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Greek Quotes

“I know you have not thought about it. Italians always act without thinking, it's the glory and the downfall of your civilisation. A German plans a month in advance what his bowel movements will be at Easter, and the British plan everything in retrospect, so it always looks as though everything occurred as they intended. The French plan everything whilst appearing to be having a party, and the Spanish...well, God knows. Anyway, Pelagia is Greek, that's my point.”

ThinkingKnowsWellsLooksPartyPlansMovementMonthsGloryBritishGreekEasterGod KnowsCivilisationAppearingRetrospectDownfallBowel Movements
Book:Corelli's Mandolin: A Novel
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“Those around you can have their novellas, sweet, their short stories of cliché and coincidence, occasionally spiced up with tricks of the quirky, the achingly mundane, the grotesque. A few will even cook up Greek tragedy, those born into misery, destined to die in misery. But you, my bride of quietness, you will craft nothing less than epic with your life. Out of all of them, your story will be the one to last.”

StoriesLastsDiesBornSweetTragedyMiseryTricksCraftsCooksGreekShort StoryEpicCoincidenceDestinedMundaneBridesQuirkyGrotesqueQuietnessGreek Tragedy
Book:Special Topics in Calamity Physics
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“Mister Cameron - I have read the unexpurgated Ovid, the love poems of Sappho, the Decameron in the original, and a great many texts in Greek and Latin histories that were not though fit for proper gentlemen to read, much less proper ladies. I know in precise detail what Caligula did to, and with, his sisters, and I can quote it to you in Latin or in my own translation if you wish. I am interested in historical truth, and truth in history is often unpleasant and distasteful to those of fine sensibility. I frankly doubt that you will produce anything to shock me.”

IfsKnowsI CanWishMy OwnDoubtProduceFineFitOriginalsHistoricalDetailsGreekGentlemanShockLatinSensibilityPreciseTranslationsLove PoemsCameronDistastefulHistorical Truth
Author:Mercedes Lackey
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“I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church.”

KnowsMindBelievePainReligionBeliefFearChurchMy OwnAtheismAtheistRageGreekCreedsSecularAgnosticReligious FaithChurch And StateSeparation Of Church And StateProtestantsOur Founding FathersReligious FreedomFounding Fathers ChristianUs Founding FathersTurkishFounding Fathers ReligionSeparation Between Church And StateFounding Fathers ReligiousFounding Fathers Anti ReligionFounding Fathers Of AmericaFounding AmericaAmerican Founding FathersFounding Fathers AtheistAnti ReligiousDeismChristian AtheistReligion And GovernmentChristian RightAge Of ReasonAgainst ReligionGreatest AtheistChristian FreedomReligious HistoryReligious Values
Book:The Theological Works of Thomas Paine
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“The so-called Christian nations are the most enlightened and progressive ... but in spite of their religion, not because of it. The Church has opposed every innovation and discovery from the day of Galileo down to our own time, when the use of anesthetic in childbirth was regarded as a sin because it avoided the biblical curse pronounced against Eve. And every step in astronomy and geology ever taken has been opposed by bigotry and superstition. The Greeks surpassed us in artistic culture and in architecture five hundred years before Christian religion was born.”

YearsHas BeensUseChristianReligionCultureNationsBornChurchSinChristianityStepsTakenFiveAtheismHundredDiscoveryInnovationArchitectureAstronomyArtisticGreekCurseSpiteEnlightenedBigotryProgressiveSuperstitionsBiblicalScience And ReligionAvoidedEvery StepChildbirthGeologyScience ReligionChristian AtheistScience Vs ReligionChristian NationAnesthetics
Author:Mark Twain
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“Before you realize this truth, say the Yogis, you will always be in despair, a notion nicely expressed in this exasperated line from the Greek stoic philosopher Epictetus: 'You bear God within you, poor wretch, and know it not.”

KnowsRealizingLinesPoorBearsDespairNotionPhilosopherGreekWithin YouStoicYogi
Book:The Complete Elizabeth Gilbert: Eat, Pray, Love; Committed; The Last American Man; Stern Men & Pilgrims
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“THAT Perseus always won. That's why my momhad named me after him, even if he was son of Zeus ann I was son of Posidon. The original Perseus was one of the only heros in the greek myths who got a happy ending. The others died-betrayed, mauled, mutilated, poisoned, or cursed by the gods. My mom hoped i would inherit Perseus's luck. Judging by how my life was going so far, i wasn't too optimistic.”

