Creation
by Gore Vidal
(Random House, New York, 1981)
One man, had he lived to be seventy-five, could have known Socrates, Zoroaster, the Buddha and Confucius.
Page viii.
Why write historical of history? Because, when dealing with periods so long ago, one is going to make a lot of it up anyway … Also, without the historical imagination even conventional history is worthless. Finally, there is the excitement when a pattern starts to emerge.
Page ix.
Four separate literature societies, more or less at the same time, abandoned their ancient oral system of communication in favor of writing everything down.
Page ix.
They affect to despise us; then they imitate us.
Page 5.
Shame is not an emotion known to the Athenians.
Page 8.
I have made it a policy never to show distress when insulted by barbarians.
Page 9.
It is a lucky thing for the rest of the world that Greeks dislike one another far more than they do us, outlanders.
Page 9.
There is nothing like having your native city burned to the ground to inspire ambitious architects.
Page 10.
Everyone truly noble is driven out sooner or later.
Page 10.
“To ride, to draw the bow, to tell the truth.” That is Persian education in a proverbial phrase
Page 12.
There is only one subject worth pondering - creation.
Page 12.
Bad laws are made to entrap those who make them.
Page 18.
For Greeks, the only existence that matters is words. They are masters of making the fantastic sound plausible.
Page 20.
Just to be able to study the sky is reason enough to be alive.
Page 22.
Except for the Greeks, every Aryan tribe has a priestly caste. Although the Greeks retain the Aryan pantheon of gods and rituals, they have lost the hereditary priests.
Page 35.
For us Persians there is nothing worse than the telling of lie while for the Greeks there is no pleasure more exquisite.
Page 41.
The harem is an unholy place. Astrologers, witches, devil-worshipers, every kind of wickedness is popular among the women.
Page 42.
The camel is a disagreeable creature whose motion an make one every bit as sick as the tossing of a ship.
Page 43.
This was my first acquaintance with the style of a court. One is promised everything; then given nothing.
Page 46.
For a witch, everything is illusion.
Page 47.
You cannot convince any Greek that several layers of light cloth will make you not only warm in the winter but cool in summer. When Greeks are not nude, they are wrapped in sweat-soaked wool.
Page 51.
At about the age of seven, Persian boys are removed from the harem and turned over to the male members of the family.
Page 56.
The secret of power … resides not in its exercise but in its aura.
Page 61.
Only in Athens does one find sexual passion mixed up with politics.
Page 65.
I pity Pericles. Since everyone agrees that he is a great man, he is bound to end badly.
Page 69.
By the time a Persian noble is twenty, there is very little that he cannot do for himself if he has to.
Page 71.
Women are sequestered not so much for their moral good as to make certain that their children will be legitimate.
Page 72-73.
In Cathay, when any aspect of a ceremony is botched, the whole thing must begin a gain from the beginning.
Page 74.
Between Cyrus and Darius most of the world was Persian and our Great King is known to everyone not only as one king of many but as king of this great earth far and wide.
Page 78.
The two men kissed on the lips, as Persian men do when they great a friend who is also an equal. A friend of inferior rank is offered only a cheek to be kissed.
Page 83.
Now that I am old, I think quite a lot about teeth - and what their absence means.
Page 84.
Sooner or later, you always fell out with Polycrates.
Page 85.
Persian children are not supposed to ask questions of adults.
Page 85.
“Wise men take whatever they can find, even in the most unlikely places.”
Page 86.
According to Pythagoras, it should be the aim of each man’s life to free the spark of deity that resides in him so that it can rejoin the entire universe.
Page 88.
"To break out of the constant cycle of death and rebirth is the aim of Pythagoras’ teaching.”
Page 89.
Repetition is the secret of the learning process.
Page 89.
The trouble with the Greeks is that they have no idea how old this earth is. They seem not to realize that everything has already happened that will ever happen, save the end.
Page 90.
Childhood is all color. Age … ? The absence of color.
Page 93.
The low-class women of Babylon are freer than any women in the world. They can own property. They do much of the buying and selling in the markets.
