Alexander the Great Quotes

“Shall I pass by and leave you lying there because of the expedition you led against Greece, or shall I set you up again because of your magnanimity and your virtues in other respects?”

“Holy shadows of the dead, I'm not to blame for your cruel and bitter fate, but the accursed rivalry which brought sister nations and brother people, to fight one another. I do not feel happy for this victory of mine. On the contrary, I would be glad, brothers, if I had all of you standing here next to me, since we are united by the same language, the same blood and the same visions.”

“There is something noble in hearing myself ill spoken of, when I am doing well.”

“Sex and sleep alone make me conscious that I am mortal.”

“Oh! Most miserable wretch that I am! Why have I not learnt how to swim?”

“In the end, when it's over, all that matters is what you've done.”

“I send you a kaffis of mustard seed, that you may taste and acknowledge the bitterness of my victory.”

“Let us conduct ourselves so that all men wish to be our friends and all fear to be our enemies.”

“Through every generation of the human race there has been a constant war, a war with fear. Those who have the courage to conquer it are made free and those who are conquered by it are made to suffer until they have the courage to defeat it, or death takes them.”

“His father is governor of Media, and though he has the greatest command given him of all the rest of my generals, he still covetously desires more, and my being without issue spurs him on to this wicked design. But Philotas takes wrong measures.”

“So far as I am concerned, I could not be accused of having set eyes, or having wished to set eyes, upon Darius' wife: on the contrary, I have refused even to listen to those who spoke to me of her beauty.”

“I consider not what Parmenio should receive, but what Alexander should give.”

“I am involved in the land of a leonine and brave people, where every foot of the ground is like a well of steel, confronting my soldier. You have brought only one son into the world, but everyone in this land can be called an Alexander.”

“I am dying from the treatment of too many physicians.”

“Bury my body and don't build any monument. Keep my hands out so the people know the one who won the world had nothing in hand when he died.”

“I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep; I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.”

“Shall I, that have destroyed my Preservers, return home?”

“For my own part, I would rather excel in knowledge of the highest secrets of philosophy than in arms.”

“I foresee a great funeral contest over me.”

“If we turn our backs of the Scythians who have provoked us, how shamefully shall we march against the revolted Bactrians; but if we pass Tanais and make the Scythians feel, by dear experience, that we are invincible, not in Asia only, it is not to be doubted but that Europe itself, as well as Asia, will come within the bounds of our conquests.”

“Your ancestors came to Macedonia and the rest of Hellas [Greece] and did us great harm, though we had done them no prior injury. I have been appointed leader of the Greeks, and wanting to punish the Persians I have come to Asia, which I took from you.”

“Do you not think it a matter worthy of lamentation that when there is such a vast multitude of them [worlds], we have not yet conquered one?”

“How great are the dangers I face to win a good name in Athens.”

“We of Macedon for generations past have been trained in the hard school of danger and war”

“You shall, I question not, find a way to the top if you diligently seek for it; for nature hath placed nothing so high that it is out of the reach of industry and valor.”