Quotes about fruit (1008 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“A society where emotions come last and selfishness is considered blessed, or placed first before anything; cannot be expected to produce good fruits!”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Selfishness

“The roots of education … are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.”

Aristotle (-384–-321 BC) Classical Greek philosopher, student of Plato and founder of Western philosophy

The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers

Graduation , Teachers' Day , Education

“Trees that are slow to grow bear the best fruit.”

Molière (1622–1673) French playwright and actor

Tree

“The first fruit of forbearance is that people will sympathize with you and they will go against the man who offended you arrogantly.”

Ali book Nahj al-Balagha

Nahj al-Balagha

People

“The branch might seem like the fruit's origin:
In fact, the branch exist because of the fruit.”

Rumi Masnavi

Mathnawi
Teachings of Rumi (1999)

“A life without love is like a tree without fruit.”

Stephen King book Doctor Sleep

Source: Doctor Sleep

Deep , love , Wise , Cute

“Kind hearts are the gardens, Kind thoughts are the roots, Kind words are the flowers, Kind deeds are the fruits, Take care of your garden And keep out the weeds, Fill it with sunshine, Kind words, and Kind deeds.”

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882) American poet

Flowers , Heart

“Give me books, French wine, fruit, fine weather and a little music played out of doors by somebody I do not know.”

John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet

Books , Music , Wine , Weather

“The exalted moment of love is always full of promise: it is not closed in on itself, but open; we see its natural fruitfulness revealed in the child, even if its spiritual fruitfulness remains hidden.”

Hans Urs Von Balthasar (1905–1988) Swedish Catholic theologian

Love Alone Is Credible (1963)

Love , Nature

“My Soul gave me good counsel, teaching me never to delight in praise or to be distressed by reproach. Before my Soul taught me, I doubted the value of my accomplishments until the passing days sent someone who would extol or disparage them. But now I know that trees blossom in the spring and give their fruits in the summer without any desire for accolades. And they scatter their leaves abroad in the fall and denude themselves in the winter without fear of reproof.”

Khalil Gibran (1883–1931) Lebanese artist, poet, and writer

The Vision: Reflections on the Way of the Soul (1994)

Fear , Soul , Spring , Tree

“Hindustan is a country which has few pleasures to recommend it…. Indians have no idea of the charms of friendly society, of frankly mixing together, or of familiar intercourse…. They have no horses, no good grapes, or musk melons, no good fruits, no ice or cold water, no good food or bread in their bazaars, no bath or colleges, no candles, no torches, not a candle stick”

Babur (1483–1530) 1st Mughal Emperor

First Mughal emperor Babur wrote in his autobiography Tuzk-e-Babri

Pleasure , Food , Idea , Water

“Why do you sow where the field is eager to destroy the fruit? Where there are medicines of sterility? Where there is murder before birth? You do not even let a harlot remain a harlot, but you make her a murderess as well. Do you see that from drunkenness comes fornication, from fornication adultery, from adultery murder? Indeed, it is something worse than murder and I do not know what to call it; for she does not kill what is formed but prevents its formation. What then? Do you contemn the gift of God, and fight with His laws? What is a curse, do you seek as though it were a blessing? Do you make the anteroom of birth the anteroom of slaughter? Do you teach the woman who is given to you for the procreation of offspring to perpetrate killing? That she may always be beautiful and lovable to her lovers, and that she may rake in more money, she does not refuse to do this, heaping fire on your head; and even if the crime is hers, you are the cause. Hence also arise idolatries. To look pretty many of these women use incantations, libations, philtres, potions, and innumerable other things. Yet after such turpitude, after murder, after idolatry, the matter still seems indifferent to many men–even to many men having wives. In this indifference of the married men there is greater evil filth; for then poisons are prepared, not against the womb of a prostitute, but against your injured wife. Against her are these innumerable tricks, invocations of demons, incantations of the dead, daily wars, ceaseless battles, and unremitting contentions.”

John Chrysostom (349–407) important Early Church Father

St. John Chrysostom, Homily 24 on the Epistle to the Romans [PG 60:626-27] https://www.patheos.com/blogs/davearmstrong/2017/10/contraception-early-church-teaching-william-klimon.html

Money , God , Law , Dead

“The fruits of victory are tumbling into our mouths too quickly.”

Hirohito (1901–1989) Emperor of Japan from 1926 until 1989

To an aide, 29 April 1942, as quoted in Pearl Harbor: From Infamy to Greatness.

Victory

“One loses, as one grows older, something of the lightness of one's dreams; one begins to take life up in both hands, and to care more for the fruit than the flower, and that is no great loss perhaps.”

W.B. Yeats (1865–1939) Irish poet and playwright

Source: The Celtic Twilight: Faerie and Folklore

Life , Dreams , Flowers , Light

“There is an influence which is getting strong and stronger day by day, which shows itself more and more in all departments of human activity, and influence most fruitful and beneficial—the influence of the artist. It was a happy day for the mass of humanity when the artist felt the desire of becoming a physician, an electrician, an engineer or mechanician or—whatnot—a mathematician or a financier; for it was he who wrought all these wonders and grandeur we are witnessing. It was he who abolished that small, pedantic, narrow-grooved school teaching which made of an aspiring student a galley-slave, and he who allowed freedom in the choice of subject of study according to one's pleasure and inclination, and so facilitated development.”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

"Roentgen Rays or Streams", Electrical Review (12 Aug 1896). Reprinted in The Nikola Tesla Treasury (2007), 307. By Nikola Tesla

Pleasure , School , Study , Freedom

“Nothing is hidden so much that it wouldn’t be revealed through its fruit.”

Paracelsus (1493–1541) Swiss physician and alchemist

Paracelsus - Doctor of our Time (1992)

“I'm very proud [to be part Italian] … Although I don't eat a lot of Italian things, because I'm vegan. … I love animals more than I love most people, not kidding. But I am a firm believer in eating a full plant-based, whole food diet that can expand your life length and make you an all-round happier person. It is tricky dining out, but I just stick to what I know – veggies, fruit and salad – then when I get home I'll have something else.”

Ariana Grande (1993) American singer-songwriter

"Ariana Grande: "I love animals more than I love most people, not kidding"" https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/ariana-grande-i-love-animals-4754625, interview with the Mirror (5 December 2014)

Love , Life , People , Food

“Enquire: 'Who am I?' and you will find the answer. Look at a tree: from one seed arises a huge tree; from it comes numerous seeds, each one of which in its turn grows into a tree. No two fruits are alike. Yet it is one life that throbs in every particle of the tree. So, it is the same Atman everywhere. All creation is That: There is beauty in the birds and in the animals. They too eat and drink like us, mate and multiply; but there is this difference: we can realize our true nature, the Atman. Having been born as human beings, we must not waste this opportunity. At least for a few seconds every day, we must enquire as to who we are. It is no use taking a return ticket over and over again. From birth to death, and death to birth is samsara. But really we have no birth and death. We must realize that.”

