and other architectural elements to their colonies in North Africa, where the numbered parts were reassembled into temples - the idea took on a new impetus with the technological advances of the Industrial Revolution. ~ Martin Filler

The ancient Romans built their greatest masterpieces of architecture, their amphitheaters, for wild beasts to fight in. ~ Voltaire

Fashion is not just about trends. It's about political history. You can trace it from the ancient Romans to probably until the '80s, and you can see defining moments that were due either to revolutions or changes in politics. ~ Daphne Guinness

Cecilia had unleashed her blood in the bath, Amy Schraff said, because the ancient Romans had done that when life became unbearable. ~ Jeffrey Eugenides

And if I am not mistaken here is the secret of the greatness that was Spain. In Spain it is men that are the poems, the pictures and the buildings. Men are its philosophies. They lived, these Spaniards of the Golden Age; they felt and did; they did not think. Life was what they sought and found, life in its turmoil, its fervour and its variety. Passion was the seed that brought them forth and passion was the flower they bore. But passion alone cannot give rise to a great art. In the arts the Spaniards invented nothing. They did little in any of those they practised, but give a local colour to a virtuosity they borrowed from abroad. Their literature, as I have ventured to remark, was not of the highest rank; they were taught to paint by foreign masters, but, inapt pupils, gave birth to one painter only of the very first class; they owed their architecture to the Moors, the French and the Italians, and the works themselves produced were best when they departed least from their patterns. Their preeminence was great, but it lay in another direction: it was a preeminence of character. In this I think they have been surpassed by none and equalled only by the ancient Romans. It looks as though all the energy, all the originality, of this vigorous race had been disposed to one end and one end only, the creation of man. It is not in art that they excelled, they excelled in what is greater than art--in man. But it is thought that has the last word. ~ W. Somerset Maugham

It's like this for all of us initially. We can contact our inner strength, our natural openness, for short periods before getting swept away. And this is excellent, heroic, a huge step in interrupting and weakening our ancient habits. If we keep a sense of humor and stay with it for the long haul, the ability to be present just naturally evolves. Gradually we lose our appetite for biting the hook. We lose our appetite for aggression. If ~ Pema Chodron

Who knows what will come when quick-tongued men make ancient grievances rhyme with fresh desire for land and conquest? ~ Kazuo Ishiguro

As the class went through the Greeks and the Romans and the Renaissance painters, (who were easy enough to remember if you'd ever seen Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) there was more dick on display than in a locker room. ~ K.A. Mitchell

I tell you, because military training is not publicly recognised by the state, you must not make that an excuse for being a whit less careful in attending to it yourself. For you may rest assured that there is no kind of struggle, apart from war, and no undertaking in which you will be worse off by keeping your body in better fettle.

"For in everything that men do the body is useful; and in all uses of the body it is of great importance to be in as high a state of physical efficiency as possible. Why, even in the process of thinking, in which the use of the body seems to be reduced to a minimum, it is matter of common knowledge that grave mistakes may often be traced to bad health.

"And because the body is in a bad condition, loss of memory, depression, discontent, insanity often assail the mind so violently as to drive whatever knowledge it contains clean out of it. But a sound and healthy body is a strong protection to a man, and at least there is no danger then of such a calamity happening to him through physical weakness: on the contrary, it is likely that his sound condition will serve to produce effects the opposite of those that arise from bad condition. And surely a man of sense would submit to anything to obtain the effects that are the opposite of those mentioned in my list.

"Besides, it is a disgrace to grow old through sheer carelessness before seeing what manner of man you may become by developing your bodily strength and beauty t ~ Xenophon Memorabilia. 371BC Marchant Translation

I don't believe there's anything in life you can't go back and fix. The ancient Vedas - the oldest Hindu philosophy - and modern science agree that time is an illusion. If that's true, there's no such thing as a past or a future - it's all one huge now. So what you fix now affects the past and the future. ~ Alan Arkin

