"We vainly accuse the fury of guns, and the new inventions of death; it is in the power of every hand to destroy us, and we are beholden unto every one we meet he doth not kill us."

Thomas Browne Literature See all quotes by Thomas Browne →

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“For the world, I count it not an Inn, but a Hospital, and a place, not to live, but to die in.”

“There is surely a Physiognomy, which those experienced and Master Mendicants observe… For there are mystically in our faces certain Characters that carry in them the motto of our Souls, wherein he that cannot read A.B.C. may read our natures.”

“I am in no way facetious, nor disposed for the mirth and galliardize of company, yet in one dream I can compose a whole Comedy, behold the action, apprehend the jests, and laugh myself awake at the conceits thereof.”

“The heart of man is the place the devil dwells in; I feel sometimes a hell within myself.”

“Who will not commend the wit of astrology? Venus, born out of the sea, hath her exaltation in Pisces.”

“I am not so much afraid of death, as ashamed thereof; 'tis the very disgrace and ignominy of our natures, that in a moment can so disfigure us that our nearest friends, Wife, and Children stand afraid and start at us.”

Resonant Thoughts

"Every observer has noted that the younger the child, the less sense he has of his own ego. From the intellectual point of view, he does not distinguish between external and internal, subjective and ob…"

— Jean Piaget

Philosophy1896–1980

#knowledge

"There are four hundred neatly marked graves somewhere in Sicily. All because one man went to sleep on the job. But they are German graves, because we caught the bastard asleep before they did."

— George S. Patton

Military1885–1945

#death

"It has had a calamitous effect on converted peoples. To be converted you have to destroy your past, destroy your history. You have to stamp on it, you have to say 'my ancestral culture does not exist,…"

— V. S. Naipaul

Literature1932–2018

#history

"Later, as power slipped from the hands of the Anarchists into the hands of the Communists and right-wing Socialists, the Government was able to reassert itself, the bourgeoisie came out of hiding and …"

— George Orwell

performing arts1903–1950

#politics