Now fighting men will sicken of battle quickly:
the more dead husks the bronze strews on the ground
the sparser the harvest then, when Zeus almighty
tips his scales and the tide of battle turns –
the great steward on high who rules our mortal wars.
You want the men to grieve for the dead by starving?
Impossible. Too many falling, day after day – battalions!
When could we find a breathing space from fasting?
No. We must steel our hearts. Bury our dead,
with tears for the day they die, not one day more.
And all those left alive, after the hateful carnage,
remember food and drink – so all the more fiercely
we can fight our enemies, nonstop, no mercy,
durable as the bronze that wraps our bodies.
– Homer
The Iliad, Book 19, lines 263-276. Odysseus says this to Achilles, in a bid to calm him. Achilles demands that the army go to war at once, but Odysseus persuades him to let the army eat and rest first as they are tired and hungry. Soldiers cannot grieve for the dead by starving and will fight more fiercely if fed, he insists. Achilles himself refuses to eat until he has killed Hector and avenged his friend Patroclus.