Nov 12, 2018

Thucydides on Retirement

Actually, I cribbed these quotes from the WSJ Saturday edition but I feel justified because not so long ago I slogged for over a year through all of the History of the Peloponnesian War. And a slog it was from first page to last. But I was glad when I was done to have had the slog. The voice, by way of the translator no doubt, sounds modern and parts of of the history were more affecting than I had expected, in particular the pathos of the Sicilian campaign and the image of the defeated, captive, abandoned soldiers sweltering in pits. 

This is a stretch on making a retirement connection but what the heck:

On Planning: “Hope is an expensive commodity”

On Spending Retrenchment: “…the usual thing among men is that when they want something they will, without any reflection, leave that to hope, while they will employ the full force of reason in rejecting what they find unpalatable.”

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