A good book is the best of friends, the same to-day and for ever.
‘Proverbial Philosophy’ Series I (1838) ‘Of Reading’
8.79 A.-R.-J. Turgot 1727-81
Eripuit coelo fulmen, sceptrumque tyrannis.
He snatched the lightning shaft from heaven, and the sceptre from tyrants.
Inscription for a bust of Benjamin Franklin, inventor of the lightning conductor in ‘Oeuvres Complétes’ (Paris, 1804)vol. 5, p. 230. A. N. de Condorcet ‘Vie de Turgot’ (1786).
8.80 Walter James Redfern Turner 1889-1946
When I was but thirteen or so I went into a golden land, Chimborazo, Cotopaxi
Took me by the hand.
‘Romance’
8.81 Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens) 1835-1910
‘The Adventures of Tom Sawyer’...was made by Mr Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly. There was things which he stretched, but mainly he told the truth.
‘The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’ (1884) ch. 1
There was some books....One was ‘Pilgrim’s Progress’, about a man that left his family it didn’t say why. I read considerable in it now and then. The statements was interesting, but tough. Another was ‘Friendship’s Offering’, full of beautiful stuff and poetry; but I didn’t read the poetry.
‘The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’ (1884) ch. 17
All kings is mostly rapscallions.
‘The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’ (1884) ch. 23
Hain’t we got all the fools in town on our side? and ain’t that a big enough majority in any town?
‘The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’ (1884) ch. 26
If there was two birds setting on a fence, he would bet you which one would fly first.
‘The Celebrated Jumping Frog’ (1867) p. 10
I don’t see no p’ints about that frog that’s any better’n any other frog.
‘The Celebrated Jumping Frog’ (1867) p. 16
Soap and education are not as sudden as a massacre, but they are more deadly in the long run.
‘Facts concerning the Recent Resignation’ in ‘A Curious Dream’ (1872)
Be virtuous and you will be eccentric.
‘Mental Photographs’ in ‘A Curious Dream’ (1872)
Barring that natural expression of villainy which we all have, the man looked honest enough.
‘A Mysterious Visit’ in ‘A Curious Dream’ (1872)
Truth is the most valuable thing we have. Let us economize it.
‘Following the Equator’ (1897) ch. 7.
It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practise either of them.
‘Following the Equator’ (1897) ch. 20
‘Classic.’ A book which people praise and don’t read.
‘Following the Equator’ (1897) ch. 25; in ‘Speeches’ (1910) p. 194 Twain offers Professor Caleb Winchester’s definition of a classic as ‘something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read’.
Man is the Only Animal that Blushes. Or needs to.
‘Following the Equator’ (1897) ch. 27
Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed.
‘Following the Equator’ (1897) ch. 28
There are several good protections against temptations, but the surest is cowardice.
‘Following the Equator’ (1897) ch. 36
By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity. Another man’s, I mean.
‘Following the Equator’ (1897) ch. 39
It takes your enemy and your friend, working together, to hurt you to the heart: the one to slander you and the other to get the news to you.
‘Following the Equator’ (1897) ch. 45
I must have a prodigious quantity of mind; it takes me as much as a week, sometimes, to make it up.
‘The Innocents Abroad’ (1869) ch. 7
They spell it Vinci and pronounce it Vinchy; foreigners always spell better than they pronounce.
‘The Innocents Abroad’ (1869) ch. 19
I do not want Michael Angelo for breakfast—for luncheon—for dinner—for tea—for supper— for between meals.
‘The Innocents Abroad’ (1869) ch. 27.
Lump the whole thing! say that the Creator made Italy from designs by Michael Angelo!
‘The Innocents Abroad’ (1869) ch. 27
That joke was lost on the foreigner—guides cannot master the subtleties of the American joke.
‘The Innocents Abroad’ (1869) ch. 27
If you’ve got a nice fresh corpse, fetch him out!
‘The Innocents Abroad’ (1869) ch. 27
What a good thing Adam had. When he said a good thing he knew nobody had said it before.
‘Notebooks’ (1935) p. 67
Familiarity breeds contempt—and children.
‘Notebooks’ (1935) p. 237
Good breeding consists in concealing how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of the other person.
‘Notebooks’ (1935) p. 345
Adam was but human—this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple’s sake; he wanted it only because it was forbidden.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 2
Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our race. He brought death into the world.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 3
Training is everything. The peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 5
One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 7
When angry, count four; when very angry, swear.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 10
As to the Adjective: when in doubt, strike it out.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 11
Put all your eggs in the one basket, and—watch that basket.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 15
Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 19
It were not best that we should all think alike; it is difference of opinion that makes horse-races.
‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ (1894) ch. 19
There is a sumptuous variety about the New England weather that compels the stranger’s admiration—and regret. The weather is always doing something there; always attending strictly to business; always getting up new designs and trying them on the people to see how they will go. But it gets through more business in spring than in any other season. In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of four-and-twenty hours.
Speech to New England Society, 22 December 1876, in ‘Speeches’ (1910) p. 59
There’s plenty of boys that will come hankering and grovelling around you when you’ve got an apple, and beg the core off of you; but when they’ve got one, and you beg for the core and remind them how you give them a core one time, they say thank you ’most to death, but there ain’t-a-going to be no core.
‘Tom Sawyer Abroad’ (1894) ch. 1
There ain’t no way to find out why a snorer can’t hear himself snore.
‘Tom Sawyer Abroad’ (1894) ch. 10
The cross of the Legion of Honour has been conferred upon me. However, few escape that distinction.
‘A Tramp Abroad’ (1880) ch. 8
An experienced, industrious, ambitious, and quite often picturesque liar.
‘Private History of a Campaign that Failed’ in ‘Century Magazine’ December 1885
The report of my death was an exaggeration.
‘New York Journal’ 2 June 1897 (often misquoted as ‘Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated’). Twain was correcting newspaper reports to the effect that he was ill or dead, and confusing him with his cousin, James Ross Clemens, who had in fact been seriously ill in London.
He [Thomas Carlyle] said it in a moment of excitement, when chasing Americans out of his backyard with brickbats. They used to go there and worship. At bottom he was probably fond of them, but he was always able to conceal it.
‘Mark Twain’s Christmas Book’ in ‘New York World’ 10 December 1899
All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.
Letter to Mrs Foote, 2 December 1887, in B. DeCasseres ‘When Huck Finn Went Highbrow’ (1934) p. 7
8.82 Kenneth Tynan 1927-80
Forty years ago he was Slightly in Peter Pan, and you might say that he has been wholly in Peter Pan ever since.
Referring to Noel Coward in ‘Curtains’ (1961) pt. 1, p. 59
What, when drunk, one sees in other women, one sees in Garbo sober.
‘Curtains’ (1961) pt. 2, p. 347
A good drama critic is one who perceives what is happening in the theatre of his time. A great drama critic also perceives what is not happening.
‘Tynan Right and Left’ (1967) foreword
A critic is a man who knows the way but can’t drive the car.
In ‘New York Times Magazine’ 9 January 1966, p. 27
9.0U
9.1Domitius Ulpian d. 228
Nulla iniuria est, quae in volentem fiat.
No injustice is done to someone who wants that thing done.
Corpus Iuris Civilis Digests 47, X.i.5 (usually cited in the form Volenti non fit iniuria: To someone who wants it no injustice occurs)
9.2 Miguel de Unamuno 1864-1937
La vida es duda,
y la fe sin la duda es sólo muerte.
Life is doubt,
And faith without doubt is nothing but death.
‘Poèsias’ (1907) ‘Salmo II’
Cùrate de la affeccion de preocuparte cómo aparezías a los dem s. Cuídate sólo de cómo aparezías Dios, cuídate de la idea que de ti Dios tenga.
Cure yourself of the condition of bothering about how you look to other people. Concern
yourself only with how you appear to God, with the idea that God has of you.
‘Vida de Don Quixote y Sancho’ (1905) pt. 1
9.3 John Updike 1932—
One out of three hundred and twelve Americans is a bore, for instance, and a healthy male adult bore consumes each year one and a half times his own weight in other people’s patience.
‘Confessions of a Wild Bore’ in ‘Assorted Prose’ (1965)
The difficulty with humorists is that they will mix what they believe with what they don’t; whichever seems likelier to win an effect.
‘Rabbit, Run’ (1960) p. 160
9.4 Archbishop James Ussher 1581-1656
Which beginning of time [the Creation] according to our Chronologie, fell upon the entrance of the night preceding the twenty third day of October in the year of the Julian Calendar, 710.
‘The Annals of the World’ (1658) p. 1 (i.e. BC 4004)
9.5 Sir Peter Ustinov 1921—
I was irrevocably betrothed to laughter, the sound of which has always seemed to me the most civilized music in the world.
‘Dear Me’ (1977) ch. 3
I do not believe that friends are necessarily the people you like best, they are merely the people who got there first.
‘Dear Me’ (1977) ch. 5
Laughter would be bereaved if snobbery died.
