Alexander the Great Quotes

Alexander the Great offers bold, strategic reflections on leadership, war and success.

29 quotes

  1. What an excellent horse do they lose, for want of address and boldness to manage him! ... I could manage this horse better than others do.

  2. Holy shadows of the dead, I'm not to blame for your cruel and bitter fate, but the accursed rivalry which brought sister nations and brother people, to fight one another. I do not feel happy for this victory of mine. On the contrary, I would be glad, brothers, if I had all of you standing here next to me, since we are united by the same language, the same blood and the same visions.

  3. If I were not Alexander, I should wish to be Diogenes.

  4. If it were not my purpose to combine barbarian things with things Hellenic (Greek), to traverse and civilize every continent, to search out the uttermost parts of land and sea, to push the bounds of Macedonia to the farthest Ocean, and to disseminate and shower the blessings of the Hellenic justice and peace over every nation, I should not be content to sit quietly in the luxury of idle power, but I should emulate the frugality of Diogenes. But as things are, forgive me Diogenes, that I imitate Herakles, and emulate Perseus, and follow in the footsteps of Dionysos, the divine author and progenitor of my family, and desire that victorious Hellenes should dance again in India and revive the memory of the Bacchic revels among the savage mountain tribes beyond the Kaukasos:

  5. Our enemies are Medes and Persians, men who for centuries have lived soft and luxurious lives; we of Macedon for generations past have been trained in the hard school of danger and war. Above all, we are free men, and they are slaves. There are Greek troops, to be sure, in Persian service - but how different is their cause from ours! They will be fighting for pay - and not much of at that; we, on the contrary, shall fight for Greece, and our hearts will be in it. As for our foreign troops - Thracians, Paeonians, Illyrians, Agrianes - they are the best and stoutest soldiers in Europe, and they will find as their opponents the slackest and softest of the tribes of Asia. And what, finally, of the two men in supreme command? You have Alexander, they - Darius!

  6. So would I, if I were Parmenion.

  7. Your ancestors came to Macedonia and the rest of Hellas (Greece) and did us great harm, though we had done them no prior injury. I have been appointed leader of the Greeks, and wanting to punish the Persians I have come to Asia, which I took from you...

  8. Youths of the Pellaians and of the Macedonians and of the Hellenic Amphictiony and of the Lakedaimonians and of the Corinthians: and of all the Hellenic peoples, join your fellow-soldiers and entrust yourselves to me, so that we can move against the barbarians and liberate ourselves from the Persian bondage, for as Greeks we should not be slaves to barbarians.

  9. Now you fear punishment and beg for your lives, so I will let you free, if not for any other reason so that you can see the difference between a Greek king and a barbarian tyrant, so do not expect to suffer any harm from me. A king does not kill messengers.

  10. Are you still to learn that the end and perfection of our victories is to avoid the vices and infirmities of those whom we subdue?

  11. To the strongest!

  12. An army of sheep led by a lion is better than an army of lions led by a sheep.

  13. There are no more other worlds to conquer!

  14. I do not steal victory

  15. I consider not what Parmenion should receive, but what Alexander should give.

  16. Nothing is impossible, to him who will try.

  17. I would rather excel others in the knowledge of what is excellent than in the extent of my powers and dominion.

  18. If we turn our backs of the Scythians who have provoked us, how shamefully shall we march against the revolted Bactrians; but if we pass Tanais and make the Scythians feel, by dear experience, that we are invincible, not in Asia only, it is not to be doubted but that Europe itself, as well as Asia, will come within the bounds of our conquests.

  19. On their side more men are standing, on ours more will fight!

  20. I am dying from the treatment of too many physicians.

  21. At Achilles tomb, O fortunate youth, to have found Homer as the herald of your glory!

  22. For my own part, I would rather excel in knowledge of the highest secrets of philosophy than in arms.

  23. So far as I am concerned, I could not be accused of having set eyes, or having wished to set eyes, upon Darius' wife: on the contrary, I have refused even to listen to those who spoke to me of her beauty.

  24. There are so many worlds and I have not yet conquered even one.

  25. As for a limit to one’s labors, I, for one, do not recognize any for a high-minded man, except that the labors themselves should lead to noble accomplishments.

  26. The end and object of conquest is to avoid doing the same thing as the conquered.

  27. Without Knowledge, Skill cannot be focused. Without Skill, Strength cannot be brought to bear and without Strength, Knowledge may not be applied.

  28. God must have loved Afghans because he made them so beautiful.

  29. True love never has a happy ending, because there is no ending to true love.