Oldest Quotes & Sayings

I flicked my eyes over to Steve again and saw him straighten. He would need a diversion just to start.
"Explanations?" I bellowed. "Explanations? There's your explanation ... there!" I stabbed a finger dramatically towards the far corner of the room.
Pathetic, really. I mean, talk about the oldest trick in the book. But it's a good book, and the trick would have been cut from subsequent editions if it didn't sometimes work. — Stephen Fry

For now is my grief heavier than the sands of the seas, she thought. This world has emptied me of all but the oldest purpose: tomorrow's life. — Frank Herbert

Wilmington, Del. (AP) June 14, 1966 - A fire that destroyed the city's oldest Negro church has led to the discovery of a wild slave narrative that highlights a little-known era of American history. The First United — James McBride

We shall remember ...... Damascus, the "Pearl of the East", the pride of Syria, the fabled garden of Eden, the home of princes and genii of the Arabian Nights,the oldest metropolis on Earth, the one city in all the world that has kept its name and held its place and looked serenely on while the Kingdoms and Empires of four thousand years have risen to life, enjoyed their little season of pride and pomp, and then vanished and been forgotten — Mark Twain

Death is the second oldest of the Endless. It's hard not to love her. She loves you, after all. — Neil Gaiman

And so, in silence, we walked the surface of a dying world, but in the breast of one of us at least had been born that which is ever oldest, yet ever new.
I loved Dejah Thoris. The touch of my arm upon her naked shoulder had spoken to me in words I would not mistake, and I knew that I had loved her since the first moment my eyes had met hers that first time in the plaza of the dead city of Korad. — Edgar Rice Burroughs

I always thought, 'Will I go into the business, or will I not go into the business?' But when my father got arrested, I really didn't have a choice. I was the oldest son, and it was something that had to be done. — Jared Kushner

At night the sky was very near, sprawled in star smoke and gamma cataclysms, but she didn't see it the way she used to, as soul extension, dumb guttural wonder, a thing that lived outside language in the oldest part of her. — Don DeLillo

But the new generation had tasted the wine of philosophy; and from this time onward the rich youth of Rome went eagerly to Athens and Rhodes to exchange their oldest faith for the newest doubts. — Will Durant

Commit the oldest sins, the newest kind of ways — William Shakespeare

Lexington is home to the University of Kentucky, where my husband and I teach, as well as to Transylvania University, the oldest college established west of the Allegheny Mountains, and several multinational companies; people come and go from all over the world. — Kim Edwards

My dad, for the first 15 years of my career, on every visit he made to a play or a film set, would find the oldest person on set and say, 'Do you think my son has a future?' — Kenneth Branagh

My oldest son started to like 'South Park' and 'Family Guy,' so we'd watch together so I could spend time with him. — Scott Bakula

One of the most painfully inauthentic ways we show up in our lives sometimes is saying "yes" when we mean "no," and saying "no" when we mean "hell yes." I'm the oldest of four, a people-pleaser - that's the good girl straitjacket that I wear sometimes. I spent a lot of my life saying yes all the time and then being pissed off and resentful. — Brene Brown

The discoveries of modern science do not disagree with the oldest traditions which claim an incredible antiquity for our race. — H. P. Blavatsky

One of the oldest aches in the bones of humanity is loneliness. I mean it's one of the things that goes way back; loneliness is not good for the world. And so, whoever you are, gay or straight, it is totally normal, natural, and healthy to want somebody to go through life with. It's central to our humanity. — Rob Bell

My parents would take my sister and me out for dinner now and then, and while waiting for the food to be served, would point out the oldest, most harried looking waitress in the place, saying sternly, Be sure you get a good education, so you don't have to do that when you're fifty! — Diana Gabaldon

I had given Holmes this wedding as a gift-only to have him turn around and hand it back to me tenfold. And now his two oldest friends in all the world had conspired against our plans, casually rendering our feeble attempts at a gift into solid gold. — Laurie R. King

I would give them (aspiring writers) the oldest advice in the craft: Read and write. Read a lot. Read new authors and established ones, read people whose work is in the same vein as yours and those whose genre is totally different. You've heard of chain-smokers. Writers, especially beginners, need to be chain-readers. And lastly, write every day. Write about things that get under your skin and keep you up at night. — Khaled Hosseini

Voclain needs an heir." "As she lacks the anatomical structures to lay an egg, my human issue will have to inherit." "Voclain is a Bloodkin legacy, one of the oldest - " "Then, mother, I suggest you get cracking and give me a brother. He can have Voclain. I'm going to be happy. — Erin Kellison

