A cornucopia of elegant excerpts, a collectanea of passages, a florilegium of ideas, a gallimaufry of aperçus, musing flowers of yore, an anthologia of verse (a Parnassus), an omnium gatherum of etymologies and origins, all singled out carefully by hand.
Nicolas de Chamfort, tr. William G. Hutchison, in: The Cynic's Breviary, 1902:
“Are you not ashamed to wish to speak better than you can?” said Seneca to one of his sons who could not work out the exordium of an oration he was composing. One might say the same to those who adopt principles stronger than their character will bear. “Are you not ashamed of wishing to be more of a philosopher than you can be?”
Henry David Thoreau, Journal, 1841, December 31:
In society you will not find health, but in nature. You must converse much with the field and woods, if you would imbibe such health into your mind and spirit as you covet for your body. Society is always diseased, and the best is the sickest. There is no scent in it so wholesome as that of the pines, nor any fragrance so penetrating and restorative as that of everlasting in high pastures. Without that our feet at least stood in the midst of nature, all our faces would be pale and livid.
I should like to keep some book of natural history always by me as a sort of elixir, the reading of which would restore the tone of my system and secure me true and cheerful views of life. For to the sick, nature is sick, but to the well, a fountain of health. To the soul that contemplates some trait of natural beauty no harm nor disappointment can come. The doctrines of despair, of spiritual or political servitude, no priestcraft nor tyranny, was ever [sic] taught by such as drank in the harmony of nature.
Philo of Alexandria, Questions and Answers on Genesis, bk. II., 69 (tr. C. D. Yonge):
This is praise of the wise man both in the literal sense of the words, and also in their hidden meaning, that his exhibition of nakedness took place not out of doors but in his house, being concealed by the roof and walls of his house. For the nakedness of the body is concealed by a house which is made of stones and beams of wood; but the covering and clothing of the soul is the discipline of wisdom. Therefore there are two kinds of nakedness, one which takes place by accident, which is the result of an involuntary offence, because the just man, using, if I may say so, his honesty as if it were a garment with which he is clothed, stumbles out of his own accord like men who are intoxicated, or who are afflicted with insanity. For in such men their offences are not deliberately committed; but it is his task and pleasing duty to clothe himself, as with a garment, with the discipline and honesty of study.
There is also another kind of nakedness of the soul which is caused by perfect virtue, which expels from itself the whole carnal weight of the body, as if it were flying from a tomb, as indeed it has long been buried in it as in a tomb. As also it avoids pleasures, and also a great number of miseries arising from the different passions and many anxieties arising from misfortunes, and indeed all the evil effects of these different circumstances. He, therefore, who has been able with distinction to pass through such various and great dangers, and to escape such injuries, and to emancipate himself from such evils, has attained to the destiny of happiness, without any stain or disgrace. For I should pronounce this to be the ornament and badge of beauty in those individuals who have been rendered worthy to pass their existence in an incorporeal manner.
See also Ralph Marcus' fine transaltion.
George Borrow, Lavengro, chapter XIV:
I have heard talk of the pleasures of idleness, yet it is my own firm belief that no one ever yet took pleasure in it. Mere idleness is the most disagreeable state of existence, and both mind and body are continually making efforts to escape from it. It has been said that idleness is the parent of mischief, which is very true; but mischief itself is merely an attempt to escape from the dreary vacuum of idleness. There are many tasks and occupations which a man is unwilling to perform, but let no one think that he is therefore in love with idleness; he turns to something which is more agreeable to his inclination, and doubtless more suited to his nature; but he is not in love with idleness. A boy may play the truant from school because he dislikes books and study; but, depend upon it, he intends doing something the while—to go fishing, or perhaps to take a walk; and who knows but that from such excursions both his mind and body may derive more benefit than from books and school?
