One of the saddest things is that the only thing that a man can do for eight hours a day, day after day, is work. You can’t eat eight hours a day, nor drink for eight hours a day, nor make love for eight hours.
—William Faulkner, 1958
Archive
Quotes
We have forgotten how to be good guests, how to walk lightly on the earth as its other creatures do.
—Barbara Ward, 1972A large city cannot be experientially known; its life is too manifold for any individual to be able to participate in it.
—Aldous Huxley, 1934Men worry over the great number of diseases, while doctors worry over the scarcity of effective remedies.
—Bian Qiao, c. 500 BCAnimals have these advantages over man: they never hear the clock strike, they die without any idea of death, they have no theologians to instruct them, their last moments are not disturbed by unwelcome and unpleasant ceremonies, their funerals cost them nothing, and no one starts lawsuits over their wills.
—Voltaire, 1769The fear of the Lord is true wisdom, and he who hath it not can in no way penetrate the true secrets of magic.
—Abraham the Jew, c. 1400Childhood knows what it wants—to leave childhood behind.
—Jean Cocteau, 1947Better a thousand enemies outside the house than one inside.
—Arabic proverbThe enlightened man says: I am body entirely and nothing beside.
—Friedrich Nietzsche, 1883Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
—John F. Kennedy, 1962I’ve dreamed enough to have a drink.
—François Rabelais, 1546Curses are like young chickens, they always come home to roost.
—Robert Southey, 1809Nowadays three witty turns of phrase and a lie make a writer.
—G.C. Lichtenberg, c. 1780