For this equality belongs to the post-Renaissance world of ideology-of political magic and the alchemical science" of politics. Envy is the basis of its broad appeal. And rampant envy, the besetting virus of modern society, is the most predictable result of insistence upon its realization. Furthermore, hue and cry over equality of opportunity and equal rights leads, a fortiori, to a final demand for equality of condition. Under its pressure self respect gives way in the large majority of men who have not reached the level of their expectation, who have no support from an inclusive identity, and who hunger for "revenge" on those who occupy a higher station and will (they expect) continue to enjoy that advantage. The end result is visible in the spiritual proletarians of the "lonely crowd." Bertrand de Jouvenel has described the process which produces such non-persons in his memorable study, On Power. They are the natural pawns of an impersonal and omnicompetent Leviathan. And to insure their docility such a state is certain to recruit a large "new class" of men, persons superior in "ability" and authority, both to their ostensible "masters" among the people and to such anachronisms as stand in their progressive way. Such is the evidence of the recent past and particularly of American history. Arrant individualism, fracturing and then destroying the hope of amity and confederation, the communal bond and the ancient vision of the good society as an extrapolation from family, is ~ M.E. Bradford

I will even not rant about treachery. I was brought up in a sea of treachery and deceit and betrayal. I swam in it like perch in the Nile. I am completely at home in it. I shall not drown. ~ Margaret George

Rainer Maria Rilke sacrificed everything
For his art he dedicated himself
To the Great Work

I admired his single-mindedness
All through my twenties
I argued his case

Now I think he was a jerk
For skipping his daughter's wedding
For fear of losing his focus

He believed in the ancient enmity
Between daily life and the highest work
Or Ruth and the Duino Elegies

It is probably a middle-class prejudice
Of mine to think that Anna Akhmatova
Should have raised her son Lev

Instead of dumping him on her husband's mom
Motherhood is a bright torture she confessed
I was not worthy of it

Lev never considered it sufficient
For her to stand outside his prison
Month after month clutching packages

And composing Requiem for the masses ~ Edward Hirsch

Spying has always gone on since ancient times. ~ Vladimir Putin

Mair sat down on the bed. The ancient pink electric blanket was still stretched from corner to corner, and she thought of the weeks of her father's last illness when she had come home to the valley to nurse him, as best she could, and to keep him company. They had enjoyed long, rambling conversations about the past and the people her father had once known. ~ Rosie Thomas

Shall I stop in to check on Bella before I go?"
"Not dressed like that. You would give her palpitations if she knew you were going into danger for her benefit."
"Luckily, I am mostly immune to Bella's powers and could cure such palpitations with a thought," Gideon mused.
Jacob raised a brow, taking the medic's measure. He could not recall the last time he had heard the Ancient crack wise about anything. It was not a wholly unpleasant experience, and it amused the Enforcer.
"I . . . am aware of what is occurring between you and Legna, as you know," Jacob mentioned with casual quiet. "I am only recently Imprinted myself, but should you require - " He broke off, suddenly uncomfortable. "Of course, you probably know far more about Imprinting than I ever will."
He is reaching out to you.
Legna's soft encouragement made Gideon suddenly aware of that fact. It was one of those nuances he would have missed completely, rusty as he was with matters of friendship and how to relate better to others.
"I am glad for the offer of any help you can provide," Gideon said quickly. "In fact, I had wanted to ask you . . . something . . ."
What did I want to ask him? he asked Legna urgently.
I do not know! I did not tell you to engage him, just to graciously accept his offer.
Oh. My apologies. Still, you are clever enough to think of something, are you not?
Legna knew he was baiting her, so she laughed.
Ask him why it is you seem to consta ~ Jacquelyn Frank

Occasionally, there are battles in the sky. One likes to imagine the angels are always triumphant. One does not like to think of the ancient and terrible scales balancing the infernal and divine as wobbling back and forth. Tilting freely, to and fro. One does not like to think that sometimes it is the angel that falls. ~ Holly Black

China is the largest and most ancient of Asiatic countries, but it is not for us boastfully to talk of her right to a position of 'leadership' among those countries. ~ Chiang Kai-shek

There are still truths in the Bible and many other ancient texts despite what religions have done to destroy and debase them. Religious dogma and myth have been used very successfully either to suppress understanding or to twist the truth sufficiently to turn something positive into something negative. ~ David Icke

He who does not cherish life, does not deserve to be among the living. ~ Luis Marques

PIGMY, n. One of a tribe of very small men found by ancient travelers in many parts of the world, but by modern in Central Africa only. The Pigmies are so called to distinguish them from the bulkier Caucasians - who are Hogmies. ~ Ambrose Bierce

