Thucydides Quotes
For if many ill-conceived plans have succeeded through the still greater lack of judgment of an opponent, many more, apparently well laid, have on the contrary ended in disgrace. The confidence with which we form our schemes is never completely justified in their execution; speculation is carried on in safety, but, when it comes to action, fear causes failure.
Thucydides. The Peloponnesian War. Translated by Richard Crawley, Modern Library, 1951, p. 68.
This is true fir government even more so than business. Politicians tend to focus on policy making and having vision, but most policy visions fail for lack of execution.
Thucydides (/θjuːˈsɪdɪdiːz/; Ancient Greek: Θουκυδίδης Thoukūdídēs [tʰuːkyːdídɛːs]; c. 460 – c. 400 BC) was an Athenian historian and general. His History of the Peloponnesian War recounts the fifth-century BC war between Sparta and Athens until the year 411 BC. Thucydides has been dubbed the father of "scientific history" by those who accept his claims to have applied strict standards of impartiality and evidence-gathering and analysis of cause and effect, without reference to intervention by the deities, as outlined in his introduction to his work.
