It is hard when nature does not respect your intentions, and she never does exactly respect them.
—Wendell Berry, 1985
Archive
Quotes
And your very flesh shall be a great poem.
—Walt Whitman, 1855Some are born to sweet delight,
Some are born to endless night.
Though the boys throw stones at frogs in sport, yet the frogs do not die in sport but in earnest.
—Bion of Smyrna, c. 100 BCEvery tooth in a man’s head is more valuable than a diamond.
—Miguel de Cervantes, 1605One of the secrets of a happy life is continuous small treats.
—Iris Murdoch, 1978An appeal to the reason of the people has never been known to fail in the long run.
—James Russell Lowell, c. 1865Tell us your phobias and we will tell you what you are afraid of.
—Robert Benchley, 1935The envious die not once, but as often as the envied win applause.
—Baltasar Gracián, 1647Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense—nonsense upon stilts.
—Jeremy Bentham, c. 1832A private sin is not so prejudicial in this world as a public indecency.
—Miguel de Cervantes, 1615What hath night to do with sleep?
—John Milton, 1637Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.
—E.B. White, 1944