Page 106.
Water that goes where you want it to go is the cheapest form of travel.
Page 107.
We live in a world not of our own making.
Page 108.
Not only do Persian men never undress in front of one another, they are never seen entirely naked by their wives or concubines - unlike the Greeks, who are modestly clothed in front of their women, except at the games, and shamelessly nude with one another.
Page 111.
Under Persian law, the Great King must name his heir before he goes to war.
Page 129.
Since long life is a curse, I now realize that I should have drunk more Helbon wine.
Page 129.
It is said that lepers have great spiritual powers.
Page 130.
Physically, human variety is quite as startling as is the sameness of human character.
Page 131.
Happily, the future was - and always is - a perfect mystery.
Page 135.
The only arts that the Dorians know are warfare and thievery.
Page 135.
It is the essence of statecraft to know when t do nothing at all.
Page 142.
The secret of complete power is complete secrecy. The monarch must be the sole knower of all things. He can share bits and pieces of knowledge with this one or that. But the entire terrain must bd visible only to him. He lone is the golden eagle.
Page 157.
Our western world is split between those who re nourished solely by the olive and those who have access to a variety of civilized oils.
Page 157.
Those who have not undergone minor disasters are usually being held in reserve for something major.
Page 173.
Salt preserves men as well as fish. Sailors always seem younger than they are.
Page 174.
In this world, there is nothing new but ourselves.
Page 175.
Aryans believe in a life after death. A heaven for the good. A hell for the bad.
Page 183.
Nothing is true except from a single point of view. From another point of view, the same thing will appear to be quite different.
Page 185.
He was neither one thing nor another. S state in which I have often found myself. After all, I am half-Persian or Chaldean and half-Ionian Greek. I serve the Aryan Great King, yet I am Zoroaster’s grandson. I reject the Aryan gods but not their kings. I believe in the way of the Truth but do not know, truly, where it is to be found.
Page 186.
Truth cannot be true without the Lie, and the Lie cannot be refuted without the True. In consequence, each human life is a battleground between the two.
Page 187.
The Aryan gods are always the same, no matter what their names.
Page 188.
The soul comes straight from the Wise Lord. The flesh is matter. Although eh first pervades the second, they are not the same. The first is eternal; the second transitory.
Page 190.
You men always like to put as much distance as possible between themselves and home.
Page 195.
I have never been able to envisage nothing because it is, I suppose, impossible for some thing - a man - to comprehend no thing at all.
Page 201.
I would not be surprised if elephants are more intelligent than human beings. After all, their heads are larger than ours, and the fact that they do not speak might well be an indication of superiority.
Page 213.
Fatness in both sexes is much admired by Indians. No woman can ever be too fat, while a prince of spheroid proportions is reckoned to be blessed by the gods and perfectly happy.
Page 215.
We Persians are more candid than other peoples. We admit openly that we created an empire in order to become richer and safer than we were before, Besides, if we had not conquered our neighbors, they would have conquered us. That is the way of the world.
Page 216.
The Aryan gods are exactly like ordinary men and women except that they seem to live forever; they also have exaggerated appetites which they overindulge, usually at the expense of human beings.
Page 217.
If you cannot count properly, you had better not go to market - or to war.
Page 225.
There is something most languorous and appealing about being bathed and oiled by pretty girls.
Page 226.
It is odd - and charming - to talk to an intelligent woman who is not a prostitute.
Page 231.
India is the only country where the full moon gives off heat.
Page 233.
The half-smile was now a full smile. The tragedy of others has that effect on princes.
Page 235.
He had a tendency to repeat one’s last statement; then changer the subject.
Page 236.
Indians are passionate game-players. They are also reckless gamblers. Fortunes are lost on a throw of the dice or at the guessing-the-numbers game.
Page 241.
I stopped listening. When Indians use numbers, they never know when to stop.
Page 247.
The Babylonians are easily the most conservative people on earth.
Page 249.
“Why should kingdoms different from human beings? They are born. They grow. They die.”
