Tracing Quotations
Mark Twain? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? Alexandre Dumas fils? Lady Mary Wortley Montagu? Ellen Osborn? Manley H. Pike? Ben Johnson? Benjamin Disraeli? Alexander Chase? Roger O’Mara? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: Making sweeping statements about the universe is difficult to resist, but exceptions seem to be unavoidable. The following comically paradoxical statement is popular. Here …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: No Generalization Is Wholly True—Not Even This One”
Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? Virgil? Apocryphal? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: The personification of Death has been employed in artworks to highlight mortality. We must attempt to achieve a full and worthwhile life during our brief period passing through this earthly realm. Here is a pertinent quotation: Death plucks my ear …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: Death Plucks My Ear and Says “Live, for I Am Coming””
Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? Albert Einstein? Ralph Waldo Emerson? Question for Quote Investigator: Encountering a novel idea or sensation causes changes that permanently alter one’s intellect. This notion can be expressed as follows: A mind that is stretched by a new idea or experience can never shrink back to its old …
Barry Commoner? Gotthold Ephraim Lessing? Leonardo da Vinci? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? John Muir? Jean Piaget? Daniel Patrick Moynihan? Solomon Short? David Gerrold? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: The universe reflects a pervasive interconnectedness. Here are two versions of a pertinent adage: Everything is connected to everything else. Everything connects to everything else. Ecological thinkers have …
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Ernest Hemingway? Mark Twain? Luke McLuke? Lydia DeVilbiss? Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? Frederick B. Wilcox? Abigail Van Buren? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: While searching the twitter database I encountered the following two similar jokes: (1) Humans need two years to learn to speak and sixty years to learn to shut up. …
Hyman Rickover? Martin Vanbee? Eleanor Roosevelt? Harry Myers? Laurence J. Peter? Sam Levenson? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: These two simple adages have a long history: Learn from your mistakes. Learn from the mistakes of others. Some wit crafted a hilarious addendum for the second adage: You can’t …
Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle? Samuel Rogers? Walter Besant? Helmuth von Moltke the Elder? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? Georges Clemenceau? Question for Quote Investigator: An amusing remark about longevity and libido has been ascribed to septuagenarians, octogenarians, nonagenarians, and centenarians. A venerable gentleman was sitting on a park bench with a friend, and he gazed …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: Ah, Would That I Were Only 80 Years Old!”
Plotinus? Herodotus? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: Many are familiar with the ancient Latin injunction of the poet Horace: “Carpe diem” or “Seize the day”. The following thematically similar statement has been attributed to other figures of the ancient world: the philosopher Plotinus and the historian Herodotus: Not to be involved with …
Judge Dowdall? William Pickford? Lord Sterndale? Anonymous? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: Some lawyers take pride in their use of rigorous logical and legal reasoning. I once heard a hilarious remark about the body of law accumulated over the centuries. I do not remember the exact wording, but it was something like this: The entire body …
Bertrand Russell? William James? Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.? Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.? Question for Quote Investigator: The eminent philosopher Bertrand Russell discussed visions and experiences in his major opus “A History of Western Philosophy” in 1945. Russell noted that subjective experiences were not always reliable: William James describes a man who got the experience from …