The Sanctuary and its deities were the main source of the city's income. Visitors paid to enter the city. They had to buy the correct apparel to perform rituals in the Sanctuary. They had to pay again to acquire offerings for the gods. Mecca was not just one of the world's oldest shrines, it was a citadel for capitalism. The people who oiled the wheels of Meccan religious life were known as Hums. — Ziauddin Sardar

Why did he kill his own mother?' Ruth asked.
'The oldest story in the book,' said Gamache.
'Ben was a male prostitute?' Gabri exclaimed.
'That's the oldest profession. Where do you keep your head?' asked Ruth. 'Never mind, don't answer that. — Louise Penny

His view of me and my ways were expressed with some degree of force to our family physician who, when at the age of a hundred and fifty-three I came down with the mumps, having summoned the whole family and said that I would burst before morning, was met by a reassuring observation from Adam that he wouldn't believe I was dead even if I had been buried a year. "It is the good who die young, Doctor," he said. "On that principle this young malefactor will live to be the oldest man in the world. — John Kendrick Bangs

There were only six adults in the oldest picture,and all of them looked really serious,like they'd probably kicked kittens for fun. — Rachel Hawkins

I know whom I shall marry. He must be handsome, young, clever enough, and very rich-ever so much richer than the Lawrences. His family musn't object, and I shall be very happy, for they shall be kind, sell-bred, genrous people, and they shall like me. He shall be the oldest and have the estate, and should be a city house in a fashionable street, and twice as comfortable as anything and full of solid luxury. One of us must marry well; Meg didn't, Jo didn't, Beth can't yet, so I shall, and make everything cozy all around. — Louisa May Alcott

I think I fell in love with her, a little bit. Isn't that dumb? But it was like I knew her. Like she was my oldest, dearest friend. The kind of person you can tell anything to, no matter how bad, and they'll still love you, because they know you. I wanted to go with her. I wanted her to notice me. And then she stopped walking. Under the moon, she stopped. And looked at us. She looked at me. Maybe she was trying to tell me something; I don't know. She probably didn't even know I was there. But I'll always love her. All my life. — Neil Gaiman

An indigenous culture with sufficient territory, and bilingual and intercultural education, is in a better position to maintain and cultivate its mythology and shamanism. Conversely, the confiscation of their lands and imposition of foreign education, which turns their young people into amnesiacs, threatens the survival not only of these people, but of an entire way of knowing. It is as if one were burning down the oldest universities in the world and their libraries, one after another - thereby sacrificing the knowledge of the world's future generations. — Jeremy Narby

St. Augustine is not only the oldest continuously-occupied European settlement on the American continent, it is also perhaps the most haunted city in the United States. Seemingly every spot in this city has some ghostly hidden history, right below the surface. Just by strolling through the historic streets you can hear the whispers of the long-dead. — James Caskey

The true history of the world must always be the history of the few; and as we measure the Himalaya by the height of Mount Everest, we must take the true measure of India from the poets of the Veda, the sages of the Upanishads, the founders of the Vedanta and Sankhya philosophies, and the authors of the oldest law-books, and not from the millions who are born and die in their villages, and who have never for one moment been roused out of their drowsy dream of life. — Friedrich Max Muller

When implemented, the Complete Lives system produces a priority curve on which individuals aged between roughly 15 and 40 years get the most substantial chance, whereas the youngest and oldest people get chances that are attenuated ... The Complete Lives system justifies preference to younger people because of priority to the worst-off rather than instrumental value. — Ezekiel Emanuel

Prostitution is said to be the world's oldest profession . It is, indeed, a model of all professional work: the worker relinquishes control over himself ... in exchange for money. Because of the passivity it entails, this is a difficult and, for many, a distasteful role. — Thomas Szasz

Our nation was not founded because we all looked alike, or prayed alike, or descended from the same family tree. But our founders, in their genius, in this, the oldest constitutional democracy, put forth on this earth the idea that all are created equal; that we all have inalienable rights. — Cory Booker

Six: everyone - and when I say everyone, I mean absolutely,positively everyone, from the librarians to the students to the staff to the oldest, cruiser janitor - was piss-down-their-legs scared of Miles Richter.
Of all the crazy things I heard about East Shoal, that was the only thing I couldn't believe. — Francesca Zappia

He knew. I could see it in his face. Look, if someone gets infected you've got between ten and twenty seconds to kill them. It might be your brother or your sister or your oldest friend. It makes no difference. And just so you know where you stand - if it happens to you, I'll do it in a heartbeat. — Selena

I am the oldest of seven. Do my siblings think I'm super cool? I wish they thought I was super cool! — Britt Robertson