There is an ancient saying,' noted Ironflanks, 'originating, I believe, from you fastbloods. The truth will set you free.'
'No, old steamer,' said the commodore. 'In my experience, the truth will get you sent to the bottom of the ocean with an anchor chain wrapped around your legs to buy your silence. But it's the truth I need, all the same. ~ Stephen Hunt

You will have memories
Because of what we did back then
When we were new at this,
Yes, we did many things, then - all
Beautiful ... ~ Sappho

But at least we have answered one ancient question. We are not alone. The stars will never again be the same to us. ~ Arthur C. Clarke

Mind out of the gutter, Suze. Eros is only one kind of love, eh? Ancient Greeks recognised four. ~ Peter Watts

One must neither passively yield to fate ("God has brought it about") nor obstinately protest against it ("Satan did it"), but rather ask oneself, "How can I best use this situation for the advance of God's Kingdom?" This is a very creative question-and it is also biblical. The promise in Romans 8:28 reads, "And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God. ~ Christian A. Schwarz

In all of Western civilization, there have been societies that celebrating the homosexuality, the ancient Greeks. But they, in fact, protected the institution of marriage as a union between one man and one woman. They got the joke. And the American people get the joke. ~ Ken Blackwell

the ancient Egyptians prescribed walking through a garden as a cure for the mad. ~ Paul Fleischman

Mermaids - those half-human, half-fish sirens of the sea - are legendary sea creatures chronicled in maritime cultures since time immemorial. The ancient Greek epic poet Homer wrote of them in The Odyssey. In the ancient Far East, mermaids were the wives of powerful sea-dragons, and served as trusted messengers between their spouses and the emperors on land. The aboriginal people of Australia call mermaids yawkyawks – a name that may refer to their mesmerizing songs.

The belief in mermaids may have arisen at the very dawn of our species. Magical female figures first appear in cave paintings in the late Paleolithic (Stone Age) period some 30,000 years ago, when modern humans gained dominion over the land and, presumably, began to sail the seas. Half-human creatures, called chimeras, also abound in mythology - in addition to mermaids, there were wise centaurs, wild satyrs, and frightful minotaurs, to name but a few.

But are mermaids real? No evidence of aquatic humanoids has ever been found. Why, then, do they occupy the collective unconscious of nearly all seafaring peoples? That's a question best left to historians, philosophers, and anthropologists. ~ NOAA National Ocean Service

Any period is fascinating: the more ancient, the better. ~ Ridley Scott

I write about times and places I would visit in a time machine, like ancient Rome or the Wild West. ~ Caroline Lawrence

The vegetarian movement is an ancient movement and is not quite a modern one. ~ Morarji Desai

I think writers from both East and West have long been fascinated by the ancient tales and the opportunity to reinterpret them. ~ Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

Her words had the intended effect. The Roman officers laughed nervously. Some sized up Ella, then looked at Octavian and snorted. The idea of a chicken lady issuing prophecies was apparently just as ridiculous to Romans as it was to Greeks. "I, uh ... " Octavian dropped his teddy bear. "No, but - ~ Rick Riordan

The ancient Greeks had two words for time. The first was chronos. The second was kairos. The ~ Greg McKeown

[God] tells the woman that she will now bring forth children in sorrow, and desire an unworthy, sometimes resentful man, who will in consequence lord her biological fate over her, permanently. What might this mean? It could just mean that God is a patriarchal tyrant, as politically motivated interpretations of the ancient story insist. I think it's - merely descriptive.
Merely. And here is why: As human beings evolved, the brains that eventually gave rise to self-consciousness expanded tremendously. This produced an evolutionary arms race between fetal head and female pelvis.56 The female graciously widened her hips, almost to the point where running would no longer be possible. The baby, for his part, allowed himself to be born more than a year early, compared to other mammals of his size, and evolved a semi-collapsible head.57 This was and is a painful adjustment for both. The essentially fetal baby is almost completely dependent on his mother for everything during that first year. The programmability of his massive brain means that he must be trained until he is eighteen (or thirty) before being pushed out of the nest. This is to say nothing of the woman's consequential pain in childbirth, and high risk of death for mother and infant alike. This all means that women pay a high price for pregnancy and child-rearing, particularly in the early stages, and that one of the inevitable consequences is increased dependence upon the sometimes unreliable and always problematic ~ Jordan B. Peterson

