Of what's to come the wise perceive things about to happen. Sometimes during moments of intense study their hearing's troubled: the hidden sound of things approaching reaches them, and they listen reverently, while in the street outside the people hear nothing whatsoever.

To certain people there comes a day when they must say the great Yes or the great No.

That we've broken their statues, that we've driven them out of their temples, doesn't mean at all that the gods are dead. O land of Ionia, they're still in love with you, their souls still keep your memory.

And if you can't shape your life the way you want, at least try as much as you can not to degrade it.

Roses by the head, jasmine at the feet so appear the longings that have passed without being satisfied, not one of them granted a night of sensual pleasure, or one of its radiant mornings.

And from this marvellous pan-Hellenic expedition, triumphant, brilliant in every way, celebrated on all sides, glorified incomparable, we emerged: the great new Hellenic world.

Nero wasn't worried at all when he heard the utterance of the Delphic Oracle: "Beware the age of seventy-three." Plenty of time to enjoy himself still. He's thirty. The deadline the god has given him is quite enough to cope with future dangers.