The chief merit of language is clearness, and we know that nothing detracts so much from this as do unfamiliar terms.
—Galen, c. 175
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Quotes
No great idea in its beginning can ever be within the law.
—Emma Goldman, 1917Be not the slave of your own past. Plunge into the sublime seas, dive deep, and swim far, so shall you come back with self-respect, with new power, with an advanced experience that shall explain and overlook the old.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1838Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government’s purposes are beneficent.
—Louis Brandeis, 1928Resorting to the law to resolve a dispute is a declaration of spiritual bankruptcy.
—Quentin Crisp, 1984Revolutionaries are greater sticklers for formality than conservatives.
—Italo Calvino, 1957In every man is a wild beast; most of them don’t know how to hold it back, and the majority give it full rein when they are not restrained by terror of law.
—Frederick the Great, 1759The happy ending is our national belief.
—Mary McCarthy, 1947If you read somebody’s diary, you get what you deserve.
—David Sedaris, 2004There is no art without Eros.
—Max Frisch, 1983Those who go overseas find a change of climate, not a change of soul.
—Horace, c. 20 BCOur whole life is but one great school; from the cradle to the grave we are all learners; nor will our education be finished until we die.
—Ann Plato, 1841As usual, what we call “progress” is the exchange of one nuisance for another nuisance.
—Havelock Ellis, 1914