The Far Arena Quotes

“We are all the children of Rome, without knowing it. Our months are called after Roman emperors or gods, our summer is July and August, named after Julius Caesar and Augustus Caesar. When you people scream fascist at us, you are referring to the rods of authority called fasces by the Romans. The idea of law written down and to be observed equally comes to us from the Romans, and our alphabet comes to us exactly from the Roman. From plumbing to the idea that surrounding someone in battle gives victory, Rome gave them to us. Rome is our common, civilized roots, so deep that many of us in the West do not even realize it unless we are educated to it. Rome is our intellectual father, and we have been living off its remnants for two thousand years.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“I am old. I should have left before. Any fool can ride the chariots of victory. It takes judgement to get off at the right time.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“She had everything to recommend her but a heart. And yet that is the last thing a young man looks at.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“Honesty is too strong a drink to be unwatered all the time; rather it should be given in doses.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“An iron plow instead of wood meant you lived past thirty. It changed more than the depth of a furrow.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“I was too rich to get honesty and too poor to change the order of the Roman world.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“they spoke well of Rome, for the taxes did not appear heavy, compared to the previous great taxes demanded by robber bands”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“King? He could lead twenty men at most and this meant, more than likely, that he was the one who had the helmet and the sword.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“whatever was down there was only an issue to fight over. The fight was really between men.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“The authorities? The authorities?” I laughed. “Why is it people think the authorities are some form of gods with either great justice or great, cunning evil, rather than the same plodding fools they see in their daily lives, and most of all in their mirrors?”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena

“Woman, so often you have said that even in the darkest night there still exists a sunlight so bright we cannot look at it. Now if this is so, somewhere in this bright day is a night so dark the terrors know no bounds. So let us not be so happy.”
― Richard Ben Sapir, The Far Arena