Sri Anandamoyi Ma (1896–1982) Hindu saint

Anandamayi Ma, Ananda Varta Quarterly
By herself

Life , Death , Beauty , Birth

“If you want to change the fruits, you will first have to change the roots. If you want to change the visible, you must first change the invisible.”

T. Harv Eker (1954) American writer

Source: Secrets of the Millionaire Mind: Mastering the Inner Game of Wealth

Change

“Sorrow is a fruit. God does not make it grow on limbs too weak to bear it.”

Victor Hugo (1802–1885) French poet, novelist, and dramatist

God

“The roots below the earth claim no rewards for making the branches fruitful.”

Rabindranath Tagore Stray Birds

134
Source: Stray Birds (1916)

“What is happening to me happens to all fruits that grow ripe.
It is the honey in my veins that makes my blood thicker, and my soul quieter.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

Soul

“Wishing to be friends is quick work, but friendship is a slow ripening fruit.”

Aristotle (-384–-321 BC) Classical Greek philosopher, student of Plato and founder of Western philosophy

Friendship , For Friend , For Bestfriend , Friendship

“It is always necessary that the substance or essence of a person be good before there can be any good works and that good works follow and proceed from a person who is already good. Christ says in Matthew 7:18: “A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.”… The fruit does not make the tree good or bad but the tree itself is what determines the nature of the fruit. In the same way, a person first must be good or bad before doing a good or bad work.”

Martin Luther (1483–1546) seminal figure in Protestant Reformation

Source: The Freedom of a Christian (1520), pp. 74-75

Way , Nature , Tree , Christ

“Mother Mary, like us, was born in sin of sinful parents, but the Holy Spirit covered her, sanctified and purified her so that this child was born of flesh and blood, but not with sinful flesh and blood. The Holy Spirit permitted the Virgin Mary to remain a true, natural human being of flesh and blood, just as we. However, he warded off sin from her flesh and blood so that she became the mother of a pure child, not poisoned by sin as we are. For in that moment when she conceived, she was a holy mother filled with the Holy Spirit and her fruit is a holy pure fruit, at once God and truly man, in one person”

Martin Luther (1483–1546) seminal figure in Protestant Reformation

The Precious and Sacred Writings of Martin Luther (1905) edited by John Nicholas Lenker; republished as Sermons of Martin Luther (1996), p. 291

God , Nature , Parent , Personality

“I eat only white foods: eggs, sugar, grated bones, the fat of dead animals; veal, salt, coconut, chicken cooked in white water; fruit mold, rice, turnips; camphorated sausage, dough, cheese (white), cotton salad, and certain fish (skinless).”

Erik Satie (1866–1925) French composer and pianist

Quoted by Rollo H. Myers (1968). Erik Satie, p.135. New York: Dover.
See also Socrate for the context of this quote.
General quotes

Food , Fish , Water , Animals

“In Matthew 12:23 Christ says: “Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the tree bad and its fruit bad,” as if to say: “Let the one who wishes to have good fruit begin by planting a good tree.” Therefore, let the person who wishes to do good works being not with the works but with the believing, for this alone makes a person good.”

Martin Luther (1483–1546) seminal figure in Protestant Reformation

Source: The Freedom of a Christian (1520), p. 76

Tree , Christ , Personality

“We used to think that Hitler was wicked when he wanted to kill all the Jews, but what Kennedy and Macmillan and others both in the East and in the West pursue policies which will probably lead to killing not only all the Jews but all the rest of us too. They are much more wicked than Hitler and this idea of weapons of mass extermination is utterly and absolutely horrible and it is a thing which no man with one spark of humanity can tolerate and I will not pretend to obey a government which is organising the massacre of the whole of mankind. I will do anything I can to oppose such Governments in any non-violent way that seems likely to be fruitful, and I should exhort all of you to feel the same way. We cannot obey these murderers. They are wicked and abominable. They are the wickedest people that ever lived in the history of man and it is our duty to do what we can.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

"On Civil Disobedience", April 15th, 1961
1960s

People , Way , Feeling , History

“(on his twin sister) "Join us next week… where Zoe will be eating fruit off my naked body.."”

Zayn Malik (1993) British singer

Sister

“Is it not frightening, that we, the Romanian people, no longer can produce fruit? That we do not have a Romanian culture of our own, of our people, of our blood, to shine in the world side by side with that of other peoples? That we be condemned today to present ourselves before the world with products of Jewish essence? That today, at this moment, when the world expects that the Romanian people appear to show the fruit of our national blood and genius, we present ourselves with an infection of Judaic cultural caricature?”

Corneliu Zelea Codreanu (1899–1938) Romanian politician

For My Legionaries: The Iron Guard (1936), Nation and Culture

People , World , Appearance

“That is it. Did you notice those pumpkins and eggplants? They are big, aren’t they? The plants bear fruit because the flowers bloom. Not a single plant bears fruit without its flower. Now ponder deeply. The world says woman is unclean, but there is nothing unclean about woman. Man and woman are equally children of God and there is no discrimination. Woman has a duty, a duty to bear children. Her monthly period is the flower. Without the flower there is no fruit. Understand this well. Take the pumpkin; if its big flower is gone, that is the end of it. In many things, there are flowers that bear no fruit. But to bear fruit without any flower is impossible. Ponder deeply. There is nothing unclean about it.”

Nakayama Miki (1798–1887) Founder of Tenrikyo

Anecdotes of Oyasama, Foundress of Tenrikyo, from Anecdote 158, "Monthly Period is the Flower," p. 128.
Anecdotes of Oyasama

God , Children , World , Flowers

“Because of you, each day is a melon slice
smelling sweetly of earth
Because of you, all fruits reach out to me
as if I were the sun.
Thanks to you, I live on the honey of hope.
You are the reason my heart beats.
Because of you, even my loneliest nights
smile like an Anatolian kilim on your wall.
Should my journey end before I reach my city,
I've rested in a rose garden thanks to you.
Because of you I don't let death enter,
clothed in the softest garments,
and knocking on my door with songs
calling me to the greatest place.”

Nâzım Hikmet (1902–1963) Turkish poet

From Because of You (29 August 1960)

Death , Smile , Hope , Sun

“Love is a fruit in season at all times, and within reach of every hand. Anyone may gather it and no limit is set. Everyone can reach this love through meditation, spirit of prayer, and sacrifice, by an intense inner life.”

