A school without grades must have been concocted by someone who was drunk on nonalcoholic wine.
—Karl Kraus, 1909
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Quotes
No preacher is listened to but time, which gives us the same train and turn of thought that elder people have in vain tried to put into our heads before.
—Jonathan Swift, 1706Ours is an age which consciously pursues health, and yet only believes in the reality of sickness.
—Susan Sontag, 1963Friendship was given by nature to be an assistant to virtue, not a companion to vice.
—Marcus Tullius Cicero, c. 45 BCDivine nature gave the fields; human art built the cities.
—Marcus Terentius Varro, c. 70 BCHumiliation is the beginning of sanctification.
—John Donne, c. 1629Shamelessness is the shame of being without shame.
—Mencius, c. 290 BCMoney speaks sense in a language all nations understand.
—Aphra Behn, 1677I mean, why on earth (outside sickness and hangovers) aren’t people continually drunk? I want ecstasy of the mind all the time.
—Jack Kerouac, 1957A mind lively and at ease can do with seeing nothing, and can see nothing that does not answer.
—Jane Austen, 1815The life of a sailor is very unhealthy.
—Francis Galton, 1883Physician, heal yourself: thus you help your patient too. Let his best help be to see with his own eyes the man who makes himself well.
—Friedrich Nietzsche, c. 1884All God’s children are not beautiful. Most of God’s children are, in fact, barely presentable.
—Fran Lebowitz, 1978