Shame on the soul, to falter on the road of life while the body still perseveres.
—Marcus Aurelius, c. 170
Archive
Quotes
Any serious attempt to do anything worthwhile is ritualistic.
—Derek Walcott, 1986The future comes like an unwelcome guest.
—Edmund Gosse, 1873Honest commerce is the great civilizer. We exchange ideas when we exchange fabrics.
—Robert G. Ingersoll, 1882To escape its wretched lot, the populace has three ways, two imaginary and one real. The first two are the rum shop and the church; the third is the social revolution.
—Mikhail Bakunin, 1871And to our age’s drowsy blood / Still shouts the inspiring sea.
—James Russell Lowell, 1848I prefer liberty with unquiet to slavery with quiet.
—Sallust, c. 35 BCWhat is death? A scary mask. Take it off—see, it doesn’t bite.
—Epictetus, c. 110Bad men live that they may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they may live.
—Socrates, c. 430 BCLanguage ought to be the joint creation of poets and manual workers.
—George Orwell, 1944Whatever the pace of this technological revolution may be, the direction is clear: the lower rungs of the economic ladder are being lopped off.
—Bayard Rustin, 1965If I had been born a man, I would have conquered Europe. As I was born a woman, I exhausted my energy in tirades against fate and in eccentricities.
—Marie Bashkirtseff, 1884We don’t have the option of turning away from the future. No one gets to vote on whether technology is going to change our lives.
—Bill Gates, 1995