Tracing Quotations
Mark Twain? William Ralph Inge? Harry A. Thompson? Havelock Ellis? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: Excessive worrying is debilitating to one’s mental health. Upsetting scenarios are often sidestepped, and the anguish was unnecessary. Here are three examples from a family of pertinent sayings: (1) Worry is interest paid on trouble before it falls due(2) Worry …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: Worry Is Like Paying Interest On a Debt You Don’t Owe”
Winston Churchill? Guy Henson? Plato? Israel Zangwill? William Ralph Inge? Robert Briffault? Herbert Hoover? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: The flaws in the democratic form of government are numerous, yet the alternatives such as oligarchy and autocracy inevitably become oppressive and tyrannical. A famous saying states that democracy is the worst form of government except …
M. Frida Hartley? William Ralph Inge? Jan Bryant Bartell? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: A verse condemning cruelty toward animals begins with the following two lines: From beasts we scorn as soulless, In forest, field and den This verse has been attributed to British social activist M. Frida Hartley and influential Anglican priest William Inge. …
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Thomas Carlyle? Benjamin Franklin? Samuel Taylor Coleridge? Johann P. F. Richter? Minna Antrim? Heinrich Heine? William Ralph Inge? Dear Quote Investigator: The most memorable and painful lessons are usually learned via direct experience, but the cost can be very high. A family of adages depict this point of view. Here are two instances: Experience is …
Continue reading “Experience Is the Best of Schoolmasters; Only the School-Fees Are Heavy”
William Ralph Inge? Fulton J. Sheen? Leonard Cohen? Charles Haddon Spurgeon? E. Luccock? Joseph R. Sizoo? Dear Quote Investigator: Any organization that aspires to multi-generational longevity must not become enmeshed in evanescent enthusiasms and fashions. Long-term steadiness and perspective are required. Here are two pertinent sayings: If you marry the spirit of your age, you …
Continue reading “If You Marry the Spirit of Your Own Generation You Will Be a Widow in the Next”
William Ralph Inge? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The number of people on planet Earth has grown to the remarkably large figure of 7.5 billion. A passage in the Book of Genesis of the King James Bible encourages fertility: And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, …
William Ralph Inge? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: I once heard the humorous claim that recorded history may be divided into two parts: Events that probably never happened. Events that do not matter. Would you please explore the provenance of this observation? Quote Investigator: William Ralph Inge was Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral in London and …
William Ralph Inge? William S. Burroughs? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: The following statement has been attributed to two very different people: William Ralph Inge and William S. Burroughs: The aim of education is the knowledge, not of facts, but of values. Inge was a professor at Cambridge and Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral in London. …
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William Ralph Inge? John Brunner? Bishop of Ripon? Anonymous? Quote Investigator: There are two different types of fools. One naively embraces and extolls everything that is old; the other credulously praises everything that is new. This insight has been ascribed to William Ralph Inge who was a professor at Cambridge and Dean of St Paul’s …
Voltaire? William Ralph Inge? Herbert Paul? Paul Chatfield? Horace Smith? Katharine Fullerton Gerould? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: I have been attempting to trace a provocative and humorous remark about originality that has been attributed to a professor at the University of Cambridge named William Ralph Inge: Originality is undetected plagiarism. Would you please help? …
Continue reading “Quote Origin: Originality Is Undetected Plagiarism”