I am not merely a habitual quoter but an incorrigible one. I am, I may as well face it, more quotatious than an old stock-market ticker-tape machine, except that you can’t unplug me. – Joseph Epstein, “Quotatious,” A Line Out for a Walk: Familiar Essays, 1991
Every book is a quotation; and every house is a quotation out of all forests and mines and stone quarries; and every man is a quotation from all his ancestors. – Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Plato; Or, The Philosopher”
When you see yourself quoted in print and you’re sorry you said it, it suddenly becomes a misquotation. – Laurence J. Peter, Peter’s Quotations: Ideas for Our Times, 1977
Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves. – Ronald Reagan
My own early experiences in war led me to suspect the value of discipline, even in that sphere where it is so often regarded as the first essential for success. – Herbert Read