Maximus Tyrius, The Dissertations, tr. Thomas Taylor, vol. I., (London, 1804), Dissertation X., p. 103:
For love alone of every thing pertaining to men, when it subsists with purity, neither admires wealth, nor dreads a tyrant, nor is astonished by empire, nor avoids a court of judicature, nor flies from death. It does not consider as dire either wild beasts, or fire, or a precipice, or the sea, or a sword, or a halter; but to it things impervious are most pervious, things dire are most easily vanquished, things terrible are most readily encountered, and things difficult are most speedily accomplished. All rivers are passable, tempests most navigable, mountains most easily run over. It is everywhere confident, despises all things, and subdues all things. To love, when love is of this kind, is a thing of great worth. I indeed think that the man of intellect will pray never to be liberated from such love as this, if it is at the same time attended with liberty, intrepidity, and an immunity from guilt.
Otto von Bismarck, quoted in: Emil Ludwig, Bismarck; The Story of a Fighter, (Blue Ribbon Books, 1927, reprinted 1934), tr. Eden and Cedar Paul, p. 67:
That which is imposing here on earth . . . is always akin to the fallen angel; who is beautiful, but lacks peace; is great in his plans and efforts, but never succeeds; is proud, and melancholy.
William Cowper, The Shrubbery, Written in a Time of Affliction:
O happy shades! to me unblest!
Friendly to peace, but not to me!
How ill the scene that offers rest,
And heart that cannot rest, agree!
This glassy stream, that spreading pine,
Those alders quivering to the breeze,
Might soothe a soul less hurt than mine,
And please, if anything could please.
But fixed unalterable Care
Foregoes not what she feels within,
Shows the same sadness everywhere,
And slights the season and the scene.
For all that pleased in wood or lawn,
While Peace possessed these silent bowers,
Her animating smile withdrawn,
Has lost its beauties and its powers.
The saint or moralist should tread
This moss-grown alley, musing, slow;
They seek like me the secret shade,
But not, like me, to nourish woe!
Me fruitful scenes and prospects waste
Alike admonish not to roam;
These tell me of enjoyments past,
And those of sorrows yet to come.
Søren Kierkegaard, Either/Or, pt. I., tr. Hans Hong and Edna Hong, (Princeton, 1987), The Tragic in Ancient Drama Reflected in the Tragic in Modern Drama, p. 145:
. . . when the age loses the tragic, it gains despair. In the tragic there is implicit a sadness and a healing that one indeed must not disdain, and when someone wishes to gain himself in the superhuman way our age tries to do it, he loses himself and becomes comic. Every individual, however original he is, is still a child of God, of his age, of his nation, of his family, of his friends, and only in them does he have his truth. If he wants to be the absolute in all this, his relativity, then he becomes ludicrous. In languages, there is sometimes found a word that because of its context is so frequently used in a specific case that it eventually becomes, if you please, independent as an adverb in this case. For the experts such a word has once and for all an accent and a flaw that it never lives down; if, then, this notwithstanding, it should claim to be a substantive and demand to be declined in all five cases, it would be genuinely comic. So it goes with the individual also when he, perhaps extracted from the womb of time laboriously enough, wants to be absolute in this enormous relativity. But if he surrenders this claim, is willing to be relative, then he eo ipso has the tragic, even if he were the happiest individual—indeed, I would say the individual is not happy until he has the tragic.
From a letter by Thomas Carlyle to Baillie/Jane Welsh, letter 101, 2 September, 1824:
The visions of eighteen are beautiful as the path of Aurora; but transient and baseless as they are beautiful. A little while and the glories of the East are clean gone; and after all, what matters it so much whether one fell gust of tempest or the silent march of the Hours have chased them away?
James Thomson, The Four Seasons, Spring:
And thou, Amanda, come, pride of my song!
Form'd by the Graces, loveliness itself!
Come with those downcast eyes, sedate and sweet,
Those looks demure, that deeply pierce the soul,
Where, with the light of thoughtful reason mix'd,
Shines lively fancy and the feeling heart:
Oh, come! and while the rosy-footed May
Steals blushing on, together let us tread
The morning dews, and gather in their prime
Fresh-blooming flowers, to grace thy braided hair,
And thy loved bosom that improves their sweets.
