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Quotes

Secrets are rarely betrayed or discovered according to any program our fear has sketched out.

—George Eliot, 1860

The best physician is he who can distinguish the possible from the impossible.

—Herophilus, c. 290 BC

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 drunken man is a living corpse.

—St. John Chrysostom, c. 390

I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?”

—Book of Ecclesiastes, 225 BC

For sooner will men hold fire in their mouths than keep a secret.

—Petronius, c. 60

In real friendship the judgment, the genius, the prudence of each party become the common property of both.

—Maria Edgeworth, 1787

It is strange indeed that the more we learn about how to build health, the less healthy Americans become.

—Adelle Davis, 1951

What can you conceive more silly and extravagant than to suppose a man racking his brains and studying night and day how to fly?

—William Law, 1728

If you have any soul worth expressing, it will show itself in your singing.

—John Ruskin, 1865

The happiness of society is the end of government.

—John Adams, 1776

None who have always been free can understand the terrible fascinating power of the hope of freedom to those who are not free.

—Pearl S. Buck, 1943

No one wins a quarrel by quarreling.

—German proverb