Quotes4study

The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, / The solemn temples, the great globe itself, / Yea, all that it inherit, shall dissolve; / And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, / Leave not a rack behind.

_Tempest_, iv. 1.

Der Dichter steht auf einer hohern Warte / Als auf den Zinnen der Partei=--The poet stands on a higher watch-tower than the pinnacle of party.

_Freiligrath._

Ye distant spires, ye antique towers.

THOMAS GRAY. 1716-1771.     _On a Distant Prospect of Eton College. Stanza 1._

Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.

C.S. Lewis

This is our true state; this is what renders us incapable both of certain knowledge and of absolute ignorance. We sail on a vast expanse, ever uncertain, ever drifting, hurried from one to the other goal. If we think to attach ourselves firmly to any point, it totters and fails us; if we follow, it eludes our grasp, and flies from us, vanishing for ever. Nothing stays for us. This is our natural condition, yet always the most contrary to our inclination; we burn with desire to find a steadfast place and an ultimate fixed basis whereon we may build a tower to reach the infinite. But our whole foundation breaks up, and earth opens to the abysses.

Blaise Pascal     The Thoughts of Blaise Pascal

The strongest castle, tower, and town, / The golden bullet beats it down.

_Shakespeare._

How sweet the music of this first heavenly chime floating across the waters of death from the towers of the New Jerusalem. Pilgrim, faint under thy long and arduous pilgrimage, hear it! It is REST. Soldier, carrying still upon thee blood and dust of battle, hear it! It is REST. Voyager, tossed on the waves of sin and sorrow, driven hither and thither on the world's heaving ocean of vicissitude, hear it! The haven is in sight; the very waves that are breaking on thee seem to murmur--"_So He giveth His beloved_ REST." It is the long-drawn sigh of existence at last answered. The toil and travail of earth's protracted week is at an end. The calm of its unbroken Sabbath is begun. Man, weary man, has found at last the long-sought-for _rest_ in the bosom of his God!--_Macduff._

Various     Thoughts for the Quiet Hour

Ye towers of Julius, London's lasting shame, With many a foul and midnight murder fed.

THOMAS GRAY. 1716-1771.     _The Bard. II. 3, Line 11._

Sometime we see a cloud that 's dragonish; A vapour sometime like a bear or lion, A tower'd citadel, a pendent rock, A forked mountain, or blue promontory With trees upon 't.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 1564-1616.     _Antony and Cleopatra. Act iv. Sc. 14._

The bravery of his grief did put me Into a towering passion.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 1564-1616.     _Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 2._

Beauty soon grows familiar to the lover, Fades in his eye, and palls upon the sense. The virtuous Marcia towers above her sex.

JOSEPH ADDISON. 1672-1719.     _Cato. Act i. Sc. 4._

Our hopes, like towering falcons, aim At objects in an airy height; The little pleasure of the game Is from afar to view the flight.

MATTHEW PRIOR. 1664-1721.     _To the Hon. Charles Montague._

The moon had climb'd the highest hill Which rises o'er the source of Dee, And from the eastern summit shed Her silver light on tower and tree.

JOHN LOWE (1750- ----): _Mary's Dream._

S?pius ventis agitatur ingens / Pinus, et cels? graviore casu / Decidunt turres, feriuntque summos / Fulmina montes=--The huge pine is more frequently shaken by the winds, high towers fall with a heavier crash, and it is the mountain-tops that the thunderbolts strike.

Horace.

Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams Beside a pumice isle in Bai?'s bay, And saw in sleep old palaces and towers Quivering within the wave's intenser day, All overgrown with azure moss and flowers So sweet, the sense faints picturing them.

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. 1792-1822.     _Ode to the West Wind._

The great Emathian conqueror bid spare The house of Pindarus, when temple and tower Went to the ground.

JOHN MILTON. 1608-1674.     _When the Assault was intended to the City._

There is no royal road to learning; no short cut to the acquirement of any art.

Anthony Trollope in Barchester Towers (date of death

Whether he be rich or whether he be poor, if he= (a man), =have a good heart, he shall at all times rejoice in a cheerful countenance; his mind shall tell him more than seven watchmen that sit above upon a tower on high.

Ecclesiasticus.

Our revels now are ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits, and Are melted into air, into thin air: And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on; and our little life Is rounded with a sleep.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 1564-1616.     _The Tempest. Act iv. Sc. 1._

Elephants endors'd with towers.