Al-Kindī, Philosophical Works of al-Kindī, tr. Peter Adamson and Peter Pormann, (Oxford, 2012), sect. 4, Ethics, Letter on the Method of how to Dispel Sorrows, pp. 254-5:
We should not content ourselves with being the most ignorant, most boorish, and most unjust people. Even if sadness were something necessary, then there would be sufficient sadness caused when the reason for sadness occurs. We ought not to anticipate it before it occurs. To experience it before it occurs is a kind of evil and malignancy. (6) Also, it is necessary not to experience it when it occurs before it is repelled. For it is harmful, as we [said] before. Therefore it is absolutely necessary to repel it, when it occurs. Whatever causes sadness is necessarily repelled by consolation after a while, if the sad person does not perish together with the sadness or shortly after the onset of sadness [i.e. if he does not die before being consoled]. (7) It is in the nature of sadness to disappear, for all things subject to coming-to-be also pass away and do not remain in [their] individual parts. We therefore ought to make every effort to alleviate and shorten the duration of the sorrow. If we shorten it <...while if we do not shorten it>, we shorten in others the repelling of the affliction that we can repel from ourselves. (8) This is characteristic for someone ignorant, wretched, boorish and unjust, for unjust is he who remains afflicted, and the most wretched is he who makes no effort to repel affliction from himself as best he can. We should not content ourselves with being wretched while we can be happy.
(1) A nice method for this is to remember the things which made us sad in the past, and from which we were consoled, as well as the things which made other people sad, whose sadness and consolation we have witnessed; and to see in our [present] state of sadness one of the saddening things of the past or one of the saddening thing which we perceived in other people, and the consolation which was brought about in the end. This gives us a great ability to console ourselves, as it did for instance in the case of Alexander, son of Philip, king of Macedonia, who persuaded his mother to be steadfast when he was on his death-bed. (2) Among his writings we find the following letter to her: «O mother of Alexander, always bear in mind that everything subject to coming-to-be and passing-away is going to be obliterated, and that your son does not content himself with the manners of minor kings, nor should you be content for yourself, when he dies, with the manners of minor mothers of kings. Order a great city to be built when you receive the message about the death of Alexander, and send word that all the people of Libya, Europe and Asia should throng to you on a set day; and that on that day, they will gather in that city to eat, drink and be merry. Order it to be announced to them that no one should come to you who has been afflicted by a misfortune, in order that Alexander's funeral be celebrated joyfully and differently from the funerals of other people which take place in sadness.» (3) After she had given orders accordingly, nobody came to her at the appointed time. Then she said: «why do people stay away from us, even though we have previously [sent for them]?» It was said to her: «You ordered that no-one come to you who has [in the past] suffered from a misfortune, yet all people have suffered from misfortunes, therefore no one has come to you.« She said: «O Alexander, how similar are your last deeds to your first. You wanted to make me completely steadfast against my loss of you; for I am not the first to suffer from misfortunes, nor are they specific to any one human being.»
James Hinton, Love's Offering, 1883, LII., p. 130:
When I think sometimes that for years and years
New springs may clothe the hills in mocking green
And new blue skies with their high azure sheen
Gladden the hearts of men,—and that men's ears
May mark new love-songs woven of joy and tears
And all things else be just as they have been
Save only that thou are not here, my queen,—
I tremble with interminable fears.
That I should lose thee—thee my one delight,
while God keeps crowds of throstles at his ear,—
Thee my one lily, while God's lilies white
Are numberless and sweet and ever near
His throne,—my one star, while he has the night
Of stars,—great God, this seems too hard to bear!
A sonnet by Luís de Camões, Sin, tr. William Baer (Selected Sonnets, University of Chicago Press, 2008, pp. 46-47):
Happy is he whose only problem worth
complaining about is love’s audacious schemes,
since they alone can never destroy his dreams
of finding some contentment here on earth.
