Top 15 Hesiod Quotes

The gods have placed sweat as the price of all things.

I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond words... When I was young, we were taught to be discreet and respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly disrespectful and impatient of restraint.

And she conceived and bore to Zeus, who delights in the thunderbolt, two sons, Magnes and Macedon, rejoicing in horses, who dwell round about Pieria and Olympus.

Sometimes a day is a step mother, sometimes a mother.

Ἄλλοτε μητρυιὴ πέλει ἡμέρη, ἄλλοτε μήτηρ.

Gossip is mischievous, light and easy to raise, but grievous to bear and hard to get rid of. No gossip ever dies away entirely, if many people voice it: it too is a kind of divinity.

Φήμη γάρ τε κακὴ πέλεται, κούφη μὲν ἀεῖραι
ῥεῖα μάλ᾽, ἀργαλέη δὲ φέρειν, χαλεπὴ δ᾽ ἀποθέσθαι.
φήμη δ᾽ οὔ τις πάμπαν ἀπόλλυται, ἥν τινα πολλοὶ
λαοὶ φημίξωσι· θεός νύ τίς ἐστι καὶ αὐτή.

Γλώσσης τοι θησαυρὸς ἐν ἀνθρώποισιν ἄριστος
φειδωλῆς.

Do not get a name either as lavish or as churlish; as a friend of rogues or as a slanderer of good men.

Μηδὲ πολύξεινον μηδ᾽ ἄξεινον καλέεσθαι,
μηδὲ κακῶν ἕταρον μηδ᾽ ἐσθλῶν νεικεστῆρα.

Neither make thy friend equal to a brother; but if thou shalt have made him so, be not the first to do him wrong.

Οὐ μὲν γάρ τι γυναικὸς ἀνὴρ ληίζετ᾽ ἄμεινον
τῆς ἀγαθῆς, τῆς δ᾽ αὖτε κακῆς οὐ ῥίγιον ἄλλο.

Bring home a wife to your house when you are of the right age, while you are not far short of thirty years nor much above; this is the right age for marriage.

Ὡραῖος δὲ γυναῖκα τεὸν ποτὶ οἶκον ἄγεσθαι,
μήτε τριηκόντων ἐτέων μάλα πόλλ᾽ ἀπολείπων
μήτ᾽ ἐπιθεὶς μάλα πολλά· γάμος δέ τοι ὥριος οὗτος.

Μέτρα φυλάσσεσθαι· καιρὸς δ᾽ ἐπὶ πᾶσιν ἄριστος.