quotes on life and death

The student has his Rome, his Florence, his whole glowing Italy, within the four walls of his library. He has in his books the ruins of an antique world and the glories of a modern one. ~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow



Fishing is the sport of drowning worms. ~Author Unknown



Our national flower is the concrete cloverleaf. ~Lewis Mumford



As long as the world is turning and spinning, we're gonna be dizzy and we're gonna make mistakes. ~Mel Brooks



The chief reason for drinking is the desire to behave in a certain way, and to be able to blame it on alcohol. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960



I have come one step away from everything. And here I stay, far from everything, one step away. ~Antonio Porchia, Voces, 1943, translated from Spanish by W.S. Merwin



Most people die at the last minute; others twenty years beforehand, some even earlier. They are the wretched of the earth. ~Louis Celine, Voyage au bout du monde, 1932



No human thing is of serious importance. ~Plato



Trust only movement. Life happens at the level of events, not of words. Trust movement. ~Alfred Adler



Your distress about life might mean you have been living for the wrong reason, not that you have no reason for living. ~Tom O'Connor



A conservative is one who admires radicals centuries after they're dead. ~Leo Rosten



The best way to predict your future is to create it. ~Peter Drucker



The only people who find what they are looking for in life are the fault finders. ~Foster's Law



Varicose veins are the result of an improper selection of grandparents. ~William Osler



O Lord, help me not to despise or oppose what I do not understand. ~William Penn



The man's desire is for the woman; but the woman's desire is rarely other than for the desire of the man. ~Samuel Taylor Coleridge



Nothing interferes with my concentration. You could put on an orgy in my office and I wouldn't look up. Well, maybe once. ~Isaac Asimov



Likely as not, the child you can do the least with will do the most to make you proud. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966



The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time. ~Mark Twain



It is difficult not to wonder whether that combination of elements which produces a machine for labor does not create also a soul of sorts, a dull resentful metallic will, which can rebel at times. ~Pearl S. Buck