Archive

Quotes

War is the child of pride, and pride the daughter of riches.

—Jonathan Swift, 1697

Colonialism has meant selling our ore and being left with the holes.

—Samora Moisés Machel, c. 1976

Man is so made that he can only find relaxation from one kind of labor by taking up another.

—Anatole France, 1881

A dog starved at his master’s gate / Predicts the ruin of the state.

—William Blake, 1807

It is impossible to tell which of the two dispositions we find in men is more harmful in a republic, that which seeks to maintain an established position or that which has none but seeks to acquire it.

—Niccolò Machiavelli, c. 1515

How can we bear misfortune most easily? If we see our enemies faring worse.

—Thales of Miletus, c. 585 BC

What the brain does by itself is infinitely more fascinating and complex than any response it can make to chemical stimulation.

—Ursula K. Le Guin, 1971

Pride and excess bring disaster for man.

—Xunzi, 250 BC

Families, I hate you! Shut-in homes, closed doors, jealous possessions of happiness.

—André Gide, 1897

Language ought to be the joint creation of poets and manual workers.

—George Orwell, 1944

It is better to live unknown to the law.

—Irish proverb

There is no greater disaster than not to know contentment.

—Laozi, c. 550 BC

Television is democracy at its ugliest.

—Paddy Chayefsky, 1976