The country only has charms for those not obliged to stay there.
—Édouard Manet, c. 1860
Archive
Quotes
When they shout “Long live progress,” always ask, “Progress of what?”
—Stanisław Jerzy Lec, 1957The less intelligent the white man is, the more stupid he thinks the black.
—André Gide, 1927And then, sir, there is this consideration: that if the abuse be enormous, nature will rise up and, claiming her original rights, overturn a corrupt political system.
—Samuel Johnson, 1791Everyone who is sick is someone else’s patient zero.
—Leslie Jamison, 2020For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.
—Book of Ecclesiastes, c. 250 BCThe first requisite to happiness is that a man be born in a famous city.
—Euripides, c. 415 BCThe character which results from wealth is that of a prosperous fool.
—Aristotle, c. 322 BCThere is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship.
—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, 1943Is all our fire of shipwreck wood?
—Robert Browning, 1862The brain may be regarded as a kind of parasite of the organism, a pensioner, as it were, who dwells with the body.
—Arthur Schopenhauer, 1851The seeds of civilization are in every culture, but it is city life that brings them to fruition.
—Susanne K. Langer, 1962A brilliant boxing match, quicksilver in its motions, transpiring far more rapidly than the mind can absorb, can have the power that Emily Dickinson attributed to great poetry: you know it’s great when it takes the top of your head off.
—Joyce Carol Oates, 1987