Matka Tereza (1910–1997) Roman Catholic saint of Albanian origin

As quoted in Love, A Fruit Always In Season : Daily Meditations from the Words of Mother Teresa of Calcutta (1987) http://books.google.com/books?id=GqcnHzdPwPcC edited by Dorothy S. Hunt
1980s

Love , Life , Time , Season

“In addition to this there is the horrible — the really disquieting — prevalence of cranks wherever Socialists are gathered together. One sometimes gets the impression that the mere words 'Socialism' and 'Communism' draw towards them with magnetic force every fruit-juice drinker, nudist, sandal-wearer, sex-maniac, Quaker, 'Nature Cure' quack, pacifist, and feminist in England.”

George Orwell book The Road to Wigan Pier

The Road to Wigan Pier (1937) - Full text online http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200391.txt

Sex , Communication , Nature , Drawing

“You Americans are so gullible. No, you won’t accept communism outright, but we’ll keep feeding you small doses of socialism until you’ll finally wake up and find you already have communism. We won’t have to fight you. We’ll so weaken your economy until you’ll fall like overripe fruit into our hands.”

Nikita Khrushchev (1894–1971) First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

Disputed
Source: Udall, U.S. Rep. Morris K., Khrushchev Could Have Said It, 2016-04-06, originally published in The New Republic, 1962 http://www.library.arizona.edu/exhibits/udall/khrushch_htm.html,

Communication , Fight

“The proper education of the young does not consist in stuffing their heads with a mass of words, sentences, and ideas dragged together out of various authors, but in opening up their understanding to the outer world, so that a living stream may flow from their own minds, just as leaves, flowers, and fruit spring from the bud on a tree.”

John Amos Comenius (1592–1670) Czech teacher, educator, philosopher and writer

Tree , Understanding , Spring , Flowers

“I don't expect it to be easy, but I'm certain it will be fruitful. My mission is to take a different approach: Instead of explicitly encouraging young people to read, my goal is to get them to see the value in their own narratives — that they, too, have a story, and that there's power not just in telling it, but in the opportunity to do so.”

Jason Reynolds (1983) author of young adult novels

As quoted in [Jason Reynolds Named New National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, https://www.loc.gov/item/prn-20-002/jason-reynolds-named-new-national-ambassador-for-young-peoples-literature/2020-01-13/, Library of Congress, 10 March 2020, January 13, 2020]

People , Reading

“Happiness lies in dedicating oneself to an idea, the fruits of which are beneficial for others.”

Zafar Mirzo (1972)

Idea , Happiness

“Everyone's dream – the contest of fruits of creativity in the world, which has attained unity through wisdom.”

Zafar Mirzo (1972)

Dreams , World , Wisdom

“Allow the fruit to fall and rot, in order to receive more.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“You look at me, you look at me closely, each time closer and then we play cyclops, we look at each other closer each time and our eyes grow, they grow closer, they overlap and the cyclops look at each other, breathing confusion, their mouths find each other and fight warmly, biting with their lips, resting their tongues lightly on their teeth, playing in their caverns where the heavy air comes and goes with the scent of an old perfume and silence. Then my hands want to hide in your hair, slowly stroke the depth of your hair while we kiss with mouths full of flowers or fish, of living movements, of dark fragrance. And if we bite each other, the pain is sweet, and if we drown in a short and terrible surge of breath, that instant death is beauty. And there is a single saliva and a single flavour of ripe fruit, and I can feel you shiver against me like a moon on the water.”

Julio Cortázar (1914–1984) Argentinian writer

Death , Pain , Beauty , Feeling

“In the increasingly convincing darkness
The words become palpable, like a fruit
That is too beautiful to eat.”

John Ashbery (1927–2017) poet from the United States

Beauty

“The greed for fruit misses the flower.”

Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) Bengali polymath

Flowers

“Although random mutations influenced the course of evolution, their influence was mainly by loss, alteration, and refinement… Never, however, did that one mutation make a wing, a fruit, a woody stem, or a claw appear. Mutations, in summary, tend to induce sickness, death, or deficiencies. No evidence in the vast literature of heredity changes shows unambiguous evidence that random mutation itself, even with geographical isolation of populations, leads to speciation.”

Lynn Margulis (1938–2011) American evolutionary biologist

Source: Acquiring Genomes: A Theory Of The Origin Of Species

Death , Literature , Appearance , Change

“You can't eat the orange and throw the peel away — a man is not a piece of fruit.”

Arthur Miller book Death of a Salesman

Willy
Source: Death of a Salesman (1949)

“Vimes stalked gloomily through the crowded streets, feeling like the only pickled onion in a fruit salad.”

Terry Pratchett book Guards! Guards!

Source: Guards! Guards!

Feeling

“I want the following word: splendor, splendor is fruit in all its succulence, fruit without sadness. I want vast distances. My savage intuition of myself.”

Clarice Lispector (1920–1977) Brazilian writer

Source: The Stream of Life

Sadness

“Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Source: 1860s, First State of the Union address (1861)
Context: Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights. Nor is it denied that there is, and probably always will be, a relation between labor and capital producing mutual benefits. The error is in assuming that the whole labor of community exists within that relation.

“For believe me! — the secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment is: to live dangerously!”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

Sec. 283; Variant translation: For believe me: the secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and greatest enjoyment is — to live dangerously.
The Gay Science (1882)
Context: For believe me! — the secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment is: to live dangerously! Build your cities on the slopes of Vesuvius! Send your ships into uncharted seas! Live at war with your peers and yourselves! Be robbers and conquerors as long as you cannot be rulers and possessors, you seekers of knowledge! Soon the age will be past when you could be content to live hidden in forests like shy deer! At long last the search for knowledge will reach out for its due: — it will want to rule and possess, and you with it!

Secret

“I have always found that mercy bears richer fruits than strict justice.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Attributed in Lincoln Memorial (1882) edited by Osborn Oldroyd
Posthumous attributions

Justice

“Here are fruits, flowers, leaves and branches, and here is my heart which beats only for you.”

Paul Verlaine (1844–1896) French poet

Valentine's Day , Flowers , Heart

“He couldn’t see why people made such a fuss about people eating their silly old fruit anyway, but life would be a lot less fun if they didn’t. And there was never an apple, in Adam’s opinion, that wasn’t worth the trouble you got into for eating it.”

Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) English author

Source: Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

Life , People

“Of course, it is very important to be sober when you take an exam. Many worthwhile careers in the street-cleansing, fruit-picking and subway-guitar-playing industries have been founded on a lack of understanding of this simple fact.”

