Progress

http://rndmqt.appspot.com contains most of these quotes now.

Charles Robert Darwin, 1809 - 1882

The plow is one of the most ancient and most valuable of man's inventions; but long before he existed the land was in fact regularly plowed, and still continues to be thus plowed by earthworms. It may be doubted whether there are many other animals which have played so important a part in the history of the world, as have these lowly organized creatures.

Charles Robert Darwin, The Formation of Vegetable Mold Through the Action of Worms [1881], ch. 7

Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803 - 1882

When you strike at a king, you must kill him.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Recollected by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, JR. From MAX LERNER, The Mind and Faith of Justice Holmes [1943]

Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803 - 1882

'Tis the good reader that makes the good book; in every book he finds passages which seem confidences or asides hidden from all else and unmistakably meant for his ear; the profit of books is according to the sensibility of the reader; the profoundest thought or passion sleeps as in a mine, until it is discovered by an equal mind and heart.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Society and Solitude [1870]. Success

Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803 - 1882

Hitch your wagon to a star.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Society and Solitude [1870]. Civilization

Victor Hugo, 1802 - 1885

An invasion of armies can be resisted, but not an idea whose time has come.

Victor Hugo, Histoire d'un Crime [written 1852], conclusion.

Brigham Young, 1801 - 1877

This is the place!

Brigham Young, On first seeing the valley of the Great Salt Lake [July 24, 1847]

Helmuth von Moltke, 1800 - 1891

Erst wägen, dann wagen.
(First ponder, then dare.)

Helmuth von Moltke, Attributed.

Horace Mann, 1796 - 1859

Lost, yesterday, somewhere between sunrise and sunset, two golden hours, each set with sixty diamond minutes, No reward is offered, for they are gone forever.

Horace Mann, Aphorism.

Carl Friedrich Gauss, 1777 - 1855

Mathematics is the queen of the sciences.

Carl Friedrich Gauss, From SARTORIOUS VON WALTERS-HAUSEN, Gauss zum Gedachtniss [1856]

Sydney Smith, 1771 - 1845

Thank God for tea! What would the world do without tea? - how did it exist? I am glad I was not born before tea.

Sydney Smith, Lady Holland's Memoir [1855], vol. 1, ch. 11

Sir Walter Scott, 1771 - 1832

Sea of upturned faces.

Sir Walter Scott, Rob Roy [1817], ch. 20

Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, 1769 - 1852

Publish and be damned.

Arthur Wellesley, Attributed; when the courtesan Harriette Wilson threatened to publish her memoirs and his letters.

Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, 1769 - 1852

The battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton.

Arthur Wellesley, From SIR WILLIAM FRASER, Words on Wellington [1889]

Napoleon I [Napoleon Bonaparte], 1769 - 1821

An army marches on its stomach.

Napoleon I, Attributed.

Napoleon I [Napoleon Bonaparte], 1769 - 1821

Go, sir, gallop, and don't forget that the world was made in six days. You can ask me for anything you like, except time.

Napoleon I, To an aide [1803]. From R. M. JOHNSTON, The Corsican.

John Heath, 1758 - 1810

Philosophia Biou Kybernetes.
(Love of wisdom [philosophy] the guide of life.)

John Heath, Greek phrase for Phi Beta Kappa, society founded at the College of William and Mary [December 5, 1776]

(The name Phi Beta Kappa is from the Green initial letters in the phrase.)

Louis XVIII, 1755 - 1824

L'exactitude est la politesse des rois.
(Punctuality is the politeness of kings.)

Louis XVIII, A favorite saying

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1749 - 1832

Ich die Baukunst eine erstarrte Music nenne.
(I call architecture frozen music.)

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Letter to Eckermann [March 23, 1829]

Abigail Adams, 1744 - 1818

Learning is not attained by chance, it must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence.

Abigail Adams, Letter to John Quincy Adams [ May 8, 1780 ]

Johann Kaspar Lavater, 1741 - 1801

If you mean to know yourself, interline such of these aphorisms as affect you agreeably in reading, and set a mark to such as left a sense of uneasiness with you; and then show your copy to whom you please.

Johann Kaspar Lavater, Aphorisms on Man [c. 1788], no. 643.

