"A day lays low and lifts up again all human things"
About this Quote
Time is the quiet tyrant in Sophocles: not a villain with a sword, but a daily mechanism that flattens the mighty and revives the ruined, without malice and without apology. "A day lays low and lifts up again all human things" compresses an entire tragic worldview into a single, almost offhand observation. The power is in the scale shift. Not years, not generations - a day. The smallest unit of lived time becomes big enough to reorder status, fortune, even identity. That economy is the point: humans dramatize their plans; the calendar shrugs and keeps moving.
The line’s intent is both warning and anesthesia. To the arrogant, it’s a memento mori: your height is temporary, your control illusory. To the despairing, it’s a counterweight: today’s collapse is not destiny. The subtext is harsher than the apparent balance. The "lifts up again" is not redemption; it’s volatility. Sophocles isn’t promising justice, only reversal. In a tragic universe, improvement can be as arbitrary and destabilizing as loss - a new rise can set the stage for a worse fall.
Context matters: Athenian tragedy was written for a public that had seen political upheavals, plague, war, exile, and sudden enrichment. Sophocles stages that civic experience as metaphysics. The day becomes fate’s instrument, reminding the audience that human life is not a straight line of merit, but a sequence of turns - and the turn can arrive by nightfall.
The line’s intent is both warning and anesthesia. To the arrogant, it’s a memento mori: your height is temporary, your control illusory. To the despairing, it’s a counterweight: today’s collapse is not destiny. The subtext is harsher than the apparent balance. The "lifts up again" is not redemption; it’s volatility. Sophocles isn’t promising justice, only reversal. In a tragic universe, improvement can be as arbitrary and destabilizing as loss - a new rise can set the stage for a worse fall.
Context matters: Athenian tragedy was written for a public that had seen political upheavals, plague, war, exile, and sudden enrichment. Sophocles stages that civic experience as metaphysics. The day becomes fate’s instrument, reminding the audience that human life is not a straight line of merit, but a sequence of turns - and the turn can arrive by nightfall.
Quote Details
| Topic | Wisdom |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite | Cite this Quote |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Sophocles. (2026, January 17). A day lays low and lifts up again all human things. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/a-day-lays-low-and-lifts-up-again-all-human-things-34374/
Chicago Style
Sophocles. "A day lays low and lifts up again all human things." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/a-day-lays-low-and-lifts-up-again-all-human-things-34374/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"A day lays low and lifts up again all human things." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/a-day-lays-low-and-lifts-up-again-all-human-things-34374/. Accessed 3 Feb. 2026.
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