The Quotes canon
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Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Jane Austen26 quotes
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. — Jane Austen · 1813You ought certainly to forgive them as a Christian, but never to admit them in your sight, or allow their names to be mentioned in your hearing. — Jane Austen · 1813To be fond of dancing was a certain step towards falling in love. — Jane Austen · 1813I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine. — Jane Austen · 1813The sooner every party breaks up, the better. — Jane Austen · 1816One man’s ways may be as good as another’s, but we all like our own best. — Jane Austen · 1817All 26 quotes →Edward Young9 quotes
Too low they build, who build beneath the stars. — Edward Young · 1745A God all mercy, is a God unjust. — Edward Young · 1743Procrastination is the thief of time. — Edward Young · 1742Death! great proprietor of all! 'tis thine
To tread out empire, and to quench the stars. — Edward Young · 1742At thirty, Man suspects himself a fool;
Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan;
At fifty chides his infamous delay,
Pushes his prudent purpose to resolve;
In all the magnanimity of thought
Resolves; and re-resolves; then dies the same. — Edward Young · 1742Be wise to-day; 'tis madness to defer. — Edward Young · 1742All 9 quotes →Christopher Hitchens5 quotes
Many religions now come before us with ingratiating smirks and outspread hands, like an unctuous merchant in a bazaar. They offer consolation and solidarity and uplift, competing as they do in a marketplace. But we have a right to remember how barbarically they behaved when they were strong and were making an offer that people could not refuse. — Christopher Hitchens · 2007Death is certain, replacing both the siren-song of Paradise and the dread of Hell. Life on this earth, with all its mystery and beauty and pain, is then to be lived far more intensely: we stumble and get up, we are sad, confident, insecure, feel loneliness and joy and love. There is nothing more; but I want nothing more. — Christopher Hitchens · 2007What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence. — Christopher Hitchens · 2007The secular State is the guarantee of religious pluralism. This apparent paradox, again, is the simplest and most elegant of political truths. — Christopher Hitchens · 1998Beware the irrational, however seductive. Shun the "transcendent" and all who invite you to subordinate or annihilate yourself. Distrust compassion; prefer dignity for yourself and others. Don't be afraid to be thought arrogant or selfish. Picture all experts as if they were mamals. Never be a spectator of unfairness or stupidity. Seek out argument and disputation for their own sake; the grave will supply plenty of time for silence. Suspect your own motives, and all excuses. Do not live for others any more than you would expect others to live for you. — Christopher Hitchens · 2001Isaac Watts4 quotes
Joy to the world! the lord is come;
Let earth receive her King.
Let ev'ry heart prepare Him room,
And heav'n and nature sing. — Isaac Watts · 1719When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the prince of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride. — Isaac Watts · 1707Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day. — Isaac Watts · 1719For Satan finds some mischief still
For idle hands to do. — Isaac Watts · 1715George Meredith2 quotes
What a woman thinks of women is the test of her nature. — George Meredith · 1885I expect that Woman will be the last thing civilized by Man. — George Meredith · 1859Ian McEwan2 quotes
It's worth remembering this: freedom of expression sustains all the other freedoms we enjoy. — Ian McEwan · 2015I love you... That is what they were all saying down their phones, from the hijacked planes and the burning towers. There is only love, and then oblivion. Love was all they had to set against the hatred of their murderers. — Ian McEwan · 2001James Callaghan2 quotes
You never reach the promised land. You can march towards it. — James Callaghan · 1976There are times, perhaps once every thirty years, when there is a sea-change in politics. It then does not matter what you say or what you do. There is a shift in what the public wants and what it approves of. I suspect there is now such a sea-change-and it is for Mrs. Thatcher. — James Callaghan · 1979George Bell1 quote
The policy is obliteration, openly acknowledged. This is not a justifiable act of war. — George Bell · 1944George Wither1 quote
Shall I wasting in despair
Die because a woman's fair?
Or make pale my cheeks with care
'Cause another's rosy are?
Be she fairer than the day,
Or the flow'ry meads in May,
If she be not so to me,
What care I how fair she be? — George Wither · 1622Richard Aldington1 quote
Patriotism is a lively sense of collective responsibility. Nationalism is a silly cock crowing on its own dunghill. — Richard Aldington · 1931