Classical Texts Quotes & Sayings

Childbirth shapes women as a horizon of anticipation. Women come into consciousness, she speculated, imagining a future pain toward which their bodies inevitably propel them. — Leslie Jamison

I've been painting and making things since I was little. — Jemima Kirke

The more corrupt the state, the more it legislates. — Tacitus

Our strengths are our tools, our personal reality. Our weaknesses are only what we are not. — Joseph Batten

I am not sure if the ladies understand the full value of the influence of absence, nor do I think it wise to teach it them, lest, like the Clelias and Mandanes of yore, they should resume the humour of sending their lovers to banishment. — Walter Scott

Theatre probably originated without texts, but by the time we get to the classical Greek period, theatre has become text-based. — Tom Stoppard

As a breath of wind or some echo rebounds from smooth, hard surfaces and returns to the source from which it issued, so the stream of beauty passes back into its possessor through his eyes, which is its natural route to the soul; arriving there and setting him all aflutter, it waters the passages of the feathers and causes the wings to grow, and fills the soul of the loved one in his turn with love. — Plato

I ordered another rum St. James and I watched the girl whenever I looked up, or when I sharpened the pencil with a pencil sharpener with the shavings curling into the saucer under my drink. — Ernest Hemingway,

It's classical mythology, Cohen," said the minstrel. "I thought everyone knew. He was chained to a rock for eternity and every day an eagle comes and pecks out his liver."
"Is that true?"
"It's mentioned in many of the classic texts."
"I'm not much of a reader," said Cohen. "Chained to a rock? For a first offence? He's still there?"
"Eternity isn't finished yet, Cohen."
"He must've had a big liver!"
"It grows again every night, according to the legend," said the minstrel.
"I wish my kidneys did," said Cohen. — Terry Pratchett

Death fosters life that life may suckle death. — Sri Aurobindo

I cannot understate the ability to handle classical texts such as Shakespeare. — Louise Jameson

We desire justice, and justice has never been obtained in haste and strong feeling. — Walter Van Tilburg Clark

Ah, merciless Love, is there any length to which you cannot force the human heart to go? — Virgil

Visitors to Lyme in the nineteenth century, if they did not quite have to undergo the ordeal facing travellers to the ancient Greek colonies -Charles did not actually have to deliver a Periclean oration plus comprehensive world news summary from the steps of the Town Hall- were certainly expected to allow themselves to be examined and spoken to. — John Fowles

Unlike modern military codes, ancient texts are almost never purposely misleading, purposely scrambled ... indeed, literacy was so uncommon until classical times that the very writing of a message sufficed to keep it from almost everybody. — E. J. W. Barber

I love the 'Housewives.' I don't watch 'American Idol' or 'X Factor.' I guess I don't like network reality: I like my Bravo; I like documentary programming - I love 'Intervention' and some things on TLC more than others - but the 'Real Housewives' to me are really revolutionary, in terms of giving camera time to women of a certain age. — Julie Klausner

We struck up a conversation, but took pains to keep to small talk at first. We touched on the most trivial of topics: I asked if he thought the fate of man was unalterable. He thought it was. — Gunter Grass

As we progress through the Steps, we will discover that true and lasting change does not happen by trying to alter our life conditions. Although it is tempting to think so, outside adjustments cannot correct inside problems. — Friends In Recovery

Imagine the wisdom to be passed down from the classical Buddhist texts. — Russell Brand

The one thing that TV is bad at doing is preaching. There are two extremes, you either turn the people into a punchline or turn them into hero, and both of those things suck, because most people are neither in real life. — Mike Rowe

Gotta concentrate, honey," he smiled, then glanced at her with a wink. "And you looking at me the way you're looking at me really is not helping. — Sibylla Matilde

When historians and literary scholars talk about the classical heritage, or the legacy to Western civilization from antiquity, they are primarily thinking of four worldviews that were written in Hebrew or Greek among the body of religious, philosophical, and literary texts created before 250 B.C. These are the Hebrew Bible, the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle, and Hellenistic, or Alexandrine, literature. — Norman F. Cantor

A beautiful sidenote is, once the toxins and dramas are removed, you purify your life. Simplify and purify. What better way to live your life? Simple and pure! — Tony Curl

As soon as we notice that certain types of event "like" to cluster together at certain times, we begin to understand the attitude of the Chinese, whose theories of medicine, philosophy, and even building are based on a "science" of meaningful coincidences. The classical Chinese texts did not ask what causes what, but rather what "likes" to occur with what. — M.L. Von Franz