AESCHYLUS QUOTES III
Greek dramatist (525 B.C.-456 B.C.)
Old men are children once again
a dream that sways and wavers
into the hard light of day.
AESCHYLUS
Agamemnon
I have been schooled by my own suffering: I've learned the many ways of being purged.
AESCHYLUS
Eumenides
Give heed, give heed and give your sympathy
To one who suffers; sorrow roaming wide
Impartial stops and stays awhile with me,
To tarry later seated close by thee.
AESCHYLUS
Prometheus Bound
Death is preferable -- it is a milder fate than tyranny.
AESCHYLUS
Agamemnon
To him that toileth God oweth glory, child of his toil.
AESCHYLUS
fragment
Time cleanses what it touches over time.
AESCHYLUS
Eumenides
The gods at will can shape a gladder strain, and from the lamentations at the graveside, a song of triumph may arise.
AESCHYLUS
The Libation Bearers
You'll see all other mortal sinners, the ones who flout the honor owed to gods or guests, or loving parents--you'll see them get the justice they deserve. For Hades holds men mightily to a strict accounting down below the earth; he sees all things, inscribes them within the book of his remembering.
AESCHYLUS
Eumenides
For in the voyage of the heart, there is a freight of hatred, and the wind of wrath blows shrill.
AESCHYLUS
The Libation Bearers
For this our task hath Fate spun without fail to last for ever sure, that we on man weighed down with deeds of hate should follow till the earth his life immure. Nor when he dies can he boast of being truly free.
AESCHYLUS
The Eumenides
If a man should wanton walk with crime ... he shall find in death no great deliverance.
AESCHYLUS
The Eumenides
His resolve is not to seem, but to be, the best.
AESCHYLUS
The Seven Against Thebes
Ares ever loves to pluck all the fairest flower of an armed host.
AESCHYLUS
fragment, Europe
Whoever is just willingly and without compulsion will not lack happiness; he will never be utterly destroyed.
AESCHYLUS
The Eumenides
Wisdom to learn is e'en for old men good.
AESCHYLUS
fragment
Oh, it is easy for the one who stands outside the prison-wall of pain to exhort and teach the one who suffers.
AESCHYLUS
Prometheus Bound
Old men are always young enough to learn.
AESCHYLUS
Agamemnon
Too credulous a woman's longing flies
And spreading swiftly, swiftly dies.
AESCHYLUS
Agamemnon
For, alone of gods, Death loves not gifts; no, not by sacrifice, nor by libation, canst thou aught avail with him; he hath no altar nor hath he hymn of praise; from him, alone of gods, Persuasion stands aloof.
AESCHYLUS
fragment, Niobe
What house
would ask for Vengeance
to perch heavy,
defiling the rafters like some bird of ill omen?
AESCHYLUS
The Suppliants