I 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, 1855
Archive
Quotes
A regime which combines perpetual surveillance with total indulgence is hardly conducive to healthy development.
—P.D. James, 1992The strength of a family, like the strength of an army, is in its loyalty to each other.
—Mario Puzo, 2001A cruel story runs on wheels, and every hand oils the wheels as they run.
—Ouida, 1880He that raises a large family, does indeed, while he lives to observe them, stand…a broader mark for sorrow; but then he stands a broader mark for pleasure too.
—Benjamin Franklin, 1786It’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, 1966A passion for horses, players, and gladiators seems to be the epidemic folly of the times. The child receives it in his mother’s womb; he brings it with him into the world, and in a mind so possessed, what room for science, or any generous purpose?
—Tacitus, c. 100’Tis the destroyer, or the devil, that scatters plagues about the world.
—Cotton Mather, 1693Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
—Lord Acton, 1887I looked and there was a pale green horse! Its rider’s name was Death, and Hades followed with him.
—Book of Revelations, c. 90The soul of a journey is liberty, perfect liberty, to think, feel, do just as one pleases. We go on a journey chiefly to be free of all impediments and of all inconveniences—to leave ourselves behind, much more to get rid of others.
—William Hazlitt, 1822Soldiers in peace are like chimneys in summer.
—William Cecil, Lord Burghley, c. 1555I ride rough waters and shall sink with no one to save me.
—Virginia Woolf, 1931