Terry Pratchett book Moving Pictures

Source: Moving Pictures

Understanding

“The spiritual experience of the philosopher is the nourishing soil of philosophy; that without it there is no philosophy; and that, even so, spiritual experience does not, or must not, enter into the intelligible texture of philosophy. The pulp of the fruit must consist of nothing but the truth.”

Jacques Maritain (1882–1973) French philosopher

Source: Existence & the Existent

Truth , Intelligence

“One is fruitful only at the cost of being rich in contradictions.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Twilight of the Idols

Source: Twilight of the Idols

“Time that withers you will wither me. We will fall like ripe fruit and roll down the grass together. Dear friend, let me lie beside you watching the clouds until the earth covers us and we are gone.”

Jeanette Winterson (1959) English writer

Source: Written on the Body

Lie , Grass , Time

“Hang there like a fruit, my soul, Till the tree die!

-Posthumus Leonatus
Act V, Scene V”

William Shakespeare Cymbeline

Source: Cymbeline

Soul , Tree

“Selfishness is one of the principal fruits of the corruption of human nature; and it is obvious that selfishness disposes us to over-rate our good qualities, and to overlook or extenuate our defects.”

William Wilberforce (1759–1833) English politician

Source: Real Christianity

Nature , Selfishness

“Nothing is more natural than mutual misunderstanding; the contrary is always surprising. I believe that one never agrees on anything except by mistake, and that all harmony among human beings is the happy fruit of an error.”

Paul Valéry (1871–1945) French poet, essayist, and philosopher

Source: The Art of Poetry

Error , Nature , Happiness

“Books and movies are like apples and oranges. They both are fruit, but taste completely different.”

Stephen King (1947) American author

Books

“Always expecting this and expecting that. May I recommend serenity to you? A life that is burdened with expectations is a heavy life. Its fruit is sorrow and disappointment. Learn to be one with the joy of the moment.”

Douglas Adams The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul

Source: The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul (1988), Ch. 4

Life , Disappointment , Learning , Joy

“Ignorance is like a delicate exotic fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Lady Bracknell, Act I.
The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)
Source: The Importance of Being Earnest and Other Plays
Context: I do not approve of anything that tampers with natural ignorance. Ignorance is like a delicate exotic fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone.

“Adam's temperament was the first command the Deity ever issued to a human being on this planet. And it was the only command Adam would never be able to disobey. It said, "Be weak, be water, be characterless, be cheaply persuadable." The later command, to let the fruit alone, was certain to be disobeyed. Not by Adam himself, but by his temperament”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

which he did not create and had no authority over.
"The Turning Point of my Life", §3, Harper's Bazar, February 1910, as reprinted in Essays and Sketches of Mark Twain (1995), ed. Stuart Miller, ISBN 1566198798

Water

“The great Question may be—What should be done with those who are enslaved already? To turn the old and infirm free, would be injustice and cruelty; they who enjoyed the labours of their better days should keep, and treat them humanely. As to the rest, let prudent men, with the assistance of legislatures, determine what is practicable for masters, and best for them. Perhaps some could give them lands upon reasonable rent, some, employing them in their labour still, might give them some reasonable allowances for it; so as all may have some property, and fruits of their labours at their own disposal, and be encouraged to industry; the family may live together, and enjoy the natural satisfaction of exercising relative affections and duties, with civil protection, and other advantages, like fellow men. Perhaps they might sometime form useful barrier settlements on the frontiers. Thus they may become interested in the public welfare, and assist in promoting it; instead of being dangerous, as now they are, should any enemy promise them a better condition.”

Thomas Paine (1737–1809) English and American political activist

1770s, African Slavery in America (March 1775)

Men , Family , Exercises , Question

“Life and experience. If one notices how some individuals know how to treat their experiences (their insignificant everyday experiences) so that these become a plot of ground that bears fruit three times a year; while others (and how many of them!) are driven through the waves of the most exciting turns of fate, of the most varied currents of their time or nation, and yet always stay lightly on the surface, like cork: then one is finally tempted to divide mankind into a minority (minimality) of those people who know how to make much out of little and a majority of those who know how to make a little out of much; indeed, one meets those perverse wizards who, instead of creating the world out of nothing, create nothing out of the world.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Human, All Too Human

Section IX, "Man Alone with Himself" / aphorism 627
Human, All Too Human (1878), Helen Zimmern translation

Life , Fate , People , World

“How many times, for instance, have we not heard people speak with all the authority of conviction about the "canine teeth" and "simple stomach" of man, as certain evidence of his natural adaptation for a flesh diet! At least we have demonstrated one fact; that if such arguments are valid, they apply with even greater force to the anthropoid apes—whose "canine" teeth are much longer and more powerful than those of man … And yet, with the solitary exception of man, there is not one of these last which does not in a natural condition absolutely refuse to feed on flesh! M. Pouchet observes that all the details of the digestive apparatus in man, as well as his dentition, constitute "so many proofs of his frugivorous origin"—an opinion shared by Professor Owen, who remarks that the anthropoids and all the quadrumana derive their alimentation from fruits, grains, and other succulent and nutritive vegetable substances, and that the strict analogy which exists between the structure of these animals and that of man clearly demonstrates his frugivorous nature. This is also the view taken by Cuvier, Linnæus, Professor Lawrence, Charles Bell, Gassendi, Flourens, and a great number of other eminent writers.”

Anna Kingsford (1846–1888) English physician, activist and feminist

The Perfect Way in Diet (London: Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., 1881), pp. 13 https://archive.org/stream/perfectwayindie00kinggoog#page/n34-14.

People , Nature , Time , Animals

“The Bible is such an interesting book to me, because it says so many things that you can't really follow it all, I don't think, can you? So I guess that's why God invented highlighters, so we could find the parts we especially like and mark them up and just follow that, cause I think if you follow any of it, you're doing pretty good, except for the part - my favorite part - did you know the most reiterated command in the whole Bible is the command to sing? Now there must be a reason for that. And uh, that's why I sing. I don't really enjoy it, I think it's hard work. I like writing, but I sing because I figure if you find a command that easy to follow you should do it a whole lot. Cause the rest of them are kinda rough, except the first command, the one to be fruitful and multiply. Most people I know have trouble not keeping that command. That's the thing that cracks me up about you know, proof-texting too. Everyone's proof-texting this book about Christ and Christ Himself said, you know, you search the Scriptures to find life, and you're not gonna find it there. But no one underlined that part, not even my folks, because we live in a time when we have come to believe that there are answers… and I don't know why we believe that. And even more worrisome is I'm not even sure why we ever came to believe that questions are all that important.”