IfsSonJudgingMomHeroDiedOriginalsLuckMy MomMythOptimisticGreekBetrayedHappy EndingsCursedZeusOrigin Of LifeGreek MythPerseus
Author:Rick Riordan
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“Oh, see then, the Simi is not in trouble. I just kill the Greek god and all’s fine. (Simi) You can’t kill a Greek god, Simi. It’s not allowed. (Acheron) There you go again, akri, saying no to the Simi. Don’t eat that, Simi. Don’t kill that, Simi. Stay here, Simi. Go to Katoteros, Simi, and wait for me to call you. I don’t like being told no, akri. (Simi)”

WaitingTroubleFineGreekSaying NoWait For MeGreek God
Book:Sins of the Night: A Dark-Hunter Novel
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“Reuven listen to me. The Talmud says that a person should do two things for himself. One is to acquire a teacher. Do you remember the other." "Choose a friend," I said. "Yes. You know what a friend is, Reuven? A Greek philosopher said that two people who are true friends are like two bodies with one soul." I nodded. "Reuven, if you can, make Danny Saunders your friend." "I like him a lot, abba." "No. Listen to me. I am not talking about only liking him. I am telling you to make him your friend and to let him make you his friend.”

PeopleIfsKnowsShouldPersonsSaidTwoSoulBodyRememberTalkingTeacherPhilosopherGreekTwo ThingsAcquireTrue FriendNot TalkingListen To MeGreek PhilosopherAbbaI Like Him
Author:Chaim Potok
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“In this story, the sun moves. In this story, every night meets a dawn and burns away in the bright morning. In this story, Winter can never hold back the Spring... He is the best of all possible audiences, the only Audience to see every scene, the Author who became a Character and heaped every shadow on Himself. The Greeks were right. Live in fear of a grinding end and a dank hereafter. Unless you know a bigger God, or better yet, are related to Him by blood.”

KnowsEndsCharacterStoriesMovingNightMorningAudienceSunBloodSceneSpringShadowBiggerWinterDawnGreekRelatedEvery NightHereafterDank
Author:N.D. Wilson
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“Answer my question, Bacchus. I’m not one of your dickless Greeks to be kept waiting for an answer. (Camulus) You better take a more civil tone with me, Cam. I’m not one of your flaccid Celts to shake in terror of your wrath. You want to fight, boy, bring it on. (Dionysus) Whoa, hang on a second. Let’s save the fighting for when you two take over the world, okay? (Styxx)”

WorldWantTwoFightingWaitingAnswersBoysOkayTerrorGreekToneShakesWrathDionysusBacchusCelts
Book:Night Pleasures/Night Embrace
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“What I wanted was to die among strangers, untroubled, beneath a cloudless sky. And yet my desire differed from the sentiments of that ancient Greek who wanted to die under the brilliant sun. What I wanted was some natural, spontaneous suicide. I wanted a death like that of a fox, not yet well versed in cunning, that walks carelessly along a mountain path and is shot by a hunter because of its own stupidity.”

WellsWantedDesireDiesNaturalWalksSunPathSkyMountainShotsSuicideAncientStrangerStupidityBrilliantGreekSentimentsSpontaneousFoxesHuntersCunningAncient GreekWanted To Die
Book:Confessions of a Mask
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“We didn't think the library was funny looking in it's faux- Greek splendor, nor did we find the cuisine limited or bland, or the movies at the Michigan theater relentlessly American and mindless. These were opinions I came to later, after I became a denizen of a City, an expatriate anxious to distance herself from the bumpkin ways of her youth. I am suddenly consumed by nostalgia for the little girl who was me, who loved the fields and believed in God, who spent winter days home sick from school reading Nancy Drew and sucking menthol cough drops, who could keep a secret.”

ThinkingWayLittlesHomeSchoolGirlReadingSecretCitiesOpinionFieldsYouthSickTheaterDistanceWinterLibraryNostalgiaGreekAnxiousConsumedSplendorMichiganMindlessCuisineNancyBlandFauxWinter DaysExpatriatesNancy DrewCough DropsHome Sick
Author:Audrey Niffenegger
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“To read" actually comes from the Latin reri "to calculate, to think" which is not only the progenitor of "read" but of "reason" as well, both of which hail from the Greek arariskein "to fit." Aside from giving us "reason," arariskein also gives us an unlikely sibling, Latin arma meaning "weapons." It seems that "to fit" the world or to make sense of it requires either reason or arms.”

