Quotes about supper

A collection of quotes on the topic of supper, time, timing, night.

Quotes about supper

Percy Bysshe Shelley photo
Mark Twain photo
Bede photo

“The present life of man, O king, seems to me, in comparison of that time which is unknown to us, like to the swift flight of a sparrow through the room wherein you sit at supper in winter, with your commanders and ministers, and a good fire in the midst, whilst the storms of rain and snow prevail abroad; the sparrow, I say, flying in at one door, and immediately out at another, whilst he is within, is safe from the wintry storm; but after a short space of fair weather, he immediately vanishes out of your sight, into the dark winter from which he had emerged. So this life of man appears for a short space, but of what went before, or what is to follow, we are utterly ignorant. If, therefore, this new doctrine contains something more certain, it seems justly to deserve to be followed.”
Talis...mihi uidetur, rex, vita hominum praesens in terris, ad conparationem eius, quod nobis incertum est, temporis, quale cum te residente ad caenam cum ducibus ac ministris tuis tempore brumali, accenso quidem foco in medio, et calido effecto caenaculo, furentibus autem foris per omnia turbinibus hiemalium pluviarum vel nivium, adveniens unus passeium domum citissime pervolaverit; qui cum per unum ostium ingrediens, mox per aliud exierit. Ipso quidem tempore, quo intus est, hiemis tempestate non tangitur, sed tamen parvissimo spatio serenitatis ad momentum excurso, mox de hieme in hiemem regrediens, tuis oculis elabitur. Ita haec vita hominum ad modicum apparet; quid autem sequatur, quidue praecesserit, prorsus ignoramus. Unde si haec nova doctrina certius aliquid attulit, merito esse sequenda videtur.

Book II, chapter 13
This, Bede tells us, was the advice given to Edwin, King of Northumbria by one of his chief men, at a meeting where the king proposed that he and his followers should convert to Christianity. It followed a speech by the chief priest Coifi, who also spoke in favor of conversion.
Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum (Ecclesiastical History of the English People)

John of the Cross photo
James Russell Lowell photo

“The Holy Supper is kept, indeed,
In whatso we share with another's need,—”

James Russell Lowell (1819–1891) American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat

Pt. II, st. 8
The Vision of Sir Launfal (1848)
Context: The Holy Supper is kept, indeed,
In whatso we share with another's need,—
Not that which we give, but what we share,—
For the gift without the giver is bare;
Who bestows himself with his alms feeds three,—
Himself, his hungering neighbor, and me.

Dan Brown photo
Tom Robbins photo
Cassandra Clare photo

“Henry," said Charlotte, who appeared to have recovered from her shock, "if you set yourself on fire deliberately, I will institute divorce proceedings. Now sit down and eat your supper. And say hello to our guest.”

Variant: Henry," said Charlotte, who seemed to have recovered from her shock, "if you set yourself on fire deliberately, I will institute divorce proceedings. Now sit down and eat your supper. And say hello to our guest.
Source: Clockwork Angel

William Goldman photo
Charles Simic photo

“If the sky falls they shall have clouds for supper.”

Charles Simic (1938) American poet

Source: The World Doesn't End: Prose Poems

John Flanagan photo
Shunryu Suzuki photo

“To have some deep feeling about Buddhism is not the point; we just do what we should do, like eating supper and going to bed. This is Buddhism.”

Shunryu Suzuki (1904–1971) Japanese Buddhist missionary

Source: Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

Francis Bacon photo

“Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper.”

Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, and author

No. 36
Apophthegms (1624)
Variant: Money is a great servant but a bad master.

Scott Adams photo

“Biblical scholars tell us that this is the same meal that Jesus ate at the last supper. But hey, I’m sure you have a good reason for ordering something else.”

Scott Adams (1957) cartoonist, writer

"Menus: Jambalaya", Stacey's at Waterford, 2008-01-14 http://www.eatatstaceys.com/staceys-waterford/menus-lunch.php,
Restaurant menus

Willy Russell photo
William Morley Punshon photo
Plutarch photo

“As Cæsar was at supper the discourse was of death,—which sort was the best. "That," said he, "which is unexpected."”

