Ancient Quotes - Page 33

• I waited for the train at Coventry; I hung with grooms and porters on the bridge, To watch the three tall spires; and there I shaped The city's ancient legend into this.

  Alfred Lord Tennyson

  Bridges, Cities, Watches

  Alfred Lord Tennyson (1851). “The Poetical Works of Alfred Lord Tennyson”

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• Laughter has something in it common with the ancient words of faith and inspiration; it unfreezes pride and unwinds secrecy; it makes people forget themselves in the presence of something greater than themselves.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Laughter, Inspiration, Pride

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• The Arab peoples possess an ancient and highly developed civilization that is in many ways more sophisticated than our own. For instance, they invented algebra. And this is why we have to go to war with Saddam Hussein this minute and bomb the shish kebab out of him before he invents trig and chemistry and the whole of America flunks high school.

  P. J. O'Rourke

  Funny, War, Humorous

  P.J. O'Rourke (2015). “Thrown Under the Omnibus”, p.281, Atlantic Books Ltd

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• Wherever we look in the ancient world the past has been controlled, but nowhere more rigorously than in the history of the Christian church. The methods of control, wherever we find them, fall under three general heads which might be described as (a) the invention, (b) the destruction, and (c) the alteration of documents.

  Hugh Nibley

  Christian, Fall, Power

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• ...a man estimable for his learning, amiable for his life, and venerable for his piety. Arbuthnot was a man of great comprehension, skilful in his profession, versed in the sciences, acquainted with ancient literature, and able to animate his mass of knowledge by a bright and active imagination; a scholar with great brilliance of wit; a wit who, in the crowd of life, retained and discovered a noble ardour of religious zeal.

  Samuel Johnson

  Religious, Science, Men

  Samuel Johnson, William Hazlitt (1854). “Johnson's Lives of the British Poets”, p.205

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• Can a society in which thought and technique are scientific persist for a long period, as, for example, ancient Egypt persisted, or does it necessarily contain within itself forces which must bring either decay or explosion?

  Bertrand Russell

  Science, Egypt, Long

  Bertrand Russell (2016). “The Impact of Science on Society”, p.87, Routledge

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• Focus on the mind and the soul. Read. Study. Enrol in a course of lectures. Pray. Become a member of a religious congregation. Study the Bible or other ancient works of wisdom.

  Jonathan Sacks

  Religious, Focus, Soul

  "In Tough Times, Seek the Spirit" by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, www.huffingtonpost.com. June 27, 2012.

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• We have more to learn today from the spectacle of a great man at a great moment than from any number of monographs on ancient wage levels.

  C. V. Wedgwood

  Men, Numbers, Heroism

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• Shall hope prevail where clamorous hate is rife,
  Shall sweet love prosper or high dreams have place
  Amid the tumult of reverberant strife
  'Twixt ancient creeds, 'twixt race and ancient race,
  That mars the grave, glad purposes of life,
  Leaving no refuge save thy succoring face?

  Sarojini Naidu

  Dream, Hope, Sweet

  Shiri R. Bakshi, Sarojini Naidu, Bishamber D. Yadav (1990). “Struggle for independence: Indian freedom fighters. Sarojini Naidu”

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• Crowds are somewhat like the sphinx of ancient fable: It is necessary to arrive at a solution of the problems offered by their psychology or to resign ourselves to being devoured by them.

  Gustave Le Bon

  People, Psychology, Sphinx

  Gustave Le Bon (2012). “The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind”, p.70, Courier Corporation

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• When I wrote 'The Alexandria Link,' I discovered that we are only aware of about 10 percent of the knowledge of the ancient world. In the ancient world, most of the knowledge was destroyed. Every emperor of China who came in wiped out everything that came before them, to the point that the country completely forgot its past.

  Steve Berry

  Country, Past, World

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• Storytelling is an ancient and honorable act. An essential role to play in the community or tribe. It's one that I embrace wholeheartedly and have been fortunate enough to be rewarded for.

  Russell Banks

  Play, Community, Roles

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• Our modern world, though infinitely more complex than that of ancient Greece, is also far more superficial. Where the Greeks offered simple psychological training, we live in an age of style and spin in which perceptions of good and evil slither and shift with the political view of the moment.

  David Gemmell

  Simple, Views, Evil

  "No shades of grey" by David Gemmell, www.theguardian.com. May 9, 2003.

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• If you look at any ancient civilization, they've all used fantasy stories to train the young.

  David Gemmell

  Civilization, Fantasy Stories, Looks

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• The dust to which this flesh shall return, it is the ancient dreaming dust of God.

  John Mellencamp

  Death, Dream, Dust

  Song: Human Wheels

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• And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Nature, Forests, Hills

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge (2009). “The Ancient Mariner and Selected Poems (EasyRead Large Edition)”, p.56, ReadHowYouWant.com

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• Ye lover of the picturesque, if ye wish to drown your grief, take my advice and visit the ancient town of Crieff.

  William Topaz McGonagall

  Grief, Scotland, Advice

  William Topaz McGonagall, “Beautiful Crief”

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• Palaeontology is the Aladdin's lamp of the most deserted and lifeless regions of the earth; it touches the rocks and there spring forth in orderly succession the monarchs of the past and the ancient river streams and savannahs wherein they flourished. The rocks usually hide their story in the most difficult and inaccessible places.

  Roy Chapman Andrews

  Spring, Science, Past

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• The publication in 1859 of the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin made a marked epoch in my own mental development, as it did in that of human thought generally. Its effect was to demolish a multitude of dogmatic barriers by a single stroke, and to arouse a spirit of rebellion against all ancient authorities whose positive and unauthenticated statements were contradicted by modern science.

  Francis Galton

  Science, Development, Spirit

  Francis Galton (2015). “Memories of My Life”, p.211, Routledge

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• And perhaps, posterity will thank me for having shown that the ancients did not know everything.

  Pierre de Fermat

  Science, Knows, Posterity

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• Down the ancient corridors through the gates of time, run the ghosts of dreams that we have left behind.

  Dan Fogelberg

  Running, Dream, Ghost

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• Quotation is more universal and more ancient than one would perhaps believe.

  James Boswell

  Believe, Universal, Quotations

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• Centuries have not worm-eaten the solidity of this ancient furniture of the mind.

  Isaac D'Israeli

  Mind, Furniture, Century

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• In the long run, the only solution I see to the problem of diversity is the expansion of mankind into the universe by means of green technology... Green technology means we do not live in cans but adapt our plants and our animals and ourselves to live wild in the universe as we find it... When life invades a new habitat, she never moves with a single species. She comes with a variety of species, and as soon as she is established, her species spread and diversify further. Our spread through the galaxy will follow her ancient pattern.

  Freeman Dyson

  Running, Moving, Mean

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• Football is controlled violence, but it is violence, which people have loved to watch since the gladiatorial contests in ancient Rome.

  Michael Mandelbaum

  Football, Rome, People

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