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45.
Now of course communities have enacted the
penalty of death for many offences far lighter than this: still hope leads
men to venture; and no one ever yet put himself in peril without the inward conviction that
he would succeed in his design.
[2]
Again, was there ever city rebelling that did not believe that it possessed
either in itself or in its alliances resources adequate to the enterprise?
[3]
All, states and individuals, are alike prone to err, and there is no law
that will prevent them; or why should men have exhausted the list of punishments in search of
enactments to protect them from evil-doers?
It is probable that in early times the penalties for the greatest offences
were less severe, and that, as these were disregarded, the penalty of death
has been by degrees in most cases arrived at, which is itself disregarded in
like manner.
[4]
Either then some means of terror more terrible than this must be
discovered, or it must be owned that this restraint is useless; and that as long as poverty gives men the courage of necessity, or plenty
fills them with the ambition which belongs to insolence and pride, and the
other conditions of life remain each under the thraldom of some fatal and
master passion, so long will the impulse never be wanting to drive men into
danger.
[5]
Hope also and cupidity, the one leading and the other following, the one
conceiving the attempt, the other suggesting the facility of succeeding,
cause the widest ruin, and, although invisible agents, are far stronger than
the dangers that are seen.
[6]
Fortune, too, powerfully helps the delusion, and by the unexpected aid that
she sometimes lends, tempts men to venture with inferior means; and this is especially the case with communities, because the stakes played
for are the highest, freedom or empire, and, when all are acting together,
each man irrationally magnifies his own capacity.
[7]
In fine, it is impossible to prevent, and only great simplicity can hope to
prevent, human nature doing what it has once set its mind upon, by force of
law or by any other deterrent force whatsoever.
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References (66 total)
- Commentary references to this page
(23):
- Sir Richard C. Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Oedipus Tyrannus, 863-910
- E.C. Marchant, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 2, 2.11
- E.C. Marchant, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 2, 2.47
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.12
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.16
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.36
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.38
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.40
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.43
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.44
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.46
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.53
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.56
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.59
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.66
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.75
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.81
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.83
- Charles F. Smith, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3, 3.84
- C.E. Graves, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 4, CHAPTER XVIII
- C.E. Graves, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 4, CHAPTER LXV
- C.E. Graves, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 5, 5.16
- W. Walter Merry, James Riddell, D. B. Monro, Commentary on the Odyssey (1886), 7.216
- Cross-references to this page
(6):
- Herbert Weir Smyth, A Greek Grammar for Colleges, VERBAL NOUNS
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 1.3.1
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 1.3.2
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 1.pos=2.2
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 3.1.3
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 3.5.2
- Cross-references in notes to this page
(1):
- Plato, Republic, Plat. Rep. 1.331a
- Cross-references in general dictionaries to this page
(36):
- LSJ, ἁπλ-ῶς
- LSJ, ἀλόγιστ-ος
- LSJ, ἀνήκω
- LSJ, ἀπείργω
- LSJ, ἀποτροπ-ή
- LSJ, δέος
- LSJ, διέξ-ειμι
- LSJ, δοξ-άζω
- LSJ, ἕκαστος
- LSJ, ἔρχομαι
- LSJ, ἐξάγω
- LSJ, ἐξουσ-ία
- LSJ, ἐφέπω
- LSJ, ἐκφροντίζω
- LSJ, ἐπίσχω
- LSJ, ἐπιβολ-ή
- LSJ, ἐπιβούλ-ευμα
- LSJ, εὑρετ-έος
- LSJ, εὐήθ-εια
- LSJ, εὐπορ-ία
- LSJ, φύω
- LSJ, ἴδιος
- LSJ, καταγιγνώσκω
- LSJ, κεῖμαι
- LSJ, μα^λα^κός
- LSJ, ὁ
- LSJ, ὁρμάω
- LSJ, παραβαίνω
- LSJ, παρέχω
- LSJ, πρόκειμαι
- LSJ, προστίθημι
- LSJ, πω
- LSJ, συμβάλλω
- LSJ, συντυ^χ-ία
- LSJ, τις
- LSJ, ζημία
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