JOHN MILTON. 1608-1674.     _Paradise Regained. Book iii. Line 329._

Britannia needs no bulwarks, No towers along the steep; Her march is o'er the mountain waves, Her home is on the deep.

THOMAS CAMPBELL. 1777-1844.     _Ye Mariners of England._

>Towering in the confidence of twenty-one.

SAMUEL JOHNSON. 1709-1784.     _Letter to Bennet Langton. Jan. 9, 1758._

Mathic architects were helpless when it came to walls. Pillars they could do. Arches they were fine with. Vaults, which were just three-dimensional arches, they knew everything about. But ask them to construct a simple wall and they would go to pieces. Where anyone else in the world would construct a wall, they’d fill in the space with a system of arches and tracery. When people complained about wind, vermin, and other things that would be kept out of a normal building by walls, they might be troubled to fill up a vacancy with a stained-glass window. But we hadn’t got round to putting all of those in yet. On a windy and rainy day it made buildings like this hellish. But on a day like this one it was fine because you could always see. As we scaled the flights of the southwestern tower we had views down into the Mynster, and out over the concent.

Neal Stephenson

Great men stand like solitary towers in the city of God, and secret passages running deep beneath external Nature give their thoughts intercourse with higher intelligences, which strengthens and consoles them, and of which the labourers on the surface do not even dream.

_Longfellow._

Elephants endors'd with towers.

_Milton._

Thou whose deep ways are in the sea, Whose footsteps are not known, To-night a world that turned from Thee Is waiting — at Thy Throne. The towering Babels that we raised Where scoffing sophists brawl, The little Antichrists we praised — The night is on them all.

Alfred Noyes

Meadows trim with daisies pied, Shallow brooks and rivers wide; Towers and battlements it sees Bosom'd high in tufted trees, Where perhaps some beauty lies, The cynosure of neighboring eyes.

JOHN MILTON. 1608-1674.     _L'Allegro. Line 75._

A falcon, towering in her pride of place, Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 1564-1616.     _Macbeth. Act ii. Sc. 4._

>Towers are measured by their shadows.

_Chinese Pr._

Disparting towers Trembling all precipitate down dash'd, Rattling around, loud thundering to the moon.

JOHN DYER. 1700-1758.     _The Ruins of Rome. Line 40._

Nor by the wayside ruins let us mourn / Who have th' eternal towers for our appointed bourne.

_Keble._

Diseased nature oftentimes breaks forth / In strange eruptions, and the teeming earth / Is with a kind of cholic pinch'd and vex'd / By the imprisoning of unruly wind / Within her womb, which, for enlargement striving, / Shakes the old bedlam earth, and topples down / Steeples and moss-grown towers.

_Hen. IV._, iii. 1.

Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years.

ROBERT BROWNING. 1812-1890.     _Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came. xxxiii._

Cels? graviore casu / Decidunt turres=--Lofty towers fall with no ordinary crash.

Horace.

On September 11, 2001, the world fractured. It's beyond my skill as a writer to capture that day, and the days that would follow — the planes, like specters, vanishing into steel and glass; the slow-motion cascade of the towers crumbling into themselves; the ash-covered figures wandering the streets; the anguish and the fear. Nor do I pretend to understand the stark nihilism that drove the terrorists that day and that drives their brethren still. My powers of empathy, my ability to reach into another's heart, cannot penetrate the blank stares of those who would murder innocents with abstract, serene satisfaction.

Barack Obama

When clouds appear like rocks and towers, / The earth's refreshed with frequent showers.

Proverb.

The Tree that was withered shall be renewed, and he shall plant it in the high places, and the City shall be blessed. Sing all ye people!

J. R. R. Tolkien (From The Lord of the Rings : The Return of the King (Book VI, Chapter 5, "The Steward and the King"); in the novel this is a song of a great Eagle heralding the victory of Aragorn's forces against those of Sauron and the Dark Tower

Age shakes Athena's tower, but spares gray Marathon.

LORD BYRON 1788-1824.     _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage. Canto ii. Stanza 88._

The conclusion of the whole matter seems to be that, if Ormuzd has not had his way in this world, neither has Ahriman. Pessimism is as little consonant with the facts of sentient existence as optimism. If we desire to represent the course of nature in terms of human thought, and assume that it was intended to be that which it is, we must say that its governing principle is intellectual and not moral; that it is a materialized logical process, accompanied by pleasures and pains, the incidence of which, in the majority of cases, has not the slightest reference to moral desert That the rain falls alike upon the just and the unjust, and that those upon whom the Tower of Siloam fell were no worse than their neighbours, seem to be Oriental modes of expressing the same conclusion.

