Archive

Quotes

Man punishes the action, but God the intention.

—Thomas Fuller, 1732

Once suspicion is aroused, everything feeds it.

—Amelia Edith Barr, 1885

Politics, n. A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.

—Ambrose Bierce, 1906

It’s easy to be independent when you’ve got money. But to be independent when you haven’t got a thing—that’s the Lord’s test.

—Mahalia Jackson, 1966

Bad men live that they may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they may live.

—Socrates, c. 430 BC

Shame on the soul, to falter on the road of life while the body still perseveres.

—Marcus Aurelius, c. 170

You must not grow used to making money out of everything. One sees more people ruined than one has seen preserved by shameful gains.

—Sophocles, c. 442 BC

The history of the world is the record of the weakness, frailty, and death of public opinion.

—Samuel Butler, c. 1902

Many, many steeples would have to be stacked one on top of another to reach from the bottom to the surface of the sea. It is down there that the sea folk live.

—Hans Christian Andersen, 1837

Friends are fictions founded on some single momentary experience.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1864

Revolutions are not about trifles, but they are produced by trifles. 

—Aristotle, c. 350 BC

Memory is the only
afterlife I can understand.

—Lisel Mueller, 1996

All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That’s his.

—Oscar Wilde, 1895