Page 253.
The thousand and one religions of India had me in a state of perfect confusion. Indians appear to accept everything which is the same as accepting nothing.
Page 254.
I always say yes, in order to lean more.
Page 255.
Sooner or later, Indians produce numbers. Since they are the vaguest of mathematicians, I always discount any number an Indian gives me.
Page 256.
I could neve r get used to the way that Indians relieve themselves in public. You cannot go any distance on any Indian trail without observing dozens of men and women squatting cheerfully at the side of the road.
Page 259.
The sight of holy men squatting beneath trees is a common one in India.
Page 260.
In hot weather, fashionable Indians often cover themselves with sandalwood paste on the ground that it makes them cool. It does no such thing. One sweats like a horse, but at least the seat smells like the most exotic perfume.
Page 262.
I have made it a point to expect the worst in life, and the fact that I am occasionally disappointed in my expectations is a source of dark solace.
Page 265.
There are as many false gods in the sky and on earth as there are kings and princes in the world. Yet it is clear to me that all mankind hungers for oneness.
Page 273.
At a king’s court, one is never entirely sincere.
Page 273.
The Aryan belief in the father’s sacredness is an essential part of their code.
Page 278.
No god can become enlightened and achieve extinction without first being reborn as a man.
Page 281.
Although everyone was quite good-natured, it is always an alarming experience to find oneself drowning in the dark odorous flesh or an Indian crowd.
Page 283.
In those days I believed that whenever holy words were written down, they lost their religious potency.
Page 290.
One cannot teach without first knowing just what it is that others believe to be true.
Page 305.
The Buddhists accept the world as it is, and try to eliminate it.
Page 306.
Indians do not have our interest in facts; their sense of time is different from ours, while their apprehension of reality is based on a profound sense that the world does not matter because the world is only shifting matter. They think that they are dreaming.
Page 306.
At the core of the Buddhist system there is an empty space which is not just the sought-after nirvana. It is perfect atheism.
Page 309.
“Since no one can ever know for certain whether or not his own view of creation is the correct one, it is absolutely impossible for him to know if someone else’s is the wrong one.”
Page 313.
The ultimate human task is to dematerialize the self.
Page 315.
Floods and civil disobedience go together in India.
Page 316.
In India, it is always a good idea to substitute pronouns for great names.
Page 318.
I have never visited any city in the world where I was not told that I had just missed the golden age.
Page 320.
I never accept the official reason for anything.
Page 321.
Usually the traveler smells a city before he sees it.
Page 324.
Greek is the language of the hair-splitters and the debate-winner; it is not the language of the God, as opposed to gods.
Page 325.
No man ever knows when he is happy; he can only know when he was happy.
Page 329.
There is no such tin as a true account of anything. Each sees the world from his own vantage point.
Page 331.
Happily, we plotted glory, as the young do.
Page 334.
There is no way not to be human except through death.
Page 336.
The court is all that matters to the court. My absence had not been noted, while my return was ignored.
Page 337.
I am the grandson of the holiest man that ever lived, a well as the son of a sorceress. I have powers denied the ordinary.
Page 338.
Out of injured self-esteem, the Greek is always ready to betray his native land. Although the Middle Kingdom is split into dozens of warring states, no man of Cathay - except, perhaps the so-called son of heaven - would dream of asking help from the army of an alien race. The yellow people are not only exceptionally intelligent, they are perfectly convinced that of all the world’s people they are unique. In their eyes, we are barbarians! That’s why only a few adventurous souls like Fan Ch’ih ever leave Cathay. The rest are indifferent to what lives beyond their Middle Kingdom.
Page 347.
In each of the Great King’s capitals, court ceremonial conforms to whatever protocol obtained before the creation of the Persian empire.
Page 349.
The cult of antiquity has always been a kind of madness at Babylon.
Page 351.
Nothing can ever be old enough or ugly enough for the true lover of antiquity.
Page 351.
For the Greeks, what is not Greek is not.
Page 355.
