Nennius

Nennius (flourished c. 800)

"Truth regards not who is the speaker, nor in what manner it is spoken, but that the thing be true."

• From History of the Britons by Nennius, translated by J. A. Giles (c. 19th century), republished by Oxford University Press, 2018. 

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Plutarch

Plutarch (c. 50-120)

"By definition foreigners must bring in foreign ideas with them, and novel ideas lead to novel attitudes. Hence inevitably many emotions and preferences emerge which - if the existing government be likened to a piece of music - are out of tune with it."

• On Sparta (Life of Lycurgus), excerpted from Plutarch's Parallel Lives, translated by Richard J. A. Talbert. New York: Penguin Classics, 2005.

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Einhard

Einhard (c. 770-840)
"I do not doubt that there are many people, devoted to contemplation and learning, who think that the circumstances of the present age should not be so neglected that almost everything that happens now - not worthy of any memory - should be condemned to silence and oblivion."

• Two Lives of Charlemagne, respectively by Einhard and Notker th Stammer, translated by David Ganz. New York: Penguin Classics, 2008. 

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Geoffrey Chaucer

Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1342-1400)

"'Murder will out.' We see it day by day.
Murder's a foul, abominable treason,
So loathsome to God's justice, to God's reason,
He will not suffer its concealment. True,
Things may lie hidden for a year or two,
But still 'Murder will out,' that's my conclusion."

• From The Canterbury Tales (The Nun's Priest's Tale) by Geoffrey Chaucer, translated into modern English by Nevill Coghill (Penguin Classics, 2003).

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The Buddha

The Buddha (Quote recorded in the 3rd century)

"Trembling and quivering is the mind,
difficult to guard and hard to restrain.
The person of wisdom sets it straight,
as a fletcher does an arrow."

• From The Dhammapada (Verses on the Way, Chapter 3), recorded in the 3rd century BCE. Translation by Glenn Wallis, 2004.

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Cassius Dio

Cassius Dio (c. 163-235)

"It seems that those who exercise supreme powers know more about everyhting else than they do about their own affairs, and although their associates have the fullest knowledge of their superiors' actions, the latter possess no accurate information in return."

•  From Cassius Dio's The Roman History (Book 55, chapter 10), translated by Ian Scott-Kilvert (Penguin Classics, 1987).

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Sigurd the Volsung/ Saga of the Volsungs

Sigurd the Volsung (Scandinavian-Germanic mythical hero)

"When men come to battle, a fearless heart serves a man better than a sharp sword."

• From The Saga of the Volsungs, by an anonymous 13th century Icelander, translated by Jesse L. Byock (Penguin Classics, 1990, 1999).

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Marcus Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius (c. 121-180 CE)

"Up and down, from one age to another, go the ordinary things of the world; being still the same."

• From the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, Book IX, meditation XXVI, (Xist Publishing edition, 2015). 

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Sima Qian

Sima Qian (c. 145-90 BCE)

"A true Son of Heaven takes the whole world within the four seas to be his family."

• From the Records of the Grand Historian (Shi Ji) by Sima Qian. Sima Qian wrote this quote in the character of the Han advisor, Xiao He. Translated by Burton Watson (Columbia University Press, 1993).

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Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin (c. 1706-1790)

"Anger is never without a reason but seldom with a good one."

• From Poor Richard's Almanac by Benjamin Franklin (Seven Treasures Publications, 2008).

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Christine de Pizan

Christine de Pizan (c. 1364-1430)

"There are in fact several women who have displayed the necessary courage, strength and bravery to undertake and accomplish extraordinary deeds which match those achieved by the great conquerors and knights mentioned in books."

• From The Book of the City of Ladies (Part I, chapter 14) by Christine de Pizan, translated by Rosalind Brown-Grant (Penguin Classics, 1999).

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Aristotle

Aristotle (c. 384-322 BCE)

"Anything that we have to learn to do we learn by the actual doing of it: people become builders by building and instrumentalists by playing instruments. Similarly we become just by performing just acts, temperate by performing temperate ones, brave by performing brave ones."

• From The Nicomachean Ethics (Book II, chapter I) by Aristotle, translated by J. A. K. Thomson (Penguin Classics, 2004).

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Thucydides / Pericles

Thucydides (c.460-400 BCE)

"What we should lament is not the loss of houses or of land, but the loss of men's lives. Men come first; the rest is the fruit of their labour."

• History of the Peloponnesian War (Book I) by Thucydides, translated by Rex Warner (Penguin Classics, 1972). The quote comes from a speech that Thucydides wrote while in the character of Pericles.

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Al-Ghazālī

Al-Ghazālī (c. 1058-1111)

"Know that the low, dense, imaginal world became for the prophets a glass, a niche for lights, a purifier of the mysteries, and a ladder to the highest world."

• From The Niche of Lights by Al Ghazālī, translated by David Buchman. Utah: Brigham Young University Press, 1998.

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Sima Qian

Sima Qian (145-87 BCE)

"Just as a good physician understands what will bring life or death to his patient, so a sage ruler perceives what will bring success or failure to his undertakings."

• From the Records of the Grand Historian (Shi Ji) by Sima Qian. Sima Qian wrote this quote in the character of the Qin minister, Fan Ju. Translated by Burton Watson (Columbia University Press, 1993).

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Egil Skallagrimsson

Egil Skallagrimsson (10th-century Viking poet)

"West over water I fared,
bearing poetry's waves to the shore
of the war-god's heart;
my course was set.
I launched my oaken craft
at the breaking of ice,
loaded my cargo of praie
aboard my ship aft."

• Egil's Saga (recorded c. 13th century possibly by Snorri Sturluson), translated by Bernard Scudder. New York: Penguin Classics, 2004 edition.

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Tacitus

Tacitus (c. 56/57-117+)

"All that tyrannical conquerors, and imitators of their brutalities, achieve is their own disrepute and their victims' renown."

• From The Annals of Imperial Rome (Chapter 7), by Tacitus, translated by Michael Grant (Penguin Classics, 1996).

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Mencius

Mencius (flourished 4th century BCE)

"Benevolence brings honour; cruelty, disgrace. Now people who dwell in cruelty while disliking disgrace are like those who are content to dwell in a low-lying place while disliking dampness."

• From The Mencius (Book II, Part A) by Mencius, translated by D. C. Lau (Penguin Classics, 2003). 

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Geoffrey of Monmouth

Geoffrey of Monmouth (quote published c. 1136)

"Human beings are conditioned by the chance happenings of history: it follows that those who have been enemies sometimes become friends and that those who have run away may yet achieve victory."

• From Geoffrey of Monmouth's The History of the Kings of Britain (Part Three), completed in 1136 CE, translated from Latin into English by Lewis Thorpe (Penguin Classics, 1966).

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Anna Komnene

Anna Komnene (c. 1083-1153)

"Such is the way of men - today they cheer, escort, treat with honour, but once they see the fortunes of life reversed, they act in the opposite manner, without a blush."

• From The Alexiad (Book IX) by Anna Komnene, translated by E.R.A. Sewter, (Penguin Classics, 2009).

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Sun Tzu

Sun Tzu (6th-5th Century BCE)

"Know Heaven,
Know Earth,
And your victory
Is complete."

• From Sun Tzu's The Art of War (Chapter Ten), translated by John Minford (Penguin Classics edition).

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