This is one of man's oldest riddles. How can the independence of human volition be harmonized with the fact that we are integral parts of a universe which is subject to the rigid order of nature's laws? — Max Planck

There is a kind of structure for a story that was peculiarly compelling for the radio. I thought I had invented it atom-by-atom sitting in an editing booth in Washington on M Street when I was in my 20s. Then I found out that it is one of the oldest forms of telling a story - it was the structure of a sermon. — Ira Glass

Yet even in the loneliness of the canyon I knew there were others like me who had brothers they did not understand but wanted to help. We are probably those referred to as "our brother's keepers," possessed of one of the oldest and possible one of the most futile and certainly one of the most haunting instincts. It will not let us go. — Norman Maclean

Rocks and minerals: the oldest storytellers. — A.D. Posey

The oldest profession [prostitution] is the most honest, for it exposes the bare bones of what civilization is all about. It's the root of all professions. — Daniel Suelo

One of the most important finds within the land of Egypt occurred when the Egyptologist and archaeologist Professor Walter B. Emery (1903-1971) was excavating tombs at the necropolis of Saqqara, one of the oldest cities in the land. There Professor Emery discovered men with blond hair and fair complexions. These individuals were revered and honored by the Egyptians as specially endowed elite. — Michael Tsarion

My biggest love is space. I completed 800 hours' space training in Moscow and I became the world's oldest man to go to the North Magnetic Pole. At 67, I also became the oldest man to reach 28,400ft on Everest without oxygen. — Brian Blessed

Closing the gate on her oldest fears as she had closed the gate of her own fenced yard, she discovered the wings she'd always wished she had. — Natalie Babbitt

A professional sex therapist." Gabe moved out into the hall. "Guess I should show some respect. They do say it's the oldest profession. No, wait, maybe I've got that mixed up with another line of work. — Jayne Ann Krentz

I have only one dream. It is the oldest of humanity, of man, in time. It is paradise. I would like to give paradise to everyone. — Frei Otto

He is the oldest of our sons, and although I loved him, I did not like him. — Gene Wolfe

Time continued to pass - the oldest trick in the world, and maybe the only one that really is magic. — Stephen King

The people and the cultures of what is known as Africa are older than the word 'Africa.' According to most records, old and new, Africans are the oldest people on the face of the earth. The people now called Africans not only influenced the Greeks and the Romans, they influenced the early world before there was a place called Europe. — John Henrik Clarke

The Aleppo Codex is not only the oldest complete codex of the Tiberian Bible text known to us, but it is altogether the earliest complete codex of that Masoretic subsystem which had been perfected by Ben-Ashers. — Goshen-Gottstein

That night, [Black Dog] lay beside Henry, and he stroked her sharp shoulder blades and scratched behind her ears. He did this late into the night as he listened to the low and terrible moans that swept through the hallways of the house and that were not from the lonely wind but from his lonely mother, who had lost her oldest child and would never have him back again. — Gary D. Schmidt

I found a copy of Leven's birth certificate and was surprised to see his birth name listed as E. Leven Thumps. I assume the E. stands for Elton, and I have no idea why they didnt spell it out, but it's intresting to think that it took exactly eleven whacks or thumps to down the oldest tree. — Obert Skye

The oldest form of theater is the dinner table. It's got five or six people, new show every night, same players. Good ensemble; the people have worked together a lot. — Michael J. Fox

My mother made me take piano lessons, and because I am her oldest and she had not yet been worn down by the task of prodding five children to practice every day, she kept me practicing despite my whining. — Sheri L. Dew

Parents always make their worst mistakes with their oldest children. That's when parents know the least and care the most, so they're more likely to be wrong and also more likely to insist that they're right. — Orson Scott Card

I was very protected growing up. My dad was very strict with me. I was the oldest of four kids, and there are three girls. So I kind of paved the way of what it was like to raise a teenage daughter. — Dominik Garcia-Lorido

I used to be the youngest person on the set [of Bored To Death]. Now I'm very often the oldest person on the set. I feel lucky about that, to be honest. Lena [Dunham], by the way is a doll to me. So much fun to work with and really open. — Richard Masur

My oldest brother and my middle brother would always beat me up and take the ball from me. I used to cry a lot, so I used to come in here and get my dad. He used to be on my team, so he used to hold them down and let me score the basket. — Gary Payton

I think the oldest comic I got when I was a kid was an issue of 'World's Finest' - it had a Neal Adams cover with Batman where he had turned into a bat, and he was attacking Superman. — Jason Aaron

