"Leonidas" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... dining-room, with my feet upon the fender, and at my elbow a small table which I had rolled up to the fire, and upon which were some apologies for dessert, with some miscellaneous bottles of wine, spirit and liqueur. In the morning I had been reading Glover's "Leonidas," Wilkie's "Epigoniad," Lamartine's "Pilgrimage," Barlow's "Columbiad," Tuckermann's "Sicily," and Griswold's "Curiosities"; I am willing to confess, therefore, that I now felt a little stupid. I made effort to arouse myself by aid of frequent Lafitte, and, all failing, I betook ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 4 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... rose in his veins. The Pass lay before him—so did the Bridge. A full suit of dove-colored pajamas and a pair of turned-up Turkish slippers was not exactly the kind of uniform that either Leonidas or Horatius would have chosen to fight his way to glory, but there was no ...
— The Veiled Lady - and Other Men and Women • F. Hopkinson Smith
... millions and a half. His ships of war were twelve hundred and seven in number, and he had three thousand smaller vessels for carrying his land forces and supplies. At the narrow pass of Thermopylae, in the northeast of Greece, this immense army was checked for a while by the heroic Leonidas and his three hundred Spartans, who, however, perished in their attempt to prevent the Persian's attack on Athens, which city was almost entirely destroyed by the invaders. The sea-fight of Salamis was won by the Greeks against enormous odds; ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... For splendour with the lightnings of their lights Whence even their uttered names Burn like the strong twin flames Of song that shakes a throne and steel that smites; As on Thermopylae when shone Leonidas, on ...
— Studies in Song • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... richest satrapy of Darius. At all events, this country abounded in those most striking events which furnish history with her richest materials. In Rajistan every small kingdom had its Thermopylae, and every little town has produced its Leonidas. But the veil of the centuries hides from posterity events that the pen of the historian might have bequeathed to the everlasting admiration of the nations. Somnath might have appeared as a rival of Delphi, the treasures ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky
... of the Netherlands, their commercial prosperity and noble enterprise; but here all thought of them had ended. Schiller had not taught us that the ancestors of the miners of Mons, the artisans of Brussels, the seamen of Antwerp, the professors of Leyden, were heroes, worthy to stand beside Leonidas and Bozzaris; Strada had failed to rouse us to enthusiasm at the thought of their long, noble battle for life. Grotius had indeed painted for us with a very Flemish nicety of detail their manners and customs, but had ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various
... defying the murderers in a tongue they could not understand, or covering their faces with their hands, as though this instinctive movement could save them from the lead. A whole people died, to be born again. And beside this picture of horror and heroism, in another close to it, he saw Palafox, the Leonidas of Saragossa, mounted on horseback, with his stylish whiskers and the arrogance of a blacksmith in a captain-general's uniform, having in his bearing something of the appearance of a popular chieftain, holding in one hand, ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... great feat in the Prussian military annals; for which, sad as the news was, Wedell got the name of Leonidas attached to him by Friedrich himself. And indeed it is a gallant passage of war; "Forcing of the Elbe at Teinitz;" of which I could give two Narratives, one from the Prussian, and one from the Saxon side; ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... body of the people protested that this act was contrary to their wishes, their peaceful habits, and beyond their control. At the fort of Beau Sejour, the brave three hundred made a gallant stand, but were defeated. Would there had been a Leonidas among them! Would that the whole of their kinsmen had erected forts instead of dykes, and dropped the plough-handles to press the edge of the sabre against the grindstone! Sad indeed is the fate of that people who make any terms with such an enemy, except such as may be granted at the bayonet's ...