In ‘Observer’ 13 March 1955
If Botticelli were alive today he’d be working for Vogue.
In ‘Observer’ 21 October 1962.
At the age of four with paper hats and wooden swords we’re all Generals. Only some of us never grow out of it.
‘Romanoff and Juliet’ (1956) act 1
A diplomat these days is nothing but a head-waiter who’s allowed to sit down occasionally.
‘Romanoff and Juliet’ (1956) act 1
10.0 V
10.1 Paul Valèry 1871-1945
Un poéme n’est jamais achevè—c’est toujours un accident qui le termine, c’est-á-dire qui le donne au public.
A poem is never finished; it’s always an accident that puts a stop to it—i.e. gives it to the
public.
‘Littèrature’ (1930) p. 46
Il faut n’appeler Science: que l’ensemble des recettes qui rèussissent toujours.—Tout le reste est littèrature.
‘Science’ means simply the aggregate of all the recipes that are always successful. All the rest
is literature.
‘Moralitès’ (1932) p. 41
Dieu crèa l’homme, et ne le trouvant pas assez seul, il lui donne une compagne pour lui faire mieux sentir sa solitude.
God created man and, finding him not sufficiently alone, gave him a companion to make him
feel his solitude more keenly.
‘Tel Quel 1’ (1941) ‘Moralitès’
La politique est l’art d’empêcher les gens de se mêler de ce qui les regarde.
Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them.
‘Tel Quel 2’ (1943) ‘Rhumbs’
10.2 Sir John Vanbrugh 1664-1726
The want of a thing is perplexing enough, but the possession of it is intolerable.
‘The Confederacy’ (1705) act 1, sc. 2
Much of a muchness.
‘The Provoked Husband’ (1728) act 1, sc. 1
Belinda: Ay, but you know we must return good for evil. Lady Brute: That may be a mistake in the translation.
‘The Provoked Wife’ (1697) act 1, sc. 1
Thinking is to me the greatest fatigue in the world.
‘The Relapse’ (1696) act 2, sc. 1
No man worth having is true to his wife, or can be true to his wife, or ever was, or ever will be so.
‘The Relapse’ (1696) act 3, sc. 2
10.3 Paul Vance and Lee Pockriss
Itsy bitsy teenie weenie, yellow polkadot bikini.
Title of song (1960)
10.4 Vivien van Damm c.1889-1960
We never closed.
Referring to the Windmill Theatre in London during World War II, in ‘Tonight and Every Night’ (1952) ch.
18
10.5 William Henry Vanderbilt 1821-85
The public be damned!
Replying to whether the public should be consulted about luxury trains, in a letter from A. W. Cole to New York Times 25 August 1918
10.6 Laurens van der Post 1906—
Human beings are perhaps never more frightening than when they are convinced beyond doubt that they are right.
‘The Lost World of the Kalahari’ (1958) ch. 3
10.7 Bartolomeo Vanzetti 1888-1927
If it had not been for these thing, I might have live out my life talking at street corners to scorning men. I might have die, unmarked, unknown, a failure. Now we are not a failure. This is our career and our triumph. Never in our full life could we hope to do such work for tolerance, for joostice, for man’s onderstanding of man as now we do by accident. Our words—our lives— our pains—nothing! The taking of our lives—lives of a good shoemaker and a poor fish-peddler —all! That last moment belongs to us—that agony is our triumph.
Statement after being sentenced to death on 9 April 1927, in M. D. Frankfurter and G. Jackson ‘Letters of Sacco and Vanzetti’ (1928) preface
Sacco’s name will live in the hearts of the people and in their gratitude when Katzmann’s and yours bones will be dispersed by time, when your name, his name, your laws, institutions, and your false god are but a deem rememoring of a cursed past in which man was wolf to the man.
Note of what he wanted to say at his trial on 9 April 1927, in M. D. Frankfurter and G. Jackson ‘Letters of Sacco and Vanzetti’ (1928) p. 380
10.8 Charles John Vaughan 1816-97
Must you go? Can’t you stay?
His formula for breaking up breakfast parties of schoolboys too shy to leave (retold with the words transposed, ‘Can’t you go? Must you stay?’) in G. W. E. Russell ‘Collections and Recollections’ ch. 24
10.9 Harry Vaughan
If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
In ‘Time’ 28 April 1952 (associated with Harry S. Truman, but attributed by him to Vaughan, his ‘military jester’)
10.10 Henry Vaughan 1622-95
Man is the shuttle, to whose winding quest And passage through these looms
God ordered motion, but ordained no Nest.