ThinkingWorldGivingWellsReasonSeemsArmsFitWeaponsMake SenseGreekLatinUnlikelySiblingHail
Author:Mark Z. Danielewski
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“The motive that impels modern reason to know must be described as the desire to conquer and dominate. For the Greek philosophers and the Fathers of the church, knowing meant something different: it meant knowing in wonder. By knowing or perceiving one participates in the life of the other. Here knowing does not transform the counterpart into the property of the knower; the knower does not appropriate what he knows. On the contrary, he is transformed through sympathy, becoming a participant in what he perceives.”

KnowsDoeDifferentReasonDesireFatherChurchWonderKnowingModernBecomingPropertyPhilosopherContraryConquerPerceiveGreekMotiveAppropriateTransformedParticipantsCounterpartsGreek Philosopher
Author:Jürgen Moltmann
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“The Greeks believed that once there were no male and female, that all souls were one. Then the souls were torn apart, male and female. The Greeks thought that when you found the other half of your soul, your soul mate, that it would be your perfect lover But I think if you find your other half, you would be too much alike to be lovers, but you would still be soul mates.”

IfsThinkingStillsSoulWould BeFoundPerfectHalfToo MuchLoversFemaleMalesYour SoulGreekMatesTornOther HalfSoul MateTorn ApartPerfect Lover
Author:Laurell K. Hamilton
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“Creation is thus God's presence in creatures. The Greek Orthodox theologian Philip Sherrard has written that "Creation is nothing less than the manifestation of God's hidden Being." This means that we and all other creatures live by a sanctity that is inexpressibly intimate, for to every creature, the gift of life is a portion of the breath and spirit of God. (pg. 308, Christianity and the Survival of Creation)”

MeanLife IsSpiritChristianityWrittenCreationCreaturesSurvivalBreathsGreekManifestationIntimateOrthodoxLive ByPortionsTheologianSanctitySpirit Of GodPhilipGod's PresenceGifts Of LifeGreek Orthodox
Book:The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays of Wendell Berry
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“...it seemed to me I was living in an insane asylum of my own making. I wnt about with all these fantastic figures: centaurs, nymphs, satyrs, gods and goddesses, as though they were patients and I was analyzing them. I read a Greek or Negro myth as if a lunatic were telling me his anamnesis.”

IfsMy OwnFiguresPatientMythInsaneFantasticGreekGoddessLunaticAsylumsMemories Dreams ReflectionsAnalyzingNymphsInsane AsylumGods And GoddessesCentaursSatyrs
Author:Carl Jung
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“For several centuries, the Celtic church of Ireland was spared the Greek dualism of matter and spirit. They regarded the world with the clear vision of faith. When a young Celtic monk saw his cat catch a salmon swimming in shallow water, he cried, "The power of the Lord is in the paw of the cat!”

WorldMatterYoungSpiritWaterChurchVisionLordClearSawsCenturyCatGreekSwimmingIrelandCriedShallowMonkPawsCelticSalmonDualismClear VisionShallow Water
Book:The Ragamuffin Gospel: Good News for the Bedraggled, Beat-Up, and Burnt Out
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“One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality. That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives. It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people’s lives simply by existing.”

PeopleWorldEndsFactsRealityAgeOur LivesWrittenAchieveThousandConnectionsStatementsGreekProvenAstonishingOutside WorldCorridors
Author:J. K. Rowling
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“There is to me about this place a smell of rot, the smell of rot that ripe fruit makes. Nowhere, ever, have the hideous mechanics of birth and copulation and death -those monstrous upheavals of life that the Greeks call miasma, defilement- been so brutal or been painted up to look so pretty; have so many people put so much faith in lies and mutability and death death death.”

PeopleLooksLyingBirthFruitSmellGreekBrutalMechanicMonstrousRipeHideousUpheavalRipe FruitMutabilityDefilement
Author:Donna Tartt
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“Well, as I said, you know the issue of Greek debt, they've grasped the principle of debt reduction. I think most people would argue that probably more needs to be done on that front, and they've just begun to take the first steps to accepting that there's going to have to be much closer economic integration in Europe.”

PeopleThinkingKnowsNeedsFirstsWellsSaidDoneAcceptingStepsPrinciplesIssuesEconomicFrontsEuropeDebtArguingGreekFirst StepsIntegrationReductionEconomic Integration
Author:Vince Cable
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