Language is the archives of history.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1844
Archive
Quotes
Keep running after a dog, and he will never bite you.
—François Rabelais, 1535How sweet it is to have people point and say, “There he is.”
—Persius, c. 60The only equals are those who are equally rich.
—Burundian proverbDisobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made—through disobedience and through rebellion.
—Oscar Wilde, 1891Man has here two and a half minutes—one to smile, one to sigh, and half a one to love; for in the midst of this minute he dies.
—Jean Paul, 1795One should always have one’s boots on and be ready to leave.
—Michel de Montaigne, 1580Hunting is all that’s worth living for—all time is lost what is not spent in hunting—it is like the air we breathe—if we have it not we die—it’s the sport of kings, the image of war without its guilt.
—Robert Smith Surtees, 1843The newspaper is the natural enemy of the book, as the whore is of the decent woman.
—Edmond and Jules de Goncourt, 1858Revolutions are not made by men in spectacles.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, 1871The earth is beautiful and bright and kindly, but that is not all. The earth is also terrible and dark and cruel.
—Ursula K. Le Guin, 1970No one gossips about other people’s secret virtues.
—Bertrand Russell, 1961Unfortunately, humanitarianism has been the mark of an inhuman time.
—G.K. Chesterton, 1932