Demosthenes Quotes

#1. Great and unexpected successes are often the cause of foolish rushing into acts of extravagance.

Demosthenes

#2. Clouds cannot cover secret places, nor denials conceal truth.

Demosthenes

#3. What we wish, that we readily believe.

Demosthenes

#4. Success has a great tendency to conceal and throw a veil over the evil deeds of men.

Demosthenes

#5. It is impossible for men engaged in low and groveling pursuits to have noble and generous sentiments. A man's thought must always follow his employment.

Demosthenes

#6. One believes in what one wants to believe in..

Demosthenes

#7. By persistent labor man may attain to all excellence.

Demosthenes

#8. The man who flies shall fight again.
[Lat., Qui fugiebat, rusus praeliabitur.]

Demosthenes

#9. Every advantage in the past is judged in the light of the final issue.

Demosthenes

#10. Close alliances with despots are never safe for free states.

Demosthenes

#11. Beware lest in your anxiety to avoid war you obtain a master.

Demosthenes

#12. The sower of the seed is assuredly the author of the whole harvest of mischief.

Demosthenes

#13. Nothing is more easy than to deceive one's self, as our affections are subtle persuaders.

Demosthenes

#14. Small opportunities are often the beginning of great enterprises.

Demosthenes

#15. Do you remember that in classical times when Cicero had finished speaking, the people said, "How well he spoke" but when Demosthenes had finished speaking, they said, "Let us march.

Demosthenes

#16. What we have in us of the image of God is the love of truth and justice.

Demosthenes

#17. The best protection for the people is not necessarily to believe everything people tell them.

Demosthenes

#18. What a man wishes, he will believe.

Demosthenes

#19. To remind a man of the good turns you have done him is very much like a reproach.

Demosthenes

#20. Good fortune is the greatest of blessings, but good counsel comes next, and the lack of it destroys the other also.

Demosthenes

#21. Nothing is easier than self-deceit.
For what every man wishes,
that he also believes to be true.

Demosthenes

#22. Excessive dealings with tyrants are not good for the security of free states.

Demosthenes

#23. The readiest and surest way to get rid of censure, is to correct ourselves.

Demosthenes

#24. He who confers a favor should at once forget it, if he is not to show a sordid ungenerous spirit. To remind a man of a kindness conferred and to talk of it, is little different from reproach.

Demosthenes

#25. Nothing is easier than self-deceit.

Demosthenes

#26. What a man wishes he generally believes to be true

Demosthenes

#27. I decline to buy repentance at the cost often thousand drachmas.

Demosthenes

#28. I'll betide thee, say I, and may the Gods, or at least the Athenians, confound thee for a vile citizen and a vile third-rate actor! Read the evidence.

Demosthenes

#29. We need money, for sure, Athenians, and without money nothing can be done that ought to be done.

Demosthenes

#30. It is the natural disposition of all men to listen with pleasure to abuse and slander of their neighbour, and to hear with impatience those who utter praises of themselves.

Demosthenes

#31. Every dictator is an enemy of freedom, an opponent of law.

Demosthenes

#32. The fact speak for themselves.

Demosthenes

#33. Everything great is not always good, but all good things, are great.

Demosthenes

#34. Small opportunities often presage great enterprises.

Demosthenes

#35. There is one safeguard known generally to the wise, which is an advantage and security to all, but especially to democracies as against despots - suspicion.

Demosthenes

#36. The man who is in the highest state of prosperity, and who thinks his fortune is most secure, knows not if it will remain unchanged till the evening.

Demosthenes

#37. We believe whatever we want to believe.

Demosthenes

#38. The more able a man is, if he make ill use of his abilities, the more dangerous will he be to the commonwealth.

Demosthenes

#39. The man who has received a benefit ought always to remember it, but he who has granted it ought to forget the fact at once.

Demosthenes

#40. You cannot have a proud and chivalrous spirit if your conduct is mean and paltry; for whatever a man's actions are, such must be his spirit.

Demosthenes

#41. The end of wisdom is consultation and deliberation.

Demosthenes

#42. There is a great deal of wishful thinking in such cases it is the easiest thing of all to deceive ones self.

Demosthenes

#43. As a vessel is known by its sound whether it be cracked or not, so men are proved by their speeches whether they be wise or foolish.

Demosthenes

#44. Virtue begins with understanding and is fulfilled by courage.

Demosthenes

#45. Whatever shall be to the advantage of all, may that prevail!

Demosthenes

#46. A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true.

Demosthenes

#47. The most noble title any child can have is Third.

Demosthenes

#48. No man who is not willing to help himself has any right to apply to his friends, or to the gods.

Demosthenes

#49. All speech is vain and empty unless it be accompanied by action.

Demosthenes