Being a visionary is a new profession, but it is really just a variant on fortunetelling, which may be the world's oldest. And its marketing appeal is similar - people will pay for reassurance about the unknown. — Nathan Myhrvold

the world's oldest written recipe is for beer. — Anonymous

Dad made it to Gold Shield Detective, so he always busted Robin, my oldest brother, and me. Always got caught, whatever we were doing. — Kevin Eubanks

Real life issues are not mathematical equations. We're not calculators crunching numbers. We're humans sorting through complex, multi-layered issues, and we're doing so while enduring the (sometimes profound) personal effects of our conclusions. While we want to be reasonable, we are inexorably pulled in the direction of our oldest mental habits and by our deepest life-impacting needs. We're repelled by those ideas which can jeopardize our comfort, safety, and happiness. We can try to be fair, but all the while we are fighting against our needs and fears. There are things we don't want to be true (or false). Our lives are built on certain beliefs which, if disproved, could wreck us. These are the truths that we 'can't handle'. — Daniel Ionson

Our bodies are made to move, and moving down the trail is one of the oldest, natural ways people have used their bodies. — Jennifer Pharr Davis

Some people have criticized the United States and the United States military for guarding oil fields and not guarding the Iraqi National Museum which had priceless antiquities in it. They say that this shows a fundamental lack of respect for Iraqi history. I want to remind those people of this: The oldest relics in the museum, 5,000 or 6,000 years old. That oil is 65 million years old. You had to guard that ... Those antiquities will only last another 5,000 or 6,000 years. When we burn that oil, those fumes will linger long after. — Jon Stewart

I'm not only the best-known daredevil on the face of the earth, I'm the oldest. — Evel Knievel

She trekked back across the meadow and down through the trees in possession of the oldest secret known to man. She sat on the mooring stone and surrendered immediately to the down of night. She hadn't slept long before she suddenly jolted awake. Thought she had heard the sweet call of a lark ascending. Unaware that it was actually the sound of her soul awakening. — Sarah Winman

I believe that dance is the oldest, noblest and most cogent of the arts. I believe that dance is the most perfect symbol of the activity of God and His angels. I believe that dance has the power to heal, mentally and physically. I believe that true education in the art of dance is education of the whole man. — Ted Shawn

Shaking's great. Shaking's one of the oldest practices known to man. Standing round a fire and connecting with the earth and moving energy through the body because it's where a lot of our stuff can get trapped. Yeah, I would recommend it. — Jerome Flynn

Alecto was the oldest, unceasing in anger. Magaera was next, retaliator of jealousy, and Tisiphone, the last, regarded as the avenger of murder. — Elisabeth Naughton

this is real, and it is happening now, just as it happened before: We are under the big tree in my backyard, on that patch of dirt where we used to build fairy houses from moss and sticks and scraps of birch. It is late afternoon. All around us is golden light. We have been together all day, in our cutoff shorts and bare feet. It is the start of fifth grade, the start of being the oldest in the school. Next year, we will be the youngest all over again. But not yet. We are playing that hand-slapping game, the one we like to play at recess. You hold your hands out, palms up, and I place mine lightly on top. You pull yours out and try to slap mine. You hit air three times. On the fourth try, your — Ali Benjamin

My first child is going to be the oldest sibling to the next kid, and that may change with each and every year. I'm looking forward to how one baby influences the other, and to my family as a whole, to every single chapter. — Blake Lively

Is the babe young? When I behold it, it seems more venerable than the oldest man. — Henry David Thoreau

My oldest step-son wants to direct or produce. As far as being an actor, I've already told them they have to wait until they're 18; I won't take them to auditions. — Elizabeth Perkins

The oldest pitcher acquires confidence in his ballclub - he doesn't try to do it all himself. — Burleigh Grimes

The thing that I remember the most in my childhood was the love of family and the discipline in the family. My father and mother both were disciplinarians, and they didn't mind using the rod. Maybe because I was the oldest child I always felt I got much more of it than anybody else. — Billy Graham

Vidal had his exuberant and stately tower in the most elegant and elevated part of Pedralbes, surrounded by hills, trees, and fairy-tale skies. I would have my sinister tower rising above the oldest, darkest streets of the city, surrounded by the miasmas and the shadows of that necropolis which poets and murderers had once called the Rose of Fire. — Carlos Ruiz Zafon

I was the oldest child, and both my parents worked, so I had a great deal of responsibility from a very young age. — Suzanne Vega

Greece won the 2004 European Championship with the oldest trick in the book: man-for-man marking. Why? Because nobody expected it - and by the time they knew what Otto Rehhagel's team were about, it was too late. Great football is like great comedy in that way. It is all in the timing. — Martin Samuel

