Quotes from Themistocles

I have with me two gods, Persuasion and Compulsion.

I choose the likely man in preference to the rich man; I want a man without money rather than money without a man.

He who commands the sea has command of everything.

[Upon being asked whether he would rather be Achilles or Homer:] Which would you rather be—a victor in the Olympic games, or the announcer of the victor?

[Of two suitors for his daughter's hand:] I choose the likely man in preference to the rich man; I want a man without money rather than money without a man.

The wooden wall is your ships.

[Of his son:] The boy is the most powerful of all the Hellenes; for the Hellenes are commanded by the Athenians, the Athenians by myself, myself by the boy's mother, and the mother by her boy.

I have with me two gods, Persuasion and Compulsion.

Tuning the lyre and handling the harp are no accomplishments of mine, but rather taking in hand a city that was small and inglorious and making it glorious and great.

Strike, but hear me.

The speech of man is like embroidered tapestries, since like them this too has to be extended in order to display its patterns, but when it is rolled up it conceals and distorts them.