Rich Mullins (1955–1997) American christian musician

Wheaton, Illinois http://www.kidbrothers.net/words/concert-transcripts/wheaton-illinois-sep1590-backup-copy.html (April 11, 1997)
In Concert

Life , God , People , Books

“Southern trees bear a strange fruit
Blood on the leaf and blood at the root
Black bodies swingin’ in the southern breeze
Strange fruit hangin’ in the poplar trees.”

Billie Holiday (1915–1959) American jazz singer and songwriter

"Strange Fruit" (1939). Though Holiday's renditions made this anti-lynching song famous, it was written by Abel Meeropol (using his pseudonym "Lewis Allen").
Misattributed

Tree

“It has so happened in all ages of the world, that some have laboured, and others have, without labour, enjoyed a large proportion of the fruits. This is wrong, and should not continue. To each labourer the whole product of his labour, or as nearly as possible, is a most worthy object of any good government.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume I, "Fragments of a Tariff Discussion" (1 December 1847)
1840s

Age , World

“Although most of us conduct our lives as omnivores, in that we eat flesh as well as vegetables and fruits, human beings have characteristics of herbivores, not carnivores. The appendages of carnivores are claws; those of herbivores are hands or hooves. The teeth of carnivores are sharp; those of herbivores are mainly flat (for grinding). The intestinal tract of carnivores is short (3 times body length); that of herbivores, long (12 times body length). Body cooling of carnivores is done by panting; herbivores, by sweating. Carnivores drink fluids by lapping; herbivores, by sipping. Carnivores produce their own vitamin C, whereas herbivores obtain it from their diet. Thus, humans have characteristics of herbivores, not carnivores.”

William C. Roberts (1932) American physician

Twenty questions on atherosclerosis

Drink , Time

“Impatience is a great obstacle to success; he who treats everything with brusqueness gathers nothing, or only immature fruit which will never ripen.”

Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French

Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)

Success

“Physical pleasure is a sensual experience no different from pure seeing or the pure sensation with which a fine fruit fills the tongue; it is a great unending experience, which is given us, a knowing of the world, the fullness and the glory of all knowing. And not our acceptance of it is bad; the bad thing is that most people misuse and squander this experience and apply it as a stimulant at the tired spots of their lives and as distraction instead of a rallying toward exalted moments.”

Rainer Maria Rilke book Letters to a Young Poet

Letter Four (16 July 1903)
Letters to a Young Poet (1934)

People , Pleasure , World

“A civil war occurring in a country, where foreigners reside and carry on trade under treaty stipulations is necessarily fruitful of complaints of the violation of neutral rights. All such collisions tend to excite misapprehensions, and possibly to produce mutual reclamations between nations which have a common interest in preserving peace and friendship.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

1860s, Second State of the Union address (1862)

Friendship , War , Peace , Country

“India's education had two aims, both organically linked. One was to strengthen our body and mind, our nerves and vitality. If the Indian teaching on this subject is followed faithfully, it ensures full, vigorous, healthy and long life. Similarly, it ensures health and unimpaired senses and a mind with undiminished powers. According to the Hindu Psychology, a man's mind and senses are powers of the soul. Therefore, they should be strengthened, widened, deepened, purified. "May I see and hear clearly and abundantly", is the repeated prayer in the, several Upanishads. Another variant of this prayer is: "May our eyes see the good, our ears hear the good." To see and hear and desire better, purer, finer and deeper is the first aim of Indian education. This means strengthening character, controlling desires and impulses, increasing powers of concentration and will. Not only this opens up our hidden powers, but this is even the basis of any fruitful life at all. If our senses and mind run their unbridled course, uninformed by any higher light, they will lead to self-destruction. But purified in the light of the soul, they become a blessing.”

Ram Swarup (1920–1998) Indian historian

On Hinduism (2000)

Life , Health , Education , Soul

“Though I think that man has from nature the capacity of living, either by prey, or upon the fruits of the earth; it appears to me, that by nature, and in his original state, he is a frugivorous animal, and that he only becomes an animal of prey by acquired habit.”

James Burnett, Lord Monboddo (1714–1799) Scottish judge, scholar of language evolution and philosopher

Of the Origin and Progress of Language (Edinburgh and London: J. Balfour and T. Cadell, 2nd ed., 1774), Vol. I, Book II, Ch. II, pp. 224-225 https://archive.org/stream/originandprogre01conggoog#page/n251/mode/2up.

Nature , Thinking , Appearance , Animals

“I am distinctly opposed to visibly arrogant and arbitrary extremes of government—but this is simply because I wish the safety of an artistic and intellectual civilisation to be secure, not because I have any sympathy with the coarse-grained herd who would menace the civilisation if not placated by sops. Surely you can see the profound and abysmal difference between this emotional attitude and the attitude of the democratic reformer who becomes wildly excited over the "wrongs of the masses". This reformer has uppermost in his mind the welfare of those masses themselves—he feels with them, takes up a mental-emotional point of view as one of them, regards their advancement as his prime objective independently of anything else, and would willingly sacrifice the finest fruits of the civilisation for the sake of stuffing their bellies and giving them two cinema shows instead of one per day. I, on the other hand, don't give a hang about the masses except so far as I think deliberate cruelty is coarse and unaesthetic—be it towards horses, oxen, undeveloped men, dogs, negroes, or poultry. All that I care about is the civilisation—the state of development and organisation which is capable of gratifying the complex mental-emotional-aesthetic needs of highly evolved and acutely sensitive men. Any indignation I may feel in the whole matter is not for the woes of the downtrodden, but for the threat of social unrest to the traditional institutions of the civilisation. The reformer cares only for the masses, but may make concessions to the civilisation. I care only for the civilisation, but may make concessions to the masses. Do you not see the antipodal difference between the two positions? Both the reformer and I may unite in opposing an unworkably arrogant piece of legislation, but the motivating reasons will be absolutely antithetical. He wants to give the crowd as much as can be given them without wrecking all semblance of civilisation, whereas I want to give them only as much as can be given them without even slightly impairing the level of national culture. … He works for as democratic a government as possible; I for as aristocratic a one as possible.”

H.P. Lovecraft (1890–1937) American author

But both recognise the limitations of possibility.
Letter to Woodburn Harris (25 February-1 March 1929), in Selected Letters II, 1925-1929 edited by August Derleth and Donald Wandrei, pp. 289-290
Non-Fiction, Letters

Men , Dogs , Feeling , Motivation

“I arrived at length at Cairo, mother of cities and seat of Pharaoh the tyrant, mistress of broad regions and fruitful lands, boundless in multitude of buildings, peerless in beauty and splendour, the meeting-place of comer and goer, the halting-place of feeble and mighty, whose throngs surge as the waves of the sea, and can scarce be contained in her for all her size and capacity.”

