Displaying Top 10 Simonides of Ceos quotes

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A man gains no possession better than a good woman, nothing more horrible than a bad one.

Variant translation: Of earthly goods, the best is a good wife; A bad, the bitterest curse of human life.


Painting is silent poetry, and poetry painting that speaks.

Quoted by Plutarch. Variant translations: Painting is silent poetry, and poetry is painting with the gift of speech. Painting is silent poetry, poetry is eloquent painting.


Go, tell the Spartans, thou who passeth by, That here, obedient to their laws, we lie.

Herodotus - Histories. Epitaph on the Cenotaph of Thermopylae, recorded by Herodotus. Note: There is a long unsolved dispute around the interpretation of the word rhemasi, such as laws, words or orders. Variant translations: Go, tell the Spartans, thou who passest by, That here obedient to their laws we lie. Stranger, go tell the men of Lacedaemon That we, who lie here, did as we were ordered. Stranger, bring the message to the Spartans that here We remain, obedient to their orders. Oh foreigner, tell the Lacedaemonians That here we lie, obeying those words.


Not even the gods fight against necessity.

Quoted by Plato in the Dialogue Protagoras. Variant translations: The gods do not fight against necessity. Not even the gods war against necessity. I praise and love all men who do no sin willingly; but with necessity even the gods do not contend.