“I am more afraid of our own blunders than of the enemy’s devices.”
Thucydides
History of the Peloponnesian War (Primary source)
The History of the Peloponnesian War is about what happens when a rising power threatens an established one. Spoiler: nothing good.
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“The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Lacedaemon [Sparta], made war inevitable.”
— Thucydides Primary source“Right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.”
— Thucydides Primary source“So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth, accepting readily the first story that comes to hand.”
— Thucydides Primary source“I think the two things most opposed to good counsel are haste and passion; haste usually goes hand in hand with folly, passion with coarseness and narrowness of mind.”
— Thucydides Primary source“We must be our own [friend] before we can be another’s.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary source“There’s hardly anything more important than being rational or objective.”
— Charlie Munger Primary source“War is mainly a catalogue of blunders.”
— Winston Churchill Primary source“He who possesses most must be most afraid of loss.”
— Leonardo da Vinci Primary source