Top 500 Sophocles Quotes (2025 Update)
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401. “The penalty is death: yet hope of gain Hath lured men to their ruin oftentimes.”

— Sophocles

402. “None but a fool or an infant could forget a father gone so far and cold. No. Lament is a pattern cut and fitted around my mind – like the bird who calls Itys! Itys! endlessly, bird of grief, angel of Zeus. O heartdragging Niobe, I count you a god: buried in rock yet always you weep.”

— Sophocles

403. “Pardon, and keep silent, for what is shameful for women must be concealed among women.”

— Sophocles

404. “I see that all of us who live are nothing but images or insubstantial shadow.”

— Sophocles

405. “Whatever God has brought about Is to be borne with courage.”

— Sophocles

406. “If to some my tale seems foolishness I am content that such could count me fool.”

— Sophocles

407. “Whoever thinks his friend more important than his country, I rate him nowhere.”

— Sophocles

408. “Henceforth ye may thieve with better knowledge whence lucre should be won, and learn that it is not well to love gain from every source. For thou wilt find that ill-gotten pelf brings more men to ruin than to weal.”

— Sophocles

409. “Know’st not whate’er we do is done in love?”

— Sophocles

410. “I well believe it, to unwilling ears; None love the messenger who brings bad news.”

— Sophocles

411. “There is an ancient saying, famous among men, that thou shouldst not judge fully of a man’s life before he dieth, whether it should be called blest or wretched.”

— Sophocles

412. “False words do not bring forth fruit.”

— Sophocles

413. “It’s impossible to speak what it is not noble to do.”

— Sophocles

414. “Whoever lives among many evils just as I, how can dying not be a source of gain?”

— Sophocles

415. “A trifle is often pregnant with high importance; the prudent man neglects no circumstance.”

— Sophocles

416. “And instead my beloved, luck sent you back to me colder than ashes, later than shadow.”

— Sophocles

417. “When men have killed joy, I do not believe they still live.”

— Sophocles

418. “When trouble ends even troubles please.”

— Sophocles

419. “Alas, how quickly the gratitude owed to the dead flows off, how quick to be proved a deceiver.”

— Sophocles

420. “For even bold natures flee, whenever they see Hades close to life.”

— Sophocles

421. “Evil counsel travels fast.”

— Sophocles

422. “Men’s minds are given to change in hate and friendship.”

— Sophocles

423. “A broad-backed ox can be driven straight on his road even by a small goad.”

— Sophocles

424. “Do not grieve yourself too much for those you hate, nor yet forget them utterly.”

— Sophocles

425. “Whoever gets up and comes to grips with Love like a boxer is a fool.”

— Sophocles

426. “Those whose life is long still strive for gain, and for all mortals all things take second place to money.”

— Sophocles

427. “Now don’t, please, be quite so single-minded, self-involved, or assume the world is wrong and you are right. Whoever thinks that he alone possesses intelligence, the gift of eloquence, he and no one else, and character too... such men, I tell you, spread them open-you will find them empty.”

— Sophocles

428. “Strike at a great man, and you will not miss.”

— Sophocles

429. “It is the merit of a general to impart good news, and to conceal the truth.”

— Sophocles

430. “What woe is lacking to my tale of woes?”

— Sophocles

431. “Each say following another, either hastening or putting off our death – what pleasure does it bring? I count that man worthless whois cheered by empty hopes. No, a noble man must either live or die well.”

— Sophocles

432. “All my love gone for nothing. Days of my love, years of my love.”

— Sophocles

433. “I say that this crime is holy.”

— Sophocles

434. “Whenever the deity contrives misfortunes for a man, he first harms their understanding.”

— Sophocles

435. “Shame I do feel. And I know there is something all wrong about me – believe me. Sometimes I shock myself.”

— Sophocles

436. “A lie never grows old.”

— Sophocles

437. “It’s not through words but actions that I want to set the luster on my life.”

— Sophocles

438. “The dead alone can feel no touch of spite.”

— Sophocles

439. “All our mortal lives are set in danger and perplexity: one day to prosper, and the next – who knows? When all is well, then look for rocks ahead.”

— Sophocles

440. “Even the stout of heart shrink when they see the approach of death.”

— Sophocles

441. “I will not live by rules like those.”

— Sophocles

442. “Compassion limits even the power of God.”

— Sophocles

443. “Rose the joint evil that is now o’erflowing. And the old happiness in that past day Was truly happy, but the present hour Hath pain, crime, ruin: – whatsoe’er of ill Mankind have named, not one is absent here.”

— Sophocles

444. “You cannot know a man’s life before the man has died, then only can you call it good or bad.”

— Sophocles

445. “No one longs to live more than someone growing old.”

— Sophocles

446. “By God, I’ll have more booty in a moment.”

— Sophocles

447. “If they are just, they are better than clever.”

— Sophocles

448. “Don’t you know that silence supports the accuser’s charge?”

— Sophocles

449. “The mind convicts itself in advance, when scoundrels are up to no good, plotting in the dark. Oh but I hate it more when a traitor, caught red-handed, tries to glorify his crimes.”

— Sophocles

450. “One must obey the man whom the city sets up in power in small things and in justice and in its opposite.”

— Sophocles