Ibn Battuta (1304–1377) Moroccan explorer

Travels in Asia and Africa (Rehalã of Ibn Battûta)

Beauty , Sea

“To this end we now need many preparatory courageous human beings who cannot very well leap out of nothing — any more than out of the sand and slime of present-day civilization and metropolitanism: human beings who know how to be silent, lonely, resolute, and content and constant in invisible activities; human beings who are bent on seeking in all things for what in them must be overcome; human beings distinguished as much by cheerfulness, patience, unpretentiousness, and contempt for all great vanities as by magnanimity in victory and forbearance regarding the small vanities of the vanquished; human beings whose judgment concerning all victors and the share of chance in every victory and fame is sharp and free; human beings with their own festivals, their own working days, and their own periods of mourning, accustomed to command with assurance but instantly ready to obey when that is called for, equally proud, equally serving their own cause in both cases; more endangered human beings, more fruitful human beings, happier beings!”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

The Gay Science (1882)

Courage , Chance , Victory , Patience

“As they say in Discworld, we are trying to unravel the Mighty Infinite using a language which was designed to tell one another where the fresh fruit was.”

Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) English author

Relatively Einstein http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/science/relativelyeinstein.shtml episode 3, "Fantasy Physics" (18 January 2005); the Discworld version of this statement appears in Night Watch (2002)
General sources

“The seasons come and the seasons go, the summer fruit and the winter snow, but here we are, and here we stay — until the time to go away.
Ah, they say, there's a land that is great, and is grand; there's no fear, and no pain — we will all live again — and everyone will find the ones they love.”

Eden ahbez (1908–1995) American songwriter and recording artist

"The Wanderer" from Eden's Island (1960)

Love , Pain , Fear , Winter

“It is my misfortune - and probably my delight - to use things as my passions tell me. What a miserable fate for a painter who adores blondes to have to stop himself putting them into a picture because they don't go with the basket of fruit!”

Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer

Herschel Browning Chip (1968, p. 267).
(another and longer version:) What a sad fate for a painter who loves blondes, but who refrains from putting them in his picture because they don’t go with the basket of fruit! What misery for a painter who hates apples to be obliged to use them all the time because they go with the cloth! I put everything I love in my paintings. So much the worse for the things, they have only to arrange themselves with one another
Richard Friendenthal (1963, p. 256).
1930s, "Conversations avec Picasso," 1934–35

Fate , Passion

“The very reason [ the Greeks] got so far is that they knew how to pick up the spear and throw it onward from the point where others had left it. Their skill in the art of fruitful learning was admirable. We ought to be learning from our neighbors precisely as the Greeks learned from theirs, not for the sake of learned pedantry but rather using everything we learn as a foothold which will take us up as high, and higher, than our neighbor.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks

Source: Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks (posthumous), p. 30

Art , Learning

“When you read Genesis, you find that it was Adam who was given the specific instruction not to eat the fruit of the tree. You see, Adam was created first, and God had ordained that he was to be the head of his family. He then gave Adam instruction as to what was expected of him. Adam, of course, would've told Eve, because she was really under his headship. Therefore, when Eve took the fruit, Adam shouldn't have joined her. He should've gone directly to God and asked for a solution. Instead, he joined his wife and brought sin and death into the world. You know, this is a lesson we need to learn today about men taking the leadership role in their families.”

Ken Ham (1951) Australian young Earth creationist

Did Adam have a Bellybutton?: And other tough questions about the Bible (2000)

Death , Men , God , World

“If then we would indeed be “filled with wisdom and spiritual understanding;” if we would “walk worthy of the Lord unto all well pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;” here let us fix our eyes! “Laying aside every weight, and the sin that does so easily beset us; let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Here best we may learn the infinite importance of Christianity. How little it can deserve to be treated in that slight and superficial way, in which it is in these days regarded by the bulk of nominal Christians, who are apt to think it may be enough, and almost equally pleasing to God, to be religious in any way, and upon any system. What exquisite folly it must be to risk the soul on such a venture, in direct contradiction to the dictates of reason, and the express declaration of the word of God! “How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?”
LOOKING UNTO JESUS!
Here we shall best learn the duty and reasonableness of an absolute and unconditional surrender of soul and body to the will and service of God.—“We are not our own; for we are bought with a price,” and must “therefore” make it our grand concern to “glorify God with our bodies and our spirits, which are God’s.” Should we be base enough, even if we could do it with safety, to make any reserves in our returns of service to that gracious Saviour, who “gave up himself for us?” If we have formerly talked of compounding by the performance of some commands for the breach of others; can we now bear the mention of a composition of duties, or of retaining to ourselves the right of practising little sins! The very suggestion of such an idea fills us with indignation and shame, if our hearts be not dead to every sense of gratitude.
LOOKING UNTO JESUS!
Here we find displayed, in the most lively colours, the guilt of sin, and how hateful it must be to the perfect holiness of that Being, “who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity.” When we see that, rather than sin should go unpunished, “God spared not his own Son,” but “was pleased[99], to bruise him and put him to grief” for our sakes; how vainly must impenitent sinners flatter themselves with the hope of escaping the vengeance of Heaven, and buoy themselves up with I know not what desperate dreams of the Divine benignity!
Here too we may anticipate the dreadful sufferings of that state, “where shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth;” when rather than that we should undergo them, “the Son of God” himself, who “thought it no robbery to be equal with God,” consented to take upon him our degraded nature with all its weaknesses and infirmities; to be “a man of sorrows,” “to hide not his face from shame and spitting,” “to be wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities,” and at length to endure the sharpness of death, “even the death of the Cross,” that he might “deliver us from the wrath to come,” and open the kingdom of Heaven to all believers.
LOOKING UNTO JESUS!
Here best we may learn to grow in the love of God! The certainty of his pity and love towards repenting sinners, thus irrefragably demonstrated, chases away the sense of tormenting fear, and best lays the ground in us of a reciprocal affection. And while we steadily contemplate this wonderful transaction, and consider in its several relations the amazing truth, that “God spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all;” if our minds be not utterly dead to every impulse of sensibility, the emotions of admiration, of preference, of hope, and trust, and joy, cannot but spring up within us, chastened with reverential fear, and softened and quickened by overflowing gratitude. Here we shall become animated by an abiding disposition to endeavour to please our great Benefactor; and by a humble persuasion, that the weakest endeavours of this nature will not be despised by a Being, who has already proved himself so kindly affected towards us. Here we cannot fail to imbibe an earnest desire of possessing his favour, and a conviction, founded on his own declarations thus unquestionably confirmed, that the desire shall not be disappointed. Whenever we are conscious that we have offended this gracious Being, a single thought of the great work of Redemption will be enough to fill us with compunction. We shall feel a deep concern, grief mingled with indignant shame, for having conducted ourselves so unworthily towards one who to us has been infinite in kindness: we shall not rest till we have reason to hope that he is reconciled to us; and we shall watch over our hearts and conduct in future with a renewed jealousy, [Pg 243] lest we should again offend him. To those who are ever so little acquainted with the nature of the human mind, it were superfluous to remark, that the affections and tempers which have been enumerated, are the infallible marks and the constituent properties of Love. Let him then who would abound and grow in this Christian principle, be much conversant with the great doctrines of the Gospel.
It is obvious, that the attentive and frequent consideration of these great doctrines, must have a still more direct tendency to produce and cherish in our minds the principle of the love of Christ.”