I had thirty-nine typed pages and a contract stating I would send the completed manuscript in by February 1, 2002. I knew where I wanted the novel to go, but I couldn't seem to shove it past page 39. I couldn't find the point of view I needed to examine the life and motives of a man who wanted to conquer the world. I did the usual: sacrificed small rodents to the moon, offered my soul to demons in exchange for inspiration, did some research. Nobody wanted the rodents or my soul, and the research into ancient conquerors seemed barren. Finally, out of the blue, a young girl stepped into my head, opened her mouth and told me where that part of the story began. ~ Patricia A. McKillip

Yes, Keith shut up." Roberta's sly grin turned her face into a mask of pure evil. "So, let me get this straight. Miss Bitchy-Witch wants to go, no, is demanding to go to Hell and make a deal with the Devil, huh? Offering yourself in trade for a mutt and some ancient pussy? Very noble and honorable, Selena. Stupid, but just what I'd expect from a coward like you. Why fight, when you can surrender, right? Myself, I find your willingness to sacrifice your own life for those creatures rather disgusting and I don't know what Father sees in you. ~ Madison Sevier

Then, as he chevies the ancient ones on their way, he opens a tunnel, a tunnel in time, back to when a certain FO star was younger, and without a planet. ~ L.E. Modesitt Jr.

The cause of our current social crises, he would have said, is a genetic defect within the nature of reason itself. And until this genetic defect is cleared, the crises will continue. Our current modes of rationality are not moving society forward into a better world. They are taking it further and further from that better world. Since the Renaissance these modes have worked. As long as the need for food, clothing and shelter is dominant they will continue to work. But now that for huge masses of people these needs no longer overwhelm everything else, the whole structure of reason, handed down to us from ancient times, is no longer adequate. It begins to be seen for what it really is ... emotionally hollow, esthetically meaningless and spiritually empty. ~ Robert M. Pirsig

Chaos does not mean total disorder. Chaos means a multiplicity of possibilities. Chaos is from the ancient Greek words that means a thing that is birthed from the void. And it was about that which is possible, not about disorder. ~ Jok Church

Are you listening, Mr. Thornfield?" Sonny prepared himself for some dreadful curse in the name of God, or perhaps some ancient African demon. "I'm listening." "I forgive you. ~ Anonymous

The ancient Vedic texts known as the Upanishads declare, "You are what your deepest desire is. As is your desire, so is your intention. As is your intention, so is your will. As is your will, so is your deed. As is your deed, so is your destiny." Our destiny ultimately comes from the deepest level of desire and also from the deepest level of intention. The two are intimately linked to each other. ~ Deepak Chopra

The Ancient Egyptians postulated seven souls."

Top soul (Vicarious), and the first to leave at the moment of death, is Ren the Secret name. This corresponds to my Director. He directs the film of your life from conception to death. The Secret Name is the title of your film. When you die, that's where Ren came in.

Second soul (Jambi), and second one off the sinking ship, is Sekem: Energy, Power. LIGHT. The Director gives the orders, Sekem presses the right buttons.

Number three (Wings/Days) is Khu, the Guardian Angel. He, she or it is third man out...depicted as flying away across a full moon, a bird with luminous wings and head of light. The sort of thing you might see on a screen in an Indian restaurant in Panama. The Khu is responsible for the subject and can be injured in his defense - but not permanently, since the first three souls are eternal. They go back to Heaven for another vessel. The four remaining souls must take their chances with the subject in the land of the dead.

Number four (The Pot) is Ba, the Heart, often treacherous. This is a hawk's body with your face on it, shrunk down to the size of a fist. Many a hero has been brought down, like Samson, by a perfidious Ba.

Number five (L.C., Lost Keys, Rosetta Stoned) is Ka, the double, most closely associated with the subject. The Ka, which usually reaches adolescence at the time of bodily death, is the only reliable guide through the Land of the Dead to the We ~ William S. Burroughs

an old Underwood office machine so big and black and ancient it looked as though it should come with a foreign correspondent attached. ~ Donald E. Westlake

Now I believe that true lasting change and sustainability--cultural or otherwise--must rely on something more ancient and universal: art--any form that evokes the archetypal imagery that lives deep in the human psyche--can, in words i once heard imparted by the author Terry Tempest Williams, "bypass rhetoric and pierce the heart. ~ Amy Irvine