How absurd men are! They never use the liberties they have, they demand those they do not have. They have freedom of thought, they demand freedom of speech.
—Søren Kierkegaard, 1843
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Quotes
Despotism achieves great things illegally; democracy doesn’t even take the trouble to achieve small things legally.
—Honoré de Balzac, 1831Happy is the man who hath never known what it is to taste of fame—to have it is a purgatory, to want it is a hell!
—Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1843Egypt was the mother of magicians.
—Clement of Alexandria, c. 200He who travels by sea is nothing but a worm on a piece of wood, a trifle in the midst of a powerful creation. The waters play about with him at will, and no one but God can help him.
—Muhammad as-Saffar, 1846The merchant always has fresh losses to expect, and the dread of base poverty forbids his rest.
—Decimus Magnus Ausonius, c. 390You furnish the pictures, and I’ll furnish the war.
—William Randolph Hearst, 1898Dreams have always been my friend, full of information, full of warnings.
—Doris Lessing, 1994Is there no way out of the mind?
—Sylvia Plath, 1962A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard.
—Martin Luther King Jr., c. 1967It is shameful and inhuman to treat men like chattels to make money by, or to regard them merely as so much muscle or physical power.
—Pope Leo XIII, 1891One has to spend so many years in learning how to be happy.
—George Eliot, 1844There is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship.
—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, 1943