The temples are busy not only with religious services and ritual prostitution but, most important of all, with moneychanging and moneylending. It is said that banking was invented by the Babylonians.
Pages 363-364.
I was always struck by the fact that the interest rates in each part of the world are usually the same. Yet there has been little or no regular contact between the three lands. I find this truly mysterious.
Page 364.
Those who are not by nature hunters side with the hunted.
Page 376.
I have found that there is no attitude so bizarre that one will not encounter it sooner or later if one travels far enough.
Page 379.
Wear a mask too long and you will come to resemble it.
Page 385.
The Greeks are the most volatile and fickle of all races because they are so easily bored. They cannot bear for things to go on as they are. In their eyes, nothing old can be good, while nothing new can be bad - until it is old. They like radical change in everything except their notion of themselves as a deeply religious people.
Page 386.
At a certain point when one is ill, all notion of time stops and you think you’ll never die because you’re still here, not dead. You are, and that is all. Nothing will change.
Page 395.
At the edge of everywhere, Bactria is nowhere.
Page 413.
Repetition has long since robbed me of true memory.
Page 414.
What man wants to worship, he will worship.
Page 415.
What we are is seldom what we want to be while what we want to be is either denied us - or changes with the season.
Page 416.
Traditionally, all land approaches to Cathay are called silk roads.
Pages 419-420.
Blue eyes disturb Cathayans. Fair skin disgusts them.
Page 423.
The Cathayans nearly as vague as the Indians when it comes to the past.
Page 425.
The Cathayan haven, by the way, differs from the Aryan heaven or any other sort of heaven that I have ever heard of in that it is a shadow place presided over not by a god or gods but by the dead ancestors, starting with the first man, the so-called Yellow Ancestor or Emperor.
Page 425.
There is a good deal of subtlety in the Cathayan language; an endless confusion.
Page 427.
Despite protests to the contrary, no ruler wants the Middle Kingdom united - except by himself. Such is the balance or nonbalance there.
Page 429.
There is no pleasure on earth to equal that of dining aboard a boat tied to a willow tree in the Wei River at the time of the summer moon.
Page 430.
They were always surprised when I spoke their language. As a barbarian, I was expected to grunt like a pig.
Page 431.
The Cathayans take very seriously the stomach’s noises.
Page 434.
Although the people of Ch’in must be the quietest and most obedient on earth, I used to find their stillness somewhat alarming - like a presage to earthquake.
Page 435.
I was slowly learning the elaborate style of the Cathayans. Nothing spoken ever quite means what it appears to mean.
Page 437.
In Cathay a dead man is never referred to by his proper name on the sensible grounds that if he is called by name, his spirit is apt to come back to earth and haunt one.
Page 442.
Although human sacrifice is hardly unknown in our part of the world, I have never seen it practiced on such a scale as it is in Cathay.
Page 443.
You can never enslave a reluctant people without first charming them. Certainly, you must convince them that your way is their way and that the chains which you have forged for them are necessary ornaments.
Page 444.
“Vanity is never seemly in the eyes of heaven.”
Page 452.
Purists dislike any innovation.
Page 457.
Cathayans in general … have little interest in the world beyond what they call the four seas.
Page 457.
Hardly anyone was interested in the western world. What is not the Middle Kingdom does not exist. In Cathayan eyes we are the barbarians, and they are the civilized. I have found that if one travels far enough, left becomes right, up down, north south.
Page 457.
They are concerned with maintaining a harmonious balance between heaven’s cloudy will and earth’s tempestuous follies. They believe that this is best done by carefully observing those elaborate ceremonies that propitiate the ancestors.
Page 458.
The Cathayans believe that the earth is square, just as they think that heaven is round.
Page 460.
Cathay is a haunted land of dragons and ghosts and outlaws.
Page 461.
Wherever one goes on this earth, all tings are spoiled by men.
Page 461.
The Cathayans regard the belch as the mind-stomach’s sincerest utterance.
Page 462.
To accept with tranquility whatever happens is to put oneself beyond sorrow or joy.