T. H. Huxley     Aphorisms and Reflections from the Works of T. H. Huxley

London is not a city, London is a person. Tower Bridge talks to you; National Gallery reads a poem for you; Hyde Park dances with you; Palace of Westminster plays the piano; Big Ben and St Paul’s Cathedral sing an opera! London is not a city; it is a talented artist who is ready to contact with you directly!

Mehmet Murat ildan

The king's name is a tower of strength.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 1564-1616.     _King Richard III. Act v. Sc. 3._

Child Rowland to the dark tower came, His word was still,--Fie, foh, and fum, I smell the blood of a British man.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 1564-1616.     _King Lear. Act iii. Sc. 4._

It is certainly not then — not in dreams — but when one is wide awake, at moments of robust joy and achievement, on the highest terrace of consciousness, that mortality has a chance to peer beyond its own limits, from the mast, from the past and its castle tower. And although nothing much can be seen through the mist, there is somehow the blissful feeling that one is looking in the right direction.

Vladimir Nabokov

Turris fortissima est nomen Jehovah=--A most strong tower is the name of Jehovah.

Motto.

I sing New England, as she lights her fire In every Prairie's midst; and where the bright Enchanting stars shine pure through Southern night, She still is there, the guardian on the tower, To open for the world a purer hour.

WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. 1817- ----.     _New England._

>Tower'd cities please us then, And the busy hum of men.

JOHN MILTON. 1608-1674.     _L'Allegro. Line 117._

The seen are shadows: the substance is found in the unseen. . . . No doubt, in Christ, the foundation of our faith is unseen; but so is that of yonder tower that lifts its tall erect form among the waves over which it throws a saving light. It appears to rest on the rolling billows; but, beneath these, invisible and immovable, lies the solid rock on which it stands secure; and when the hurricane roars above, and breakers roar below, I could go calmly to sleep in that lone sea tower. Founded on a rock, and safer than the proudest palace that stands on the sandy, surf-beaten shore, it cannot be moved. Still less the Rock of Ages! Who trusts in that is fit for death, prepared for judgment, ready for the last day's sounding trumpet, since, "The Lord redeemeth the soul of His servants, and none of them that trust in Him shall be desolate."--_Guthrie._

Various     Thoughts for the Quiet Hour

Which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it.

NEW TESTAMENT.     _Luke xiv. 28._

Aion is a child at play, gambling; a child’s is the kingship. Telesphorus traverses the dark places of the world, like a star flashing from the deep, leading the way to the gates of the sun and the land of dreams.

Bollingen Tower inscription ~ by Carl Jung, quoting ~ Heraclitus & Homer

That tower of strength Which stood four-square to all the winds that blew.

ALFRED TENNYSON. 1809- ----.     _Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington. Stanza 4._

When we say that the ancestors of the Blacks, who today live mainly in Black Africa, were the first to invent mathematics, astronomy, the calendar, sciences in general, arts, religion, agriculture, social organization, medicine, writing, technique, architecture; that they were the first to erect buildings out of 6 million tons of stone (the Great Pyramid) as architects and engineers—not simply as unskilled laborers; that they built the immense temple of Karnak, that forest of columns with its famed hypostyle hall large enough to hold Notre-Dame and its towers; that they sculpted the first colossal statues (Colossi of Memnon, etc.)—when we say all that we are merely expressing the plain unvarnished truth that no one today can refute by arguments worthy of the name.

Cheikh Anta Diop

Was this the face that launch'd a thousand ships, And burnt the topless towers of Ilium? Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss! Her lips suck forth my soul: see, where it flies!

CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE. 1565-1593.     _Faustus._

Those who sweat in flames of hell,    Leaden eared, some thought their bowels

Here's the reason that they fell:    Lispeth forth the sweetest vowels.

While on earth they prayed in SAS,    These they offered up in praise

PL/1, or other crass,            Thinking all this fetid haze

Vulgar tongue.                A rapsody sung.

Some the lord did sorely try        Jabber of the mindless horde

Assembling all their pleas in hex.    Sequel next did mock the lord

Speech as crabbed as devil's crable    Slothful sequel so enfangled

Hex that marked on Tower Babel        Its speaker's lips became entangled

The highest rung.            In his bung.

