The Quotes canon
Sourced and curated.
Every quote has been curated by hand and carefully authenticated.
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.
Purpose of life35 quotes
For our discussion is about no ordinary matter, but on the right way to conduct our lives. — Socrates · 375 BCFor what should a man live, if not for the pleasures of discourse? — Plato · 370 BCConsider your origin;
you were not born to live like brutes,
but to follow virtue and knowledge. — Dante Alighieri · 1321Only two things does he anxiously wish for-bread and circuses. — Juvenal · 127I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. — Henry David Thoreau · 1854What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare? — W.H. Davies · 1911All 35 quotes →Life5 quotes
What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare? — W.H. Davies · 1911Don't be in a hurry. You'll miss the best parts in life. — Saloon hostess · 1956Did you ever think that maybe there's more to life than being really, really, really, ridiculously good looking? — Derek Zoolander · 2001All animals, except man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it. — Samuel Butler (novelist) · 1902We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion and medicine, law, business, engineering. These are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. — John Keating · 1989Man and animals3 quotes
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. — Genesis 1:28 · 1405 BCAll animals, except man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it. — Samuel Butler (novelist) · 1902What is a man
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more. — William Shakespeare · 1616Meaning of life3 quotes
When a man sees his end, he wants to know there was some purpose to his life. — Marcus Aurelius · 2000There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened. — Douglas Adams · 1980A man who becomes conscious of the responsibility he bears toward a human being who affectionately waits for him, or to an unfinished work, will never be able to throw away his life. He knows the “why” for his existence, and will be able to bear almost any “how.” — Viktor Frankl · 1946Personal growth3 quotes
The good of man is the active exercise of his soul's faculties in conformity with excellence or virtue... Moreover this activity must occupy a complete lifetime; for one swallow does not make spring, nor does one fine day; and similarly one day or a brief period of happiness does not make a man supremely blessed and happy. — Aristotle · 322 BCTo be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life. — Robert Louis Stevenson · 1882If what matters in a person's existence is to accept the inevitable consciously, to taste the good and bad to the full and to make for oneself a more individual, unaccidental and inward destiny alongside one's external fate, then my life has been neither empty nor worthless. — Hermann Hesse · 1910Work3 quotes
Human beings were not meant to sit in little cubicles staring at computer screens all day, filling out useless forms, and listening to eight different bosses drone on about mission statements! — Peter Gibbons · 1999Ah, why
Should life all labor be? — Alfred Tennyson · 1832Man must work by the sweat of his brow whatever his class, and that should make up the whole meaning and purpose of his life and happiness and contentment. — Anton Chekhov · 1901Authenticity2 quotes
To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life. — Robert Louis Stevenson · 1882If what matters in a person's existence is to accept the inevitable consciously, to taste the good and bad to the full and to make for oneself a more individual, unaccidental and inward destiny alongside one's external fate, then my life has been neither empty nor worthless. — Hermann Hesse · 1910Slowing down2 quotes
What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare? — W.H. Davies · 1911Don't be in a hurry. You'll miss the best parts in life. — Saloon hostess · 1956The human condition2 quotes
I don’t know if we each have a destiny, or if we’re all just floatin’ around accidental-like on a breeze. But I, I think maybe it’s both. Maybe both get happening at the same time. — Forrest Gump · 1994Sometimes I think the purpose of life is to reconcile us to its eventual loss by wearing us down, by proving, however long it takes, that life isn't all it's cracked up to be. — Julian Barnes · 2011Aimlessness1 quote
I just don't know what I'm supposed to be. You know? — Charlotte (Lost in Translation) · 2003Alienating work1 quote
Human beings were not meant to sit in little cubicles staring at computer screens all day, filling out useless forms, and listening to eight different bosses drone on about mission statements! — Peter Gibbons · 1999Busyness1 quote
What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare? — W.H. Davies · 1911Children1 quote
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. — Genesis 1:28 · 1405 BCConsumerism1 quote
This isn't life! This is just stuff! And it's become more important to you than living! Well, honey, that's just nuts. — Lester Burnham · 1999Decline of civilization1 quote
Only two things does he anxiously wish for-bread and circuses. — Juvenal · 127Ennui1 quote
I just don't know what I'm supposed to be. You know? — Charlotte (Lost in Translation) · 2003Entertainment1 quote
Only two things does he anxiously wish for-bread and circuses. — Juvenal · 127Fate1 quote
I don’t know if we each have a destiny, or if we’re all just floatin’ around accidental-like on a breeze. But I, I think maybe it’s both. Maybe both get happening at the same time. — Forrest Gump · 1994Fear of God1 quote
Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. — Ecclesiastes 12:13 · 931 BCGood conversation1 quote
For what should a man live, if not for the pleasures of discourse? — Plato · 370 BCHaving fun1 quote
For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn? — Jane Austen · 1813Hedonism1 quote
The prudent man aspires not to pleasure, but to the absence of pain. — Aristotle · 322 BCHow to live1 quote
For our discussion is about no ordinary matter, but on the right way to conduct our lives. — Socrates · 375 BCHuman nature1 quote
What is a man
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more. — William Shakespeare · 1616Incremental improvement1 quote
The good of man is the active exercise of his soul's faculties in conformity with excellence or virtue... Moreover this activity must occupy a complete lifetime; for one swallow does not make spring, nor does one fine day; and similarly one day or a brief period of happiness does not make a man supremely blessed and happy. — Aristotle · 322 BCIntrospection1 quote
I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. — Henry David Thoreau · 1854Killing time1 quote
What'll we do with ourselves this afternoon? And the day after that, and the next thirty years? — F. Scott Fitzgerald · 1925Life lessons1 quote
I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. — Henry David Thoreau · 1854Living in harmony1 quote
The goal in life is living in agreement with nature. — Zeno of Citium · 200Living intentionally1 quote
If what matters in a person's existence is to accept the inevitable consciously, to taste the good and bad to the full and to make for oneself a more individual, unaccidental and inward destiny alongside one's external fate, then my life has been neither empty nor worthless. — Hermann Hesse · 1910