Be charitable before Wealth makes thee covetous.
Month: August 2012
Claude Debussy
of Richard Wagner
A beautiful sunset that was mistaken for a dawn.
Oliver Wendell Holmes (Snr)
He must be a poor creature that does not often repeat himself.
Oliver Wendell Holmes (Snr)
He must be a poor creature that does not often repeat himself.
Willard Van Orman Quine
Quine’s Paradox
“Yields falsehood when preceded by its quotation” yields falsehood when preceded by its quotation.
Engraved
Nikainetos, third century BC
I am the grave of Biton, traveller:
If from Torone to Amphipolis you go
Give Nicagoras this message: his one son
Died in a storm, in early winter, before sunrise.
Of John Wycliffe
The Avon to the Severn runs,
The Severn to the sea,
And Wycliffe’s dust shall spread abroad,
Wide as the waters be.
50 years after his death Wycliffe, who instigated the first full translation of the bible into English, was condemned for heresy and his body was dug up, his bones burned and his ashes poured into the river Avon
The English Lesson
We’ll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes;
But the plural of ox should be oxen not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,
But the plural of house is houses, not hice.
If the plural of man is always called men,
Why shouldn’t the plural of pan be called pen?
If I spoke of my foot and showed you my feet,
When I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?
If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,
Why shouldn’t the plural of booth be called beeth?
If the singular is this, and the plural is these,
Why shouldn’t the plural of kiss be kese?
Then one may be that, and three would be those,
Yet the plural of hat would never be hose.
We speak of a brother and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
So plurals in English, I think you’ll agree,
Are indeed very tricky–singularly.
E F Schumacher
Once you have a formula and an electronic computer, there is an awful temptation to squeeze the lemon until it is dry and present a picture of the future which through its very precision and verisimilitude carries conviction. Yet a man who uses an imaginary map, thinking it a true one, is likely to be worse off than someone with no map at all; for he will fail to inquire wherever he can, to observe every detail on his way, and to search continuously with all his senses and all his intelligence for indications of where he should go.
Michael Johnson
I didn’t have a pre-race ritual, only a post race one – I stood on a podium and someone put a medal around my neck.
Thomas Pryor Gore (Gore Vidal’s grandfather)
Never have children, only grandchildren