Page 463.
I made no defense of the Buddha. After all, neither the Cathayan way nor the Buddhist noble truths has ever appealed to me. Each requires the banishment of the world as we know it.
Page 468.
He had the advantage of knowing what all the words of his language meant - and that is the secret of power.
Page 470.
Do nothing that is not natural - and ritual is natural - and all will be for the best.
Page 470.
It is hard to take seriously another world’s wise man, particularly at second hand.
Page 472.
In the Middle Kingdom, one never knows what is a proverb and what is nonsense. To a foreign ear, the two can sound perilously alike.
Page 475.
All things seem possible when new leaves unfold. For me, the spring is the best time of the year.
Page 477.
The smells of a Cathayan city are more agreeable than not because pungent foods are cooked on braziers at every crossing and sweet-smelling wood is burned in private as well as in public houses.
Page 480.
A Cathayan crowd smells more of oranges than of sweat.
Page 480.
Do not dispute the remaining senses of a blind man.
Page 480.
I have yet to come across a really inspired liar who was not positively lyric on the virtue of truth-telling.
Page 481.
Since most Cathayan temples are made of wood, I am fairly certain that even the most ancient temple is simply a phoenixlike recreation of a long-vanished original.
Page 484.
Like most people who enjoy explaining things, he hated to answer questions.
Page 485.
I have learned in my travels that most religious observances make no sense unless one has been accepted into the inner mysteries of the cult.
Page 485.
Cathayans use the word interesting rather the way that Greeks use the word catastrophic.
Page 494.
I have always found men quite fathomable. They look entirely to their own interest. On the other hand, how men choose to interpret or explain the fact of, let us say, creation is often mysterious to me.
Page 496.
It is an understatement to say that Confucius was not generally popular. In fact, he was hated and resented not only by his fellow clerks but by the high officers of state as well. The reason for this was simple. He was a nag. He knew exactly how and precisely why things should be done, and he was never shy in expressing his opinions to his superiors. Nevertheless, irritating as he was, he was too valuable a man to ignore.
Page 498.
Unlike your lively friend Socrates, he did not ask questions in order to lead the young to wisdom. Confucius answered questions; and many of his answers came from a positively archival memory.
Page 499.
Although many Cathayans believe that Confucius is a divine sage - one of those rare heaven-sent teachers who do such a lot of harm - Confucius himself steadfastly denied not only divinity but sagacity.
Page 499.
At no point did Confucius ever want to be a professional teacher. But since we always get what we do not want in life, he was besieged by would-be students wherever he went.
Page 501.
Sometimes it is wise to confront rather than evade what you fear.
Page 502.
Gentle or seemly behavior is the Confucian ideal.
Page 502.
Universal protocol requires that no one may leave a room before the ruler.
Page 504.
Cathayans delight in understatement; revel in the cryptic aside.
Page 506.
That seems to be a law of families. Whatsoever the father is, the son is not.
Page 510.
In the presence of a superior the courtier must always look humble and apprehensive.
Page 513.
It was the genius of the Chou dynasty to mitigate man’s destructive nature through intricate rituals, observances, manners and music. A man of the court must know and act upon three hundred rules of major ritual.
Page 513.
When men of power are together - anywhere on earth - they tend to disregard many of the niceties which they show to the public.
Page 514.
I would make myself interesting to Confucius - not the easiest of endeavors, since the world outside the four seas is of no concern to Cathayans. Fortunately, Confucius proved to be unique. He was fascinated by the world of the four barbarians: that is, those who live north south, east and west of the Middle Kingdom.
Page 515.
I found him most agreeable, and not at all priestly. In fact, he was disagreeable only when someone powerful behaved in an unseemly way.
Page 516.
There is no better way of getting a man to let down his guard than to mention his rivals.
Page 516.
In Cathay, constant loud disturbances in that region of the body signify a superior mind forever at work.
Page 517.
“What are the four virtues?” I asked. Everything is numbered east of the Indus River.
Page 518.