Happy is he who, far from home, embraces
nothing but his long-lost memories,
because when new problems arise, he sees
them clearly, comprehending the sorrow he faces.
And happy is he who lives in any state
where only fraud and love’s deceits and doubt,
are able to torture his heart from within.
But tragic is he who lives beneath the weight
of some unforgivable act, living without
consciousness of the damage of his sin.
Ditoso seja aquele que somente
se queixa de amorosas esquivanças;
pois por elas não perde as esperanças
de poder n’algum tempo ser contente.
Ditoso seja quem, estando absente,
não sente mais que a pena das lembranças;
porque inda que se tema de mudanças,
menos se teme a dor quando se sente.
Ditoso seja, enfim, qualquer estado
onde enganos, desprezos e isenção
trazem o coração atormentado.
Mas triste quem se sente magoado
de erros em que não pode haver perdão,
sem ficar n’alma a mágoa do pecado.
Egon Friedell, A Cultural History of the Modern Age, tr. Charles Francis Atkinson, Vol. I (1930; rpt. London: Vision Press, 1953), p. 147:
And most probably our century will seem as ghostly and unreal to a later age as the fourteenth century to us.
Goethe, as quoted in: Emil Ludwig, Goethe: The History of a Man, tr. Ethel Colburn Mayne (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1928), p. 136:
To live within limits, to want one thing, or a very few things, very much and love them very dearly, cling to them, survey them from every angle, become one with them—that is what makes the poet, the artist, the human being.
Arthur Schopenhauer, Parerga and Paralipomena, tr. E. F. J. Payne, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000 [1974]), vol. II., ch. XXII., §268, p. 498:
The presence of an idea is like that of a loved one. We imagine that we shall never forget it and that the beloved can never become indifferent to us; but out of sight, out of mind! The finest thought runs the risk of being irretrievably forgotten if it is not written down, and the beloved ofbeing taken from us unless she has been wedded.
Entry from my personal Journal, written in November 24, 2022:
There are at least two ways in dealing with and making use of Philosophy, deciding what kind of person you are, and what kind of will you do harbour: 1) One either raises himself to what he learns and is made aware of through reading Philosophy and then absorbing every last iota of that read, cultivating within everything in need of being cultivated and altered, and turning it into a truly lived experience, or 2) one goes the way of what I call learned cherry-picking, as he, out of Philosophy and the Philosophers' opinions, only makes use of that which might justify his already espoused virtues, habits, opinions, convictions, articles of behaviour, traits of personality, etc.
Now, one might be just too well-pleased with himself that he won't notice the fact that he leads the second way. To lead the two ways concomitantly is fine, as we humans have our weaknesses; but to lead only the second way is not fine, nor is it fine to miss noticing that one might be leading the two ways together.
Titi Lucreti Cari, De Rerum Natura, tr. H. A. J. Munro, (Cambridge, London, 1864 [2009]), vol. I., bk. IV., nearly lines 1045-1209, pp. 199-206:
. . . that to which the fell desire all tends, and the body seeks that object from which the mind is wounded by love; for all as a rule fall towards their wound and the blood spirts out in that direction whence comes the stroke by which we are struck; and if he is at close quarters, the red stream covers the foe. Thus then he who gets a hurt from the weapons of Venus, whatever be the object that hits him, be it a woman breathing love from her whole body, he inclines to the quarter whence he is wounded, and yearns to unite with it and join body with body; for a mute desire gives a presage of the pleasure.
This pleasure is for us Venus; from that desire is the Latin name of love, from that desire has first trickled into the heart yon drop of Venus' honeyed joy and soon is replaced by chilly care; for though that which you yearn for is away, yet idols of it are at hand and its sweet name is present to the ears. But it is meet to fly idols and scare away all that feeds love and turn your mind on another object, distract your passion elsewhere and not keep it, with your thoughts once set on one object by love of it, and so lay up for yourself care and unfailing pain. For the sore gathers strength and becomes inveterate by feeding, and every day the madness grows in violence and the misery becomes aggravated, unless you choose to erase the first wounds by new blows and first heal them when yet fresh, roaming abroad after Venus the pandemian, or transfer to something else the emotions of your mind.
