Seek not to know who said this or that, but take note of what has been said. – Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, translated from Latin

Whenever we would prepare the mind by a forcible appeal, an opening quotation is a symphony preluding on the chords whose tones we are about to harmonize. – Isaac D’Israeli, “Quotation,” A Second Series of Curiosities of Literature

An inveterate quote plucker is what I have become. – Elaine Bernstein Partnow, preface to The Quotable Woman: From Eve to 1799, 1985

No, Sir, it is a good thing; there is a community of mind in it. Classical quotation is the parole of literary men all over the world. – Samuel Johnson, quoted in The Life of Samuel Johnson by James Boswell, Volume II