— Acadia - or, A Month with the Blue Noses • Frederic S. Cozzens
... notable Corps of men; which has its place in World-History;—though to us, so is History written, they remain mere rubrics of men; nameless; a shaggy Grenadier Mass, crossed with buff-belts. And yet might we not ask: What Argonauts, what Leonidas' Spartans had done such a work? Think of their destiny: since that May morning, some three years ago, when they, unparticipating, trundled off d'Espremenil to the Calypso Isles; since that July evening, some ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... Kentucky at first undertook to hold the position of armed neutrality in the civil war. On September 4, 1861, Gen. Leonidas Polk, moving up from Tennessee with a considerable force into Western Kentucky, seized Hickman and Columbus on the Mississippi, and threatened Paducah on the Ohio. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, appointed brigadier-general of volunteers on August 7, 1861, to date from May 17th, assumed ...
— From Fort Henry to Corinth • Manning Ferguson Force
... us the "Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam" did some other desirable work; but Professor Moulton quotes this paragraph from a popular life of Fitzgerald, published in Dublin: "Not Greece of old in her palmiest days—the Greece of Homer and Demosthenes, of Eschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles, of Pericles, Leonidas, and Alcibiades, of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, of Solon and Lycurgus, of Apelles and Praxiteles—not even this Greece, prolific as she was in sages and heroes, can boast such a lengthy bead-roll as Ireland can of names immortal in history!" But "this was for Irish consumption." ...
— The Greatest English Classic A Study of the King James Version of • Cleland Boyd McAfee
... men to guard a mile and a half of ramparts! Three hundred to protect some sixty-five broad acres within the walls! But the place was a Thermopylae, and there was a fine old Leonidas at the head of its three hundred. He was enough to make Spartans of them. Colonel Dimmick was the man,—a quiet, modest, shrewd, faithful, Christian gentleman; and he held all Virginia at bay. The traitors ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various
... but divinized heroes. Greece is for us Apollo, as a symbol of whatever is filled with light, high, beautiful and noble; Heracles for what is strength, energy, organization, life as it should be lived by human beings. Leonidas stands for us as a symbol of heroic deeds; Demosthenes as a symbol of the convincing powers of oratory and Pericles as the crystallization of Grecian life in its totality of beauty, learning and social and civic ...
— Simon Bolivar, the Liberator • Guillermo A. Sherwell
... much in need. In addition, we burned twenty-six cars containing ten thousand stand of small arms, three pieces of artillery, a great quantity of clothing, a heavy supply of ammunition, and the personal baggage of General Leonidas Polk. A large number of prisoners, mostly sick and convalescent, also fell into our hands; but as we could not carry them with us—such a hurried departure was an immediate necessity, by reason of our critical situation—the ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... may say so, of his shop; though, perhaps, the real motive for it was dislike to the republican artist, and distaste to an act of national resistance against a great military invader. "A bad subject," said he "after all, Leonidas was turned." He had the littleness to expect to be prominent in every picture of national victories of his time, and was displeased at a painting of an action in Egypt for Madame Murat, in which her wounded husband was the principal figure. Power made him impatient ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... Athenians conspired against Diocles and Hippias, tyrants of Athens. Diocles they slew; but Hippias, making his escape, avenged him. Chion and Leonidas of Heraclea, disciples of Plato, conspired against the despots Clearchus and Satirus. Clearchus fell, but Satirus survived and avenged him. The Pazzi, of whom we have spoken so often, succeeded in murdering Giuliano only. From such conspiracies, therefore, as are directed ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli
... we found ourselves like an island in the midst of the sea. A Wallachian army ten thousand strong, under Moga's command, beset us on all sides, while we had but three hundred armed men all told,—just the number that Leonidas had at Thermopylae. Our eldest brother, Berthold, who, since he turned vegetarian, can't bear to see a chicken killed for dinner, and is dead set against all bloodshed, advised us to make peaceful terms with ...