Plutarch (46–127) ancient Greek historian and philosopher

Cæsar
Roman Apophthegms

Albrecht Thaer photo

“Arriving in Berlin, I found myself in my element, and began to breathe freely. Jerusalem and Lessing had given us letters of introduction to the greatest men in Berlin; but they knew us already, Leisewitz as author of "Julius Von Tarent," and myself as author of my Dissertation. We had daily the choice of the first society; covers were laid for us in the first families daily, for dinner as well as supper. Von Zetlitz sent a general invitation that covers were laid for us every day during our stay in Berlin. Most of the time we could spare was divided between physicians and philosophers, of which the latter had the greater share. Spalding, Mendelsohn, Eberhard, Engel, Nicolai, Reichard, and Madame Bamberger, daughter of Doctor Sack, Bishop of Berlin, honoured us with their most sincere friendship. The latter, a highly gifted and accomplished lady, possessed the rare art of spreading over the most abstract hypothesis and theorem the brightest and most charming light; Jerusalem, the father of the ill-fated Werther (see the "Sorrows of Werther," by Goethe), used to send her his works to correct, and she alone was able to console and comfort him, when he was informed of the death of his beloved son. This amiable lady assumes in common life the character of a plain woman, and when at court, as friend of the Queen and the Princess Amalie, she won all hearts by her truly noble man ners and unconstrained courtesy: at court beloved, she was admired, nay, adored in the philosophical clubs. But do not think that here alone we spent all our time; Madame Bamberger knew how to blend study with amusement; she issued frequently cards of invitation to select parties, for suppers and balls, and her house was the point of union of all that was learned, beautiful, and amiable. Thus Berlin became my Paradise. I had the most tempting offers from the Minister of State to stay here; but the illness of my father obliged me, after a stay of three months, to return home. I visited Lessing on my journey back; stayed two days, which were the most interesting of all days I ever remember.”

Albrecht Thaer (1752–1828) German agronomist and an avid supporter of the humus theory for plant nutrition

My Life and Confessions, for Philippine, 1786

Bill Engvall photo
Mary Wortley Montagu photo
Rudy Rucker photo
John Wallis photo

“The harvest-home or supper is a thing of the past. To those who feel the fascination of the past this may appear sad, but it is not so really for, even while it existed, this surface goodwill was often an empty show.”

Flora Thompson (1876–1947) English author and poet

August Chapter The Peverel Papers - A yearbook of the countryside ed Julian Shuckburgh Century Hutchinson 1986
The Peverel Papers

Johannes Bosboom photo

“To show this later progress in my own work I refer to my [paintings] 'Organ-playing monk', in 1850, my 'Lord's Supper in the Geestes-kerk (church) in Utrecht' in 1852, and my 'Bakenesse-kerk (church) in Haarlem', painted a dozen years later. All three can be found in the museum Fodor and can thus be compared to each other. The preference will undoubtedly be given to the latter, which for its strength and unity is counted among the masterpieces of this [Fodor] collection.”

Johannes Bosboom (1817–1891) Dutch painter

version in original Dutch (citaat van Johannes Bosboom, in Nederlands): Om dien lateren vooruitgang in mijn eigen werk te toonen, verwijs ik naar mijn [werken] 'Orgelspelende monnik' in 1850, mijn 'Avondmaalsviering in de Geesteskerk te Utrecht' in 1852 en mijn 'Bakenessekerk te Haarlem', een tiental jaren later geschilderd - alle drie in het museum Fodor te vinden en dus onderling te vergelijken. De voorkeur zal ongetwijfeld aan het laatste worden toegekend, dat om zijn kracht en éénheid tot de meesterstukjes dezer verzameling gerekend wordt.
Quote of Bosboom, in his autobiography, c. 1890; as cited in De Hollandsche Schilderkunst in de Negentiende Eeuw, G. H. Marius; https://ia800204.us.archive.org/31/items/dehollandschesch00mariuoft/dehollandschesch00mariuoft.pdf Martinus Nijhoff, s-’Gravenhage / The Hague, tweede druk, 1920, pp. 108-09 (translation from the original Dutch: Fons Heijnsbroek)
1890's

Stephen King photo
George Herbert photo

“307. Hee wrongs not an old man that steales his supper from him.”

George Herbert (1593–1633) Welsh-born English poet, orator and Anglican priest

Jacula Prudentum (1651)

Diogenes Laërtius photo

“A man once asked Diogenes what was the proper time for supper, and he made answer, "If you are a rich man, whenever you please; and if you are a poor man, whenever you can."”

Diogenes Laërtius (180–240) biographer of ancient Greek philosophers

Diogenes, 6.
The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (c. 200 A.D.), Book 6: The Cynics

Thomas Fuller (writer) photo

“2541. Hope is a good Breakfast, but a bad Supper.”

