Archive

Quotes

You never know what worse luck your bad luck has saved you from.

—Cormac McCarthy, 2005

Gambling is the child of avarice, the brother of iniquity, and the father of mischief.

—George Washington, 1783

An 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 BC

Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of these two has the grander view?

—Victor Hugo, 1862

History is a people’s memory, and without a memory man is demoted to the level of the lower animals.

—Malcolm X, 1964

No preacher is listened to but time, which gives us the same train and turn of thought that elder people have in vain tried to put into our heads before.

—Jonathan Swift, 1706

No one wins a quarrel by quarreling.

—German proverb

In peace, children inter their parents; war violates the order of nature and causes parents to inter their children.

—Herodotus, 440 BC

Technology feeds on itself. Technology makes more technology possible.

—Alvin Toffler, 1970

I am an old scholar, better-looking now than when I was young. That’s what sitting on your ass does to your face.

—Leonard Cohen, 1970

Beautiful credit! The foundation of modern society.

—Mark Twain, 1873

O citizens, first acquire wealth; you can practice virtue afterward.

—Horace, c. 8 BC

Anyone who’s never watched somebody die is suffering from a pretty bad case of virginity.

—John Osborne, 1956