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Explore 7518 quotes originally in English

History says, Don't hope
On this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up
And hope and history rhyme.

Seamus Heaney

More information about this quote

Topic

Hope Political progress Progress

Author

Seamus Heaney

Source

The Cure at Troy

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1990 1990s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Heaney, Seamus. The Cure at Troy: A Version of Sophocles - Philoctetes. Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 1991.

In some men only the feeble glimmerings of Taste appear; the beauties which they relish are of the coarsest kind; and of these they have but a weak and confused impression, while in others, Taste rises to an acute discernment, and a lively enjoyment of the most refined beauties.

Hugh Blair

More information about this quote

Topic

Taste Refinement Discernment Elitism

Author

Hugh Blair

Source

Lectures on Rhetoric and Belle Lettres

Medium

Lecture

Language

English

Time

1787 1780s 18th century

Era

Age of Enlightenment

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Blair, Hugo. "Lecture II: Taste." Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres. 1787, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland.

Current Citation

Blair, Hugo. "Lecture II: Taste." Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres. SIU Press, 2005.

I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.

Edna St. Vincent Millay

More information about this quote

Topic

Inevitability of death Death

Author

Edna St. Vincent Millay

Source

Dirge Without Music

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1928 1920s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Millay, Edna St. Vincent. "Dirge Without Music." The Buck in the Snow, and Other Poems. Harper & Brothers, 1928, st. 1.

The worker is the slave of capitalist society, the female worker is the slave of that slave.

James Connolly

More information about this quote

Topic

Oppression of women Men and women Anti-capitalism Capitalism

Author

James Connolly

Source

The Re-Conquest of Ireland

Medium

Pamphlet

Genre

Political literature

Language

English

Time

1915 1910s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Connolly, James. Labour in Ireland: Labour in Irish History: the Re-conquest of Ireland. Dublin: Irish Workers' Cooperative Society, 1915.

What mighty ills have not been done by woman!
Who was 't betrayed the Capitol? -A woman!
Who lost Mark Antony the world? -A woman!
Who was the cause of a long ten years' war,
And laid at last old Troy in ashes? -Woman!
Destructive, damnable, deceitful woman!

Thomas Otway

The Orphan

More information about this quote

Topic

Misogyny Women

Speaker

Castalio

Author

Thomas Otway

Source

The Orphan

Genre

Tragedy (play) Tragedy

Language

English

Time

1680 1680s 17th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Otway, Thomas. The Orphan. Performed by Elizabeth Barry and Thomas Betterton and Thomas Gillow and John Wiltshire and Henry Norris and William Smith and Thomas Percival and Margaret Osborne and Joseph Williams. 1680, Dorset Garden Theatre, London, England, UK, act 3, sc. 1.

A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community.

Aldo Leopold

A Sand County Almanac

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More information about this quote

Topic

Moral theory Environmental protection

Author

Aldo Leopold

Source

A Sand County Almanac

Medium

Essay

Genre

Nature writing

Language

English

Time

1949 1940s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Leopold, Aldo. "The Land Ethic." A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There. Oxford University Press, 1949.

Recollect that the Almighty, who gave the dog to be companion of our pleasures and our toils, hath invested him with a nature noble and incapable of deceit.

Sir Walter Scott

The Talismam

More information about this quote

Topic

Dogs Man's best friend Man and animals

Author

Sir Walter Scott

Source

The Talismam

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1825 1820s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Scott, Walter, Sir. The Talisman. Edinburgh: Archibald Constable and Co./London: Hurst, Robinson and Co., 1825, ch. 24.

I come into the peace of wild things
Who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light.

Wendell Berry

More information about this quote

Topic

Man and nature Spending time in nature Nature

Author

Wendell Berry

Source

The Peace of Wild Things

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1968 1960s 20th century

Authentication Score 0

Citation

Berry, Wendell. "The Peace of Wild Things." Openings. Harcourt, Brace & World, 1968.

Men at forty
Learn to close softly
The doors to rooms they will not be
Coming back to.

Donald Justice

Read Men at Forty at Poetry Foundation

More information about this quote

Topic

Middle age The road not taken Shrinking horizons Aging

Author

Donald Justice

Source

Men at Forty

Statement Type

Metaphor, analogy and simile

Language

English

Time

1967 1960s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Justice, Donald. "Men at Forty." Night Light. Wesleyan University Press, 1967.

The fog comes
On little cat feet.
It sits looking
Over harbour and city
On silent haunches
And then moves on.

Carl Sandburg

Read Fog at Poetry Foundation

More information about this quote

Topic

Fog Weather

Author

Carl Sandburg

Source

Fog

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1916 1910s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Sandburg, Carl. "Fog." Chicago Poems. Henry Holt and Company, 1916, I. 1.

Current Citation

Sandburg, Carl. "Fog." The Complete Poems of Carl Sandburg. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2003, I. 1.

Man is the result of a purposeless and materialistic process that did not have him in mind.

George Gaylord Simpson

More information about this quote

Topic

Human origins Nature of man Evolution

Author

George Gaylord Simpson

Source

The Meaning Of Evolution

Language

English

Time

1949 1940s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Simpson, George Gaylord. The Meaning of Evolution. Yale University Press, 1949, epilogue.

