Top 8 Ronald Syme Quotes
#2. The custom of prefixing or appending to historical narratives an estimate of the character and personality of the principal agent is of doubtful advantage at the best of times - it either imparts a specious unity to the action or permits apology or condemnation on moral and emotional grounds.
Ronald Syme
#3. A democracy cannot rule an empire. Neither can one man, though empire may appear to presuppose monarchy. There is always an oligarchy somewhere, open or concealed.
Ronald Syme
#4. Individuals capture attention and engross history, but the most revolutionary changes in Roman politics were the work of families or of a few men.
Ronald Syme
#5. Pietas prevailed, and out of the blood of Caesar the monarchy was born.
Ronald Syme
#6. The strength and vitality of an empire is frequently due to the new aristocracy from the periphery.
Ronald Syme
#7. In matters of literary and historical appraisement, one cannot operate with the methods of a laboratory or furnish the proof to be demanded in a court of law. The best is only the probable. Any who raise complaint have an easy remedy: to offer something better, something coherent and constructive.
Ronald Syme
#8. Crassus was in the habit of maintaining that nobody should be called rich who was not able to maintain an army on his income.
Ronald Syme
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