Tacitus Quotes

Indeed, the crowning proof of their valour and their strength is that they keep up their superiority without harm to others.

What is today supported by precedents will hereafter become a precedent.

cupido dominandi cunctis adfectibus flagrantior est

The younger men had been born after the victory of Actium; most even of the elder generation, during the civil wars; few indeed were left who had seen the Republic. It was thus an altered world, and of the old, unspoilt Roman character not a trace lingered. Equality was an outworn creed, and all eyes looked to the mandate of the sovereign, ...

So true is it that all transactions of preeminent importance are wrapt in doubt and obscurity; while some hold for certain facts the most precarious hearsays, others turn facts into falsehood; and both are exaggerated by posterity.

Corruptissima re publica plurimae leges.

Some might consider him as too fond of fame; for the desire for glory clings even to the best men longer than any other passion.

Expugnatae urbis praedam ad militem, deditae ad duces pertinere.

Because they didn't know better, they called it "civilization," when it was part of their slavery.

No one in Germany laughs at vice, nor do they call it the fashion to corrupt and to be corrupted.

Ne Tiberium quidem caritate aut rei publicae cura successorem adscitum, sed quoniam adrogantiam saevitiamque eius introspexerit, comparatione deterrima sibi gloriam quaesivisse.

Their shields are black, their bodies dyed. They choose dark nights for battle, and, by the dread and gloomy aspect of their death-like host, strike terror into the foe, who can never confront their strange and almost infernal appearance.

non enim ignavia magna imperia contineri

Quanquam severa illic matrimonia

There is a division of duties between the army and its generals. Eagerness for battle becomes the soldiers, but generals serve the cause by forethought, by counsel, by delay oftener than by temerity. As I promoted your victory to the utmost of my power by my sword and by my personal exertions, so now I must help you by prudence and by counsel, the qualities which belong peculiarly to a general.