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97 quotes that mention time in so many words. Each one is checked against the book it comes from.
Dost thou love life? then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of
Lost time is never found again
Never leave that till to-morrow, which you can do to-day.
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.
Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure.
Isn’t it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?
To fill the hour,—that is happiness
The years teach much which the days never know.
We do not have a very short time assigned to us, but we lose a great deal of it
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven
Hatred does not cease by hatred at any time: hatred ceases by love, this is an old rule.
These are the times that try men’s souls.
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time
Life’s but a walking shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts
Cowards die many times before their deaths;
The valiant never taste of death but once.
We keep our first lover for a long time—if we do not get a second.
Who has not, at one time or another—sacrificed himself for the sake of his good name?
History-writing is a way of getting rid of the past.
What a long time people were vainly disputing about the Antipodes!
A rainbow which lasts a quarter of an hour is looked at no more.
We all live on the past, and through the past are destroyed.
Habit is habit, and not to be flung out of the window by any man, but coaxed down-stairs a step at a time.
There is an old-time toast which is golden for its beauty. “When you ascend the hill of prosperity may you not meet a friend.”
There are two times in a man’s life when he should not speculate: when he can’t afford it, and when he can.
Time is waste of money.
In seed-time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy.
Eternity is in love with the productions of time.
The busy bee has no time for sorrow.
The hours of folly are measured by the clock, but of wisdom no clock can measure.
The eagle never lost so much time as when he submitted to learn of the crow.
ACEPHALOUS, adj. In the surprising condition of the Crusader who absently pulled at his forelock some hours after a Saracen scimitar had, unconsciously to him, passed through his neck, as related by de Joinville.
APOLOGIZE, v.i. To lay the foundation for a future offence.
BIGAMY, n. A mistake in taste for which the wisdom of the future will adjudge a punishment called trigamy.
CLOCK, n. A machine of great moral value to man, allaying his concern for the future by reminding him what a lot of time remains to him.
DAY, n. A period of twenty-four hours, mostly misspent. This period is divided into two parts, the day proper and the night, or day improper—the former devoted to sins of business, the latter consecrated to the other sort. These two kinds of social activity overlap.
DUEL, n. A formal ceremony preliminary to the reconciliation of two enemies. Great skill is necessary to its satisfactory observance; if awkwardly performed the most unexpected and deplorable consequences sometimes ensue. A long time ago a man lost his life in a duel.
EPICURE, n. An opponent of Epicurus, an abstemious philosopher who, holding that pleasure should be the chief aim of man, wasted no time in gratification from the senses.
EXTINCTION, n. The raw material out of which theology created the future state.
FUTURE, n. That period of time in which our affairs prosper, our friends are true and our happiness is assured.
GRAPESHOT, n. An argument which the future is preparing in answer to the demands of American Socialism.
IMPENITENCE, n. A state of mind intermediate in point of time between sin and punishment.
IMPROVIDENCE, n. Provision for the needs of to-day from the revenues of to-morrow.
MILLENNIUM, n. The period of a thousand years when the lid is to be screwed down, with all reformers on the under side.
OLD, adj. In that stage of usefulness which is not inconsistent with general inefficiency, as an old man. Discredited by lapse of time and offensive to the popular taste, as an old book.
PRESENTABLE, adj. Hideously appareled after the manner of the time and place.
PROPHECY, n. The art and practice of selling one’s credibility for future delivery.
QUOTIENT, n. A number showing how many times a sum of money belonging to one person is contained in the pocket of another—usually about as many times as it can be got there.
RADICALISM, n. The conservatism of to-morrow injected into the affairs of to-day.
REFLECTION, n. An action of the mind whereby we obtain a clearer view of our relation to the things of yesterday and are able to avoid the perils that we shall not again encounter.
TRUTH, n. An ingenious compound of desirability and appearance. Discovery of truth is the sole purpose of philosophy, which is the most ancient occupation of the human mind and has a fair prospect of existing with increasing activity to the end of time.
YESTERDAY, n. The infancy of youth, the youth of manhood, the entire past of age.
Philosophy triumphs easily over past evils and future evils; but present evils triumph over it.
Nothing should so much diminish the satisfaction which we feel with ourselves as seeing that we disapprove at one time of that which we approve of at another.
A clever man ought to so regulate his interests that each will fall in due order. Our greediness so often troubles us, making us run after so many things at the same time, that while we too eagerly look after the least we miss the greatest.
There are persons whose only merit consists in saying and doing stupid things at the right time, and who ruin all if they change their manners.
There are people who are like farces, which are praised but for a time (however foolish and distasteful they may be).
It is impossible to love a second time those whom we have really ceased to love.
There are matters and maladies which at certain times remedies only serve to make worse; true skill consists in knowing when it is dangerous to use them.
We reach quite inexperienced the different stages of life, and often, in spite of the number of our years, we lack experience.