Edward Gibbon, 1737 - 1794

The various modes of worship, which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people, as equally true; by the philosopher, as equally false; and by the magistrate, as equally useful.

Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire [1776 - 1788], ch. 2

John Adams, 1735 - 1826

I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain.

John Adams, Letter to Abigail Adams [May 12, 1780]

John Adams, 1735 - 1826

A pen is certainly an excellent instrument to fix a man's attention and to inflame his ambition.

John Adams, Diary [November 14, 1760]

Adam Smith, 1723 - 1790

Every individual necessarily labors to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally indeed neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. . . . He intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. . . . By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good.

Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations [1776], vol. I, bk. IV, ch. 2

Samuel Adams, 1722 - 1803

What a glorious morning for America!

Samuel Adams, Upon hearing the gunfire at Lexington (Massachusetts) [April 19, 1775]
The phrase was adopted by the town of Lexington as a legend for the town seal.

Christian Furchtegott Gellert, 1715 - 1769

Live as you will have wished to have lived when you are dying.

Christian Furchtegott Gellert, Of Death, st. 2.

Samuel Johnson, 1709 - 1784

Tomorrow I purpose to regulate my room.

Samuel Johnson, Prayers and Meditations, 1764.
(Dr Johnson is the most quoted English writer after Shakespeare)

Voltaire [Francois Marie Arouet], 1694 - 1778

We must cultivate our garden.
(Il faut cultiver notre jardin.)

Voltaire, Candide [1759]

Edmond Hoyle, 1672 - 1769

When in doubt, win the trick.

Edmond Hoyle, Twenty-four Rules for Learners, rule 12

Matsuo Basho, 1644 - 1694

Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the men of old; seek what they sought.

Matsuo Basho, The Rustic Gate, From the collection Basho Bunshu.

Sir Isaac Newton, 1642 - 1727

O Diamond! Diamond! thou little knowest the mischief done!

Sir Isaac Newton, Said to a pet dog who knocked over a candle and set fire to his papers.

Louis XIV, 1638 - 1715

I almost had to wait.

Louis XIV, Attributed remark when a coach he had ordered arrived just in time.

Louis XIV, 1638 - 1715

L'etat c'est moi.
(I am the state.)

Louis XIV, Attributed remark before the parliament in 1651.

Thomas Traherne, c. 1637 - 1674

You never enjoy the world alright, till the sea itself floweth in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens, and crowned with the stars: and perceive yourself to be the sole heir of the whole world.

Thomas Traherne, Centuries of Meditations [1908], Century I, sec. 29

Robert South, 1634 - 1716

Speech was given to the ordinary sort of men whereby to communicate their mind; but to wise men, whereby to conceal it.

Robert South, Sermon [1676]

Benedict [Baruch] Spinoza, 1632 - 1677

Will and Intellect are one and the same thing.

Baruch Spinoza, Ethics [1677], pt. 1, proposition 49: corollary.

John Locke, 1632 - 1704

Good and evil, reward and punishment, are the only motives to a rational creature: these are the spur and reins whereby all mankind are set on work, and guided.

John Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education [1693], sec. I, 54.

John Dryden, 1631 - 1700

Happy the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call today his own;
He who, secure within, can say,
Tomorrow, do thy worst, for I have lived today.

John Dryden, Imitation of Horace, bk. III, ode 29 [1685], l. 65.

William Walker, 1623 - 1684

Learn to read slow: all other graces
Will follow in their proper places.

William Walker, The Art of Reading.

Blaise Pascal, 1623 - 1662

Cleopatra's nose, had it been shorter, the whole face of the world would have been changed.

Blaise Pascal, Pensees [1670], no. 162.

Moliere [ Jean Baptiste Poquelin], 1622 - 1673

Grammar, which knows how to control even kings.
Moliere, Les Femmes Savantes [1672], act II, sc. vi

Jeremy Taylor, 1613 - 1667

Every schoolboy knows it.

Jeremy Taylor, On the Real Presence, V.

Sir John Suckling, 1609 - 1642

But as when an authentic watch is shown,
Each man winds up and rectifies his own,
So in our very judgments.

