Archive

Quotes

Luck is not something you can mention in the presence of self-made men.

—E.B. White, 1944

Those who make the worst use of their time are the first to complain of its brevity.

—Jean de La Bruyère, 1688

Style is the image of character.

—Edward Gibbon, c. 1789

It is hard when nature does not respect your intentions, and she never does exactly respect them.

—Wendell Berry, 1985

Anything one is remembering is a repetition, but existing as a human being that is being, listening, and hearing is never repetition.

—Gertrude Stein, 1935

I never practice, I always play.

—Wanda Landowska, 1953

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

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.

—John F. Kennedy, 1962

If you read somebody’s diary, you get what you deserve.

—David Sedaris, 2004

There is no greater disaster than not to know contentment.

—Laozi, c. 550 BC

It is not light that we need, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.

—Frederick Douglass, 1852

Alas! We are ridiculous animals.

—Horace Walpole, 1777

As natural selection works solely by and for the good of each being, all corporeal and mental endowments will tend to progress toward perfection.

—Charles Darwin, 1859