You suffer from the oldest delusion in politics. You think you can change the world by talking to a leader. Leaders are the effects, not the causes of changes. — Alasdair Gray

Quest stories are about the oldest form of narrative there is, and they're also the perfect metaphor for life because we're all on a journey trying to figure out where we're going and who we are. 'Solomon Creed' is just doing it with more danger and guns involved. — Simon Toyne

I should have bailed. That little voice had my back. That little voice is older than I am. It's older than the oldest person who ever lived. I should have listened to that voice. — Rick Yancey

Never choose the card a man wants you to. Mat should have realized that. It was one of the oldest cons in creation. — Robert Jordan

Besides prostitution, magic is one of the oldest art forms that exist. — David Blaine

That's the oldest sin of all. Pride. Spiritual pride. Believing that you're better than others. Believing that you're enlightened, you're smart, you're in the know, and everyone else is stumbling about blindly in the darkness. The old us-versus-them. My group is better than your group. My people, my nation, my country, my religion, my gender, my sexual orientation. Old as sin. And it's a Big Lie. — Jerome Wilde

This was the most emotional title of my career. I was the youngest champion, and now I'm the oldest. — Kelly Slater

My oldest sister was an actress living in NYC by the time I was ten, and desperately wanted to be the one in charge of the words. — Julianna Baggott

Japan. So successful was the Japanese 'welfare superpower' that by the 1970s life expectancy in Japan had become the longest in the world. But that, combined with a falling birth rate, has produced the world's oldest society, with more than 21 per cent of the population already over the age of 65. — Niall Ferguson

Many old music hall fans were present at the funeral today of Fred 'Chuckles' Jenkins, Britain's oldest and unfunniest comedian. In tribute, the vicar read out one of Fred's jokes, and the congregation had two minutes silence. — Ronnie Barker

Come take a look at one of the oldest human urges- religion. After all, the only thing that makes us screwier is sex. — Lilith Saintcrow

Simonides, a poet famous in his generation, is, I think, author of the oldest satire that is now extant, and, as some say, of the first that was ever written. — Joseph Addison

Catholics speak, like baseball players, in the coded language of gesture. Sure, the Roman Catholic Church is an abomination to man and a disgrace to God, but it comes with a highly structured Mass, several sacred pilgrimages, the oldest songs, the most impressive architecture, and a whole bunch of things to do whenever you enter the church. Taken all together, they make you one with your brother. — Joshua Ferris

The world's oldest and deepest body of freshwater, Lake Baikal, is turning into a swamp, Russian ecologists warn. — Anonymous

Live your life, take chances, be crazy. Dont wait 'cause right now is the oldest you've ever been & the youngest you'll be ever again — Suzanne Collins

All Cabinet Ministers and other senior ministers are still sworn in as Privy Counsellors for life. The oath (which dates back to the thirteenth-century and has been described as Britain's oldest secrecy provision) commits them to keep all advice to the monarch secret. — Clive Ponting

Nobody strikes a medal for the Royal Military Canal campaign any more, but a pint in the back bar of the ancient Mermaid Inn, perched in front of one of the biggest and oldest inglenooks you're ever likely to see, is its own reward. — David Hewson

In politics, the connection between what you pay for and what you actually get is problematic at best ...
This is another way of asserting that your vote in the marketplace counts for so much more than your vote in the polling booth. Cast your dollars for the washing machine of your choice and that is what you get
nothing more and nothing less. Pull the lever for the politician of your choice and, most of the time (if you're lucky), you will get some of what you do want and much of what you don't. The votes of a special interest lobby may ultimately cancel out yours. As someone much wiser than me once said, "[P]olitics may not be the oldest profession, but the results are often the same."
— Lawrence W. Reed

Every time something happens, whether I've won the most or lost the most, there's always 'oldest' tied to it. It's not a surprise anymore. — Daniel Nestor

Motherhood is the second oldest profession in the world. It never questions age, height, religious preference, health, political affiliation, citizenship, morality, ethnic background, marital status, economic level, convenience, or previous experience. — Erma Bombeck

Kyle is my best friend. Why would I risk screwing that up?"
"Mackenzie Catherine Dobson, have you learned nothing from romantic comedies? Do I need to make a trip to the video store?" Tess set her fork down and sighed. "'We're just friends' is the oldest plot device in the book. All it really means is that you're just friends until one of you get the balls to do something about all the unresolved tension. — Kathleen Peacock

The women are, of course, the biggest single group of oppressed people in the world and, if we are to believe the Book of Genesis, the very oldest. — Chinua Achebe