‘Man’ from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
Wise Nicodemus saw such light
As made him know his God by night.
Most blest believer he!
Who in that land of darkness and blind eyes Thy long expected healing wings could see When Thou didst rise!
And, what can never more be done,
Did at midnight speak with the Sun!
‘The Night’ l. 5 from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
Dear Night! this world’s defeat;
The stop to busy fools; care’s check and curb; The day of spirits; my soul’s calm retreat Which none disturb!
‘The Night’ l. 25 from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
My soul, there is a country Far beyond the stars,
Where stands a wingéd sentry All skilful in the wars;
There, above noise and danger, Sweet Peace is crowned with smiles, And One born in a manger Commands the beauteous files.
‘Peace’ from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
Happy those early days, when I Shined in my angel-infancy. Before I understood this place Appointed for my second race, Or taught my soul to fancy aught But a white, celestial thought; When yet I had not walked above A mile or two from my first love,
And looking back—at that short space— Could see a glimpse of His bright face.
‘The Retreat’ l. 1 from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
And in those weaker glories spy Some shadows of eternity.
‘The Retreat’ l. 13 from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
But felt through all this fleshly dress Bright shoots of everlastingness.
‘The Retreat’ l.19 from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
Some men a forward motion love, But I by backward steps would move, And when this dust falls to the urn, In that state I came, return.
‘The Retreat’ l.29 from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
They are all gone into the world of light, And I alone sit lingering here;
Their very memory is fair and bright, And my sad thoughts doth clear.
‘They Are All Gone’ from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
I see them walking in an air of glory, Whose light doth trample on my days:
My days, which are at best but dull and hoary, Mere glimmering and decays.
‘They Are All Gone’ from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
Dear, beauteous death! the jewel of the just, Shining nowhere but in the dark;
What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust, Could man outlook that mark!
‘They Are All Gone’ from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
And yet, as angels in some brighter dreams Call to the soul when man doth sleep,
So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted themes, And into glory peep.
‘They Are All Gone’ from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
I saw Eternity the other night,
Like a great ring of pure and endless light, All calm, as it was bright;
And round beneath it, Time in hours, days, years, Driv’n by the spheres
Like a vast shadow moved; in which the world And all her train were hurled.
‘The World’ from ‘Silex Scintillans’ (1650-5)
10.11 Ralph Vaughan Williams 1872-1958
I don’t know whether I like it, but it’s what I meant.
Referring to his 4th symphony, in Christopher Headington ‘Bodley Head History of Western Music’ (1974) p. 293
It’s a Rum Go!
His reply when asked what he thought about music, in Leslie Ayr ‘The Wit of Music’ (1966) p. 43
10.12 Thorstein Veblen 1857-1929
Conspicuous consumption of valuable goods is a means of reputability to the gentleman of leisure.
‘Theory of the Leisure Class’ (1899) ch. 4
So it is something of a homiletical commonplace to say that the outcome of any serious research can only be to make two questions grow where one question grew before.
‘Evolution of the Scientific Point of View’ in ‘University of California Chronicle’ (1908) vol. 10, no. 4
10.13 Vegetius 4th-5th century A.D.
Qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum.
Let him who desires peace, prepare for war.
‘De Rei Militari’ 3, prologue (usually cited in the form Si vis pacem, para bellum If you want peace, prepare for war)
10.14 Venantius Fortunatus c.530-c.610
Pange, lingua, gloriosi Proelium certaminis.
Sing, my tongue, of the battle in the glorious struggle.
‘Pange lingua gloriosi’ in J. P. Migne ‘Patrologia Latina’ (1844-64) vol. 88 (Passiontide hymn ‘Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle’)
Vexilla regis prodeunt, Fulget crucis mysterium; Qua vita mortem pertulit, Et morte vitam protulit.
The banners of the king advance, the mystery of the cross shines bright; where his life went
through with death, and from death brought forth life.
‘Vexilla Regis’ in ‘Analecta Hymnica’ vol. 50, no. 67, p. 74
Regnavit a ligno Deus.
God reigned from the wood.
‘Vexilla Regis’ in ‘Analecta Hymnica’ vol. 50, no. 67, p. 74
10.15 Pierre Vergniaud 1753-93
Il a ètè permis de craindre que la Rèvolution, comme Saturne, dèvorât successivement tous ses enfants.
There was reason to fear that the Revolution, like Saturn, might devour in turn each one of her
children.
Alphonse de Lamartine ‘Histoire des Girondins’ (1847) bk. 38, ch. 20
10.16 Paul Verlaine 1844-96
Et tout le reste est littèrature.
