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Quotes

A man who exposes himself when he is intoxicated has not the art of getting drunk.

—Samuel Johnson, 1779

When the physician said to him, “You have lived to be an old man,” he said, “That is because I never employed you as my physician.”

—Pausanias, c. 450 BC

He may be a patriot for Austria, but the question is whether he is a patriot for me.

—Emperor Francis Joseph, c. 1850

What does education often do? It makes a straight-cut ditch of a free, meandering brook.

—Henry David Thoreau, 1850

There’s hope a great man’s memory may outlive his life half a year.

—William Shakespeare, c. 1600

Spoon feeding in the long run teaches us nothing but the shape of the spoon.

—E.M. Forster, 1951

Some people make stuff; other people have to buy it. And when we gave up making stuff, starting in the 1980s, we were left with the unique role of buying.

—Barbara Ehrenreich, 2008

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

—Thales of Miletus, c. 585 BC

It is not right for a ruler who has the nation in his charge, a man with so much on his mind, to sleep all night.

—Homer, c. 750 BC

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

—William Blake, 1807

Do you not see how God is praised by those in the heavens and those on earth? The very birds praised Him as they wing their way.

—The Qur’an, c. 620

The believer in magic and miracles reflects on how to impose a law on nature—and, in brief, the religious cult is the outcome of this reflection.

—Friedrich Nietzsche, 1878

There is no man so fortunate that there shall not be by him when he is dying some who are pleased with what is going to happen.

—Marcus Aurelius, c. 175