Words matter. These are the best Sophocles Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
Do not grieve yourself too much for those you hate, nor yet forget them utterly.
Evil counsel travels fast.
Better not to exist than live basely.
If you were to offer a thirsty man all wisdom, you would not please him more than if you gave him a drink.
There is no greater evil for men than the constraint of fortune.
How sweet for those faring badly to forget their misfortunes even for a short time.
If we are to keep our democracy, there must be one commandment: ‘Thou shalt not ration justice.’
Reason is God’s crowning gift to man.
Ignorant men don’t know what good they hold in their hands until they’ve flung it away.
Even a poor man can receive honors.
A word does not frighten the man who, in acting, feels no fear.
There is a time when even justice brings harm.
Bear up, my child, bear up; Zeus who oversees and directs all things is still mighty in heaven.
There is no sense in crying over spilt milk. Why bewail what is done and cannot be recalled?
A soul that is kind and intends justice discovers more than any sophist.
To give birth is a fearsome thing; there is no hating the child one has borne even when injured by it.
Whoever gets up and comes to grips with Love like a boxer is a fool.
He who throws away a friend is as bad as he who throws away his life.
It’s impossible to speak what it is not noble to do.
No man loves the bearer of bad tidings.
For the dead there are no more toils.
Those whose life is long still strive for gain, and for all mortals all things take second place to money.
I see that all of us who live are nothing but images or insubstantial shadow.
Man is not constituted to take pleasure in the same things always.
There is no witness so terrible and no accuser so powerful as conscience which dwells within us.
Hide nothing, for time, which sees all and hears all, exposes all.
Who seeks shall find.
Quick decisions are unsafe decisions.
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.
I see the state of all of us who live, nothing more than phantoms or a weightless shadow.
Not even old age knows how to love death.
Whoever thinks his friend more important than his country, I rate him nowhere.
When trouble ends even troubles please.
There is a point at which even justice does injury.
Wisdom outweighs any wealth.
Men should pledge themselves to nothing; for reflection makes a liar of their resolution.
A man growing old becomes a child again.
Success is dependent on effort.
Reverence does not die with mortals, nor does it perish whether they live or die.
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.
Look and you will find it – what is unsought will go undetected.
Every man can see things far off but is blind to what is near.
No one who errs unwillingly is evil.
It is the task of a good man to help those in misfortune.
Time alone reveals the just man; but you might discern a bad man in a single day.
A wise doctor does not mutter incantations over a sore that needs the knife.
A human being is only breath and shadow.
To live without evil belongs only to the gods.
The rewards of virtue alone abide secure.
Men may know many things by seeing; but no prophet can see before the event, nor what end waits for him.
Whoever grows angry amid troubles applies a drug worse than the disease and is a physician unskilled about misfortunes.
Don’t you know that silence supports the accuser’s charge?
If my body is enslaved, still my mind is free.
Old age and the passage of time teach all things.
A wise man does not chatter with one whose mind is sick.
Every man can see things far off but is blind to what is near.
Evil gains work their punishment.
Silence is an ornament for women.
Not to be born is, past all prizing, best.
No enemy is worse than bad advice.
A short saying often contains much wisdom.
The gods plant reason in mankind, of all good gifts the highest.
Trust dies but mistrust blossoms.
In a just cause the weak will beat the strong.
One word frees us of all the weight and pain in life. That word is love.
Much wisdom often goes with fewest words.
War never takes a wicked man by chance, the good man always.
Whoever thinks that he alone has speech, or possesses speech or mind above others, when unfolded such men are seen to be empty.
Wisdom is the supreme part of happiness.
Hush! Check those words. Do not cure ill with ill and make your pain still heavier than it is.
One who knows how to show and to accept kindness will be a friend better than any possession.
Gratitude to gratitude always gives birth.
I would rather miss the mark acting well than win the day acting basely.
Money is the worst currency that ever grew among mankind. This sacks cities, this drives men from their homes, this teaches and corrupts the worthiest minds to turn base deeds.
The oaths of a woman I inscribe on water.
Now I see that going out into the testing ground of men it is the tongue and not the deed that wins the day.
Foolishness is indeed the sister of wickedness.
For death is not the worst, but when one wants to die and is not able even to have that.
Not knowing anything is the sweetest life.
Rather fail with honor than succeed by fraud.
There are some who praise a man free from disease; to me no man who is poor seems free from disease but to be constantly sick.
When a man has lost all happiness, he’s not alive. Call him a breathing corpse.
It was my care to make my life illustrious not by words more than by deeds.
Children are the anchors that hold a mother to life.
There is no success without hardship.
Not even Ares battles against necessity.
Always desire to learn something useful.
Our happiness depends on wisdom all the way.
Alas, how quickly the gratitude owed to the dead flows off, how quick to be proved a deceiver.
Men of ill judgment ignore the good that lies within their hands, till they have lost it.
How dreadful knowledge of the truth can be when there’s no help in the truth.
The keenest sorrow is to recognize ourselves as the sole cause of all our adversities.
If it were possible to cure evils by lamentation and to raise the dead with tears, then gold would be a less valuable thing than weeping.
If you have done terrible things, you must endure terrible things; for thus the sacred light of injustice shines bright.
Fortune cannot aid those who do nothing.
To be doing good deeds is man’s most glorious task.
But this is a true saying among men: the gifts of enemies are no gifts and profitless.
Without labor nothing prospers.
Kindness is ever the begetter of kindness.
For the wretched one night is like a thousand; for someone faring well death is just one more night.