— Manasseh - A Romance of Transylvania • Maurus Jokai
... Greek who led the Persians across a pass in the mountains, whereby they were able to surround and overcome Leonidas and his ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... when we came to Fores last night; so we did not see what is called King Duncan's monument. I shall now mark some gleanings of Dr Johnson's conversation. I spoke of Leonidas, and said there were some good passages in it. JOHNSON. 'Why, you must SEEK for them.' He said, Paul Whitehead's Manners was a poor performance. Speaking of Derrick, he told me he had a kindness for him, and had often said, that if his letters had been written by one of a ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... why in slumbers Lethargic dost thou lie? Awake, and join thy numbers With Athens, old ally! Leonidas recalling, That chief of ancient song, Who saved ye once from falling, The terrible! the strong! Who made that bold diversion In old Thermopylae, And warring with the Persian To keep his country free; With his three hundred waging The battle, long he stood, ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... authors or the orators immediately before it, were those authors and orators Homers and Ciceros, would still shake a disparaging head, and talk of these degenerate days as Homer himself talked ages before Leonidas stood in the pass of Thermopylae, or Miltiades routed Asian armaments at Marathon. Guy Darrell belonged to a former race. The fathers of those young members rising now into fame had quoted to their sons his pithy sentences, his vivid images; and ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... in her day, and whose poem "Try Again" deals with one of those incidents held in affectionate remembrance by youth. Bruce and the spider may be less historically true, but it seems destined to eternal life alongside Leonidas and his Spartans. Older readers may remember Miss Cook's "My Old Arm Chair," which is usually given the place of honor ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... cases at least, from the supposition that every object has its mancs. The obolus for Charon, the cake of honey for Cerberus, the shadows of these articles would be borne and used by the shadow of the dead man. Leonidas saying, "Bury me on my shield: I will enter even Hades as a Lacedamonian," 46 must either have used the word Hades by metonymy for the grave, or have imagined that a shadowy fac simile of what was interred in the grave went ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... of the empire," he wrote; the first object of attack would be New Orleans, then Vera Cruz, then Mexico City; scenes of violence and pillage would follow; let His Excellency be on his guard. To ward off these calamities, "I will hurl myself like a Leonidas into the breach." But let His Excellency remember what risks the writer of this letter incurs, "by offering without orders this communication to a foreign power," and let him reimburse the bearer of this letter to the amount of 121,000 pesos which ...
— Jefferson and his Colleagues - A Chronicle of the Virginia Dynasty, Volume 15 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Allen Johnson
... South had become so complete that out of one hundred and six Congressional districts the opposition had only been able to elect four representatives,—Leonidas C. Houck from East Tennessee, Daniel L. Russell of North Carolina, Milton G. Urner of Maryland, and Joseph Jorgensen of Virginia. These were the few survivors in a contest waged for the extermination of the Republican party ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... across the road which his enemy had to traverse. One party characterized his conduct at the mill as that of the captain of a pirate ship, the other likened it to any of the great deeds of devotion told in history—the death of Leonidas and his three hundred, or ...
— Through the Fray - A Tale of the Luddite Riots • G. A. Henty
... which at first meant heaven-sent victory, or the strength and presence of some Divine spirit, became to them only the signs of their own pride or rage: the victor raven of Corvus sinks into the shamed falcon of Marmion, and the lion-heartedness which gave the glory and the peace of the gods to Leonidas, casts the glory and the might of kinghood to the dust ...
— The Pleasures of England - Lectures given in Oxford • John Ruskin
... thither, as to a more prominent theatre, athletes of God were sent from Egypt and all Thebais, according to their merit, and they won crowns from God through their great patience under many tortures and every mode of death. Among these was Leonidas, said to be the father of Origen, who was beheaded while his ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... "Leonidas, hero of Thermopylae!" shouted Mr. Smitz, and then continued at a conversational pitch, "if any of you wish to speak to him in his own language, you have full permission ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... prominent officer with a high ecclesiastical title, the Rt. Rev. Lieutenant-General Leonidas Polk, D.D., LL.D., Bishop of Louisiana, commanding a corps in Bragg's army. He was killed in battle at Pine Mountain, Ga., during Sherman's advance on Atlanta. Stonewall Jackson was so famed for his ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XII • John Lord
... more or less inflated; conscious of representing the King's person, and being a Roman Dictator,—though it is a perilously difficult office too, and requires more than a Letter of Instructions to qualify you for it! This is not Leonidas Wedell, whom readers once knew; poor Leonidas is dead long since, fell in the Battle of Sohr, soon after the heroic feat of Ziethen's and his at Elbe-Teinitz (Defence of Elbe against an Army); this is Leonidas's elder Brother. Friedrich had observed his fiery ways on ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... march at six in the morning. Passed the plantation of Leonidas Polk Walker. He is said to be the wealthiest man in North Alabama. His domain extends for fifteen miles along the road. The overseer's house and the negro huts near it ...
