It is not light that we need, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.
—Frederick Douglass, 1852
Archive
Quotes
The screech and mechanical uproar of the big city turns the citified heads, fills citified ears—as the song of birds, wind in the trees, animal cries, or as the voices and songs of his loved ones once filled his heart. He is sidewalk happy.
—Frank Lloyd Wright, 1958History does not merely touch on language, but takes place in it.
—Theodor Adorno, c. 1946So many men, so many opinions.
—Terence, 161 BCI have been ever of the opinion that revolutions are not to be evaded.
—Benjamin Disraeli, 1844Religion is by no means a proper subject of conversation in mixed company.
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 1754The ability to store our data externally helps us imagine that our time is limitless, our space infinite.
—Carina Chocano, 2012Language is the armory of the human mind and at once contains the trophies of its past and the weapons of its future conquests.
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1817All the daughters of music shall be brought low.
—Ecclesiastes, c. 400 BCDon’t try to make a profit on a bad trade; just try to find the best place to get out.
—Linda Bradford Raschke, 1992What one knows is, in youth, of little moment; they know enough who know how to learn.
—Henry Adams, 1907Reality is always the foe of famous names.
—Petrarch, 1337Avoid the talk of men. For talk is mischievous, light, and easily raised, but hard to bear and difficult to be rid of. Talk never wholly dies away when many people voice her: even talk is in some ways divine.
—Hesiod, c. 700 BC