Why have I nominated you, lady, to bear up beneath this most terrible of trials, you and your sisters of the… — Steven Pressfield

Do you love your country? [...] This man, with his life, has preserved it. Bear him with honor.

I believe him, Dienekes. He's so fucking stupid, this is just the way he would skrew it up.

This aspis was my father's and his father's before him. I have sworn before God to die before another man took this from my hand. He crossed to the ranks of Thespians, to a man, an obscure warrior among them. Into the fellow's grasp he placed the shield.