— The Citizen-Soldier - or, Memoirs of a Volunteer • John Beatty
... fancy. In another text of the Ulster cycle, Cath ruis na Rig, Conchobor's warriors adorn and beautify themselves in this way before the battle. The Aryan Celt behaved as did the Aryan Hellene. All readers of Herodotus will recall how the comrades of Leonidas prepared for battle by engaging in games and combing out their hair, and how Demaretus, the counsellor of Xerxes, explained to the king "that it is a custom with these men that when they shall prepare to imperil their lives; ...
— Heroic Romances of Ireland Volumes 1 and 2 Combined • A. H. Leahy
... discharge of the domestic duties, was never the mother of a great representative mind; because she is incapable of imparting those stern principles of exalted morality and fixity of purpose essential in forming the character of such men. The mother of Cincinnatus was a farmer's wife; of Leonidas, a shepherdess; and the mothers of Washington, Webster, Clay, Calhoun, William H, Crawford, and Andrew Jackson were all the wives of farmers—rural and simple in their pursuits, distinguished for energy and purity; constant in their principles, and ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... eat and drink or e'er we die (The sunlight flushes on the sea). Three hundred soldiers feasted high An hour before Thermopylae; Leonidas pour'd out the wine, And shouted ere he drain'd the cup, "Ho! comrades, let us gaily dine— This night with Pluto we shall sup"; And if they leant upon a reed, And if their reed was slight and slim, There's something good in Spartan creed— ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... Mackay, "let the contents of it be put through me if one of them should be injured." Well did Mr. Heron in his able speech, referring to these facts, say, "Though they were rebels who acted that heroic part, who could say their hearts, were not animated with the courage of Leonidas, and ...
— Speeches from the Dock, Part I • Various
... perfect in human conception, as brought into existence by the genius of Michael Angelo, and Raphael, this city affords rich and ample materials for study and description, though it is unable to excite that grandest feeling of the human breast, which is raised by the land of Leonidas and of Socrates. Greece fought for liberty! Rome for conquest! The philosophy of Rome is less original, less pure and disinterested, less practical ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... down to us it is easy to see that during his early married life he paid most attention to his horses. In 1760 he kept a stallion both for his own mares and for those of his neighbors, and we find many entries concerning the animal. Successors were "Leonidas," "Samson," "Steady," "Traveller" and "Magnolia," the last a full-blooded Arabian and probably the finest beast he ever owned. When away from home Washington now and then directed the manager to advertise the animal then reigning or to exhibit him in public places such as fairs. ...
— George Washington: Farmer • Paul Leland Haworth
... admit that even Shakespeare worked on a higher plane, or was a greater power on earth, than King Alfred or George Washington, even if it be that he will survive them both in the memory of man. The name of every man but one who fought with Leonidas at Thermopylae is forgotten. But is AEschylus greater than Leonidas, or Miltiades, or Themistocles? The literature of Athens preserves to immortality the fame of its great authors. But it was Solon, and Pericles, and Miltiades that created and saved and made great the city, without ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... advancement in general intelligence and culture, and in the depth and arrangement of thought. The venerable Judge Whittaker, who seldom leaves his home at night, was on the platform, and at the close of the valedictory, which was given by Leonidas Burbridge, of Greenville, Miss., he jumped from his chair, seized the young man by the hand and expressed his wonder and gratification at all he had heard and seen, saying that in all his fifty years of life in New Orleans he had seen nothing ...
