Bid me discourse, I will enchant thine ear.
—William Shakespeare, 1592
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Quotes
Without a decisive naval force, we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious.
—George Washington, 1781Man is a troublesome animal and therefore is not very manageable.
—Plato, c. 349 BCAn irreligious man is not one who denies the gods of the majority, but one who applies to the gods the opinions of the majority. For what most men say about the gods are not ideas derived from sensation, but false opinions, according to which the greatest evils come to the wicked, and the greatest blessings come to the good from the gods.
—Epicurus, c. 250 BCOne of the most time-consuming things is to have an enemy.
—E.B. White, 1977One of the secrets of a happy life is continuous small treats.
—Iris Murdoch, 1978The traveler with nothing on him sings in the robber’s face.
—Juvenal, c. 125I take it as a prime cause of the present confusion of society that it is too sickly and too doubtful to use pleasure frankly as a test of value.
—Rebecca West, 1939Words pay no debts.
—William Shakespeare, 1601Friend! It is a common word, often lightly used. Like other good and beautiful things, it may be tarnished by careless handling.
—Harriet Jacobs, 1861Give us the luxuries of life, and we will dispense with the necessities.
—John Lothrop Motley, 1858By nature, men are nearly alike; by practice, they get to be wide apart.
—Confucius, c. 500 BCLike a broken gong be still, be silent. Know the stillness of freedom where there is no more striving.
—Siddhartha Gautama, c. 500 BC