Nor is he who shuns love without the fruits of Venus, but rather enjoys those blessings which are without any pain: doubtless the pleasure from such things is more unalloyed for the healthy-minded than for the love-sick; for in the very moment of enjoying the burning desire of lovers wavers and wanders undecided, and they cannot tell what first to enjoy with eyes and hands. What they have sought, they tightly squeeze and cause pain of body and often imprint their teeth on the lips and clash mouth to mouth in kissing, because the pleasure is not pure and there are hidden stings which stimulate to hurt even that whatever it is from which spring those germs of frenzy. But Venus with light hand breaks the force of these pains during love, and the fond pleasure mingled therein reins in the bites. For in this there is hope, that from the same body whence springs their burning desire, their flame may likewise be quenched; the direct contrary of which nature protests to be the case; and this is the one thing of all, in which, when we have most of it, then all the more the breast burns with fell desire. Meat and drink are taken into the body; and as they can fill up certain fixed parts, in this way the craving for drink and bread is easily satisfied; but from the face and beauteous bloom of man nothing is given into the body to enjoy save flimsy idols; a sorry hope which is often snatched off by the wind. As when in sleep a thirsty man seeks to drink and water is not given to quench the burning in his frame, but he seeks the idols of waters and toils in vain and thirsts as he drinks in the midst of the torrent stream, thus in love Venus mocks lovers with idols, nor can bodies satisfy them by all their gazing upon them nor can they with their hands rub aught off the soft limbs, wandering undecided over the whole body. At last when they have united and enjoy the flower of age, when the body now has a presage of joys and Venus is in the mood to sow the fields of woman, they greedily clasp each other's body and suck each other's lips and breathe in, pressing meanwhile teeth on each other's mouth; all in vain, since they can rub nothing off nor enter and pass each with his whole body into the other's body; for so sometimes they seem to will and strive to do: so greedily are they held in the chains of Venus, while their limbs melt overpowered by the might of the pleasure. At length when the gathered desire has gone forth, there ensues for a brief while a short pause in the burning desire; and then returns the same frenzy, then comes back the old madness, when they are at a loss to know what they really desire to get, and cannot find what device is to conquer that mischief: in such utter uncertainty they pine away by a hidden wound.
Then too they waste their strength and ruin themselves by the labour, then too their life is passed at the beck of another . . . all in vain, since out of the very well-spring of delights rises up something of bitter, to pain amid the very flowers; either when the conscience-stricken mind haply gnaws itself with remorse to think that it is passing a life of sloth and ruining itself in brothels, or because she has launched forth some word and left its meaning in doubt and it cleaves to the love-sick heart and burns like living fire, or because it fancies she casts her eyes too freely about or looks on another, and it sees in her face traces of a smile.
And these evils are found in love returned and highly prosperous; but in crossed and hopeless love are ills such as you may seize with closed eyes, past numbering; so that it is better to watch beforehand in the manner I have prescribed, and be on your guard not to be drawn in. For to avoid falling into the toils of love is not so hard as, after you are caught, to get out of the nets you are in and to break through the strong meshes of Venus. And yet even when you are entangled and held fast you may escape the mischief, unless you stand in your own way and begin by overlooking all the defects of her mind or those of her body, whoever it is whom you court and woo. For this men usually do, same as the ugly woman; and fumigates herself, poor wretch, with nauseous perfumes, her very maids running from her and giggling secretly. But the lover, when shut out, often in tears covers the threshold with flowers and wreaths and anoints the haughty door-posts with oil of marjoram and imprints kisses, poor wretch, on the doors. When however he has been admitted, if on his approach but one single breath should come in his way, he would seek specious reasons for departing, and the long-conned deep-drawn complaint would fall to the ground; and then he would blame his folly, on seeing that he had attributed to her more than it is right to concede to a mortal. Nor is this unknown to our Venuses; wherefore all the more they themselves hide with the utmost pains all that goes on behind the scenes of life from those whom they wish to retain in the chains of love; but in vain, since you may yet draw forth from her mind into the light all these things and search into all her smiles; and if the is of a fair mind and not troublesome, overlook them in your turn and make allowance for human failings.