William Wilberforce (1759–1833) English politician

Source: Real Christianity (1797), p. 240-243.

Love , Death , Wisdom , God

“Let us therefore join hands, Britons, Burmans and all nations alike, to build up an abiding fruitful peace over the foundations of the hard-won victory that all of us desiring progressive direction in our own affairs and in the world at large, have at long last snatched firmly and completely from the grabbing hands of Fascist barbarians, a peace, as I have said, not of the graveyard, but creative of freedom, progress and prosperity in the world.”

Aung San (1915–1947) Burmese revolutionary leader

Address delivered at the meeting of East and West Association held on August 29, 1945, at the City Hall of Rangoon

World , Peace , Freedom , Victory

“The story of Adam and Eve represents the fruit as producing a psychological transformation. So the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is an abstraction across trees, and it's trying to say: 'Here's something that's common across trees, it's a fruit that's common across trees.' The fruit that's common across trees is something that you might call food, fair enough. But here's something that's even more cool: food that's stable across the entire domain of food, isn't food – it's information. We use the same bloody circuits in our brain to forage for information, that animals use to forage for information. Why is that? Because we figured out knowing where the food is, is more important than having the food… That's why we're information foragers.”

Jordan Peterson (1962) Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology

Biblical Series IV: Adam and Eve: Self-Consciousness, Evil, and Death https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ifi5KkXig3s

Food , Knowledge , Tree , Evil

“So, there lies the brave de Kalb. The generous stranger, who came from a distant land to fight our battles and to water with his blood the tree of liberty. Would to God he had lived to share its fruits!”

George Washington (1732–1799) first President of the United States

Upon visiting the grave of Johann de Kalb, some years after his death, as quoted in "Baron De Kalb" https://books.google.com/books?id=40wyAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA96&dq=%22Would+to+God+he+had+lived+to+share+its+fruits%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=2IoZVa3XLuyasQTXiIDoCg&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22Would%20to%20God%20he%20had%20lived%20to%20share%20its%20fruits%22&f=false (1827), by George R. Graham and Edgar Allan Poe, Graham's Illustrated Magazine of Literature, Romance, Art, and Fashion, Volume 2, Watson, p. 96.
Posthumous attributions

God , Tree , Water , Distant

“When we rejoice in our fulness, then we can part with our fruits with joy.”

Rabindranath Tagore Stray Birds

159
Stray Birds (1916)

Joy , Parting

“My father was a schoolmaster in a little North German town, and for the very reason that at home culture was a means of livelihood, I detested learning and literature from childhood onwards. That is nature's way. In pursuance of her mysterious design to safeguard the creative faculty, she is apt to make children scorn their father's bent. She does not want to encourage an easy, effortless acceptance of a heritage, a mere handing down of acquisitions from one generation to the next. She sows the seeds of discord, and will only allow children to follow in their parent's footsteps after they have made laborious but fruitful detours.”

Stefan Zweig (1881–1942) Austrian writer

Confusion of Feelings or Confusion: The Private Papers of Privy Councillor R. Von D (1927)

Children , Way , Home , Literature

“With respect to what are called denominations of religion, if every one is left to judge of its own religion, there is no such thing as a religion that is wrong; but if they are to judge of each other's religion, there is no such thing as a religion that is right; and therefore all the world is right, or all the world is wrong. But with respect to religion itself, without regard to names, and as directing itself from the universal family of mankind to the Divine object of all adoration, it is man bringing to his Maker the fruits of his heart; and though those fruits may differ from each other like the fruits of the earth, the grateful tribute of every one is accepted.”

Thomas Paine book Rights of Man

Part 1.3 Rights of Man
1790s, Rights of Man, Part I (1791)

World , Family , Religion , Universe

“There's not a stupidest thing--I've dressed in women's clothes, I've dressed as a Nazi. I've gone onstage naked. I've gone on so drunk I didn't even know I did a show. I've done so many stupid things, but it's all part of Ozzy. I never pre-planned 99.9% of the things I've done. Some were drastically wrong, some were drastically right. I don't know if you saw the VH1 thing [VH1's Behind The Music Ozzy documentary] recently. In one hour, it's impossible to write my life down. I come from a rather large family, three older sisters and two younger brothers. On the documentary, they interviewed my sister and it was the first time I'd seen her in years. I've had a very, very unique life. I often sit back and remember when I had no money--when you're in the middle of it, you get depressed thinking it's going to last forever. All of a sudden, out of nowhere--a bolt of lightning--here I am! I'm very well-off; I've got property all over the place, I've had a very fruitful career. But I've never had a No.1 album in America. But I've lasted several generations and somebody says to me, "Do you notice any difference in the audience?"”

Ozzy Osbourne (1948) English heavy metal vocalist and songwriter

I've been doing it now for 30 years. Some of the fans are older, but I've picked up new fans along the way.

Launch.com, October 30, 1998

Life , Women , Money , Stupidity

“Christ is risen, and you are overthrown! Christ is risen, and the demons are fallen! Christ is risen, and the angels rejoice! Christ is risen, and life reigns! Christ is risen, and not one dead remains in a tomb! For Christ, being raised from the dead, has become the first-fruits of them that have slept.”

John Chrysostom (349–407) important Early Church Father

Paschal Homily

Life , Angels , Christ , Dead

“It is by a blend of lively curiosity and intelligent selfishness that the artists who wish to mature late, who feel too old to die, the Goethes, Tolstoys, Voltaires, Titians and Verdis, reach a fruitful senescence. They cannot afford to associate with those who are burning themselves up or preparing for a tragedy or whom melancholy has marked for her own. Not for them the accident-prone, the friend in whom the desire for self-destruction keeps blistering out in broken legs or threatening them in anxiety-neuroses. Not for them the drumming finger, the close-cropt nail, the chewed glasses, the pause on the threshold, the wandering eye, or the repeated ‘um’ and ‘er.”

