Unfortunately, humanitarianism has been the mark of an inhuman time.
—G.K. Chesterton, 1932
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Quotes
Friendship itself will not stand the strain of very much good advice for very long.
—Robert Wilson Lynd, 1924What mighty contests rise from trivial things.
—Alexander Pope, 1712The elephant, although a gross beast, is yet the most decent and most sensible of any other upon earth. Although he never changes his female, and hath so tender a love for her whom he hath chosen, yet he never couples with her but at the end of every three years, and then only for the space of five days.
—St. Francis de Sales, 1609The greatest thing in family life is to take a hint when a hint is intended—and not to take a hint when a hint isn’t intended.
—Robert Frost, 1939Art transcends its limitations only by staying within them.
—Flannery O’Connor, 1964From a man’s face, I can read his character. If I can see him walk, I know his thoughts.
—Gaius Petronius Arbiter, c. 60What the brain does by itself is infinitely more fascinating and complex than any response it can make to chemical stimulation.
—Ursula K. Le Guin, 1971Punishment is a sort of medicine.
—Aristotle, c. 340 BCRain is grace; rain is the sky condescending to the earth; without rain there would be no life.
—John Updike, 1989Animals are good to think with.
—Claude Lévi-Strauss, 1962History is a people’s memory, and without a memory man is demoted to the level of the lower animals.
—Malcolm X, 1964If the bird does like its cage, and does like its sugar, and will not leave it, why keep the door so very carefully shut?
—Olive Schreiner, 1883