Books Quotes
Samuel Johnson is on this page more than once for good reason. In The Rambler (1750) he wrote that no place gives a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a public library. Boswell (1791) has him saying that a man ought to read just as inclination leads him, because what he reads as a task will do him little good. Alberto Manguel, Emerson and Northrop Frye are among the most-quoted writers here, which is what you would expect from people who spent their working lives reading.
Two entries are flagged as misattributed. The quip about a manuscript that is both good and original, with the good parts not original and the original parts not good, is credited to Johnson. “Rommel, you magnificent bastard! I read your book!” is credited to General Patton.
Human beings can lose their lives in libraries. They ought to be warned.
Master books, but do not let them master you. Read to live, not live to read.
Learning hath gained most by those books by which the printers have lost.
A good book is the best of friends, the same today and forever.
Learn to read slow,
all other graces
Will follow in their proper places.
How pure the joy, when first my hands unfold
The small, rare volume, black with tarnished gold!
The birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the author.
A sure sign of a good book is that you like it more the older you get.
Rainy days should be spent at home with a cup of tea and a good book.
It is a vanity to persuade the world one hath much learning, by getting a great library.
Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.