Cyril Connolly book Enemies of Promise

Source: Enemies of Promise (1938), Part 2: The Charlock’s Shade, Ch. 16: Outlook Unsettled (p. 137)

Feeling , Intelligence , Selfishness

“The woman offers the man fruit. Maybe that's how our female ancestors enticed males to join them in caring for offspring. 'I'll offer you food, and in response we're going to make a team. That's the deal.' And that's the human deal. That's why we're more or less monogamous and why we more or less pair-bond, and why something approximating marriage is a human universal. You can find exceptions, but who cares? Look at the vast pattern. The price we pay for having very large brains is that we're very dependent, and it takes a long time for us to get programmed, and because of that we need relatively stable family bonding, and that's basically what we've evolved. You don't get that without making males self conscious. Why not impregnate and run. It's not 'why do men abandon their children?' that's the mystery. It's 'why do any men ever stick with them?”

Jordan Peterson (1962) Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology

Just look at the animal kingdom. The simple and easiest thing is always the most likely thing to occur. It's the exception - the long term commitment - that needs explanation."
Concepts

Men , Marriage , Children , Family

“Dinocrates, I appreciate your design as excellent in composition, and I am delighted with it, but I apprehend that anybody who should found a city in that spot would be censured for bad judgement. For as a newborn babe cannot be nourished without the nurse's milk, nor conducted to the approaches that lead to growth in life, so a city cannot thrive without fields and the fruits thereof pouring into its walls.”

Alexander the Great (-356–-323 BC) King of Macedon

Vitruvius, De Architectura Bk. 2, Introduction, Sec. 3

Life

“I always believed that at some time fate would take from me the terrible effort and duty of educating myself. I believed that, when the time came, I would discover a philosopher to educate me, a true philosopher whom one could follow without any misgiving because one would have more faith in him than one had in oneself. Then I asked myself: what would be the principles by which he would educate you?—and I reflected on what he might say about the two educational maxims which are being hatched in our time. One of them demands that the educator should quickly recognize the real strength of his pupil and then direct all his efforts and energy and heat at them so as to help that one virtue to attain true maturity and fruitfulness. The other maxim, on the contrary, requires that the educator should draw forth and nourish all the forces which exist in his pupil and bring them to a harmonious relationship with one another. … But where do we discover a harmonious whole at all, a simultaneous sounding of many voice in one nature, if not in such men as Cellini, men in whom everything, knowledge, desire, love, hate, strives towards a central point, a root force, and where a harmonious system is constructed through the compelling domination of this living centre? And so perhaps these two maxims are not opposites at all? Perhaps the one simply says that man should have a center and the other than he should also have a periphery? That educating philosopher of whom I dreamed would, I came to think, not only discover the central force, he would also know how to prevent its acting destructively on the other forces: his educational task would, it seemed to me, be to mould the whole man into a living solar and planetary system and to understand its higher laws of motion.”

Friedrich Nietzsche Untimely Meditations

“Schopenhauer as educator,” § 3.2, R. Hollingdale, trans. (1983), pp. 130-131
Untimely Meditations (1876)

Love , Men , Hate , Fate

“According to the old story, King Midas had long hunted wise Silenus, Dionysus' companion, without catching him. When Silenus had finally fallen into his clutches, the king asked him what was the best and most desirable thing of all for mankind. The daemon stood still, stiff and motionless, until at last, forced by the king, he gave a shrill laugh and spoke these words: 'Miserable, ephemeral race, children of hazard and hardship, why do you force me to say what it would be much more fruitful for you not to hear? The best of all things is something entirely outside your grasp: not to be born, not to be, to be nothing. But the second-best thing for you — is to die soon.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book The Birth of Tragedy

Es geht die alte Sage, dass König Midas lange Zeit nach dem weisen Silen, dem Begleiter des Dionysus, im Walde gejagt habe, ohne ihn zu fangen. Als er ihm endlich in die Hände gefallen ist, fragt der König, was für den Menschen das Allerbeste und Allervorzüglichste sei. Starr und unbeweglich schweigt der Dämon; bis er, durch den König gezwungen, endlich unter gellem Lachen in diese Worte ausbricht: `Elendes Eintagsgeschlecht, des Zufalls Kinder und der Mühsal, was zwingst du mich dir zu sagen, was nicht zu hören für dich das Erspriesslichste ist? Das Allerbeste ist für dich gänzlich unerreichbar: nicht geboren zu sein, nicht zu sein, nichts zu sein. Das Zweitbeste aber ist für dich - bald zu sterben.
Source: The Birth of Tragedy (1872), p. 22

Children

“O mortals, from your fellows' blood abstain,
Nor taint your bodies with a food profane:
While corn, and pulse by Nature are bestow'd,
And planted orchards bend their willing load;
While labour'd gardens wholesom herbs produce,
And teeming vines afford their gen'rous juice;
Nor tardier fruits of cruder kind are lost,
But tam'd with fire, or mellow'd by the frost;
While kine to pails distended udders bring,
And bees their hony redolent of Spring;
While Earth not only can your needs supply,
But, lavish of her store, provides for luxury;
A guiltless feast administers with ease,
And without blood is prodigal to please.”
Parcite, mortales, dapibus temerare nefandis corpora! sunt fruges, sunt deducentia ramos pondere poma suo tumidaeque in vitibus uvae, sunt herbae dulces, sunt quae mitescere flamma mollirique queant; nec vobis lacteus umor eripitur, nec mella thymi redolentia florem: prodiga divitias alimentaque mitia tellus suggerit atque epulas sine caede et sanguine praebet.

Ovid Metamorphoses

Book XV, 75–82 (from Wikisource); on vegetarianism, as the following quote
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Food , Spring , Nature , Bee

“I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.”

Smedley D. Butler (1881–1940) United States Marine Corps General, 2 time Medal of Honor recipient and activist

War is a racket (1935)
Source: Common Sense, Vol. 4, No. 11 (November, 1935), p. 8. Quoted in 'I Might Have Given Al Capone a Few Hints' https://www.nytimes.com/1987/09/10/opinion/l-i-might-have-given-al-capone-a-few-hints-023587.html, The New York Times, September 10, 1987.

Way , Boy , Business , Light

“Work is the outcome of effort; fruit, of life.”

James Hudson Taylor (1832–1905) Missionary in China

(J. Hudson Taylor. A Ribband of Blue and Other Bible Studies. London: China Inland Mission, n.d., 45).

Life , Effort