Livy
Livy
Titus Livius—known as Livy /ˈlɪvi/ in English—was a Roman historian who wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people – Ab Urbe Condita Libri– covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome before the traditional foundation in 753 BC through the reign of Augustus in Livy's own time. He was on familiar terms with the Julio-Claudian dynasty, advising Augustus's grandnephew, the future emperor Claudius, as a young man not long before 14 AD in a letter to...
NationalityRoman
ProfessionHistorian
men haste doe
All things will be clear and distinct to the man who does not hurry; haste is blind and improvident.
woe defeat
Woe to the conquered.
men wish violence
Fortune blinds men when she does not wish them to withstand the violence of her onslaughts.
men luck disposition
Good fortune and a good disposition are rarely given to the same man.
war
War is just to those to whom war is necessary.
strong law limits
Law is a thing which is insensible, and inexorable, more beneficial and more profitious to the weak than to the strong; it admits of no mitigation nor pardon, once you have overstepped its limits.
rewards
Never is work without reward, or reward without work.
war arms no-hope
...war is just to those for whom it is necessary, and arms are clear of impiety for those who have no hope left but in arms.
war upset irrationality
Nowhere are our calculations more frequently upset than in war.
peace war law
There are laws for peace as well as war.
flower imagination wit
Wit is the flower of the imagination.
Bad beginnings, bad endings.
garden cities government
When Tarquin the Proud was asked what was the best mode of governing a conquered city, he replied only by beating down with his staff all the tallest poppies in his garden.
time spring events
Events of great consequence often spring from trifling circumstances.