Nor does the woman sigh always with fictitious love, when she locks in her embrace and joins with her body the man's body and holds it, sucking his lips into her lips and drinking in his kisses. Often she does it from the heart, and seeking mutual joys courts him to run the complete race of love. And in no other way could birds cattle wild-beasts sheep and mares submit to bear the males, except because the very exuberance of nature in the females is in heat and burns and joyously draws in the Venus of the covering males. See you not too how those whom mutual pleasure has chained are often tortured in their common chains I How often in the highways do dogs, desiring to separate, eagerly pull different ways with all their might, while all the time they are held fast in the strong fetters of Venus. This they would never do, unless they experienced mutual joys, strong enough to force them into the snare and hold them in its meshes. Wherefore again and again I repeat there is a common pleasure.
For a fine and eloquent version in verse for these unsurpassed, learned lines of Lucretius that leave you imbued with awe and engross you into a ruminative mood, vide:
Lucretius, On the Nature of Things, trans. into verse John Mason Good, (London, 1851), bk. IV., pp. 184-189.
Henri-Frédéric Amiel, The Journal Intime, May 27, 1849:
To be misunderstood even by those whom one loves is the cross and bitterness of life. It is the secret of that sad and melancholy smile on the lips of great men which so few understand; it is the cruelest trial reserved for self-devotion; it is what must have oftenest wrung the heart of the Son of man; and if God could suffer, it would be the wound we should be forever inflicting upon Him. He also—He above all—is the great misunderstood, the least comprehended. Alas! alas! never to tire, never to grow cold; to be patient, sympathetic, tender; to look for the budding flower and the opening heart; to hope always, like God; to love always—this is duty.
Achilleus Tatios, The Loves of Clitopho and Leucippe, bk. I., found in: The Greek Romances (Scriptores Erotici Græci), tr. Rowland Smith, (London, 1901), pp. 358-9:
Woman is a 'bitter sweet;' (αὕτη κακῶν ηδονή) in her nature she is akin to the Sirens, for they too, slay their victims with a dulcet voice; the very "pomp and circumstance" of marriage shews the magnitude of the evil; there is the din of pipes, the knocking at the doors, the bearing about of torches. With all this noise and tumult, who will not exclaim, 'Unhappy is the man who has to wed!'—to me, he seems like a man ordered off to war. Were you unacquainted with classic lore, you might plead ignorance of women's doings, whereas you are so well read, as to be capable of teaching others. How many subjects for the stage have been furnished by womankind! Call to mind the necklace of Eriphyle, the banquet of Philomela, the calumny of Sthenobœa, the incest of Aerope, the murderous deed of Procne. Does Agamemnon sigh for the beauty of Chryseis?—he brings pestilence upon the Grecian host; does Achilles covet the charms of Briseis?—he prepares misery for himself; if Candaules has a fair wife, that wife becomes the murderess of her husband! The nuptial torches of Helen kindled the fire which consumed Troy! How many suitors were done to death through the chastity of Penelope? Phædra, through love, became the destroyer of Hippolytus; Clytemnestra, through hate, the murderess of Agamemnon! Ο! all-audacious race of women! they deal death whether they love or hate! The noble Agamemnon must needs die, he whose beauty is described to have been cast in a heavenly mould,
'Jove o'er his eyes celestial glories spread,
And dawning conquest play'd around his head. (Homer. Il. ii. 478.)
and yet this very head was cut off by—a woman!
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, The Autobiography of Goethe. Truth and Poetry: From my Own Life , tr. John Oxenford, bks. I-XX (London: George B...