At Rome thing can or cannot be done when you are told anything cannot be done, there is an end of it.””It is much more convenient at Paris; when anything cannot be done you pay...

Sir, you do understand that – officially – I’m not actually a centurion. I haven’t even been assigned to a legion yet.’The general continued writing as he spoke. ‘What was the name?”Corbulo, sir.”Corbulo, you have...

When in Rome, live as the Romans do; when elsewhere, live as they live elsewhere.

I wanted to go to Rome. I got an offer to do an Italian film and I went.

What happened? It took Gibbon six volumes to describe the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, so I shan’t embark on that. But thinking about this almost incredible episode does tell one something about...

Rome had Senators too, that’s why it declined.

They’re Lares. House gods.””House gods,” Percy said. “Like…smaller than real gods, but larger than apartment gods?

My point is that this Potter business has legs. It will run and run, and we must be utterly mad, as a country, to leave it to the Americans to make money from a great...

Auctus took the initiative again, eyeballing his foe as he strode towards him. Indavara bounced up and down on his toes and waited. His options were limited; he needed time to see what Auctus could...

No more light answers. Let our officersHave note what we purpose. I shall breakThe cause of our expedience to the QueenAnd get her leave to part. For not aloneThe death of Fulvia, with more urgent...

Your Life Determines Your Journey & Your Journey Determines Your Life

When friends come to Rome in early summer to visit me I like to take them to the Pantheon during thunderstorms and stand them beneath the opening of the feathery, perfectly proportioned dome as rain...

All the great groups that stood about the Cross represent in one way or another the great historical truth of the time; that the world could not save itself. Man could do no more. Rome...

Rome has been called the “Sacred City”: – might not our Oxford be called so too? There is an air about it, resonant of joy and hope: it speaks with a thousand tongues to the...

When in Rome, do as Rome does.

There are many churches in my name and in the name of my apostles. The greatest and holiest is named after Peter; it is a place of great splendor in Rome. Nowhere can be found...

his-story” is often determined by those who survived to write it. In other words, history is written by the victors…Now, with the help of the Roman historian Tacitus, I shall tell you Queen Boudicca’s story,...

I Only Believe What I See But I Question Everything I Hear

But the new generation had tasted the wine of philosophy; and from this time onward the rich youth of Rome went eagerly to Athens and Rhodes to exchange their oldest faith for the newest doubts.

I would like to be like Rome when I am an old lady.

Then none was for a party;Then all were for the state;Then the great man helped the poor,And the poor man loved the great;Then lands were fairly proportioned;Then spoils were fairly sold;The Romans were like brothersIn...

Veni, vidi, vici. (I came, I saw, I conquered.)

Planning is for the world’s great cities, for Paris, London, and Rome, for cities dedicated, at some level, to culture. Detroit, on the other hand, was an American city and therefore dedicated to money, and...

Everything we know and believe about deity and divinity nowadays, is a direct origin of old civilizations. Everybody, Greeks, Saxons, Assyrians and Soumerians, all imitate the ancient ways of the first tribes of central Africa...

Oh Lion in a peculiar guise,Sharp Roman road to Paradise,Come eat me up, I’ll pay thy tollWith all my flesh, and keep my soul.

For too many generations of the common people of Rome were allowed no hand in governing, and their state religion had long since mummified into dry rituals that never touched ordinary passions. It was inevitable,...

The claim at the heart of this book has been carefully researched by several generations of scholars and is orthodox in academic circles, if not beyond. Christians under the Roman Empire were neither constantly persecuted...

In Rome the statues, in Paris the paintings, and in Prague the buildings suggest that pleasure can be an education.

I have this theory, that this will be the only city that future archaeologists find, Las Vegas. The dry climate will preserve it all and teams of scientists in the year 5000 will carefully sweep...

The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher as equally false; and by the magistrate as equally useful.

This revolutionary idea of Western citizenship—replete with ever more rights and responsibilities—would provide superb manpower for growing legions and a legal framework that would guarantee that the men who fought felt that they themselves in...

One encounters in the streets, late at night on the evenings of fetes, the most strange and bizarre passers-by. Do these nights of popular celebration cause ancient and forgotten avatars to stir in the depths...

Great empires are not maintained by timidity.

I just love Rome. It really does cast a spell on you.

Rome was mud and smoky skies; the rank smell of the Tiber and the exotically spiced cooking fires of a hundred different nationalities. Rome was white marble and gilding and heady perfumes; the blare of...

It was an inflexible maxim of Roman discipline that good soldier should dread his own officers far more than the enemy

Everyone is running from something. But if we’re lucky, really lucky, fate intervenes and presents an opportunity to conquer our fears. Only then, if triumphant, can a destiny bestowed become a destiny fulfilled.

Just when the gods had ceased to be, and the Christ had not yet come, there was a unique moment in history, between Cicero and Marcus Aurelius, when man stood alone.

In Italy, there are so many significant architectural structures in history such as the Pantheon in Rome, or the Duomo.

Since my arrival in Rome, I have had many opportunities to wonder if compassion’s opposite is cruelty, or to reflect whether or not indifference would serve as a better black to its white.

The soul becomes dyed with the colour of its thoughts.

Goddammit! How does the world keep spinning with women on the planet?”Ian St. John in THE POMPEII SCROLL

…they were no more than steaks served up to portly politicians who controlled the personnel departments of the TV stations. (Showgirls in Italy)

Oblige me by taking away that knife. I can’t look at the point of it. It reminds me of Roman history.

Who set Rome on fire? The man we must admire. For killing his wife, and taking the life of mother and brother and so many others, while plucking his damnable lyre.

I think about that centurion from time to time and wonder, had he retired to a farm in Campagna, happy with his harvest of grapes and grandchildren, or had he fallen amongst his comrades on...

he might have dealt tenderly at least with you. It is a hard, cruel nature which in youth can forget its first loves.

In Rome it seems as if there were so many things which are more wanted in the world than pictures.

[H]e could see the island of Manhattan off to the left. The towers were jammed together so tightly, he could feel the mass and stupendous weight.Just think of the millions, from all over the globe,...

Peut-être pouvons-nous même reconnaître les signes presque imperceptibles qui annoncent qu’un monde vient de disparaître, non pas le sifflement des obus par-dessus les plaines éventrées du Nord, mais le déclenchement d’un obturateur, qui trouble à...