Aristophanes Quotes

To invoke solely the weaker arguments and yet triumph is an art worth more than a hundred thousand drachmae.

There is no beast, no rush of fire, like woman so untamed. She calmly goes her way where even panthers would be shamed.

Open your mouth and shut your eyes and see what Zeus will send you.

Shall I crack any of those old jokes, master, At which the audience never fail to laugh?

A man's homeland is wherever he prospers.

[Y]ou [man] are fool enough, it seems, to dare to war with [woman=] me, when for your faithful ally you might win me easily.

Under every stone lurks a politician.

To win the people, always cook them some savoury that pleases them.

Love is simply the name for the desire and the pursuit of the whole.

A demagogue must be neither an educated nor an honest man; he has to be an ignoramus and a rogue.

An actor should refine public taste.

One must not try to trick misfortune, but resign oneself to it with good grace.

Evil events from evil causes spring.

I was the first to make it understood
that reason could undermine the just premises of the good.

Characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.

Even if you persuade me, you won't persuade me.

You cannot make a crab walk straight.

A slave is but half a man.

The old are in a second childhood.

A truce to idle phrases!

I saw a cavalry captain buy vegetable soup on horseback. He carried the whole mess home in his helmet.

I must think of something foolproof for a fool.

Do not bandy words with your father, nor treat him as a dotard, nor reproach the old man, who has cherished you, with his age.

Do not take a blind guide.

It is from their foes, not their friends, that cities learn the lesson of building high walls

Let each man exercise the art he knows.

What can you answer? Now be careful, don't arouse my spite, Or with my slipper I'll take you napping,
faces slapping
Left and right.

Poverty, the most fearful monster that ever drew breath.

The gods, my dear simple fellow, are a mere expression coined by vulgar superstition. We frown upon such coinage here.

An insult directed at the wicked is not to be censured; on the contrary, the honest man, if he has sense, can only applaud.

The truth is forced upon us, very quickly, by a foe.

A prudent person after all can pick something
Even from an enemy.

Comedy is allied to justice.

If a man owes me money, I never seem to forget. But if I do the owing, I somehow never remember.

Ah! the Generals! they are numerous, but not good for much!

That man is sharp who can say what he wants in a minimum of words.

Politics, these days, is no occupation
for an educated man, a man of character.
Ignorance and total lousiness are better.

Why, I'd like nothing better than to achieve some bold adventure, worthy of our trip.

It is the compelling power of great thoughts and ideas to engender phrases of equal size.

Mix and knead together all the state business as you do for your sausages. To win the people, always cook them some savory that pleases them.

These impossible women! How they do get around us! The poet was right: Can't live with them, or without them.

If you strike upon a thought that baffles you, break off from that entanglement and try another, so shall your wits be fresh to start again.

What unlooked-for things do happen, to be sure, in a long life!

Comedy too can sometimes discern what is right.

MEN Ah cursed drab, what have you brought this water for? WOMEN What is your fire for then, you smelly corpse? Yourself to burn?

An ancient tradition declares that every idiot blunder we pass into law will sooner or later redound to Athens' profit.

Old age is second childhood.

Times change. The vices of your age are stylish today.

How can I study from below, that which is above?

The love of wine is a good man's failing.

You vote yourselves salaries out of the public funds and care only for your own personal interests; hence the state limps along.

It is bad taste for a poet to be coarse and hairy.

High thoughts must have high language.

Youth ages, immaturity is outgrown, ignorance can be educated, and drunkenness sobered, but stupid lasts forever.

No man is really honest; none of us is above the influence of gain.

Today things are better than yesterday.

Love is merely the name for the desire and pursuit of the whole.

There is no honest man! not one, that can resist the attraction of gold!

You can't have anything else to say: you've poured out every drop of what you know.

A man may learn wisdom even from a foe.

To plunder, to lie, to show your arse, are three essentials for climbing high.

The trickiest thing is the nature of man, apparent in everything.

The wise learn many things from their enemies.

need a poet who can really write. Nowadays it seems like 'many are gone, and those that live are bad'.12

By words the mind is winged.

Thou shouldst not decide until thou hast heard what both have to say.

Hunger knows no friend but its feeder.

Even from enemies much can be learned by the intelligent,
More in fact than from our friends.

Open your mind before your mouth

Shrines! Shrines! Surely you don't believe in the gods. What's your argument? Where's your proof?

Prayers without wine are perfectly pointless.

Lysistrata: To seize the treasury; no more money, no more war.

I would treat her like an egg, the shell of which we remove before eating it; I would take off her mask and then kiss her pretty face.

Old age is but a second childhood.

You should not decide until you have heard what both have to say.

Wealth
the most excellent of all gods.

Under every rock lurks a politician.

You cannot teach a crab to walk straight.

You will never make the crab walk straight.

Words give wings to the mind and make a man soar to heaven.

A fox is subtlety itself.

Meton (astronomer in 5th century BC): With the straight ruler I set to work To make the circle four-cornered .

That is what we do each time we see someone who falls in love with evil strategies, until we hurl him into misery, so he may learn to fear the Gods.

Ignorance can be cured, but stupidity is forever

When men drink wine they are rich, they are busy, they push lawsuits, they are happy, they are friends.

Your lost friends are not dead, but gone before, advanced a stage or two upon that road which you must travel in the steps they trod.

Chorus of old men: How true the saying: 'Tis impossible to live with the baggages, impossible to live without 'em.

Quickly, bring me a beaker of wine, so that I may wet my mind and say something clever.

One bush, they say, can never hide two thieves.

Have you ever, looking up, seen a cloud like to a Centaur, a Part, or a Wolf, or a Bull?

Full of wiles, full of guile, at all times, in all ways, are the children of Men.

There's no art where there's no fee.

First listen, my friend, and then you may shriek and bluster.

Woman is adept at getting money for herself and will not easily let herself be deceived; she understands deceit too well herself.

A man should be able to stand up under any disaster for his country's good.

Children have a master to teach them, grown-ups have the poets.

It often happens that less depends upon the valor of an army than the skill of the leader.

A man can learn wisdom even from a foe

Wise people, even though all laws were abolished, would still lead the same life.