God never sent a messenger save with the language of his folk, that he might make the message clear for them.
—The Qur’an, c. 620
Archive
Quotes
Friendship’s a noble name, ’tis love refined.
—Susanna Centlivre, 1703The important thing, I think, is not to be bitter. You know, if it turns out that there is a God, I don’t think that he’s evil. I think that the worst thing you could say about him is that basically he’s an underachiever. After all, you know, there are worse things in life than death.
—Woody Allen, 1975It is weak and silly to say you cannot bear what it is your fate to be required to bear.
—Charlotte Brontë, 1847If we pretend to respect the artist at all, we must allow him his freedom of choice, in the face, in particular cases, of innumerable presumptions that the choice will not fructify. Art derives a considerable part of its beneficial exercise from flying in the face of presumptions.
—Henry James, 1884I look for the end of the future, but it never ceases to arrive.
—Zhuangzi, c. 325 BCThe 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, 1939my mind is
a big hunk of irrevocable nothing
Without a decisive naval force, we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious.
—George Washington, 1781It is wretched business to be digging a well just as you’re dying of thirst.
—Plautus, c. 193 BCI’ve been on a calendar, but never on time.
—Marilyn Monroe, 1962In time history must become a fairy tale—it will become again what it was in the beginning.
—Novalis, c. 1798The young man must store up, the old man must use.
—Seneca the Younger, c. 63