“And better had they ne'er been born,
Who read to doubt, or read to scorn.”

Source: The Monastery (1820), Ch. 12.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "And better had they ne'er been born, Who read to doubt, or read to scorn." by Walter Scott?

Walter Scott151

Scottish historical novelist, playwright, and poet 1771–1832

Related quotes

“T is an old tale and often told;
But did my fate and wish agree,
Ne'er had been read, in story old,
Of maiden true betray'd for gold,
That loved, or was avenged, like me.”

Walter Scott Marmion

Canto II, stanza 27.
Marmion (1808)

“A person who does not read is no better than one cannot read.”

Earl Nightingale (1921–1989) American motivational speaker

Source: Lead the Field

“The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

“Reading a poem aloud by someone who understands it, can be a crucial experience, but better yet is reading it aloud oneself.”

John Hollander (1929–2013) American poet

“Her life, except for reading, had been dull—but it had not been in vain.”

Fredric Brown book The Mind Thing

Source: The Mind Thing (1961), Chapter 20 (p. 570)

“It is only a certain type of mind that scorns what is known by all and reads secrets as jewels.”

Neal Stephenson book Seveneves

“Five Thousand Years Later” (p. 749)
Seveneves (2015), Part Three

“I started reading SF when I was about twelve and I read all I could, so any author who was writing about that time, I read. But there's no doubt who got me off originally and that was A. E. van Vogt.”

Philip K. Dick (1928–1982) American author

As quoted in "Vertex Interviews Philip K. Dick" by Arthur Byron Cover, in Vertex, Vol. 1, no. 6 (February 1974) http://2010philipkdickfans.philipkdickfans.com/frank/vertexin.htm <br class="br">Context: I started reading SF when I was about twelve and I read all I could, so any author who was writing about that time, I read. But there's no doubt who got me off originally and that was A. E. van Vogt. There was in van Vogt's writing a mysterious quality, and this was especially true in The World of Null A. All the parts of that book did not add up; all the ingredients did not make a coherency. Now some people are put off by that. They think that's sloppy and wrong, but the thing that fascinated me so much was that this resembled reality more than anybody else's writing inside or outside science fiction. … reality really is a mess, and yet it's exciting. The basic thing is, how frightened are you of chaos? And how happy are you with order? Van Vogt influenced me so much because he made me appreciate a mysterious chaotic quality in the universe which is not to be feared.