Quotes

i. “Example is always more efficacious than precept.” (Samuel Johnson)

ii. “Pleasure is very seldom found where it is sought. Our brightest blazes of gladness are commonly kindled by unexpected sparks.” (-ll-)

iii. “Self-confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings.” (-ll-)

iv. “It matters not how a man dies, but how he lives. The act of dying is not of importance, it lasts so short a time.” (-ll-. Modern medicine has arguably made this quote less true today than it was.)

v. “Always, Sir, set a high value on spontaneous kindness. He whose inclination prompts him to cultivate your friendship of his own accord, will love you more than one whom you have been at pains to attach to you.” (-ll-)

vi. “As I know more of mankind, I expect less of them, and am ready now to call a man a good man, upon easier terms than I was formerly.” (-ll-)

vii. “Cations that have similar coordination numbers and similar ionic radii tend to substitute for each other and make mixed compounds that we call solid solutions, which are analogous in every way to common liquid solutions. Natural olivines are solid solutions of variable amounts of iron and magnesium silicates. The pure magnesium olivine is Mg₂SiO₄, forsterite; the pure iron olivine is Fe₂SiO₄, fayalite.” (from Earth, p.64. I primarily included this quote here as a sort of very brief explanation for why I probably will not quote very much from this book. I’ve read the first 4 chapters (100 pages) so far.)

viii. “I am skeptical when someone says that a biological genetic grouping corroborates a historical linguistic grouping or vice versa for a simple reason: genetic material and language are transmitted by different mechanisms (I’ll skip my usual joke about this), so in principle a one-to-one correspondence should be surprising.” (Bruce Mannheim, via Razib Khan)

ix. “That virtue which requires to be ever guarded is scarce worth the sentinel.” (Oliver Goldsmith)

x. “A conquering army on the border will not be stopped by eloquence.” (Otto von Bismarck)

xi. “The happier the time, the quicker it passes.” (Pliny the Younger – the original quote in Latin: “Tanto brevius omne, quanto felicius tempus”)

xii. “With books, as with companions, it is of more consequence to know which to avoid, than which to choose; for good books are as scarce as good companions.” (Charles Caleb Colton)

xiii. “Many books require no thought from those who read them, and for a very simple reason; they made no such demand upon those who wrote them.” (-ll-)

xiv. “Hunger is sharper than the sword.” (Beaumont and Fletcher)

xv. “The inevitableness, the idealism, and the blessing of war, as an indispensable and stimulating law of development, must be repeatedly emphasized. [...] it is not only a biological law but a moral obligation and, as such, an indispensable factor in civilization.” (Friedrich von Bernhardi, Germany and the next War (1911))

xvi. “By the laws of England, by the laws of Christianity, and by the constitution of society, when there is a difference of opinion between husband and wife, it is the duty of the wife to submit to the husband.” (wikiquote provides the following source for the quote: Molina, V.-C., In re Agar-Ellis; Agar-Ellis v. Lascelles (1878), L. R. 10 C. D. 55.)

xvii. “No woman marries for money: they are all clever enough, before marrying a millionaire, to fall in love with him.” (Cesare Pavese)

xviii. “All sins have their origin in a sense of inferiority, otherwise called ambition.” (-ll-)

xix. “Idleness makes hours pass slowly and years swiftly. Activity makes the hours short and the years long.”