- WIST is my personal collection of quotations, curated for thought, amusement, turn of phrase, historical significance, or sometimes just (often-unintentional) irony. Please feel free to browse and borrow.
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Popular Quotables
- “Wealth and Poverty,” speech, National… (6,588)
- “The Lesson for Today,” A Witness Tree (1942) (5,797)
- Agamemnon, ll. 175-183 [tr. Johnston (2007)] (5,686)
- Nobel prize acceptance speech (10 Dec 1962) (4,867)
- “The Triumph of Stupidity” (10 May 1933) (4,807)
- “On The Conduct of Life” (1822) (3,903)
- “In Search of a Majority,” Speech,… (3,807)
- “Get a Knife, Get a Dog, but Get Rid of… (3,662)
- “Hallowed Ground” (1825) (3,056)
- “The Historian as Participant,” Daedalus… (3,056)
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Adams, John • Bacon, Francis • Bible • Bierce, Ambrose • Billings, Josh • Butcher, Jim • Chesterton, Gilbert Keith • Churchill, Winston • Einstein, Albert • Eisenhower, Dwight David • Emerson, Ralph Waldo • Franklin, Benjamin • Fuller, Thomas (1654) • Gaiman, Neil • Galbraith, John Kenneth • Gandhi, Mohandas • Goethe, Johann von • Hazlitt, William • Heinlein, Robert A. • Hoffer, Eric • Huxley, Aldous • Ingersoll, Robert Green • James, William • Jefferson, Thomas • Johnson, Lyndon • Johnson, Samuel • Kennedy, John F. • King, Martin Luther • La Rochefoucauld, Francois • Lewis, C.S. • Lincoln, Abraham • Mencken, H.L. • Orwell, George • Pratchett, Terry • Roosevelt, Eleanor • Roosevelt, Theodore • Russell, Bertrand • Seneca the Younger • Shakespeare, William • Shaw, George Bernard • Stevenson, Adlai • Stevenson, Robert Louis • Twain, Mark • Watterson, Bill • Wilde, Oscar- Only the 45 most quoted authors are shown above. Full author list.
Recent Feedback
- 6-Jul-20 - (Attributed) | WIST on Quoted in Plutarch, Parallel Lives, “The Life of Solon,” sec. 18.5 [tr. Perrin (1914)].
- 6-Jul-20 - Agamemnon, l. 928 | WIST on Oedipus Rex, l. 1529 (concluding words).
- 20-May-20 - Introduction to the Art of Thinking, ch. 1, "Friendship" (1761) | WIST on John 15:13 (KJV).
- 18-May-20 - Chamblee54 on Clouds, ll. 998-999 (423 BC) [tr. Athenian Soc. (1912)].
- 18-May-20 - Chamblee54 on Mills E. Godwin, Governor of Virginia (Dec 1966).
- 11-May-20 - Chamblee54 on “Indian Summer,” Enough Rope (1926).
Quotations about dependency
Note that not all quotations have been tagged, so the Search function may find additional quotations on this topic.
The old saying holds. Owe your banker £1000 and you are at his mercy; owe him £1 million and the position is reversed.
John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946) English economist
“Overseas Financial Policy in Stage III” (15 May 1945)
Unpublished memo distributed to the British Cabinet. Variant: "If you owe your bank a hundred pounds, you have a problem. But if you owe a million, it has."
People become attached to their burdens sometimes more than the burdens are attached to them.
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) British playwright and critic
A Treatise on Parents and Children (1910)
Great men are rarely isolated mountain peaks; they are the summits of ranges.
Thomas Wentworth Higginson (1823-1911) American minister, author, abolitionist, soldier
“A Plea for Culture,” Atlantic Essays (1871)
There is no greater challenge than to have someone relying upon you; no greater satisfaction than to vindicate his expectation.
Kingman Brewster, Jr. (1919-1988) American educator, diplomat
Baccalaureate address, Yale (12 Jun 1966)
Depending on the kindness of strangers may not be as bad as depending on the competence of strangers.
Arthur D. Hlavaty (b. 1942) American writer, editor, publisher [a/k/a "Supergee"]
“Derogatory Reference” #100 (2002)
(Source)
Give a man a fish, and you’ll feed him for a day. Give him a religion, and he’ll starve to death while praying for a fish.
Other Authors and Sources
Timothy Jones
Only free men can negotiate; prisoners cannot enter into contracts. Your freedom and mine cannot be separated.
Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) South African revolutionary, politician, statesman
Letter from prison to Zindzi Mandela, given in Soweto speech (10 Feb 1985)
On refusing to bargain for freedom after 21 years in prison. Quoted in Time (25 Feb 1985).