There are as many nights as days, and the one is just as long as the other in the year's course. Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word "happy" would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness.

Carl Jung

Quoted in The Times of London

More information about this quote

Topic

Night and day Happiness Sadness Yin and yang

Speaker

Carl Jung

Source

The Times of London

Medium

Newspaper

Language

English

Time

1960 1960s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Jung, Carl. "The Art of Living." Sunday Times, 17 July 1960.

I can't use liquor as a crutch, because a crutch helps me walk. Liquor severely screws up the way I walk. It ain't like a crutch, it's like a step I didn't see.

Mitch Hedberg

Comedy Central Presents

Watch Comedy Central Presents Mitch Hedberg at Amazon Watch Comedy Central Presents Mitch Hedberg at Amazon
Read the full transcript of this special at scrapsfromtheloft.com

More information about this quote

Topic

Alcohol

Speaker

Mitch Hedberg

Source

Comedy Central Presents

Medium

Comedy special

Genre

Comedy (stand up)

Language

English

Time

1999 1990s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Hedberg, Mitch. Comedy Central Presents. Comedy Central, 5 Jan. 1999.

I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great Imperial family to which we all belong.

Elizabeth II

More information about this quote

Topic

British empire

Speaker

Elizabeth II

Medium

Radio broadcast Speech

Statement Type

Promises and vows

Language

English

Time

1947 1940s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Elizabeth II. Speech on her twenty-first birthday. 21 Apr. 1947, Cape Town, South Africa, Africa. Radio broadcast.

Government is, or ought to be instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security of the people, nation, or community; of all the various modes and forms of government, that is best which is capable of producing the greatest degree of happiness and safety, and is most effectually secured against the danger of maladministration.

George Mason

Virginia Bill of Rights

Read The Virginia Declaration of Rights at the National Archives website

More information about this quote

Topic

Precepts and axioms

Author

George Mason

Source

Virginia Bill of Rights

Genre

Political literature

Language

English

Time

1776 1770s 18th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Mason, George. Virginia Bill of Rights. 12 June 1776, article 3.

It came upon the midnight clear,
That glorious song of old,
From Angels bending near the earth
To touch their harps of gold;
'Peace on the earth, good will to man
From Heaven's all gracious King,'
The world in solemn stillness lay
To hear the angels sing.

Edmund Sears

It Came Upon the Midnight Clear

Read the lyrics to this hymn at hymnary.org

More information about this quote

Topic

Jesus's birth

Author

Edmund Sears

Source

It Came Upon the Midnight Clear

Medium

Hymn Song

Language

English

Time

1849 1840s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Sears, Edmund. "That Glorious Song of Old." The Christian Register, 1849, I. 1.

The Puritans, who nobly fled from a land of despotism to a land of freedom, where they could not only enjoy their own religion, but could prevent everybody else from enjoying his.

Charles Farrar Browne

More information about this quote

Topic

Puritanism

Author

Charles Farrar Browne

Medium

Letter

Statement Type

Irony

Language

English

Time

1866 1860s 19th century

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Browne, Charles Farrar. "Introduction to the Club." London Punch Letters. c. 1866, no. 5.

Laws are generally found to be nets of such a texture, as the little creep through, the great break through, and the middle-sized are alone entangled in.

William Shenstone

More information about this quote

Topic

Nature of law Law

Author

William Shenstone

Medium

Essay

Genre

Political literature

Language

English

Time

1764 1760s 18th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Shenstone, William. "On Politicks." The Works in Verse and Prose of William Shenstone, Esq. Vol. 2, London: R. and J. Dodsley, 1764.

That community is already in process of dissolution where each man begins to eye his neighbor as a possible enemy, where nonconformity with the accepted creed, political as well as religious, is a mark of disaffection; where denuciation, without specification or backing, takes the place of evidence; where orthodoxy chokes freedom of dissent; where faith in the eventual supremacy of reason has become so timid that we dare not enter our convictions in the open lists, to win or lose.

Learned Hand

More information about this quote

Topic

Diversity of opinion Questioning authority Dissent Red Scare

Speaker

Learned Hand

Medium

Speech

Language

English

Time

1952 1950s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Hand, Learned. Speech to the Board of Regents. 24 Oct. 1952, University of the State of New York, Albany, NY, USA.

O, what may man within him hide,
Though angel on the outward side!

William Shakespeare

Measure for Measure

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Read Measure for Measure at The Folger Shakespeare Library

More information about this quote

Topic

Looks are deceiving Wolf in sheep's clothing Appearance vs. reality

Speaker

Duke Vincentio

Author

William Shakespeare

Source

Measure for Measure

Medium

Play

Genre

Comedy (play)

Language

English

Time

1616 1610s 17th century

Era

European Renaissance

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Shakespeare, William. "Measure for Measure." Mr. William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. London: Edward Blount and William and Isaac Jaggard, 1623, act 3, sc. 2.

Current Citation

Shakespeare, William. "Measure for Measure." The Norton Shakespeare, edited by Stephen Greenblatt, et al., 3rd ed., W. W. Norton & Company, 2015, act 3, sc. 2.