Archive

Quotes

Happiness is no laughing matter.

—Richard Whately, 1843

In order that people may be happy in their work, these three things are needed: they must be fit for it; they must not do too much of it; and they must have a sense of success in it.

—John Ruskin, 1850

The sole business of a seaman onshore who has to go to sea again is to take as much pleasure as he can.

—Leigh Hunt, 1820

Under all speech that is good for anything, there lies a silence that is better. Silence is deep as eternity; speech is shallow as time.

—Thomas Carlyle, 1838

Law makes long spokes of the short stakes of men.

—William Empson, 1928

Resorting to the law to resolve a dispute is a declaration of spiritual bankruptcy.

—Quentin Crisp, 1984

Society as a whole must be converted into a gigantic school.

—Che Guevara, 1965

It is noble to die before doing anything that deserves death.

—Anaxandrides, c. 376

So many men, so many opinions.

—Terence, 161 BC

Most vegetarians I ever saw looked enough like their food to be classed as cannibals.

—Finley Peter Dunne, 1900

Knowledge itself is power.

—Francis Bacon, 1597

A machine is a slave that neither brings nor bears degradation.

—Benjamin Disraeli, 1844

The civilized man has built a coach but has lost the use of his feet.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1841