Quotes from work
Iliad

Homér Original title Ἰλιάς

The Iliad is an ancient Greek epic poem in dactylic hexameter, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles.

“May you be turned every man of you into earth and water as you sit spiritless and inglorious in your places.”

Homér Iliad

VII. 99–100 (tr. Samuel Butler).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“He lacks the sense to see a day behind, a day ahead.”

Homér Iliad

I. 343 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“Alike the idlers and the active die.”

Homér Iliad

IX. 320 (tr. Lord Derby).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“The day will come when sacred Troy must die,
Priam must die and all his people with him,
Priam who hurls the strong ash spear!”

Homér Iliad

IV. 164–165 (tr. Robert Fagles); spoken by Agamemnon.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“Think not to match yourself against gods, for men that walk the earth cannot hold their own with the immortals.”

Homér Iliad

V. 440–442 (tr. Samuel Butler).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“Let us put our griefs to rest in our own hearts…
What good's to be won from tears that chill the spirit?
So the immortals spun our lives that we, we wretched men
live on to bear such torments—the gods live free of sorrows.”

Homér Iliad

XXIV. 522–526 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“Prayers are Jove's daughters, of celestial race,
Lame are their feet, and wrinkled is their face;
With humble mien, and with dejected eyes,
Constant they follow where Injustice flies.”

Homér Iliad

IX. 498–500 (tr. Alexander Pope).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“Oh but if Zeus's lightning blinded us those days,
it's Zeus who drives us, hurls us on today!”

Homér Iliad

XV. 724–725 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“If any man obeys the gods, they listen to him also.”

Homér Iliad

I. 218 (tr. Richmond Lattimore).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“Ashamed to decline the challenge, yet fearing to accept it.”

Homér Iliad

VII. 93 (tr. Samuel Butler).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“There can be no covenants between men and lions, wolves and lambs can never be of one mind.”

Homér Iliad

XXII. 262–263 (tr. Samuel Butler); Achilles to Hector.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“Shaker of the earth, you would have me be as one without prudence
if I am to fight even you for the sake of insignificant
mortals, who are as leaves are, and now flourish and grow warm
with life, and feed on what the ground gives, but then again
fade away and are dead.”

Homér Iliad

XXI. 462–466 (tr. R. Lattimore); Apollo to Poseidon.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“As stars in the night sky glittering
round the moon's brilliance blaze in all their glory
when the air falls to a sudden, windless calm…
all the lookout peaks stand out and the jutting cliffs
and the steep ravines and down from the high heavens bursts
the boundless, bright air and all the stars shine clear
and the shepherd's heart exults.”

Homér Iliad

VIII. 551–555 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Alexander Pope's translation:
: As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night,
O'er heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light,
When not a breath disturbs the deep serene,
And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene;
Around her throne the vivid planets roll,
And stars unnumbered gild the glowing pole,
O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,
And tip with silver every mountain's head;
Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise,
A flood of glory bursts from all the skies.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)