I take it as a prime cause of the present confusion of society that it is too sickly and too doubtful to use pleasure frankly as a test of value.
—Rebecca West, 1939
Archive
Quotes
A difference of taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections.
—George Eliot, 1876There is no profit without another’s loss.
—Roman proverbDreams have always been my friend, full of information, full of warnings.
—Doris Lessing, 1994“Abroad,” that large home of ruined reputations.
—George Eliot, 1866There is no greater disaster than not to know contentment.
—Laozi, c. 550 BCLuck is not something you can mention in the presence of self-made men.
—E.B. White, 1944Education is a weapon whose effects depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed.
—Joseph Stalin, 1934Slang is a language that rolls up its sleeves, spits on its hands, and goes to work.
—Carl Sandburg, 1959Give us the child for eight years and it will be a Bolshevist forever.
—Vladimir Lenin, 1923Traveling is the ruin of all happiness! There’s no looking at a building here after seeing Italy.
—Fanny Burney, 1782The life of a sailor is very unhealthy.
—Francis Galton, 1883There is no art without Eros.
—Max Frisch, 1983