“Women are never supposed to have any occupation of sufficient importance not to be interrupted, except "suckling their fools "; and women themselves have accepted this, have written books to support it, and have trained themselves so as to consider whatever they do as not of such value to the world or to others, but that they can throw it up at the first "claim of social life." They have accustomed themselves to consider intellectual occupation as a merely selfish amusement, which it is their " duty " to give up for every trifler more selfish than themselves.”

—  Florence Nightingale

Cassandra (1860)

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 "Women are never supposed to have any occupation of sufficient importance not to be interrupted, except "suckling their …" by Florence Nightingale?
Florence Nightingale photo
Florence Nightingale81
English social reformer and statistician, and the founder o… 1820–1910

Related quotes

“Because most people are not sufficiently employed in themselves, they run about loose, hungering for employment, and satisfy themselves in various supererogatory occupations. The easiest of these occupations, which have all to do with making things already made, is the making of people: it is called the art of friendship.”

Laura Riding Jackson (1901–1991) poet, critic, novelist, essayist and short story writer

"The Myth" from Anarchism Is Not Enough (London: Jonathan Cape, 1928)

Irshad Manji photo

“Many Muslim women will not consider themselves as inferior but wear a veil because they feel as dignified human beings. Because they want to protect themselves against staring and judging by men. If women are so dignified, why is it the burden of women to cover up, in order to protect themselves from the stares of men? Why can't be accepted from men to control their own instincts or animal behaviour? This is a question that I have never heard a satisfactory answer from a Muslim women.”

Irshad Manji (1968) Feminist from Canada, author, journalist, activist

Muslims need critical thinking - Irshad Manji http://www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2004/0818verhofstadt.html August 18, 2004 (interview by Dirk Verhofstadt)

Marshall McLuhan photo

“Native societies did not think of themselves as being in the world as occupants but considered that their rituals created the world and keep it operational.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

College and University Journal, Volumes 6-7, American College Public Relations Association, 1967, p. 3
1960s

Phyllis Chesler photo

“Women … do not have to forsake the "wisdom of the heart" and become men. They need only transfer the primary force of their supportiveness to themselves and to each other—but never to the point of self-sacrifice.”

Phyllis Chesler (1940) Psychotherapist, college professor, and author

Women and Madness (2005), p. 348, and see Women and Madness (1972), p. 301 (similar text).
Women and Madness (1972, 2005)

Warren Farrell photo

“Men may be way behind in creating choices for themselves, but have actually been quiet supporters of the choices women want for themselves.”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. 123.

F. Scott Fitzgerald photo

“Great books write themselves, only bad books have to be written.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940) American novelist and screenwriter

Catherine of Genoa photo

“This is the beatitude that the blessed might have, and yet they have it not, except in so far as they are dead to themselves and absorbed in God. They have it not in so far as they remain in themselves and can say: `I am blessed.”

Catherine of Genoa (1447–1510) Italian author and nurse

Words are wholly inadequate to express my meaning, and I reproach myself for using them. I would that every one could understand me, and I am sure that if I could breathe on creatures, the fire of love burning within me would inflame them all with divine desire. O thing most marvelous!
Source: Life and Doctrine, Ch.IX

Blaise Pascal photo

“The best books are those, which those who read them believe they themselves could have written.”

Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer, and Christian philosopher

The Art of Persuasion

William Penn photo

“It is admirable to consider how many Millions of People come into, and go out of the World, Ignorant of themselves, and of the World they have lived in.”

William Penn (1644–1718) English real estate entrepreneur, philosopher, early Quaker and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania

1
Fruits of Solitude (1682), Part I

“They have amused themselves after their fashion, and I have no quarrel with them.”

Robertson Davies (1913–1995) Canadian journalist, playwright, professor, critic, and novelist

Three Worlds, Three Summers — But Not the Summer Just Past (1949).
Context: One might think, to hear some people talk, that this had been a particularly fine summer. From their point of view, I suppose, it has. They have rushed about the lakes in noisy little boats; they have permitted themselves to be dragged behind other little boats, standing more or less upright on ironing boards; they have immersed themselves in lakes into which countless summer cottage privies drain; they have laboriously pursued summer flirtations, and some of them have achieved gritty conquests on the sands; they have sat in hot little boats waiting to catch fish which they have then had to eat; they have passed many hours changing their skins from pinkish-drab to brown, erroneously believing that they are "storing up sunshine" against the winter months; they have motored penitential distances; they have taken thousands of feet of film of people whose names they will not be able to remember in November. They have amused themselves after their fashion, and I have no quarrel with them.

Related topics