“My life is more to me than all the wealth of Ilius”

“I say no wealth is worth my life.”

“I say no wealth is worth my life! Not all they claimwas stored in the depths of Troy, that city built on riches,in the old days of peace before the sons of Achaea came-not all the gold held fast in the Archer's rocky vaults,in Phoebus Apollo's house on Pytho's sheer cliffs!Cattle and fat sheep can all be had for the raiding,tripods all for the trading, and tawny-headed stallions.But a man's life breath cannot come back again-no raiders in force, no trading brings it back,once it slips through a man's clenched teeth.Mother tells me,the immortal goddess Thetis with her glistening feet,that two fates bear me on to the day of death.If I hold out here and I lay siege to Troy,my journey home is gone, but my glory never dies.If I voyage back to the fatherland I love,my pride, my glory dies...true, but the life that's left me will be long,the stroke of death will not come on me quickly.”

“There is nothing alive more agonized than man / of all that breathe and crawl across the earth.”

“Come, Friend, you too must die. Why moan about it so?Even Patroclus died, a far, far better man than you.And look, you see how handsome and powerful I am?The son of a great man, the mother who gave me life--A deathless goddess. But even for me, I tell you,Death and the strong force of fate are waiting.There will come a dawn or sunset or high noonWhen a man will take my life in battle too--flinging a spear perhapsOr whipping a deadly arrow off his bow.”

“…but there they lay, sprawled across the field, craved far more by the vultures than by wives.”

“Be still my heart; thou hast known worse than this.”