“If the mind is wearied by study, or the body worn with sickness,
It is well to lie fallow for a while, in the vacancy of sheer amusement;
But when thou prosprest in health, and thine intellect can soar untired,
To seek uninstructive pleasure is to slumber on the couch of indolence.”

—  Martin Farquhar Tupper

Of Recreation.
Proverbial Philosophy (1838-1849)

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 "If the mind is wearied by study, or the body worn with sickness, It is well to lie fallow for a while, in the vacancy …" by Martin Farquhar Tupper?
Martin Farquhar Tupper photo
Martin Farquhar Tupper 31
English writer and poet 1810–1889

Related quotes

Anne Brontë photo

“While on my lonely couch I lie,
I seldom feel myself alone,
For fancy fills my dreaming eye
With scenes and pleasures of its own.”

Anne Brontë book Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell

Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (1846), Dreams (1845)
Context: While on my lonely couch I lie,
I seldom feel myself alone,
For fancy fills my dreaming eye
With scenes and pleasures of its own.
Then I may cherish at my breast
An infant's form beloved and fair,
May smile and soothe it into rest
With all a Mother's fondest care.

Alexander Pope photo

“The sick in body call for aid: the sick
In mind are covetous of more disease;
And when at worst, they dream themselves quite well.
To know ourselves diseased, is half our cure.”

Alexander Pope (1688–1744) eighteenth century English poet

Edward Young, "Night Thoughts," (1742-1745) Part IX http://www.litgothic.com/Texts/young_night_thoughts.pdf.
Misattributed

Benjamin Disraeli photo

“Amusement to an observing mind is study.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Part 1, Chapter 23.
Books, Coningsby (1844), Contarini Fleming (1832)

François Fénelon photo

“The greatest defect of common education is, that we are in the habit of putting pleasure all on one side, and weariness on the other; all weariness in study, all pleasure in idleness.”

François Fénelon (1651–1715) Catholic bishop

Remarquez un grand défaut des éducations ordinaires: on met tout le plaisir d'un côté , et tout l'ennui de l'autre; tout l'ennui dans l'étude, tout le plaisir dans les divertissements.
De l'éducation des filles, ch. 5, cited from De l’éducation des filles, dialogues des morts et opuscules divers (Paris: Firmin Didot, 1857) p. 21; translation from Selections from the Writings of Fénelon (Boston: Hilliard, Gray, Little and Wilkins, 1829) p. 72.

Báb photo

“In every nation thou beholdest unnumbered spiritual leaders who are bereft of true discernment, and among every people thou dost encounter myriads of adherents who are devoid of the same characteristic. Ponder for a while in thy heart, have pity on thyself and turn not aside thine attention from proofs and evidences. However, seek not proofs and evidences after thine idle fancy; but rather base thy proofs upon what God hath appointed. Moreover, know thou that neither being a man of learning nor being a follower is in itself a source of glory. If thou art a man of learning, thy knowledge becometh an honour, and if thou art a follower, thine adherence unto leadership becometh an honour, only when these conform to the good-pleasure of God.”

Báb (1819–1850) Iranian prophet; founder of the religion Bábism; venerated in the Bahá'í Faith

Dalá’Il-I-Sab‘ih

George Gordon Byron photo

“The wretched gift eternity
Was thine — and thou hast borne it well.”

George Gordon Byron (1788–1824) English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement

II.
Prometheus (1816)
Context: Titan! to thee the strife was given
Between the suffering and the will,
Which torture where they cannot kill;
And the inexorable Heaven,
And the deaf tyranny of Fate,
The ruling principle of Hate,
Which for its pleasure doth create
The things it may annihilate,
Refused thee even the boon to die:
The wretched gift eternity
Was thine — and thou hast borne it well.
All that the Thunderer wrung from thee
Was but the menace which flung back
On him the torments of thy rack;
The fate thou didst so well foresee,
But would not to appease him tell;
And in thy Silence was his Sentence,
And in his Soul a vain repentance,
And evil dread so ill dissembled,
That in his hand the lightnings trembled.

Thomas Dekker photo

“Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers?
O sweet content!
Art thou rich, yet is thy mind perplex'd?
O punishment!”

Thomas Dekker (1572–1632) English dramatist and pamphleteer

Poem Sweet Content http://www.bartleby.com/101/204.html

Jiddu Krishnamurti photo

“It's no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

As quoted in The Eden Express https://books.google.com/books?id=o89v2m2ybCEC&q=%22well-adjusted+to+a+profoundly+sick+society%22 (1975) by Mark Vonnegut, p. 208
1970s

Richard Francis Burton photo

“Conquer thyself, till thou hast done this, thou art but a slave; for it is almost as well to be subjected to another's appetite as to thine own.”

Richard Francis Burton (1821–1890) British explorer, geographer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, cartographer, ethnologist, spy, lin…

As quoted in The New Dictionary of Thoughts : A Cyclopedia of Quotations from the Best Authors of the World, Both Ancient and Modern, Alphabetically Arranged by Subjects (1957) by Tryon Edwards, p. 510

Related topics