Extreme avarice is nearly always mistaken, there is no passion which is oftener further away from its mark, nor upon which the present has so much power to the prejudice of the future.
Avarice often produces opposite results: there are an infinite number of persons who sacrifice their property to doubtful and distant expectations, others mistake great future advantages for small present interests.
Not their love of humanity, but the impotence of their love, prevents the Christians of today—burning us.
Before the storm breaks, the dust rises violently for the last time—the dust that is soon to be laid forever.
Many a man knocks about on the wall with his hammer, and believes that he hits the right nail on the head every time.
No nation gains the power of judgment except it can pass judgment on itself. But to attain this great privilege takes a very long time.
It is as certain as it is strange that truth and error come from one and the same source. Thus it is that we are often not at liberty to do violence to error, because at the same time we do violence to truth.
By force of habit we look at a clock that has run down as if it were still going, and we gaze at the face of a beauty as though she still loved.
If a man sets out to study all the laws, he will have no time left to transgress them.
A frivolous impulsive encouragement of problematical talents was a mistake of my early years; and I have never been able to abandon it altogether.
At all times it has not been the age, but individuals alone, who have worked for knowledge. It was the age which put Socrates to death by poison, the age which burnt Huss. The ages have always remained alike.
Men’s prejudices rest upon their character for the time being and cannot be overcome, as being part and parcel of themselves. Neither evidence nor common-sense nor reason has the slightest influence upon them.
Great primeval powers, evolved in time or in eternity, work on unceasingly: whether to weal or to woe, is a matter of chance.
To live in a great idea means to treat the impossible as though it were possible. It is just the same with a strong character; and when an idea and a character meet, things arise which fill the world with wonder for thousands of years.
That is why children’s lives are a series of refined judgments, not to say prejudices; and to efface a rapid but partial perception in order to make way for a more general one, time is necessary. To bear this in mind is one of the teacher’s greatest duties.
There is no outward sign of politeness that will be found to lack some deep moral foundation. The right kind of education would be that which conveyed the sign and the foundation at the same time.
We are fond of looking to the future, because our secret wishes make us apt to turn in our favour the uncertainties which move about in it hither and thither.
It would not be worth while to see seventy years if all the wisdom of this world were foolishness with God.
From this time forward, if a man does not apply himself to some art or handiwork, he will be in a bad way. In the rapid changes of the world, knowledge is no longer a furtherance; by the time a man has taken note of everything, he has lost himself.
Faith, Love, and Hope once felt, in a quiet sociable hour, a plastic impulse in their nature; they worked together and created a lovely image, a Pandora in the higher sense, Patience.
It is not worth while to do anything for the world that we have with us, as the existing order may in a moment pass away. It is for the past and the future that we must work: for the past, to acknowledge its merits; for the future, to try to increase its value.
If a man would enter upon some course of knowledge, he must either be deceived or deceive himself, unless external necessity irresistibly determines him. Who would become a physician if, at one and the same time, he saw before him all the horrible sights that await him?
How many years must a man do nothing before he can at all know what is to be done and how to do it!
When a new literature succeeds, it obscures the effect of an earlier one, and its own effect predominates; so that it is well, from time to time, to look back. What is original in us is best preserved and quickened if we do not lose sight of those who have gone before us.
The most original authors of modern times are so, not because they produce what is new, but only because they are able to say things the like of which seem never to have been said before.
An author can show no greater respect for his public than by never bringing it what it expects, but what he himself thinks right and proper in that stage of his own and others’ culture in which for the time he finds himself.
Against the three unities there is nothing to be said, if the subject is very simple; but there are times when thrice three unities, skilfully interwoven, produce a very pleasant effect.
Various maxims of the ancients, which we are wont to repeat again and again, had a meaning quite different from that which is apt to attach to them in later times.
An historic sense means a sense so cultured that, in valuing the deserts and merits of its own time, it takes account also of the past.
If one has not read the newspapers for some months and then reads them all together, one sees, as one never saw before, how much time is wasted with this kind of literature.
When we say of a landscape that it has a romantic character, it is the secret feeling of the sublime taking the form of the past, or, what is the same thing, of solitude, absence, or seclusion.
In every kind of Art there is a degree of excellence which may be reached, so to speak, by the mere use of one’s own natural talents. But at the same time it is impossible to go beyond that point, unless Art comes to one’s aid.
Inattention to the present business, be it what it will; the doing one thing, and thinking at the same time of another, or the attempting to do two things at once, are the never-failing signs of a little, frivolous mind.
When the old clipped money was called in for a new coinage in King William’s time, to prevent the like for the future, they stamped on the edges of the crown pieces these words, et decus et tutamen. That is exactly the case of good breeding.
We know all about the habits of the ant, we know all about the habits of the bee, but we know nothing at all about the habits of the oyster. It seems almost certain that we have been choosing the wrong time for studying the oyster.