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Explore 7518 quotes originally in English

The trouble
with being best man is, you don't get a chance
to prove it.

Les A. Murray

More information about this quote

Topic

Best man Weddings

Author

Les A. Murray

Source

The Boys Who Stole the Funeral

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1989 1980s 20th century

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Murray, Les A. The Boys Who Stole the Funeral: A Novel Sequence. Angus & Robertson Publishers, 1980.

Our greatest glory is, not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.

Oliver Goldsmith

The Citizen of the World

More information about this quote

Topic

Overcoming adversity Adversity

Author

Oliver Goldsmith

Source

The Citizen of the World

Medium

Novel

Genre

Satire

Language

English

Time

1761 1760s 18th century

Authentication Score 2

Citation

Goldsmith, Oliver. "Letter VII." The Citizen of the World; or, Letters from a Chinese Philosopher. Dublin: George and Alex. Ewing, 1762. Originally published in The Public Ledger, Jan. 1760 - Aug. 1761.

If thou wilt ease thine heart
Of lover and all its smart
Then sleep, dear, sleep.

Thomas Lovell Beddoes

More information about this quote

Topic

Broken heart Moving forward Sleep as balm Sleep

Author

Thomas Lovell Beddoes

Source

Death's Jest Book

Language

English

Time

1850 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Beddoes, Thomas Lovell. Death's Jest-book; Or, The Fool's Tragedy. London: William Pickering, 1850.

Current Citation

Beddoes, Thomas Lovell. Death's Jest Book. Routledge, 2020.

Look at that sea, girls-all silver and shadow and vision of things not seen. We couldn't enjoy its loveliness any more if we had millions of dollars and ropes of diamonds.

L.M. Montgomery

Anne of Green Gables

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More information about this quote

Topic

Ocean and sea

Speaker

Anne Shirley

Author

L.M. Montgomery

Source

Anne of Green Gables

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1908 1900s 20th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Montgomery, L. M. Anne of Green Gables. L. C. Page & Co., 1908.

Current Citation

Montgomery, L. M. Anne of Green Gables. Puffin Books, 2014.

We must soften into a credulity below the milkiness of infancy, to think all men virtuous. We must be tainted with a malignity truly diabolical, to believe all the world to be equally wicked and corrupt.

Edmund Burke

More information about this quote

Topic

Human nature Original sin Virtue Perspective

Author

Edmund Burke

Source

Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontent

Medium

Pamphlet

Genre

Political literature

Language

English

Time

1770 1770s 18th century

Era

Age of Enlightenment

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Burke, Edmund. Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents. London: J. Dodsley, 1770.

Current Citation

Burke, Edmund. "Thoughts on the Present Discontents." The Portable Edmund Burke, edited by Isaac Kramnick. Penguin, 2009.

Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best; it removes all that is base.

George S. Patton

More information about this quote

Topic

War

Speaker

George S. Patton

Medium

Speech

Genre

Military speech

Language

English

Time

1944 1940s 20th century

Authentication Score 2

Citation

Patton, George Smith. Address to the troops. 5 June 1944, England, UK.

Though collecting quotations could be considered as merely an ironic mimetism-victimless collecting, as it were... In a world that is well on its way to becoming one vast quarry, the collector becomes someone engaged in a pious work of salvage. The course of modern history having already sapped the traditions and shattered the living wholes in which precious objects once found their place, the collector may now in good conscience go about excavating the choicer, more emblematic fragments.

Susan Sontag

Melancholy Objects

More information about this quote

Topic

Quotations

Author

Susan Sontag

Source

Melancholy Objects The New York Review of Books

Medium

Essay Magazine

Language

English

Time

1974 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Sontag, Susan. "Melancholy Objects." The New York Review of Books, 18 Apr. 1974.

Whether we like it or not, change comes, and the greater the resistance, the greater the pain.

Alan Watts

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More information about this quote

Topic

Resistance to change Change Acceptance

Author

Alan Watts

Source

Become What You Are

Genre

Religious literature Philosophical literature

Language

English

Time

1995 1990s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Watts, Alan. Become What You Are. Shambhala, 1995.

Look at it this way, you know. A man takes a job, you know? And that job—I mean, like that—that becomes what he is. You know, like—you do a thing and that's what you are. Like I've been a cabbie for seventeen years. Ten years at night. I still don't own my own cab. You know why? Because I don't want to. That must be what I want. To be on the night shift drivin' somebody else's cab. You understand? I mean, you become—you get a job, you become the job. One guy lives in Brooklyn. One guy lives in Sutton Place. You got a lawyer. Another guy's a doctor. Another guy dies. Another guy gets well. You know, people are born. I envy you. Go on, get laid, get drunk. Do anything. You got no choice, anyway. I mean, we're all fucked. More or less, ya know.

Taxi Driver

Watch Taxi Driver at Amazon Watch Taxi Driver at Amazon

More information about this quote

Topic

Jobs Meaninglessness

Speaker

Wizard

Actor

Peter Boyle

Source

Taxi Driver

Medium

Film

Genre

Neo-noir Crime (film) Crime

Language

English

Time

1976 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Taxi Driver. Directed by Martin Scorsese, Bill/Phillips Productions/Italo/Judeo Productions, 1976.

I would be married, but I'de have no Wife,
I would be married to a single Life.

