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Quotes

Ridicule often checks what is absurd, and fully as often smothers that which is noble.

—Walter Scott, 1823

The basis of optimism is sheer terror.

—Oscar Wilde, 1891

No real friendship without absolute liberty.

—George Sand, 1866

Man is a tool-using animal. Nowhere do you find him without tools; without tools he is nothing, with tools he is all.

—Thomas Carlyle, 1836

Every country has the government it deserves.

—Joseph de Maistre, 1811

Men argue, nature acts.

—Voltaire, 1764

The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.

—Steve Biko, 1971

The self is like an infant: given free rein, it craves to suckle.

—al-Busiri, c. 1250

The play is the tragedy “Man,” And its hero the conqueror worm.

—Edgar Allan Poe, 1843

Worry over what has not occurred is a serious malady.

—Solomon ibn Gabirol, 1050

The bathing was so delightful this morning, and Molly so pressing with me to enjoy myself, that I believe I stayed in rather too long, as since the middle of the day I have felt unreasonably tired. I shall be more careful another time, and shall not bathe tomorrow as I had before intended.

—Jane Austen, 1804

I shall soon be six-and-twenty. Is there anything in the future that can possibly console us for not being always twenty-five?

—Lord Byron, 1813

Credulity forges more miracles than trickery could invent.

—Joseph Joubert, 1811