What is outside my mind means nothing to it.
—Marcus Aurelius, c. 170Quotes
The purest joy is to live without disguise, unconstrained by the ties of a grave reputation.
—Al-Hariri, c. 1108Every man has a right to utter what he thinks truth, and every other man has a right to knock him down for it. Martyrdom is the test.
—Samuel Johnson, 1780A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard.
—Martin Luther King Jr., c. 1967The first mistake of art is to assume that it’s serious.
—Lester Bangs, 1971One race there is of men, one of gods, but from one mother we both draw our breath.
—Pindar, c. 450 BCThe universe is an object of thought at least as much as it is a means of satisfying needs.
—Claude Lévi-Strauss, 1962One’s friends are divided into two classes, those one knows because one must and those one knows because one mustn’t.
—Sybil Taylor, 1922The law looks at no one’s face.
—Gabriel Okara, 1964Art imitates nature as well as it can, as a pupil follows his master; thus it is a sort of grandchild of God.
—Dante, c. 1315These landscapes of water and reflection have become an obsession.
—Claude Monet, 1908No great idea in its beginning can ever be within the law.
—Emma Goldman, 1917People will not look forward to posterity who never look backward to their ancestors.
—Edmund Burke, 1790