Escritas — Poems List

Franz Kafka

You do not need to

You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet, still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet.

161

Voltaire

It is one of the

It is one of the superstitions of the human mind to have imagined that virginity could be a virtue.

213

Socrates

The shortest and surest way

The shortest and surest way to live with honor in the world is to be in reality what we would appear to be; all human virtues increase and strengthen themselves by the practice and experience of them.

51

George Orwell

It was a cold, bright

It was a cold, bright day in April and the clocks were striking thirteen.

81

Voltaire

I have never made but

I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: "O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous." And God granted it.

139

Samuel Johnson

If you are idle, be

If you are idle, be not solitary; if you are solitary be not idle.

55

Nelson Mandela

There is nothing like returing

There is nothing like returing to a place that remains uncganged to find how you yourself have altered.

76

Randy K. Milholland

The key is to commit

The key is to commit crimes so confusing that police feel too stupid to even write a crime report about them.

38

Voltaire

It is an infantile superstition

It is an infantile superstition of the human spirit that virginity would be thought a virtue and not the barrier that separates ignorance from knowledge

128

Sir Edward Dyer

My mind to me a

My mind to me a kingdom is,

26

Theodore Roosevelt

Justice consists not in being

Justice consists not in being neutral between right and wrong, but in finding out the right and upholding it, wherever found, against the wrong.

53

Khalil Gibran

The envier praises me unknowingly.

234

Voltaire

Animals have these advantages over

Animals have these advantages over man: they never hear the clock strike, they die without any idea of death, they have no theologians to instruct them, their last moments are not disturbed by unwelcome and unpleasant ceremonies, their funerals cost them nothing, and no one starts lawsuits over their wills.

251

John Dryden

But far more numerous was

But far more numerous was the herd of such,

117

Thomas Edison

The doctor of the future

The doctor of the future will give no medicine, but will educate his patients in the care of the human frame, in diet, and in the cause and prevention of disease.

104

Richard Pryor

I never met anybody who

I never met anybody who said when they were a kid, "I wanna grow up and be a critic."

118

William Shakespeare

Mine honour is my life;

Mine honour is my life; both grow in one; take honour from me and my life is done.

153

William Van Horne

The biggest things are always

The biggest things are always the easiest to do because there is no competition.

23

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Happiness is as a butterfly

Happiness is as a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but which if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.

101

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

So many Gods, so many

So many Gods, so many creeds

245

James A. Garfield

History is philosophy teaching by

History is philosophy teaching by example, and also warning; its two eyes are geography and chronology.

50

Sun Tzu

War is a matter of

War is a matter of vital importance to the State; the province of life or death; the road to survival or ruin. It is mandatory that it be thoroughly studied.

297

E. Catherine Tobler

Not going home is already

Not going home is already like death.

13

Socrates

True knowledge exists in knowing

True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing.

65