Sir John Suckling, Aglaura [1638], epilogue.

John Milton, 1608 - 1674

Thou canst not touch the freedom of my mind.

John Milton, Comus [1634], l. 663

John Milton, 1608 - 1674

What hath night to do with sleep?

John Milton, Comus [1634], l. 122

Edmund Waller, 1606 - 1687

And keeps the palace of the soul.

Edmund Waller, Of Tea.

Edmund Waller, 1606 - 1687

Poets that lasting marble seek
Must come in Latin or Greek.

Edmund Waller, Of English Verse [1668]

Sir Kenelm Digby, 1603 - 1661

The hot water is to remain upon it [the tea] no longer than whiles you can say the Miserere Psalm very leisurely.

Sir Kenelm Digby, The Closer Opened. Tea with Eggs.

Oliver Cromwell, 1599 - 1658

Mr. Lely, I desire you would use all your skill to paint my picture truly like me, and not flatter me at all; but remark all these roughnesses, pimples, warts, and everything as you see me, otherwise I will never pay a farthing for it.



Oliver Cromwell, From HORACE WALPOLE, Anecdotes of Painting in England [1762 - 1771]

Rene Descartes, 1596 - 1650

The first precept was never to accept a thing as true until I knew it as such without a single doubt.

Rene Descartes, Le Discours de la Methode [1637], I

George Herbert, 1593 - 1633

Thursday come, the week is gone.

George Herbert, Jacula Prudentum [1651]. no. 587

Robert Burton, 1577 - 1640

Why doth one man's yawning make another yawn?

Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy [1621 - 1651]. pt. I, sec. 2, member 3, subsec. 2

John Donne, 1572 - 1631

She, and comparisons are odious.

John Donne, Elegies, no. 8, The Comparison, l. 54

William Shakespeare, 1564 - 1616

See! how she leans her cheek upon her hand:
O! that I were a glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek.

William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, II, ii, 23

William Shakespeare, 1564 - 1616

A horse! a horse! my kingdom for a horse!

William Shakespeare, Richard III, V, iv, 7

Francis Bacon, 1561 - 1626

Knowledge is power [Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est].

Francis Bacon, Meditationes Sacrae [1597]. De Haeresibus

John Lyly, c.1554 - 1606

Delays breed dangers.

John Lyly, Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit [1579]. Arber's reprint, p. 65

Henri IV [Henry of Navarre], 1553 - 1610

I want there to be no peasant in my realm so poor that he will not have a chicken in his pot every Sunday.

Henri IV, Attributed.

Elizabeth I, 1533 - 1603

I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too; and think foul scorn that Parma or Spain, or any other prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm.

Elizabeth I, Speech to the troops at Tilbury on the approach of the Armada [1588]

Henri Estienne, c. 1531 - 1598

Si jeunesse savait, si vieillesse pouvait
[If youth but knew, if old age but could]

Henri Estienne, Les Premices [1594]

Niccolo Machiavelli, 1469 - 1527

Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.

Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince [1532], ch. 26

William Dunbar, c.1465 - c.1530

London, thou art the flower of Cities all.

William Dunbar, London, refrain.

Francois Villon, 1431 - c.1465

But where are the snows of yesteryear?

Francois Villon, Le Grand Testament, Ballades des Dames du Temps Jadis.

Francois Villon, 1431 - c. 1465

Ah God! Had I but studied
In the days of my foolish youth.

Francois Villon, Le Grand Testament, 26.

Geoffrey Chaucer, c. 1343 - 1400

To rede, and drive the night away.

Geoffrey Chaucer, The Book of the Duchess [1369], l.49

Yoshida Kenko, 1283 - 1350

To sit alone in the lamplight with a book spread out before you, and hold intimate converse with men of unseen generations - such is a pleasure beyond compare.

Yoshida Kenko, Tsurezure-Gusa (Essays in Idleness) [c. 1340]

Dante Alighieri, 1265 - 1321

O conscience, upright and stainless, how bitter a sting to thee is a little fault!

Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy [c.1310 - 1320]. Purgatorio, canto III, l, 8.

Dante Alighieri, 1265 - 1321

He listens well who takes notes.

Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy [c.1310-1320]. Inferno, canto XV, l. 99

St. Thomas Aquinas, c. 1225 - 1274

Reason in man is rather like God in the world.

St. Thomas Aquinas, Opuscule 11, De Regno.

Fujiwara no Teika, 1162 - 1241

In the expression of the emotions originality merits the first consideration....The words
used, however, should be old ones.

Fujiwara no Teika, Guide to the Composition of Poetry.

Averroes, 1126 - 1198

Knowledge is the conformity of the object and the intellect.

Averroes, Destructio Destructonium

Gratian [Franciscus Gratianus], Twelfth century

Paintings are the Bible of the laity.

Gratian, Decretum, pt. III

Peter Abelard, 1079 - 1142

Against the disease of writing one must take special precautions, since it is a dangerous and contagious disease.

Letter 8, Abelard to Heloise.

Galen, 129 - 199

The chief merit of language is clearness, and we know that nothing distracts us so much from this as do unfamiliar terms.

Galen, On the Natural Faculties, bk. I, sec. 2

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, 121 - 180

In the morning, when you are sluggish about getting up, let this thought be present: "I am rising to a man's work."

(Seems this was a problem as early as ~100 A.D.!)

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Meditations, V, I

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, 121 - 180

Search men's governing principles, and consider the wise, what they shun and what they cleave to.

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Meditations, IV, 38

Pliny the Younger [Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus], c.61 - c.112

He [Pliny the Elder] used to say that "no book was so bad but some good might be got out of it."

Pliny the Younger, Lettersm bk. III, letter 5.

Juvenal [Decimus Junius Juvenalis], c. 50 - c. 130,

For revenge is always the delight of a mean spirit, of a weak and petty mind! You may immediately draw proof of this - that no one rejoices more in revenge than a woman.

Juvenal, Satires, XIII, l. 189

Persius [Aulus Persius Flaccus] A.D. 34 - 62

Tell, priests, what is gold doing in a holy place?

Persius, Satires, II, l. 69

Lucius Annaeus Seneca c. 4 B.C. - A.D. 65

A good mind possesses a kingdom.

Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Thyestes, 380.

Aristotle 384 - 322 B.C.

Hope is a waking dream.

Aristotle, From DIOGENES LAERTIUS, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, bk. V, sec. 18

Plato c. 428 - 348 B.C.

The life which is unexamined is not worth living.

Plato, Dialogues, Apology, 38.

Julius Caesar 100 - 44 B.C.

It is not these well-fed long-haired men that I fear, but the pale and the hungry-looking.

Julius Caesar, From PLUTARCH, Lives, Antony, sec. 11.

Marcus Tullius Cicero 106 - 43 B.C.

These studies are a spur to the young, a delight to the old; an ornament in prosperity, a consoling refuge in adversity; they are pleasure for us at home, and no burden abroad; they stay up with us at night, they accompany us when we travel, they are with us in our country visits.

Marcus Tullius Cicero, Pro Archia Poeta, VII, 16.

Euclid fl. 300 B.C.

Q.E.D. [Quod erat demonstrandum: Which was to be proved.]

Euclid, Elements, bk. I, proposition 5

Socrates 469 - 399 B.C

Often when looking at a mass of things for sale, he would say to himself, "How many things I have no need of!"

Socrates, From DIOGENES LAERTIUS, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, bk. II, sec 25.

Confucius 551 - 479 B.C.

When we see men of worth, we should think of equaling them; when we see men of a contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves.

The Confucian Analects, bk. 4:17.

Simonides c. 556 - 468 B.C.

The city is the teacher of the man.

Simonides, Fragment 53.

Hesiod c. 700 B.C.

If you should put even a little on a little, and should do this often, soon this too would become big.

Hesiod, Works and Days, l. 361

Ptahhotpe - Twenty-fourth century B.C.

Do not be arrogant because of your knowledge, but confer with the ignorant man as with the learned.... Good speech is more hidden than malachite, yet it is found in the possession of women slaves at the millstones.

The Maxims of Ptahhotpe [c. 2350 B.C.], maxim no. 1

Familiar Quotations

John Bartlett's Familiar Quotations