WIST Quotations https://wist.info Wish I'd Said That! Tue, 04 Aug 2026 22:26:31 +0000 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.0.2 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.0.2 https://wist.info/wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/little-w-little-box-60x60.jpg imprecation – WIST Quotations https://wist.info 32 32 43606282 Euripides -- Medea [Μήδεια], l. 659ff, Antistrophe 2 (431 BC) [tr. Theodoridis (2004)] https://wist.info/euripides/82775/ https://wist.info/euripides/82775/#respond Tue, 17 Mar 2026 18:19:23 +0000 Dave https://wist.info/?p=82775 CHORUS: I hope the man who does not honour his friends, the man who does not open an honest heart to them, I hope that man dies a horrible, a miserable death. Such a man will certainly never be a friend of mine!

[ΚΥΚΛΩΨ: ἀχάριστος ὄλοιθ᾽ ὅτῳ πάρεστιν
μὴ φίλους τιμᾶν καθαρᾶν ἀνοί-
ξαντα κλῇδα φρενῶν: ἐμοὶ
μὲν φίλος οὔποτ᾽ ἔσται.]


Euripides (485?-406? BC) Greek tragic dramatist
Medea [Μήδεια], l. 659ff, Antistrophe 2 (431 BC) [tr. Theodoridis (2004)]
    (Source)

(Source (Greek)). Other translations:

Perish the wretch devoid of worth.
Engrossed by mean and selfish ends.
Whose heart expands not, those he lov'd, to aid;
Never may I lament attachments thus repaid.
[tr. Wodhull (1782)]

Unpitied may he die,
Who to a friend assistance can deny;
Nor, to afflicted virtue kind,
Unlocks the treasures of his mind!
[tr. Potter (1814)]

Let shameful blight
Slay him who gives not friends their right,
Unlocking them his heart's pure store:
Let him be friend of mine no more.
[tr. Webster (1868)]

May he perish and find no favour, whoso hath not in him honour for his friends, freely unlocking his heart to them. Never shall he be friend of mine.
[tr. Coleridge (1891)]

Thankless may he perish who desires not to assist his friends, having unlocked the pure treasures of his mind; never shall he be friend to me.
[tr. Buckley (1892)]

But he, who regardeth not friends, accursed may he perish, and hated,
Who opes not his heart with sincerity's key to the hapless-fated --
Never such shall be friend of mine!
[tr. Way (Loeb) (1894)]

Ah, but the man -- cursèd be he,
Cursèd beyond recover,
Who openeth, shattering, seal by seal,
A friend's clean heart, then turns his heel,
Deaf unto love: never in me
Friend shall he know nor lover.
[tr. Murray (1906)]

Perish the fiend! whose iron heart
To fair Affection’s truth unknown,
Bids her he fondly lov’d depart,
Unpitied, helpless, and alone;
Who ne’er unlocks with silver key,
The milder treasures of his soul;
May such a friend be far from me,
And Ocean’s storms between us roll!
[tr. Byron (1907)]

O let him die ungraced whose heart
Will not reward his friends,
Who cannot open an honest mind
No friend will he be of mine.
[tr. Warner (1944)]

May dishonor and ruin fall on the man
Who, having unlocked the secrets
Of a friend's frank heart, can then disown him!
He shall be no friend of mine.
[tr. Vellacott (1963)]

Perish unloved the one
who does not unlock a pure heart to friends;
No friend of mind will he ever be.
[tr. Podlecki (1989)]

May that man die unloved who cannot honor his friends, unlocking to them his honest mind. To me at any rate he shall never be friend.
[tr. Kovacs (Loeb) (1994)]

Untouched by grace or favour may he die, the man who cannot honour his loved ones, by opening a heart that harbours no guile! Never shall he be friend of mine.
[tr. Davie (1996)]

Without grace may he perish who
does not treat his loved ones honorably
unbolting his heart in pure love.
He will never be a friend of mine.
[tr. Luschnig (2007)]

The man who shames his family,
who does not open up his heart
and treat them in all honesty --
may he perish unlamented.
With him I never could be friends.
[tr. Johnston (2008)]

May an ungrateful person be destroyed, one who does not honour family and friends when he has opened up their hearts and found them pure; may such a person never be my friend.
[tr. Ewans (2022)]

May he perish without grace [kharis], whoever could treat his philoi without timē, not opening the key of his phrenes. Never will he be philos to me.
[tr. Coleridge / Ceragioli / Nagy / Hour25]

May that man die unloved who cannot honour his friends, unlocking to them his honest mind. To me at any rate he shall never be a friend.
[tr. Kovacs / Zhang / Rogak]

 ]]> https://wist.info/euripides/82775/feed/ 0 82775 Twain, Mark -- Story (1905), “The War Prayer” https://wist.info/twain-mark/5637/ https://wist.info/twain-mark/5637/#respond Thu, 14 Feb 2008 12:59:17 +0000 Dave http://wist.info/wp/?p=5637 “You heard these words: ‘Grant us the victory, O Lord our God!’ That is sufficient. The whole of the uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant words. Elaborations were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory — must follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen!
“O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle — be Thou near them! With them — in spirit — we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it — for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.
(After a pause.) “Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits!”


Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
Story (1905), “The War Prayer”
    (Source)

A mysterious man speaking to a church congregation gathered to pray for the victory of their local men going off to war.

The story was originally written after the Spanish-American War and during the Philippine-American War. It was rejected at the time by Harper's Bazaar on 1905-03-22 as "too radical" and "not quite suited to a woman's magazine." He was further discouraged by his family, friends, and publishers from publishing something so "sacrilegious."

It's frequently claimed that the story was eventually published in Harper's Magazine, Vol 80, No. 798 (1916-11), during World War I. In reality, that issue only contains Part 7 (the last installment) of his The Mysterious Stranger (a different story).

It was not published until collected in Europe and Elsewhere (1923) [ed. Paine]. ]]> https://wist.info/twain-mark/5637/feed/ 0 5637