“Gambling houses are temples where the most sordid and turbulent passions contend; there no spectator can be indifferent. A card or a small square of ivory interests more than the loss of an empire, or the ruin of an unoffending group of infants, and their nearest relatives.” PassionHouseInterestLossGroupsCardsRuinsTemplesEmpiresGamblingSquaresIndifferentInfantSpectatorsIvory Author:Johann Georg Ritter von Zimmermann
“He [Julius Caesar] learned that Alexander , having completed nearly all his conquests by the time he was thirty-two years old, was at an utter loss to know what he should do during the rest of his life, whereat Augustus expressed his surprise that Alexander did not regard it as a greater task to set in order the empire which he had won than to win it.” KnowsShouldYearsTwoOrderWinningLossGreaterTasksRegardSurpriseThirtyEmpiresTwo YearsConquestJuliusAugustusTwo Year Olds Author:Augustus
“The very word "change" has changed. When I was young--and not just because I was young--we looked forward with confident impatience to change. Planned, controlled, beneficent change would continue to clear slums, sweep up the remains of empire, raise living and educational standards, tidy away--firmly but kindly--the last aboriginals who still raved about martial glory or the pride of wealth. Now, as it seems to me, change is set almost exclusively in the minor key, change seen overwhelmingly as loss.” StillsSeemsLastsYoungChangeWealthLossClearChangedPrideKeysGloryStandardsRaisesRemainsEducationalEmpiresControlledMinorsImpatienceTidySlumsAboriginal Book:Games with Shadows Source: Games with Shadows
“Timid and cowardly soldiers cause the loss of a nation's independence; but pusillanimous magistrates destroy the empire of the laws, the rights of the throne, and even social order itself.” LawOrderNationsSocialCausesLossRightsIndependenceSoldierEmpiresThronesCowardlySocial OrderMagistrates Author:Napoleon Bonaparte
“If all the barbarian conquerors had been annihilated in the same hour, their total destruction would not have restored the empire of the West: and if Rome still survived, she survived the loss of freedom, of virtue, and of honour.” IfsStillsHoursLossHistoryVirtueDestructionWestEmpiresHonourRomeSurvivedBarbariansRoman EmpireConqueror Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Source: The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
“One of the reasons the English got through all their falls and the loss of their empire, all their disasters, their strikes, their difficulties, their wars through the years was they had Shakespeare to fall back on. And they speak well in England.” YearsWellsWarReasonFallSpeakLossDifficultyEnglandStrikesDisasterEmpiresFall BackThrough The Years Author:Norman Mailer
“The loss of India would mark and consummate the downfall of the British Empire. That great organism would pass at a stroke out of life into history.From such a catastrophe there could be no recovery.” LossIndiaMarkBritishRecoveryEmpiresOrganismsStrokesCatastropheBritish EmpireDownfall Author:Lord Randolph Churchill
“Everything that everyone is afraid of has already happened: The fragility of capitalism, which we don't want to admit; the loss of the empire of the United States; and American exceptionalism. In fact, American exceptionalism is that we are exceptionally backward in about fifteen different categories, from education to infrastructure.” WantDifferentStatesFactsLossUnitedUnited StatesHappenedCapitalismEmpiresCategoriesFifteenBackwardsInfrastructureFragilityExceptionalismAmerican Exceptionalism Author:James Hillman