Richard Crashaw

More information about this quote

Topic

Single life Marriage

Author

Richard Crashaw

Source

On Marriage Steps to the Temple

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1646 1640s 17th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Crashaw, Richard. "On Marriage." Steps to the Temple. Humphrey Moseley, 1646, I. 1.

All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated.

John Donne

Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, and severall steps in my Sicknes

More information about this quote

Topic

Nature of death Death

Author

John Donne

Source

Meditation XVII Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, and severall steps in my Sicknes

Statement Type

Metaphor, analogy and simile

Language

English

Time

1624 1620s 17th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Donne, John. "Meditation XVII." Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, and severall steps in my Sicknes. London, 1624.

Current Citation

Donne, John. "Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions." Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions and Death's Duel. Vintage, 1999, meditation 17.

It is a fine thing to be out on the hills alone. A man can hardly be a beast or a fool alone on a great mountain.

Francis Kilvert

More information about this quote

Topic

Spending time in nature Man and nature Nature

Author

Francis Kilvert

Medium

Personal journal

Language

English

Time

1871 1870s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Kilvert, Francis. Diary entry. 29 May 1871.

Inside every old person is a young person wondering what happened.

Terry Pratchett

Moving Pictures

More information about this quote

Topic

Lost youth Youth vs. old age Old age

Author

Terry Pratchett

Source

Moving Pictures

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1990 1990s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Pratchett, Terry. Moving Pictures. Victor Gollancz, 1990.

With the dead there is no rivalry. In the dead there is no change. Plato is never sullen. Cervantes is never petulant. Demosthenes never comes unseasonably. Dante never stays too long. No difference of political opinion can alienate Cicero. No heresy can excite the horror of Bossuet.

Thomas Babington Macaulay

More information about this quote

Topic

Western intellectual tradition

Author

Thomas Babington Macaulay

Source

Lord Bacon Edinburgh Review

Medium

Essay Magazine

Language

English

Time

1837 1830s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Macaulay, Thomas Babington. "Lord Bacon." Edinburgh Review, July 1837.

Young people have a marvellous faculty of either dying or adapting themselves to circumstances. Even if they are unhappy-very unhappy-it is astonishing how easily they can be prevented from finding it out, or at any rate from attributing it to any other cause than their own sinfulness.

Samuel Butler (Novelist)

The Way of All Flesh

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More information about this quote

Topic

Adaptability

Author

Samuel Butler (Novelist)

Source

The Way of All Flesh

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1902 1900s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Butler, Samuel. The Way of All Flesh. Grant Richards, 1903, ch. 6.

Current Citation

Butler, Samuel. The Way of All Flesh. Everyman's Library, 1993, ch. 6.

Wrongs are often forgiven, but contempt never is. Our pride remembers it for ever.

Lord Chesterfield

Read Chesterfield's Letters to His Son at Project Gutenberg

More information about this quote

Topic

Forgiveness Contempt

Author

Lord Chesterfield

Source

Letters of Lord Chesterfield

Medium

Letter

Language

English

Time

1748 1740s 18th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Stanhope, Philip Dormer. Letter to his son. 1 July 1748.

Nothing begins, and nothing ends,
That is not paid with moan;
For we are born in other's pain,
And perish in our own.

Francis Thompson

More information about this quote

Topic

Life and death The human condition

Author

Francis Thompson

Source

Daisy

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1893 1890s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Thompson, Francis. "Daisy." Poems. London: Elkin Mathews and John Lane, 1893, st. 15.

I never saw daffodils so beautiful. They grew among the mossy stones about and about them; some rested their heads upon these stones as on a pillow for weariness; and the rest tossed and reeled and danced, and seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind that blew upon them over the lake.

Dorothy Wordsworth

More information about this quote

Topic

Daffodils Flowers Nature scene

Author

Dorothy Wordsworth

Medium

Personal journal

Language

English

Time

1802 1800s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Wordsworth, Dorothy. Journal Entry. 15 Apr. 1802.

Current Citation

Wordsworth, Dorothy. "The Grasmere Journal, Journal entry 15 April 1802." The Grasmere and Alfoxden Journals, edited by Pamela Woof. Oxford University Press, 2008.

It is surely in reality the most important work in the world. What do ships, railways, mines, cars, government etc. exist for except that people may be fed, warmed, and safe in their own homes?

C.S. Lewis

On homemaking.

More information about this quote

Topic

Housework and homemaking

Author

C.S. Lewis

Source

Letters of C.S. Lewis

Medium

Letter

Language

English

Time

1955 1950s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Lewis, C.S. "16 March 1955." Letters of C.S. Lewis, edited by W.H. Lewis. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1966. Originally from Letter to Mrs. Johnson, 16 Mar. 1955.

Manners are of more importance than laws... Manners are what vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady, uniform, insensible operation, like that of the air we breathe in. They give their whole form and color to our lives.

Edmund Burke

More information about this quote

Topic

Manners Custom and convention

Author

Edmund Burke

Source

Two Letters to a Member of the Present Parliament, on the Proposals for Peace with the Regicide Directory of France

Medium

Open letter Letter

Genre

Political literature

Language

English

Time

1796 1790s 18th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Burke, Edmund. Two Letters to a Member of the Present Parliament, on the Proposals for Peace with the Regicide Directory of France. London: F. and C. Rivington, 1796, letter 1.

Current Citation

Burke, Edmund. Letters on a Regicide Peace." The Portable Edmund Burke, edited by Isaac Kramnick. Penguin, 2009, letter 1.