Play, wherein persons of condition, especially ladies, waste so much of their time, is a plain instance to me that men cannot be perfectly idle; they must be doing something, for how else could they sit so many hours toiling at that which generally gives more vexation than delight to people whilst they are actually engaged in it?
—John Locke, 1693
Archive
Quotes
As man disappears from sight, the land remains.
—Maori proverbDarkness endows the small and ordinary ones among mankind with poetical power.
—Thomas Hardy, 1874Death keeps no calendar.
—George Herbert, 1640Your piping-hot lie is the best of lies.
—Plautus, c. 200 BCToil is man’s allotment; toil of brain, or toil of hands, or a grief that’s more than either, the grief and sin of idleness.
—Herman Melville, 1849Midnight shakes the memory
As a madman shakes a dead geranium.
When they shout “Long live progress,” always ask, “Progress of what?”
—Stanisław Jerzy Lec, 1957I have never felt salvation in nature. I love cities above all.
—Michelangelo Antonioni, 1967The only equals are those who are equally rich.
—Burundian proverbHappiness is a warm puppy.
—Charles Schulz, 1971Uprootedness is by far the most dangerous malady to which human societies are exposed, for it is a self-propagating one.
—Simone Weil, 1943I look for the end of the future, but it never ceases to arrive.
—Zhuangzi, c. 325 BC