Miscellany

'The matter admits of no delay, is so plain as not to admit of discussion, and too righteous to be brought into controversy' – Cardinal Wolsey (1529)

'Give me a good dinner, and an appetite to eat it, and I will be happier than the mightiest potentate which this world can produce, surrounded by his satellites, and rioting in the indulgence of immeasurable power. Satisfied in this respect, I should pass my time in unalloyed happiness, and pity those whom fate had excluded from a similar enjoyment, as the victims of chance; and the slaves of misery' – Dr Johnson (spurious)

'There is no foundation for the complaint that only a small minority of human beings have been given the power to understand what is taught them . . . as birds are born for flying, horses for speed, beasts of prey for ferocity, so are we for mental activity and resourcefulness' – Quintilian

'Although our German friends are somewhat jealous of their well-deserved reputation as a nation of thinkers, they sometimes seem, individually, very much disposed to grudge one another a share in that distinction' – Horace Howard Furness (1877) 

'Fortune lets nothing stand stable: things long prosperous are not perdurable, harsh adversity will be unbearable; now for the better, now for the worse, always in flux: everything under the sun is mutable' – John Skelton 

'The most profitable thing in this world for the institution of the human life is history. One, the continual reading thereof maketh young men equal in prudence to old men, and to old fathers stricken in age it ministereth experience of things' - Lord Berners (1523) 

'But, whilst we grant this indulgence to genius, if it be asked, whether we can extend it to indifferent talent, the answer must be, that we assuredly do not, and cannot' – Thomas Campbell on excusing faults in Shakespeare 

'Take away from History Why, How, and To what end things have been done, and Whether the thing done hath succeeded according to Reason; and all that remains will be an idle Sport and Foolery, than a profitable Instruction: and though for the present it may delight, for the future it cannot profit' – William Camden (1615), paraphrasing Polybius. 

'There are always plenty of rivals to our work . . . The only people who achieve much are those who . . . seek it while conditions are still unfavourable' – C. S. Lewis

'Increase of worldly things makes men poor and not rich, because every worldly thing hath a need annexed unto it' – A 'paradoxe' from the Renaissance, quoted by Stephen Gardiner in 1545 

'The wealth of a nation consisteth in driving a native commodity through the most hands to the highest artificial perfection' – Thomas Fuller (1662)

'A sense of unity is the opposite of a sense of uniformity. Uniformity, where everyone "belongs," uses the same clichés, thinks alike and behaves alike, produces a society . . . totally lacking in human dignity. Real unity tolerates dissent and rejoices in variety of outlook' – Northrop Frye

'At school you are engaged not so much in acquiring knowledge as in making mental efforts under criticism. A certain amount of knowledge you can indeed with average faculties acquire so as to retain; nor need you regret the hours you spent on much that is forgotten, for the shadow of lost knowledge at least protects you from many illusions. But you go to a great school not so much for knowledge as for arts and habits; for the habit of attention, for the art of expression, for the art of assuming at a moment’s notice a new intellectual position, for the art of entering quickly into another person’s thoughts, for the habit of submitting to censure and refutation, for the art of indicating assent or dissent in graduated terms, for the habit of regarding minute points of accuracy, for the art of working out what is possible in a given time, for taste, for discrimination, for mental courage, and for mental soberness. Above all, you go to a great school for self-knowledge' – William Johnson Cory, master at Eton (c. 1870) 

'If a man write six good lines he is immortal – isn’t that worth trying for?' – Ezra Pound 

'The study of literature, or more probably of morphology, verb-roots, etc., was permitted the German professor in, let us say, 1880-1905, to keep his mind off life in general, and off public life in particular. In America it was permitted from precedent; it was known to be permitted in Germany; Germany had a "great university tradition", which it behooved America to equal and perhaps to surpass' – Ezra Pound

'I am now at the work I dislike most in the world – looking over and marking examination papers' – Matthew Arnold (1863)

'It is a fine thing to be rich but a finer to be free – Jacob Piso (1509) 

'The response of the intellectuals tended to be withdrawal from worldly affairs and a turn from reason to mysticism' – L. S. Stavrianos