“Many books in my library are now behind and beneath me. They were good in their way once, and so were the clothes I wore when I was ten years old; but I have outgrown them. Nobody ever outgrows Scripture; the book widens and deepens with our years.”

— Charles Spurgeon

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 37.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Sept. 28, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Many books in my library are now behind and beneath me. They were good in their way once, and so were the clothes I wor…" by Charles Spurgeon?

Charles Spurgeon photo

Charles Spurgeon49

British preacher, author, pastor and evangelist 1834–1892

Related quotes

“When I read a good book, I wish my life were three thousand years long.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

“Never lend books, for no one ever returns them; the only books I have in my library are books that other folks have lent me.”

Anatole France (1844–1924) French writer

“Look, working nine, ten years old at the farm, I was not harmed at all. When a nine-year-old, ten-year-old goes to work somewhere, it's full of people there. Now, when I'm smoking a crack pipe, nobody says anything. [...] But I want to say that I, my older brother, a sister of mine, a little younger, at that age, eight, nine, ten, twelve years, worked on the farm.”

Jair Bolsonaro (1955) Brazilian president elect

In a live social media broadcast on 4 July 2019, defending child labor. Bolsonaro Defends Child Labor https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/internacional/en/brazil/2019/07/bolsonaro-defends-child-labor.shtml. Folha de S.Paulo (5 July 2019). <br class="br">2019

“I can see he's not in your good books,' said the messenger.
'No, and if he were I would burn my library.”

William Shakespeare book Much Ado About Nothing

Source: Much Ado About Nothing

“The place was part museum, part library, and part archive; I loved it at first sight…and smell, for here there were thousands of printed books, many very old indeed, and nothing smells quite as wonderful as old books.”

Dan Simmons book The Fall of Hyperion

Source: The Fall of Hyperion (1990), Chapter 32 (p. 269)

“I ain't as good as I once was
I got a few years on me now.
But there was a time back in my prime
When I could really lay it down.
And if you need some love tonight,
Then I might have just enough.
I ain't as good as I once was,
But I'm as good once as I ever was.”

Toby Keith (1961) American country music singer and actor

As Good as I Once Was, written with Scotty Emerick
Song lyrics, Honkytonk University (2005)

“When I was a child, books were everything. And so there is in me, always, a nostalgic, yearning for the lost pleasure of books. It is not a yearning that one ever expects to be fulfilled.”

Diane Setterfield book The Thirteenth Tale

Source: The Thirteenth Tale

“I remember now how our bright spring green deepened.
With the years the seasons changed,
And we were lush as the underside of August.”

Ani DiFranco (1970) musician and activist

How Long Can It Last
Song lyrics

“Ten years from now, no one is going to care how quickly the books came out. The only thing that will matter, the only thing anyone will remember, is how good they were. That's my main concern, and always will be.”

George Raymond Richard Martin (1948) American writer, screenwriter and television producer

Official blog, (July 2007) https://grrm.livejournal.com/17565.html?thread=2143645#t2143645

“I am not a visual person. I have spent so many bounded years in my childhood that I have grown used to having books as my window on reality.”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

In Joy Still Felt (1980), p. 217
General sources

Related topics