The greatest hero of Greece was Hercules. He was a personage of quite another order from the great hero of Athens, Theseus. He was... what all Greece except Athens most admired. The Athenians were different from the other Greeks and their hero therefore was different. Theseus was, of course, bravest of the brave as all heroes are, but unlike other heroes he was as compassionate as he was brave and a man of great intellect as well as great bodily strength. It was natural that the Athenians should have such a hero because they valued thought and ideas as no other part of the country did. In Theseus their ideal was embodied. But Hercules embodied what the rest of Greece most valued. His qualities were those the Greeks in general honored and admired. Except for unflinching courage, they were not those that distinguished Theseus. Hercules was the strongest man on earth and he had the supreme self-confidence magnificent physical strength gives. He considered himself on an equality with the gods.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It is all a question of sensitiveness. Brute force and overbearing may make a terrific effect. But in the end, that which lives li...ves by delicate sensitiveness. If it were a question of brute force, not a single human baby would survive for a fortnight. It is the grass of the field, most frail of all things, that supports all life all the time. But for the green grass, no empire would rise, no man would eat bread: for grain is grass; and Hercules or Napoleon or Henry Ford would alike be denied existence.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I was with Hercules and Cadmus once, When in a wood of Crete they bayed the bear... With hounds of Sparta: never did I hear Such gallant chiding; for besides the groves, The skies, the fountains, every region near Seemed all one mutual cry. I never heard So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their chins... The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars, Who, inward searched, have livers white as milk!LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
We've cracked the hemispheres with careless hand! Now, from the Gates of Hercules we flood...
Westward, westward till the barbarous brine Whelms us to the tired world where tasseling corn, Fat beans, grapes sweeter than muscadine Rot on the vine: in the land were we born.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Now, from the Gates of Hercules we flood Westward, westward till the barbarous brine... Whelms us to the tired land where tasseling corn, Fat beans, grapes sweeter than muscadine Rot on the vine: in that land were we born.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The nearest beach to us on the other side, whither we looked, due east, was on the coast of Galicia, in Spain, whose capital is Sa...ntiago, though by old poets' reckoning it should have been Atlantis or the Hesperides; but heaven is found to be farther west now.... A little south of east was Palos, where Columbus weighed anchor, and farther yet the pillars which Hercules set up; concerning which when we inquired at the top of our voices what was written on them,--for we had the morning sun in our faces, and could not see distinctly,--the inhabitants shouted Ne plus ultra (no more beyond), but the wind bore to us the truth only, plus ultra (more beyond), and over the Bay westward was echoed ultra (beyond). We spoke to them through the surf about the Far West, the true Hesperia, heos peras or end of the day, the This Side Sundown, where the sun was extinguished in the Pacific, and we advised them to pull up stakes and plant those pillars of theirs on the shore of California, whither all our folks were gone,--the only ne plus ultra now. Whereat they looked crestfallen on their cliffs, for we had taken the wind out of all their sails.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I expect a time when, or rather an integrity by which, a man will get his coat as honestly and as perfectly fitting as a tree its ...bark. Now our garments are typical of our conformity to the ways of the world, i.e., of the devil, and to some extent react on us and poison us, like that shirt which Hercules put on.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The true reformer does not want time, nor money, nor coöperation, nor advice. What is time but the stuff delay is made of? And de...pend upon it, our virtue will not live on the interest of our money. He expects no income, but outgoes; so soon as we begin to count the cost, the cost begins. And as for advice, the information floating in the atmosphere of society is as evanescent and unserviceable to him as gossamer for clubs of Hercules.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I have travelled a good deal in Concord; and everywhere, in shops, and offices, and fields, the inhabitants have appeared to me to... be doing penance in a thousand remarkable ways.... The twelve labors of Hercules were trifling in comparison with those which my neighbors have undertaken; for they were only twelve, and had an end; but I could never see that these men slew or captured any monster or finished any labor.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »