Polybius Quotes

• Monarchy degenerates into tyranny, aristocracy into oligarchy, and democracy into savage violence and chaos.

  Polybius

  Historical, Democracy, Aristocracy

  43 Copy quote

• If history is deprived of the Truth, we are left with nothing but an idle, unprofitable tale.

  Polybius

  Tales, Idle, Left

  Polybius (2003). “The Rise of the Roman Empire”, p.25, Penguin UK

  54 Copy quote

• Since the masses of the people are inconstant, full of unruly desires, passionate, and reckless of consequences, they must be filled with fears to keep them in order. The ancients did well, therefore, to invent gods, and the belief in punishment after death.

  Polybius

  Order, Punishment, People

  "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark". Book by Carl Sagan, "The Fine Art of Baloney Detection", quoting "The Histories", work by Polybius, 1995.

  23 Copy quote

• Nor ought we ever to allow any growing power to acquire such a degree of strength as to be able to tear from us, without resistance, our natural, undisputed rights.

  Polybius

  Rights, Tears, Degrees

  17 Copy quote

• A good general not only sees the way to victory; he also knows when victory is impossible.

  Polybius

  Leadership, Creative, Victory

  32 Copy quote

• The common people feel themselves oppressed by the grasping of some, and their vanity is flattered by others. Fired with evil passions, they are no longer willing to submit to control, but demand that everything be subject to their authority. The invariable result is that government assumes the noble names of free and popular, but becomes in fact the most execrable thing, mob rule.

  Polybius

  Passion, Names, Vanity

  22 Copy quote

• In our own time the whole of Greece has been subject to a low birth rate and a general decrease of the population, owing to which cities have become deserted and the land has ceased to yield fruit, although there have neither been continuous wars nor epidemics...For as men had fallen into such a state of pretentiousness, avarice, and indolence that they did not wish to marry, or if they married to rear the children born to them, or at most as a rule but one or two of them, so as to leave these in affluence and bring them up to waste their substance, the evil rapidly and insensibly grew.

  Polybius

  Children, War, Men

  21 Copy quote

• All things are subject to decay and change.

  Polybius

  Decay, Subjects, All Things

  Polybius (1812). “The General History of the Wars of the Romans”, p.401

  20 Copy quote

• Knowing how to win is the first step. We must also know how to make use of our victories.

  Polybius

  Motivational, Winning, Knowing

  16 Copy quote

• From this I conclude that the best education for the situations of actual life consists of the experience we acquire from the study of serious history. For it is history alone which without causing us harm enables us to judge what is the best course in any situation or circumstance.

  Polybius

  Judging, Serious, Study

  19 Copy quote

• [There can be no] rational administration of government when good men are held in the same esteem as bad ones.

  Polybius

  Integrity, Men, Good Man

  17 Copy quote

• Those who know how to win are much more numerous than those who know how to make proper use of their victories.

  Polybius

  Sports, Wisdom, Winning

  "Histories" by Polybius, book X, ch. 31,

  14 Copy quote

• On any occasion when one can discover the cause of events, one should not resort to the gods.

  Polybius

  Events, Causes, Should

  9 Copy quote

• The mob is easily led and may be moved by the smallest force, so that its agitations have a wonderful resemblance to those of the sea.

  Polybius

  Sea, Agitation, May

  11 Copy quote

• When the ancients said a work well begun was half done, they meant to impress the importance of always endeavoring to make a good beginning.

  Polybius

  Done, Half, Said

  13 Copy quote

• The government will take the fairest of names, but the worst of realities--mob rule.

  Polybius

  Reality, Government, Names

  16 Copy quote

• The particular aspect of history which both attracts and benefits its readers is the examination of causes and the capacity, which is the reward of this study, to decide in each case the best policy to follow. Now in all political situations we must understand that the principle factor which makes for success or failure is the form of a state's constitution: it is from this source, as if from a fountainhead, that all designs and plans of action not only originate but reach their fulfillment.

  Polybius

  Design, Political, Principles

  12 Copy quote

• Can any one be so indifferent or idle as not to care to know by what means, and under what kind of polity, almost the whole inhabited world was conquered and
  brought under the dominion of the single city of Rome, and that too within a period of not quite fifty-three years?

  Polybius

  Mean, Rome, Years

  Polybius, Evelyn S. Shuckburgh (2012). “The Histories of Polybius: Translated from the Text of F. Hultsch”, p.1, Cambridge University Press

  10 Copy quote

• For peace, with justice and honor, is the fairest and most profitable of possessions, but with disgrace and shameful cowardice, it is the most infamous and harmful of all.

  Polybius

  Peace, Justice, Honor

  10 Copy quote

• We can profit only by our own misfortunes and those of others. The former, though they may be the more beneficial, are also the more painful; let us turn, then, to the latter.

  Polybius

  May, Painful, Profit

  10 Copy quote

• That historians should give their own country a break, I grant you; but not so as to state things contrary to fact. For there are plenty of mistakes made by writers out of ignorance, and which any man finds it difficult to avoid. But if we knowingly write what is false, whether for the sake of our country or our friends or just to be pleasant, what difference is there between us and hack writers? Readers should be very attentive to and critical of historians, and they in turn should be constantly on their guard.

  Polybius

  Friendship, Country, Mistake

  14 Copy quote

• How highly should we honor the Macedonians, who for the greater part of their lives never cease from fighting with the barbarians for the sake of the security of Greece? For who is not aware that Greece would have constantly stood in the greater danger, had we not been fenced by the Macedonians and the honorable ambition of their kings?

  Polybius

  Kings, Ambition, Fighting

  Polybius, William Roger Paton (1960). “Polybius: the histories”

  54 Copy quote

• The glorious memory of brave men is continually renewed; the fame of those who have performed any noble deed is never allowed to die; and the renown of those who have done good service to their country becomes a matter of common knowledge to the multitude, and part of the heritage of posterity.

  Polybius

  Country, Memories, Men

  Polybius, Friedrich Hultsch (1889). “The Histories”

  11 Copy quote

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