When the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.
Edith HamiltonRead
To rejoice in life, to find the world beautiful ... was a mark of the Greek spirit.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the importance of finding joy and beauty in life, reflecting a core aspect of the Greek mindset.
Edith Hamilton highlights that the ability to celebrate life and appreciate the beauty of the world is a defining characteristic of the Greek spirit. This notion suggests that embracing happiness and recognizing the splendor around us are integral to a fulfilling existence, echoing ancient Greek values that prioritized joy, nature, and human experience.
Themes
JoyBeautyLifeGreek SpiritHappiness
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be shared during a motivational speech about finding beauty in everyday life.
More from Edith Hamilton
All quotes βThe power of good is shown not by triumphantly conquering evil, but by continuing to resist evil while facing certain defeat.
Edith HamiltonRead
Theories that go counter to the facts of human nature are foredoomed.
Edith HamiltonRead
Responsibility is the price every man must pay for freedom.
Edith HamiltonRead
So far, we do not seem appalled at the prospect of exactly the same kind of education being applied to all the school children from the Atlantic to the Pacific, but there is an uneasiness in the air, a realization that the individual is growing less easy to find; an idea, perhaps, of what standardization might become when the units are not machines, but human beings.
Edith HamiltonRead
Pain is the most individualized thing on earth. It is true that it is the great common bond as well, but that realization only comes when it is over. To suffer is to be alone. To watch another suffer is to know the barrier that shuts each of us away by himself Only individuals can suffer.
Edith HamiltonRead
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Trying to describe the process of becoming an alcoholic is like trying to describe air. It's too big and mysterious and pervasive to be defined. Alcohol is everywhere in your life, omnipresent, and you're both aware and unaware of it almost all the time, all you know is you'd die without it, and there is no simple reason why this happens, no single moment, no physiological event that pushes a heavy drinker across a concrete line into alcoholism. It's a slow, gradual, insidious, elusive becoming.
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When we see life, we call it beautiful. When we see death, we call it ugly. But it is more beautiful still to see oneself living at great speed, right up to the moment of death.
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Live everyday as if it were your last because someday you're going to be right.
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I know what it's like to see one's mother go through the agony of death and be unable to help; there is no consolation. We all have to bear such heavy burdens, for they are unalterably linked to life.
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My life is a blessing every day that I get up. God saved my feet. How am I not going to use them?
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The men have piled up in my past, have fallen trenchantly through my life, like an avalanche that doesn't mean to kill but is going to bury me alive just the same.
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