Demosthenes
Small opportunities are often the beginning of great enterprises.Collection: Great
Beware lest in your anxiety to avoid war you obtain a master.Collection: War
Every dictator is an enemy of freedom, an opponent of law.Collection: Freedom
A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true.Collection: Believe
All speech is vain and empty unless it be accompanied by action.Collection: Speech
Everything great is not always good, but all good things, are great.Collection: Greatness
Clouds cannot cover secret places, nor denials conceal truth.Collection: Clouds
Success has a great tendency to conceal and throw a veil over the evil deeds of men.Collection: Men
Nothing is so easy as to deceive one's self; for what we wish, that we readily believe; but such expectations are often inconsistent with the real state of things.Collection: Real
The best protection for the people is not necessarily to believe everything people tell them.Collection: Believe
There are all kinds of devices invented for the protection and preservation of countries: defensive barriers, forts, trenches, and the like... But prudent minds have as a natural gift one safeguard which is the common possession of all, and this applies especially to the dealings of democracies. What is this safeguard? Skepticism. This you must preserve. This you must retain. If you can keep this, you need fear no harm.Collection: Trust
Nothing is easier than self-deceit.Collection: Self
One believes in what one wants to believe in.Collection: Believe
Since we are not yet fully comfortable with the idea that people from the next village are as human as ourselves, it is presumptuous in the extreme to suppose we could ever look at sociable, tool-making creatures who are from other evolutionary paths and see not beasts, but brothers, not rivals, but fellow pilgrims journeying to the shrine of intelligence...The difference... is not in the creature judged, but in the creature judging.Collection: Brother
Nothing is so easy as to deceive oneself; for what we wish, we readily believe.Collection: Inspirational
It is not possible to found a lasting power upon injustice, perjury, and treachery. These may, perhaps, succeed for once, and borrow for awhile, from hope, a gay and flourishing appearance. But time betrays their weakness, and they fall into ruin of themselves. For, as in structures of every kind, the lower parts should have the greatest firmness--so the grounds and principles of actions should be just and true.Collection: Fall
By persistent labor man may attain to all excellence.Collection: Men
What we have in us of the image of God is the love of truth and justice.Collection: Love
It is not possible to found a lasting power upon injustice, perjury, and treachery.Collection: Character
The man who has received a benefit ought always to remember it, but he who has granted it ought to forget the fact at once.Collection: Men
As a vessel is known by the sound, whether it be cracked or not; so men are proved, by their speeches, whether they be wise or foolish.Collection: Wise
You cannot have a proud and chivalrous spirit if your conduct is mean and paltry; for whatever a man's actions are, such must be his spirit.Collection: Life
The man who is in the highest state of prosperity, and who thinks his fortune is most secure, knows not if it will remain unchanged till the evening.Collection: Men
Do you remember that in classical times when Cicero had finished speaking, the people said, "How well he spoke" but when Demosthenes had finished speaking, they said, "Let us march.Collection: People
The fact speak for themselves.Collection: Life
No man who is not willing to help himself has any right to apply to his friends, or to the gods.Collection: Men
Great and unexpected successes are often the cause of foolish rushing into acts of extravagance.Collection: Rushing
The sower of the seed is assuredly the author of the whole harvest of mischief.Collection: Harvest
Excessive dealings with tyrants are not good for the security of free states.Collection: Tyrants
Small opportunities often presage great enterprises.Collection: Opportunity
Whatever shall be to the advantage of all, may that prevail!Collection: May
Nothing is more easy than to deceive one's self, as our affections are subtle persuaders.Collection: Self
There is one safeguard known generally to the wise, which is an advantage and security to all, but especially to democracies as against despots - suspicion.Collection: Trust
Beware lest in your anxiety to avoid war you obtain a masterCollection: Peace
He who confers a favor should at once forget it, if he is not to show a sordid ungenerous spirit. To remind a man of a kindness conferred and to talk of it, is little different from reproach.Collection: Kindness
The end of wisdom is consultation and deliberation.Collection: Wisdom
Good fortune is the greatest of blessings, but good counsel comes next, and the lack of it destroys the other also.Collection: Blessing
What a man wishes, he will believe.Collection: Believe
To remind a man of the good turns you have done him is very much like a reproach.Collection: Men
It is impossible for men engaged in low and groveling pursuits to have noble and generous sentiments. A man's thought must always follow his employment.Collection: Men
It is the natural disposition of all men to listen with pleasure to abuse and slander of their neighbour, and to hear with impatience those who utter praises of themselves.Collection: Men
We need money, for sure, Athenians, and without money nothing can be done that ought to be done.Collection: Needs
I decline to buy repentance at the cost of ten thousand drachmas.Collection: Cost
Close alliances with despots are never safe for free states.Collection: Safety
The readiest and surest way to get rid of censure, is to correct ourselves.Collection: Way
What we wish, that we readily believe.Collection: Believe
There is a great deal of wishful thinking in such cases it is the easiest thing of all to deceive ones self.Collection: Thinking
We believe whatever we want to believe.Collection: Believe
The more able a man is, if he make ill use of his abilities, the more dangerous will he be to the commonwealth.Collection: Men