“Laughter and tears are meant to turn the wheels of the same machinery of sensibility; one is wind-power, and the other water-power; that is all.”

12th Annual Report to the Massachusetts State Board of Education http://www.tncrimlaw.com/civil_bible/horace_mann.htm (1848); published in Life and Works of Horace Mann Vol. III, (1868) edited by Mary Mann, p. 669
Context: Education, then, beyond all other devices of human origin, is the great equalizer of the conditions of men, — the balance-wheel of the social machinery. I do not here mean that it so elevates the moral nature as to make men disdain and abhor the oppression of their fellow-men. This idea pertains to another of its attributes. But I mean that it gives each man the independence and the means by which he can resist the selfishness of other men. It does better than to disarm the poor of their hostility towards the rich: it prevents being poor.

"A New Method of Obtaining Very Great Moving Powers at Small Cost" (1690)

Come ne l'alto mar legno talora,
Che da duo venti sia percosso e vinto,
Ch'ora uno inanzi l'ha mandato, ed ora
Un altro al primo termine respinto,
E l'han girato da poppa e da prora.
Canto XXI, stanza 53 (tr. D. R. Slavitt)
Orlando Furioso (1532)

Source: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

"The Funeral" (l. 1–4)

#8756, Part 88
Ten Thousand Flower Flames Part 1-100 (1979)

Variant: It's all mirror, mirror on the wall because beauty is power the same way money is power the same way a gun is power.
Source: Invisible Monsters