“The perfect gentleman is courteous in private life. He is punctilious in his dealings with the prince. He gives the common people not only their due but more. Finally, he is entirely just in dealing with those who serve him, and the state.”
Page 518.
Confucius was one of the few wise men who actually asked questions in order to find out what he did not know. As a rule, this world’s sages prefer to bait the listener with carefully constructed questions in order to elicit answers that will reflect the wise man’s immutable views.
Page 519.
“A gentleman or a ruler … must do nothing in defiance of ritual. He should treat everyone in the same courteous way. He should never do anything to anyone that he would not like them to do to him.”
Page 520.
We both laughed with pleasure. It is always agreeable to see something done marvellously well.
Page 521.
Confucius was an atheist. I am certain of that. But he believed in the power of ritual and ceremony as conceived by the long-dead Chou dynasty because he was devoted to order, balance, harmony in human affairs.
Page 522.
“I know a few things. I love learning. I have tried to understand this wold. I listen to everyone. I put to one side what seems doubtful and I’m cautious about the rest.”
Page 523.
The duke looked properly fierce, as befits a man without power.
Page 526.
The long periods of relative peace and stability at Babylon and even Magadha had made complex banking procedures possible. The Middle Kingdom is too fragmented for any very elaborate system of borrowing and lending.
Page 529.
Whenever Confucius mentioned the duke of Chou, one could be fairly certain that he himself was about to subvert custom in the name of the legendary founder of Lu, whose sayings seemed never to contradict Confucius’ own views of things.
Page 532.
Confucius always had a deep dislike for the unanswerable question.
Page 533.
“The world that matters in this world, the living world. But since we love and respect those who came before us, we observe those rites which remind us of our unity with the ancestors.”
Page 533.
“Heaven is far. Man is near. We honor the dead for the sake of the living.”
Page 534.
There is always a point beyond which you cannot drive people, and when that point is reached, either the ruler must enslave them all or he must find some clever way to retreat form his position.
Page 535.
In difficult times, loyalty is expensive.
Page 535.
To this day, I associate utter loneliness with snow falling, chestnuts burning.
Page 537.
It is believed that only by making the most noise possible can the evil spirits of the old year be driven out to make way for the good spirits of the new year.
Page 537.
Contrary to what people may think, the old are always more swift to change their moods than the young.
Page 540.
“For Confucius, the moral life is all that matters. This means that whenever personal desire or interest conflicts with right action, then those desires and interests must be set to one side.”
Page 544.
I think that for all practical purposes the Confucians are atheists. They do not believe in an afterlife or a day of judgment. They are not interested in how the world was created or for what purpose. Instead, they act as if this life is all there is and to conduct it properly is all that matters. For them, heaven is simply a word to describe correct behavior.
Pages 544-545.
If one is going to eliminate the creator of all tings, then it is a good idea to replace the creator with a very clear idea of what constitutes goodness in the human scale.
Page 545.
There is nothing like a vow of silence to loosen the tongue.
Page 547.
If you honestly want what is good, the people will want the same.
Page 553.
To pursue righteousness is a life’s work. In fact, the basic disposition of a true gentleman is righteousness.
Page 555.
The truculent wise man who finds fault with everyone is often the safest man in the realm - rather like a court jester, and as seldom heeded.
Page 556.
In Cathay, if one does not pray both to heaven and earth to look after a dying man, he will come back and haunt those who were not willing to placate, on his behalf, the two halves of the original egg. Cathayans believe that each man has tow spirits inside him. One is a life spirit, which ends when the body dies. The other is a personality spirit, which continues to exist as long as it is remembered and honored with sacrifices.
Page 561.
“To learn and not to think over what you have learned is perfectly useless. To think without having first learned is dangerous.”
Page 564.
Confucius also thought that a teacher must always be able to reinterpret the old in terms of the new.
Page 564.
For Confucius true wisdom is to know the extent of what you don’t know quite as well as you know what you do know.
Page 564.
Without ritual, courtesy becomes tiresome. Caution becomes timidity. Daring becomes dangerous. Inflexibility becomes hardness.
