Sophocles

Ill-gotten gains work evil.

There is no happiness where there is no wisdom;

No wisdom but in submission to the gods.

Big words are always punished,

And proud men in old age learn to be wise.

The ideal condition

Would be, I admit, that men should be right by instinct;

But since we are all too likely to go astray,

The reasonable thing is to learn from those who can teach.

Love, unconquerable,

Waster of rich men, keeper

Of warm lights and all-night vigil

In the soft face of a girl:

Sea-wanderer, forest-visitor!

Even the pure immortals cannot escape you,

And mortal man, in his one day's dusk,

Trembles before your glory.

Evil seems good, soon or late, to him whose mind the god draws to mischief.

It is no weakness for the wisest man

To learn when he is wrong.

Think not that thy word, and thine alone, must be right.

Numberless are the world's wonders, but none

More wonderful than man.

All men are liable to err; but when an error hath been made, that man is no longer witless or unblest who heals the ill into which he hath fallen, and remains not stubborn.

For whoso lives, as I, in many woes,

How can it be but death shall bring him gain?

Grief teaches the steadiest minds to waver.

Wisdom outweighs any wealth.