The desire of knowledge, like the thirst of riches, increases ever with the acquisition of it.
—Laurence Sterne, 1760
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Quotes
If there is a technological advance without a social advance, there is, almost automatically, an increase in human misery.
—Michael Harrington, 1962I hate the present modes of living and getting a living. Farming and shopkeeping and working at a trade or profession are all odious to me. I should relish getting my living in a simple, primitive fashion.
—Henry David Thoreau, 1855When the missionaries first came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said, “Let us pray.” We closed our eyes. When we opened them, we had the Bible and they had the land.
—Desmond Tutu, 1984Family! Thou art the home of all social evil, a charitable institution for comfortable women, an anchorage for house-fathers, and a hell for children.
—August Strindberg, 1886I’ve been bathing in the poem / Of star-infused and milky sea / Devouring the azure greens.
—Arthur Rimbaud, 1871I quit life as from an inn, not as from a home.
—Marcus Tullius Cicero, 44 BCMan is a noble animal, splendid in ashes and pompous in the grave.
—Thomas Browne, 1658Most people who sneer at technology would starve to death if the engineering infrastructure were removed.
—Robert A. Heinlein, 1984Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps, for he is the only animal that is struck with the difference between what things are and what they ought to be.
—William Hazlitt, 1819In the case of news, we should always wait for the sacrament of confirmation.
—Voltaire, 1764Language is the house of being. In its home human beings dwell. Those who think and those who create with words are the guardians of this home.
—Martin Heidegger, 1949I shall curse you with book and bell and candle.
—Thomas Malory, c. 1470