Lethargy Quotes

• The problem with lethargy is that doing nothing validates the fear that nothing can be done.

  Bill Crawford

  Done, Doing Nothing, Problem

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• Great minds are to make others great. Their superiority is to be used, not to break the multitude to intellectual vassalage, not to establish over them a spiritual tyranny, but to rouse them from lethargy, and to aid them to judge for themselves.

  William Ellery Channing

  Spiritual, Judging, Mind

  William Ellery Channing (1840). “Lectures on the elevation of the labouring portion of the community”, p.35

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• Lethargy is the forerunner of death to the public liberty.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Patriotism, Liberty, Civil Rights

  Thomas Jefferson, John Dewey (2008). “The Essential Jefferson”, p.66, Courier Corporation

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• Living a healthy lifestyle will only deprive you of poor health, lethargy, and fat.

  Jill Johnson

  Motivational, Fitness, Health

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• The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions, it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Freedom, People

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoirs, 2: Correspondence and Private Papers”, p.268

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• There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up.

  Oscar Wilde

  Funny, Wisdom, Selfish People

  Oscar Wilde (2015). “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, p.61, First Avenue Editions

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• Once conform, once do what others do because they do it, and a kind of lethargy steals over all the finer senses of the soul.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Inspirational, Being Yourself, Freedom

  Attributed to "Essais" by Michel de Montaigne, 1595.

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• Adversity cleanses the lethargies of man

  Nelson Mandela

  Adversity, Men

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• If you know someone who’s depressed, please resolve never to ask them why. Depression isn’t a straightforward response to a bad situation; depression just is, like the weather. Try to understand the blackness, lethargy, hopelessness, and loneliness they’re going through. Be there for them when they come through the other side. It’s hard to be a friend to someone who’s depressed, but it is one of the kindest, noblest, and best things you will ever do.

  Stephen Fry

  Inspirational, Friendship, Sympathy

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• The nation which reposes on the pillow of political confidence, will sooner or later end its political existence in a deadly lethargy.

  James Madison

  Political, Politics, Ends

  James Madison (1867). “1829-1836”, p.511

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• Freedom's enemies are waste, lethargy, indifference, immorality, and the insidious attitude of something for nothing.

  William Arthur Ward

  Attitude, Enemy, Waste

  William Arthur Ward (1968). “Thoughts of a Christian Optimist: The Words of William Arthur Ward”

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• Lethargy, bordering on sloth should remain the cornerstone of an investment style.

  Warren Buffett

  Style, Sloth, Investing

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• What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Freedom, Gun

  Letter toWilliam Stephens Smith, 13 Nov. 1787

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• The people cannot be all, and always well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Patriotic, Tyrants, People

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoirs, 2: Correspondence and Private Papers”, p.268

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• Once conform, once do what other people do because they do it, and a lethargy steals over all the finer nerves and faculties of the soul. She becomes all outer show and inward emptiness; dull, callous, and indifferent.

  Virginia Woolf

  Numbness, People, Soul

  Virginia Woolf (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Virginia Woolf (Illustrated)”, p.2280, Delphi Classics

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• What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, I call either the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination.

  Oscar Wilde

  Loyalty, Imagination, Fidelity

  Oscar Wilde (2016). “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, p.46, Xist Publishing

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• Lent comes providentially to reawaken us, to shake us from our lethargy.

  Pope Francis

  Ash Wednesday, Lenten, Shakes

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• Drugs age you after mental excitement. Lethargy then. Why? Reaction. A lifetime in a night. Gradually changes your character.

  James Joyce

  Character, Night, Drug

  James Joyce (2016). “ULYSSES (Modern Classics Series)”, p.81, e-artnow

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• It's hard to be a friend to someone who's depressed, but it is one of the kindest, noblest, and best things you will ever do.

  Stephen Fry

  Depression, Being Depressed, Best Things

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• Ennui and lethargy are waging a war inside me.

  Aaron Allston

  War, Ennui

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• America is ripe for lies and lethargy. The pure mountain air is going and gone. It is a huge burden and a sadness for us all.

  Ralph Steadman

  Lying, Sadness, Air

  "The Joke's Over". Book by Ralph Steadman, 2006.

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• What really matters is that we should all of us realize that we are guilty of inhumanity. The horror of this realization should shakes us out of our lethargy so that we can direct our hopes and our intentions to the coming of an era in which war will have no place.

  Albert Schweitzer

  War, Realization, Matter

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• When I behold a fashionable table set out in all its magnificence, I fancy that I see gouts and dropsies, fevers and lethargies, with other innumerable distempers lying in ambuscade among the dishes. Nature delights in the most plain and simple diet. Every animal but man keeps to one dish. Herbs are the food of this species, fish of that, and flesh of a third. Man falls upon everything that comes in his way; not the smallest fruit or excrescence of the earth, scarce a berry or a mushroom can escape him.

  Joseph Addison

  Lying, Fall, Science

  Joseph Addison (1827). “A Selection [- Second Selection] from the Paper of Addison: In the Spectator and Guardian, for the Use of Young Persons”, p.236

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• People who love only once in their lives are shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, I call either the lethargy of custom, or their lack of imagination

  Sydney Smith

  Loyalty, People, Imagination

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• Here lies interred in the eternity of the past, from whence there is no resurrection for the days - whatever there may be for the dust - the thirty-third year of an ill-spent life, which, after a lingering disease of many months sank into a lethargy, and expired, January 22d, 1821, A.D. leaving a successor inconsolable for the very loss which occasioned its existence.

  Lord Byron

  Lying, Loss, Past

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