— The American Missionary, Vol. 43, No. 8, August, 1889 • Various
... not hold out. He quickly changed his plan, postponing Belgium, but not for long, and fell back on the passes of the forest that he was about to make so famous. "They are the Thermopylae of France," he said, "but I mean to do better than Leonidas." ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... debated is whether the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae, seeing themselves deserted by the army, shall remain or flee. The different rhetors declaim as follows, making Leonidas the speaker:— ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... bulletins of Bonaparte! O, ye less grand long lists of kill'd and wounded! Shade of Leonidas, who fought so hearty, When my poor Greece was once, as now, surrounded! O, Caesar's Commentaries! now impart, ye Shadows of glory! (lest I be confounded) A portion of your fading twilight hues, So beautiful, ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... be supposed, Sparta contributed little of anything to art, literature, science, philosophy, or government. She left to the world some splendid examples of heroism, as for example the sacrifice of Leonidas and his Spartans to hold the pass at Thermopylae, and a warning example of the brutalizing effect on a people of excessive devotion to military training. It is a pleasure to turn from this dark picture to the wonderful (for the time) educational system that ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY
... the next generation were to struggle almost hopelessly. Time, which sets all things right, has placed David in his proper place; and while to-day we may admire the immense knowledge of the man as manifested in the great classical pictures, like the Horatii, the Sabines, or the Leonidas at Thermopylae, we remain cold before their array of painted statues. His portraits—Marat, the charming sketch of Madame Recamier, his own portrait as a young man, the group of Michel Gerard and his family, and the Pope Pius VII.—give the touch of nature which is ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various
... of despair, for, even in that dreadful crisis, he thought more of the little fellow than he did of himself. If he could have been assured of his safety, he would have been ready to wheel about and meet his score or more of foes, and fight them single-handed, as Leonidas and his band did at Thermopylae. But the fate of the two was linked together, and, sink or swim, it must ...
— The Cave in the Mountain • Lieut. R. H. Jayne
... with the Greek history of Arrian the most valuable source of information respecting the military career of Alexander the Great—then the only wonder is that the great conqueror was not made by his biographers to have—Leonidas-like—defended the Thermopylean passes in the Hindu Kush against the invasion of the first Vedic Brahmins "from the Oxus." Withal the Buddhist dates are either rejected or only accepted pro tempore. Well may the Hindu resent the preference shown to the testimony of ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... the Greek is [Greek: *eleupheria*]. In the thoughts of all three nations, the idea is precisely the same, and the word used for the idea by each nation therefore accurately translates the word of the other: [Greek: *eleupheria*]—libertas—franchise—reciprocally translate each other. Leonidas is characteristically [Greek: *eleupheros*] among Greeks; Publicola, characteristically liber, among Romans; Edward III. and the Black Prince, characteristically frank among French. And that common idea, which the words express, as all the careful scholars among you will know, is, with ...
— Val d'Arno • John Ruskin
... contributed to raise such compositions from being merely inscriptive into a branch of literature. He opened a new field, and the larger portion of these productions in Greek were written about this time. They are not generally humorous, with the exception of a few from Philo and Leonidas of Alexandria who lived about 60 B.C., from Ammianus in 120 B.C., and from Lucilius, a great composer of this kind, of whose history nothing is known but that he lived in the reign of Nero. The following are from ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... and luxurious"; he accuses them of ruling their husbands. "What difference," he says, "does it make whether the women rule or the rulers are ruled by women, for the result is the same?"[271] This gynaecocracy was noticed by others. "You of Lacedaemon," said a strange lady to Gorgo, wife of Leonidas, "are the only women in the world that rule the men." "We," she answered, "are the only women who bring forth men."[272] ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley |
