XVIII. 107–110 (tr. Robert Fagles); spoken by Achilles.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)
Context: If only strife could die from the lives of gods and men
and anger that drives the sanest man to flare in outrage—
bitter gall, sweeter than dripping streams of honey,
that swarms in people's chests and blinds like smoke.
Ὡς ἔρις ἔκ τε θεῶν ἔκ τ' ἀνθρώπων ἀπόλοιτο καὶ χόλος, ὅς τ' ἐφέηκε πολύφρονά περ χαλεπῆναι, ὅς τε πολὺ γλυκίων μέλιτος καταλειβομένοιο ἀνδρῶν ἐν στήθεσσιν ἀέξεται ἠΰτε καπνός.
Source: Passion and Purity: Learning to Bring Your Love Life Under Christ's Control
“There is, in addition to a courage with which men die; a courage by which men must live.”
“The only way to live is to die. I must die. I deserve only death.”
Lews Therin Telamon
(15 October 1994)
“Men may live fools, but fools they cannot die.”
Source: Night-Thoughts (1742–1745), Night IV, Line 843.
“For neither do men live nor die in vain.”
Book II, Ch. 8 (Ch. 25 in editions without Book divisions): Dead London
The War of the Worlds (1898)
Context: For so it had come about, as indeed I and many men might have foreseen had not terror and disaster blinded our minds. These germs of disease have taken toll of humanity since the beginning of things — taken toll of our prehuman ancestors since life began here. But by virtue of this natural selection of our kind we have developed resisting power; to no germs do we succumb without a struggle, and to many — those that cause putrefaction in dead matter, for instance — our living frames are altogether immune. But there are no bacteria in Mars, and directly these invaders arrived, directly they drank and fed, our microscopic allies began to work their overthrow. Already when I watched them they were irrevocably doomed, dying and rotting even as they went to and fro. It was inevitable. By the toll of a billion deaths man has bought his birthright of the earth, and it is his against all comers; it would still be his were the Martians ten times as mighty as they are. For neither do men live nor die in vain.
“Why do men die before their wives? Could it be because they want to?”
Attention Scum! (2001), Episode One
“Men will wrangle for religion, write for it, fight for it, die for it; anything but live for it.”
Vol. I; XXV
Lacon (1820)
Variant: Men will wrangle for religion, write for it, fight for it, die for it; anything but live for it.
