The multiplicity of facts and writings is become so great that every thing must soon be reduced to extracts and dictionaries. – Voltaire

It should be a pleasure to the appreciative reader, while recognizing their beauty, to cull these flowers of thought for the benefit of those who, less fortunate than himself, have not the time to indulge in literary pleasures. – Maturin M. Ballou, January 1886, preface to Edge-Tools of Speech

Precepts or maxims are of great weight; and a few useful ones at hand do more toward a happy life than whole volumes that we know not where to find. – Seneca

To be amused by what you read — that is the great spring of happy quotations. – C.E. Montague (1867–1928), “Quotation”