“ Friends are no use in trouble. ”
Plutarch, Moralia (c. 100 AD). copy citation
| Author | Plutarch |
|---|---|
| Source | Moralia |
| Topic | trouble |
| Date | c. 100 AD |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | Translated by Arthur Richard Shilleto |
| Weblink | http://www.gutenberg.org/files/23639/23639-h/23639-h.htm |
Context
“For it is not those who have learnt and know how to enjoy the present, but those who ever hang on the future, and hope after what they have not, that float as it were on hope as on a raft, though they never get beyond the walls. 939
Jocasta. But did your father's friends do nothing for you? Polynices. Be fortunate! Friends are no use in trouble. Jocasta. Did not your good birth better your condition? Polynices. 'Tis bad to want. Birth brought no bread to me. 940
392 But it was ungrateful in Polynices thus to rail against exile as discrediting his good birth and robbing him of friends, for it was on account of his good birth that he was deemed worthy of a royal bride though an exile, and he came to fight supported by a band of friends and allies, a great force, as he himself admits a little later,
” source
Jocasta. But did your father's friends do nothing for you? Polynices. Be fortunate! Friends are no use in trouble. Jocasta. Did not your good birth better your condition? Polynices. 'Tis bad to want. Birth brought no bread to me. 940
392 But it was ungrateful in Polynices thus to rail against exile as discrediting his good birth and robbing him of friends, for it was on account of his good birth that he was deemed worthy of a royal bride though an exile, and he came to fight supported by a band of friends and allies, a great force, as he himself admits a little later,
” source
