Ocean. A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man—who has no gills.
—Ambrose Bierce, 1906
Archive
Quotes
I drink for the thirst to come.
—François Rabelais, 1535People will not look forward to posterity who never look backward to their ancestors.
—Edmund Burke, 1790Men who are unhappy, like men who sleep badly, are always proud of the fact.
—Bertrand Russell, 1930The civilized man has built a coach but has lost the use of his feet.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1841Under all speech that is good for anything, there lies a silence that is better. Silence is deep as eternity; speech is shallow as time.
—Thomas Carlyle, 1838The purest joy is to live without disguise, unconstrained by the ties of a grave reputation.
—Al-Hariri, c. 1108According to the law of custom, and perhaps of reason, foreign travel completes the education of an English gentleman.
—Edward Gibbon, c. 1794It would be madness, and inconsistency, to suppose that things which have never yet been performed can be performed without employing some hitherto untried means.
—Francis Bacon, 1620If the present be compared with the remote past, it is easily seen that in all cities and in all peoples there are the same desires and the same passions as there always were.
—Niccolò Machiavelli, c. 1513Play, wherein persons of condition, especially ladies, waste so much of their time, is a plain instance to me that men cannot be perfectly idle; they must be doing something, for how else could they sit so many hours toiling at that which generally gives more vexation than delight to people whilst they are actually engaged in it?
—John Locke, 1693Is this dying? Is this all? Is this all that I feared when I prayed against a hard death? Oh, I can bear this! I can bear it!
—Cotton Mather, 1728There is no profit without another’s loss.
—Roman proverb