— Did you fear him, Crassus?
— Not when I fought him, I knew he could be beaten. But now I fear him, even more than I fear you.
— Me?
— Yes, my dear Caesar, you.
I'd rather be here, a free man among brothers, facing a long march and a hard fight, than to be the richest citizen of Rome, fat with food he didn't work for, and surrounded by slaves. <...> And maybe there's no peace in this world, for us or for anyone else, I don't know. But I do know that, as long as we live, we must remain true to ourselves.
— If you looked into a magic crystal, you saw your army destroyed and yourself dead. If you saw that in the future, as I'm sure you're seeing it now, would you continue to fight?
— Yes.
— Knowing that you must lose?
— Knowing we can. All men lose when they die and all men die. But a slave and a free man lose different things.
— They both lose life.
— When a free man dies, he loses the pleasure of life. A slave loses his pain. Death is the only freedom a slave knows. That's why he's not afraid of it. That's why we'll win.
— What are you thinking about?
— I'm free. And what do I know? I don't even know how to read.
— You know things that can't be taught.
— I know nothing. Nothing. And I wanna know. I want to... I wanna know.
— Know what?
— Everything! Why a star falls and a bird doesn't, where the sun goes at night, why the moon changes shape. I wanna know where the wind comes from.
— The wind begins in a cave: far to the north, a young god sleeps in that cave. He dreams of a girl and he sighs, and the night wind stirs with his breath.
— I wanna know all about you. Every line, every curve. I wanna know every part of you. Every beat of your heart.
— There's one man I hate: Crassus.
— You've grown very ambitious in your hatred.