Rejoice, young man, while you are young, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Follow the inclination of your heart and the desire of your eyes, but know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment.
—Book of Ecclesiastes, c. 200 BC
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Quotes
The legislator is like the navigator of a ship on the high seas. He can steer the vessel on which he sails, but he cannot alter its construction, raise the wind, or stop the waves from swelling beneath his feet.
—Alexis de Tocqueville, 1835Be temperate in wine, in eating, girls, and sloth, or the Gout will seize you.
—Benjamin Franklin, 1734Tomorrow never comes, man. It’s all the same fucking day.
—Janis Joplin, 1972If you have any soul worth expressing, it will show itself in your singing.
—John Ruskin, 1865Hatred of domestic work is a natural and admirable result of civilization.
—Rebecca West, 1912A merchant may, perhaps, be a man of an enlarged mind, but there is nothing in trade connected with an enlarged mind.
—Samuel Johnson, 1773The most may err as grossly as the few.
—John Dryden, 1681You may drive out nature with a pitchfork, yet she’ll be constantly running back.
—Horace, 20 BCThere is no foreign land; it is the traveler only that is foreign.
—Robert Louis Stevenson, 1883Man is the one name belonging to every nation upon earth: there is one soul and many tongues, one spirit and various sounds; every country has its own speech, but the subjects of speech are common to all.
—Tertullian, c. 217Even members of the nobility, let alone persons of no consequence, would do well not to have children.
—Yoshida Kenko, c. 1330It is not too much to expect that our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter.
—Lewis Strauss, 1954