“Even you are not rich enough, Sir Robert, to buy back your past. No man is.”
Mrs Cheveley, Act I
Usually quoted as: No man is rich enough to buy back his own past.
Source: An Ideal Husband (1895)
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Oscar Wilde 812
Irish writer and poet 1854–1900Related quotes
“All the power's in the hands of people rich enough to buy it.”
Joe Strummer / Mick Jones, "White Riot", The Clash (1977).
Lyrics
Source: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Red Prophet (1988), Chapter 1.
“Don't you ever mind," she asked suddenly, "not being rich enough to buy all the books you want?”
Source: The House of Mirth
“There you [Sir Robert Peel] sit, doing penance for the disingenuousness of years.”
Speech in the House of Commons (14 April 1845)
“The British ambassador was Sir Robert Morier.”
Source: Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White, Vol. 2 (1922), p. 13
Context: The British ambassador was Sir Robert Morier. He too was a strong character, though lacking apparently in some of General [der Infanterie] von Schweinitz's more kindly qualities. He was big, roughish, and at times so brusque that he might almost be called brutal. When bullying was needed it was generally understood that he could do it con amore.
“All the money you made will never buy back your soul.”
Song lyrics, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963), Masters of War
Gut Symmetries (1997)
Context: They were letting off fireworks down at the waterfront, the sky exploding in grenades of colour. Whatever it is that pulls the pin, that hurls you past the boundaries of your own life into a brief and total beauty - even for a moment - it is enough.
“I sell my time to get enough money to buy it back.”
#151
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)