Page 565.
There is no need to know what we cannot know. There is so much for us to deal with here.
Page 566.
I favor the ritual because it comforts the living, shows respect for the dead, reminds us of our continuity with all those who have gone before. After all, they outnumber us by the millions.
Page 567.
“While you burn with life, your seed can make a new human being but when your fire is out, no one can bring you to life again. The dead, dear friend, are cold ashes. They have no consciousness. But that is no reason not to honor their memory, and ourselves, and our descendants.”
Page 568.
If there is one thing the professional priest detests, it is being told about a rival religion or system of thought.
Page 580.
I suppose that one is always tempted to challenge those who think that they and they alone possess the truth or the way or the key to the mystery.
Page 582.
When it comes to memory, the professional priest is worse - or better - than the poet.
Page 583.
When two armies of equal size attack each other, ultimate victory toes to the army that manages to kill the other side’s leader. Should neither leader die, the result is an endless melee.
Page 589.
I have found that whatever men are in youth they will be in age.
Page 592.
I have noticed that in those countries where the heat is intense and bodies mature early and age swiftly, men and women deliberately make themselves fat in order to retain if not the beauty of adolescence, the charm of the infantile.
Page 592.
In Persia, the Great King never appears in public without a chamberlain who will whisper into his ear the names of those who approach him.
Page 593.
When I think of India, gold flares in the darkness behind the lids of these blind eyes. When I think of Cathay silver gleams and I see again, as if I were really seeing, silver snow fall against silver willows.
Page 598.
Traditionally, Spartans are faithless allies.
Page 606.
It is always a mistake to act out of character.
Page 606.
“Every bit of gold that I got from Babylon was spent in Greece. So the lesson is plain: Never go to war against a poor country, because no matter how it turns out, you lose.”
Page 616.
It is hard for a Greek to realize that Greece is small, and poor; that Persian is large, and rich. That life is short. Short.
Page 616.
I have noticed that many parents are more thrilled than not to outlive grown children.
Page 616.
Spartans are used neither to luxury nor to relative freedom. When these two things coincide, as they do in the Persian court, the Spartan is demoralized.
Pages 617-618.
Traditionally, at the Persian court, the queen mother takes precedence over the queen consort.
Page 620.
It is a general law that great men do not live long once they are separated from the people whom they ennobled.
Page 637.
Without Themistocles and Cimon, Athens was - and is - of no particular consequence in the world.
Page 637.
Eunuchs tend to get sentimental with old age.
Page 638.
My sight was going, which means one is obliged to listen carefully to others - the ultimate cruelty.
Page 638.
Although I longed for death, the actual business of dying can have its unpleasant side.
Page 640.
So little remains the same in this life that one can only take pleasure in a man who persists in telling you, year after year, the same stories in precisely the same words.
Page 641.
Although Athenian citizens are encouraged to have affairs with adolescent boys of their own class, once the boy has grown a proper beard, he must give up having sexual relations with other citizens. He is expected to get married and begin a family. Then, his duty done, he is encouraged to find a boy to love in order to continue the - what? - training, I suppose, of a new citizen and soldier.
Page 648.
Since General Pericles has never shown the slightest interest in boys, he is considered to be heartless.
Page 648.
This is a small city, and since the leading men know each other far too well, their attacks upon one another are always personal and calculated not only to wound but to fester.
Page 652.
Fortunately - or unfortunately - the public man almost always ends by confusing himself with the people that he leads.
Page 654
One is never under oath when talking to a ruler.
Page 654.
The first principles of the universe ar atoms and empty space; everything else ins merely human thought. Worlds such as this one are unlimited in number. They come into being, and perish. But nothing can come into being from that which is not, or pass away into what is not. Further, the essential atoms are without limit in size and number and thy make if the universe a vortex in which all composite things are generated - fire, water, air, earth.
The cause of the coming into being of all things is the ceaseless whirl, which I call necessity; and everything happens according to necessity. Thus, creation is constantly created and re-created.
Page 656.