Top 500 Sophocles Quotes (2025 Update)
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251. “For most men friendship is a faithless harbor.”

— Sophocles

252. “When people fall in deep distress, their native sense departs.”

— Sophocles

253. “No more shall ye behold such sights of woe, deeds I have suffered and myself have wrought; henceforward quenched in darkness shall ye see those ye should ne’er have seen; now blind to those whom, when I saw, I vainly yearned to know.”

— Sophocles

254. “It’s no city at all, owned by one man alone.”

— Sophocles

255. “A friend in word is never friend of mine.”

— Sophocles

256. “Not from Hades’ black and universal lake can you lift him. Not by groaning, not by prayers. Yet you run yourself out in a grief with no cure, no time-limit, no measure. It is a knot no one can untie. Why are you so in love with things unbearable?”

— Sophocles

257. “You clearly hate to yield, but you will regret it when your anger has passed. Such natures are justly the hardest for themselves to bear.”

— Sophocles

258. “The eyes of men love to pluck the blossoms from the faded flowers they turn away.”

— Sophocles

259. “You win the victory when you yield to friends.”

— Sophocles

260. “Do not fear for me. Make straight your own path to destiny.”

— Sophocles

261. “Of no mortal say, ‘That man is happy,’ till vexed by no grievous ill he pass Life’s goal.”

— Sophocles

262. “Not to be born is, past all prizing, best.”

— Sophocles

263. “Heaven ne’er helps the men who will not act.”

— Sophocles

264. “Oh death, death, why do you never come to me thus summoned always day by day?”

— Sophocles

265. “If I am Sophocles, I am not mad; and if I am mad, I am not Sophocles.”

— Sophocles

266. “You are a woman marked for sorrow.”

— Sophocles

267. “The man the state has put in place must have obedient hearing to his least command when it is right, and even when it’s not.”

— Sophocles

268. “Of evils current upon earth The worst is money. Money ’tis that sacks Cities, and drives men forth from hearth and home; Warps and seduces native innocence, And breeds a habit of dishonesty.”

— Sophocles

269. “It is best to live anyhow, as one may; do not be afraid of marriage with your mother! Many have lain with their mothers in dreams too. It is he to whom such things are nothing who puts up with life best.”

— Sophocles

270. “Many are the things that man seeing must understand. Not seeing, how shall he know what lies in the hand of time to come?”

— Sophocles

271. “The only crime is pride.”

— Sophocles

272. “A fool cannot be an actor, though an actor may act a fool’s part.”

— Sophocles

273. “Shall we not perish wretchedest of all, If in defiance of the law we cross A monarch’s will? – weak women, think of that, Not framed by nature to contend with men. Remember.”

— Sophocles

274. “The end excuses any evil.”

— Sophocles

275. “Money is the worst currency that ever grew among mankind. This sacks cities, this drives men from their homes, this teaches and corrupts the worthiest minds to turn base deeds.”

— Sophocles

276. “An enemy’s gift is ruinous and no gift.”

— Sophocles

277. “I owe more to the dead, with whom I will spend a much longer time, than I will ever owe to the living.”

— Sophocles

278. “Even the bold will fly when they see Death drawing in close enough to end their life.”

— Sophocles

279. “It is hope that maintains most of mankind.”

— Sophocles

280. “The shimmering night does not stay for mortals, not misfortunes, nor wealth, but in a moment it is gone, and to the turn of another comes joy and loss.”

— Sophocles

281. “In his den the monster keep, Giver of eternal sleep.”

— Sophocles

282. “It is the dead, not the living, who make the longest demands.”

— Sophocles

283. “Another husband could be found and with That husband another son. But I have no mother now. I have no father. I cannot bring another brother to the world.”

— Sophocles

284. “Foolishness is indeed the sister of wickedness.”

— Sophocles

285. “For a man to help others with all his gifts and native strength: that is the noblest work.”

— Sophocles

286. “For whoever knows how to return a kindness he has received must be a friend above all price.”

— Sophocles

287. “The sleep of a sick man has keen eyes. It is a sleep unsleeping.”

— Sophocles

288. “Deem no man happy until he passes the edo fhis life without suffering grief.”

— Sophocles

289. “For every nation that lives peaceably, there will be many others to grow hard and push their arrogance to extremes; the gods attend to these things slowly. But they attend to those who put off God and turn to madness.”

— Sophocles

290. “Comply, and fear not, for my load of woe Is incommunicable to all but me.”

— Sophocles

291. “Ugly deeds are taught by ugly deeds.”

— Sophocles

292. “A state is not a state if it belongs to one man.”

— Sophocles

293. “The gods plant reason in mankind, of all good gifts the highest.”

— Sophocles

294. “There is a kind of excellence in me and you – born in us – and it cannot live in shame.”

— Sophocles

295. “We long to have again the vanished past, in spite of all its pain.”

— Sophocles

296. “To many men much-wandering hope comes as a boon, but to many others it is the deception of vain desires.”

— Sophocles

297. “But the power of destiny is something awesome; neither wealth, nor Ares, nor a tower, nor dark-hulled ships might escape it.”

— Sophocles

298. “Better not to exist than live basely.”

— Sophocles

299. “This is Electra. Brilliant no more.”

— Sophocles

300. “Surely, to think your own the only wisdom, and yours the only word, the only will, betrays a shallow spirit, an empty heart.”

— Sophocles