Great Throughts Treasury

"Every one is full of his own opinion."

"Everything comes to him who knows how to wait."

"Half the world does not know how the other half lives."

"He who has patience may accomplish anything."

"If you wish to avoid seeing a fool you must first break your looking-glass."

"How shall I be able to rule over others, that have not full power and command of myself?"

"Wisdom entereth not into a malicious mind."

"So much is a man worth as he esteems himself."

"By non-usage all privileges are lost, say the clerks."

"I go to seek a great perhaps."

"I never sleep in comfort save when I am hearing a sermon or praying to God."

"It is the nature of man to long after things forbidden and to desire what is denied us."

"In dreaming, the soul doth often timers foretell what is to come."

"Do what you like."

"Link by link the armor is made."

"Nature abhors a vacuum."

"Misery is the companion of law-suits."

"Never trust in people who always look out at one hole."

"Whilst he boasteth that he can discern the least mote in the eye of another, he is not able to see the huge block that puts out the sight of both his eyes."

"What harm in getting knowledge even from a sot, a pot, a fool, a mitten, or a slipper?"

"Time ripens all things; by time all things are made evident."

"Without health life is not life; it is only a state of languor and suffering - an image of death."

"A child is not a vase to be filled, but a fire to be lit."

"Gestures, in love, are incomparably more attractive, effective and valuable than words."

"Debts and lies are generally mixed together. "

"Ignorance is the mother of all evils. "

"It is my feeling that Time ripens all things; with Time all things are revealed; Time is the father of truth. "

"Time, which wears down and diminishes all things, augments and increases good deeds, because a good turn liberally offered to a reasonable man grows continually through noble thought and memory. "

"There is no truer cause of unhappiness amongst men than, where naturally expecting charity and benevolence, they receive harm and vexation. "

"Science without conscience is the death of the soul. "

"No clock is more regular than the belly. "

"We always long for the forbidden things, and desire what is denied us. "

"Knowledge without conscience is but the ruin of the soul. "

"A bellyful is a bellyful."

"A certain jollity of mind, pickled in the scorn of fortune."

"A crier of green sauce."

"A good head is a head full of knowledge."

"A habit does not a monk make"

"A mother-in-law dies only when another devil is needed in hell."

"A young Saint - an old Devil, (mark this, an old saying, and as true a one as, a Young Whore an old Saint)"

"A war undertaken without sufficient monies has but a wisp of force. Coins are the very sinews of battles."

"Absence diminishes small loves and increases great ones, as the wind blows out the candle and blows up the bonfire."

"Above the pitch, out of tune, and off the hinges."

"Alluring, courtly, comely, fine, complete, wise, personable, ravishing, and sweet, come joys enjoy. The Lord celestial hath given enough wherewith to please us all."

"As for me, I never study; In our abbey, we never study, for fear of the mumps."

"All their life was spent not in laws, statutes, or rules, but according to their own free will and pleasure. They rose out of their beds when they thought good : they did eat, drink, labour, sleep, when they had a mind to it, and were disposed for it. None did awake them, none did offer to constrain them to eat, drink, nor to do any other thing ; for so had Gargantua established it. In all their rule, and strictest tie of their order, there was but this one clause to be observed, DO WHAT THOU WILT. Because men that are free, well-born, well-bred, and conversant in honest companies, have naturally an instinct and spur that prompteth them unto virtuous actions, and withdraws them from vice, which is called honour. Those same men, when by base subjection and constraint they are brought under and kept down, turn aside from that noble disposition, by which they formerly were inclined to virtue, to shake off and break that bond of servitude, wherein they are so tyrannously enslaved; for it is agreeable with the nature of man to long after things forbidden, and to desire what is denied us."

"Aristotle, that first of men and peerless pattern of all philosophy, was our sovereign lady's godfather, and wisely and properly gave her the name of Entelechy. Her true name then is Entelechy, and may he be in tail beshit, and entail a shit-a-bed faculty and nothing else on his family, who dares call her by any other name; for whoever he is, he does her wrong, and is a very impudent person. You are heartily welcome, gentlemen. With this they colled and clipped us about the neck, which was no small comfort to us, I'll assure you."

"Appetite comes with eating ... but the thirst goes away with drinking."

"Because just as arms have no force outside if there is no counsel within a house, study is vain and counsel useless that is not put to virtuous effect when the time calls."

"As soon as he was born, he cried not as other babes use to do, Miez, miez, miez, miez, but with a high, sturdy, and big voice shouted about, Some drink, some drink, some drink, as inviting all the world to drink with him. The noise hereof was so extremely great, that it was heard in both the countries at once of Beauce and Bibarois. I doubt me, that you do not thoroughly believe the truth of this strange nativity. Though you believe it not, I care not much: but an honest man, and of good judgment, believeth still what is told him, and that which he finds written."