I learned to make my mind large, as the universe is large, so that there is room for paradoxes.
—Maxine Hong Kingston, 1976
Archive
Quotes
A college degree is a social certificate, not a proof of competence.
—Elbert Hubbard, 1911I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
—Galileo Galilei, 1615The only competition worthy a wise man is with himself.
—Anna Jameson, 1846Whenever in history equality appeared on the agenda, it was exported somewhere else, like an undesirable.
—Mary McCarthy, 1971There is no crime without precedent.
—Seneca the Younger, c. 60The misfortune of the man of color is having been enslaved. The misfortune and inhumanity of the white man are having killed man somewhere.
—Frantz Fanon, 1952Appearances are a glimpse of the obscure.
—Anaxagoras, c. 450 BCI am ill every time it blows hard, and nothing but my enthusiastic love for the profession keeps me one hour at sea.
—Admiral Horatio Nelson, 1804We are a commercial people. We cannot boast of our arts, our crafts, our cultivation; our boast is in the wealth we produce.
—Ida M. Tarbell, 1904There ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.
—Mark Twain, 1894The criminal is the creative artist; the detective only the critic.
—G.K. Chesterton, 1911War to the castles; peace to the cottages.
—Nicolas Chamfort, 1790