Thomas Fuller (writer) (1654–1734) British physician, preacher, and intellectual

Introductio ad prudentiam: Part II (1727), Gnomologia (1732)

Philipp Meyer photo
Harry Turtledove photo
Philip Schaff photo

“In the progress of the work he founded a Collegium Biblieum, or Bible club, consisting of his colleagues Melanchthon, Bugenhagen (Pommer), Cruciger, Justus Jonas, and Aurogallus. They met once a week in his house, several hours before supper. Deacon Georg Rörer (Rorarius), the first clergyman ordained by Luther, and his proof-reader, was also present; occasionally foreign scholars were admitted; and Jewish rabbis were freely consulted. Each member of the company contributed to the work from his special knowledge and preparation. Melanchthon brought with him the Greek Bible, Cruciger the Hebrew and Chaldee, Bugenhagen the Vulgate, others the old commentators; Luther had always with him the Latin and the German versions besides the Hebrew. Sometimes they scarcely mastered three lines of the Book of Job in four days, and hunted two, three, and four weeks for a single word. No record exists of the discussions of this remarkable company, but Mathesius says that "wonderfully beautiful and instructive speeches were made."
At last the whole Bible, including the Apocrypha as "books not equal to the Holy Scriptures, yet useful and good to read," was completed in 1534, and printed with numerous woodcuts.
In the mean time the New Testament had appeared in sixteen or seventeen editions, and in over fifty reprints.
Luther complained of the many errors in these irresponsible editions.
He never ceased to amend his translation. Besides correcting errors, he improved the uncouth and confused orthography, fixed the inflections, purged the vocabulary of obscure and ignoble words, and made the whole more symmetrical and melodious.
He prepared five original editions, or recensions, of his whole Bible, the last in 1545, a year before his death.
The edition of 1546 was prepared by his friend Rörer, and contains a large number of alterations, which he traced to Luther himself. Some of them are real improvements, e. g., Die Liebe höret nimmer auf, for, Die Liebe wird nicht müde (1 Cor. 13:8). The charge that he made the changes in the interest of Philippism (Melanchthonianism), seems to be unfounded.”

Philip Schaff (1819–1893) American Calvinist theologian

Luther's Bible club

Diogenes Laërtius photo

“Diogenes said once to a person who was showing him a dial, "It is a very useful thing to save a man from being too late for supper."”

Diogenes Laërtius (180–240) biographer of ancient Greek philosophers

Menedemus, 3.
The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (c. 200 A.D.), Book 6: The Cynics

Thomas Fuller (writer) photo

“2420. He wrongs not an old Man, who steals his Supper from him.”

Thomas Fuller (writer) (1654–1734) British physician, preacher, and intellectual

Compare Poor Richard's Almanack (1737) : He that steals the old man's supper, do's him no wrong.
Introductio ad prudentiam: Part II (1727), Gnomologia (1732)

Joan Miró photo

“How did I think up my drawings and my ideas for painting? Well I'd come home to my Paris studio in Rue Blomet at night, I'd go to bed, and sometimes I hadn't any supper. I saw things, and I jotted them down in a notebook. I saw shapes on the ceiling..”

Joan Miró (1893–1983) Catalan painter, sculptor, and ceramicist

from: Miro, on English Wikipedia
Miró's quote on 'automatic painting and drawing', explaining the start of his work 'Harlequin's Carnival' he made in Paris, strongly admired then by Surrealists like André Breton
1915 - 1940

Saki photo
John Aubrey photo
Will Cuppy photo
Frederick Buechner photo
Ilana Mercer photo

“The White House Correspondents' Dinner (WHCD) should have been more appropriately called the Sycophants' Supper. Would that it was the last such supper.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"Thanks, POTUS, For Breaking-Up The Annual Correspondents’ Circle Jerk." http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/05/thanks_potus_for_breakingup_the_annual_correspondents_circle_jerk.html The American Thinker, May 8, 2017.
2010s, 2017

“The Lord's Supper! the marriage supper of the Lamb! There are vacant seats around the table here. Will there be dear ones missed at the table there?”

Abbott Eliot Kittredge (1834–1912) American minister

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 374.

Tim McGraw photo
Larry Flynt photo

“Majority rule will only work if you're considering individual rights. You can't have five wolves and one sheep vote on what they want to have for supper”

Larry Flynt (1942) American publisher

[Carol LLoyd, Flynt's revenge http://www.salon.com/news/1999/02/cov_23newsa.html, Salon, 1999-02-23]

Gordon Lightfoot photo
Pauline Kael photo
Kent Hovind photo
James Hudson Taylor photo
Rosa Parks photo
Gottfried Leibniz photo
Joseph Goebbels photo

“After supper we are sitting close to the church in a quiet spot. As if from a distance we hear prayers and singing. The monks are holding their vesper services. Then it falls silent, wonderfully silent!
The sun has already set. … We are quiet, too. … A door is closed somewhere. A man's, then a woman's voice. Children are praying! My dear Jesus! Then it falls silent again. Wonderfully silent!
The night spreads its wide, black wings over the land.”

Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945) Nazi politician and Propaganda Minister

Nach dem Abendbrot sitzen wir an der Kirche in einem stillen Winkel. Wie von ferne hören wir Gebet und Singen. Die Mönche halten ihre Abendandacht. Und dann wird es still, wunderbar still!
Die Sonne ist schon untergegangen. … Auch wir schweigen. … Irgendwo wird eine Tür geschlossen. Eine Männer-, dann eine Frauenstimme. Kinderbeten! Du lieber Jesus mein! Dann wird es wieder still. Wunderbar still!
Die Nacht legt ihre breiten, schwarzen Flügel auf das Land.
Michael: a German fate in diary notes (1926)

Letitia Elizabeth Landon photo

“They say suppers are very unwholesome, our grandfathers and grandmothers never discovered it …”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

The Monthly Magazine

Ursula K. Le Guin photo

“Summon up a supper,” he said. “Oh, I could. On golden plates, if you like. But that’s illusion, and when you eat illusions you end up hungrier than before.”

Ursula K. Le Guin (1929–2018) American writer

Source: Earthsea Books, The Tombs of Atuan (1971), Chapter 11, "The Western Mountains"

George Gordon Byron photo

“What say you to such a supper with such a woman?”

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

Note to a Letter on Bowles's Strictures, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

Sinclair Lewis photo

“The doctor asserted, 'Sure religion is a fine influence—got to have it to keep the lower classes in order—fact, it's the only thing that appeals to a lot of these fellows and makes 'em respect the rights of property. And I guess this theology is O. K.; lot of wise old coots figured it out, and they knew more about it than we do.' He believed in the Christian religion, and never thought about it; he believed in the church, and seldom went near it; he was shocked by Carol's lack of faith, and wasn't quite sure what was the nature of the faith that she lacked. Carol herself was an uneasy and dodging agnostic. When she ventured to Sunday School and heard the teachers droning that the genealogy of Shamsherai was a valuable ethical problem for children to think about; when she experimented with the Wednesday prayer-meeting and listened to store-keeping elders giving unvarying weekly testimony in primitive erotic symbols and such gory Chaldean phrases as 'washed in the blood of the lamb' and 'a vengeful God…' then Carol was dismayed to find the Christian religion, in America, in the twentieth century, as abnormal as Zoroastrianism—without the splendor. But when she went to church suppers a felt the friendliness, saw the gaiety with which the sisters served cold ham and scalloped potatoes; when Mrs. Champ Perry cried to her, on an afternoon call, 'My dear, if you just knew how happy it makes you to come into abiding grace,' then Carol found the humanness behind the sanguinary and alien theology.”

Main Street (1920)

“And as for their piety towards God, it is very extraordinary; for before sun-rising they speak not a word about profane matters, but put up certain prayers which they have received from their forefathers, as if they made a supplication for its rising. After this every one of them are sent away by their curators, to exercise some of those arts wherein they are skilled, in which they labor with great diligence till the fifth hour. After which they assemble themselves together again into one place; and when they have clothed themselves in white veils, they then bathe their bodies in cold water. And after this purification is over, they every one meet together in an apartment of their own, into which it is not permitted to any of another sect to enter; while they go, after a pure manner, into the dining-room, as into a certain holy temple, and quietly set themselves down; upon which the baker lays them loaves in order; the cook also brings a single plate of one sort of food, and sets it before every one of them; but a priest says grace before meat; and it is unlawful for any one to taste of the food before grace be said. The same priest, when he hath dined, says grace again after meat; and when they begin, and when they end, they praise God, as he that bestows their food upon them; after which they lay aside their [white] garments, and betake themselves to their labors again till the evening; then they return home to supper, after the same manner; and if there be any strangers there, they sit down with them. Nor is there ever any clamor or disturbance to pollute their house, but they give every one leave to speak in their turn; which silence thus kept in their house appears to foreigners like some tremendous mystery; the cause of which is that perpetual sobriety they exercise, and the same settled measure of meat and drink that is allotted them, and that such as is abundantly sufficient for them.”

Jewish War

Herman Melville photo

“I feel that the Godhead is broken up like the bread at the Supper, and that we are the pieces. Hence this infinite fraternity of feeling.”

Herman Melville (1818–1891) American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet

Letter to Nathaniel Hawthorne (July 1851); published in Memories of Hawthorne (1897) by Rose Hawthorne Lathrop, p. 158
Context: Whence came you, Hawthorne? By what right do you drink from my flagon of life? And when I put it to my lips — lo, they are yours and not mine. I feel that the Godhead is broken up like the bread at the Supper, and that we are the pieces. Hence this infinite fraternity of feeling. Now, sympathising with the paper, my angel turns over another leaf. You did not care a penny for the book. But, now and then as you read, you understood the pervading thought that impelled the book — and that you praised. Was it not so? You were archangel enough to praise the imperfect body, and embrace the soul.

David Rakoff photo