War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. The Two Towers
Let an understanding man imagine human nature originally produced without the sense of sight, and consider what ignorance and trouble such a defect would bring upon him, what a darkness and blindness in the soul; he will then see by that of how great importance to the knowledge of truth would be the privation of such another sense, or of two or three, should we be so deprived. Essays
“Waste not your Hour, nor in the vain pursuit / Of This and That endeavour and dispute / Better be jocund with the fruitful Grape / Than sadden after none, or bitter, Fruit.” Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
Thou seest how few be the things, the which if a man has at his command his life flows gently on and is divine. Book II
Quotes