Because in life they prayed so ill

And offered god such swinish swill

Now they sweat in flames of hell

Sweat from lack of APL

Sweat dung!

Fortune Cookie

And I suppose the little things are harder to get used to than the big

ones.  The big ones you get used to, you make up your mind to them.  The

little things come along unexpectedly, when you aren't thinking about

them, aren't braced against them.

        -- Marion Zimmer Bradley, "The Forbidden Tower"

Fortune Cookie

    It took 300 years to build and by the time it was 10% built,

everyone knew it would be a total disaster. But by then the investment

was so big they felt compelled to go on. Since its completion, it has

cost a fortune to maintain and is still in danger of collapsing.

    There are at present no plans to replace it, since it was never

really needed in the first place.

    I expect every installation has its own pet software which is

analogous to the above.

        -- K. E. Iverson, on the Leaning Tower of Pisa

Fortune Cookie

A mother mouse was taking her large brood for a stroll across the kitchen

floor one day when the local cat, by a feat of stealth unusual even for

its species, managed to trap them in a corner.  The children cowered,

terrified by this fearsome beast, plaintively crying, "Help, Mother!

Save us!  Save us!  We're scared, Mother!"

    Mother Mouse, with the hopeless valor of a parent protecting its

children, turned with her teeth bared to the cat, towering huge above them,

and suddenly began to bark in a fashion that would have done any Doberman

proud.  The startled cat fled in fear for its life.

    As her grateful offspring flocked around her shouting "Oh, Mother,

you saved us!" and "Yay!  You scared the cat away!" she turned to them

purposefully and declared, "You see how useful it is to know a second

language?"

Fortune Cookie

"If you own a machine, you are in turn owned by it, and spend your time

 serving it..."

        -- Marion Zimmer Bradley, _The Forbidden Tower_</p>

Fortune Cookie

"There's always been Tower of Babel sort of bickering inside Unix, but this

is the most extreme form ever.  This means at least several years of confusion."

-- Bill Gates, founder and chairman of Microsoft,

   about the Open Systems Foundation

Fortune Cookie

And he climbed with the lad up the Eiffelberg Tower.  "This," cried the Mayor,

"is your town's darkest hour!  The time for all Whos who have blood that is red

to come to the aid of their country!" he said.  "We've GOT to make noises in

greater amounts!  So, open your mouth, lad!  For every voice counts!"  Thus he

spoke as he climbed.  When they got to the top, the lad cleared his throat and

he shouted out, "YOPP!"

    And that Yopp...  That one last small, extra Yopp put it over!

Finally, at last!  From the speck on that clover their voices were heard!

They rang out clear and clean.  And they elephant smiled.  "Do you see what

I mean?" They've proved they ARE persons, no matter how small.  And their

whole world was saved by the smallest of All!"

    "How true!  Yes, how true," said the big kangaroo.  "And, from now

on, you know what I'm planning to do?  From now on, I'm going to protect

them with you!"  And the young kangaroo in her pouch said, "ME TOO!  From

the sun in the summer.  From rain when it's fall-ish, I'm going to protect

them.  No matter how small-ish!"

        -- Dr. Seuss "Horton Hears a Who"

Fortune Cookie

    The Magician of the Ivory Tower brought his latest invention for the

master programmer to examine.  The magician wheeled a large black box into the

master's office while the master waited in silence.

    "This is an integrated, distributed, general-purpose workstation,"

began the magician, "ergonomically designed with a proprietary operating

system, sixth generation languages, and multiple state of the art user

interfaces.  It took my assistants several hundred man years to construct.

Is it not amazing?"

    The master raised his eyebrows slightly. "It is indeed amazing," he

said.

    "Corporate Headquarters has commanded," continued the magician, "that

everyone use this workstation as a platform for new programs.  Do you agree

to this?"

    "Certainly," replied the master, "I will have it transported to the

data center immediately!"  And the magician returned to his tower, well

pleased.

    Several days later, a novice wandered into the office of the master

programmer and said, "I cannot find the listing for my new program.  Do

you know where it might be?"

    "Yes," replied the master, "the listings are stacked on the platform

in the data center."

        -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"

Fortune Cookie

    A novice asked the master: "I perceive that one computer company is

much larger than all others.  It towers above its competition like a giant

among dwarfs.  Any one of its divisions could comprise an entire business.

Why is this so?"

    The master replied, "Why do you ask such foolish questions?  That

company is large because it is so large.  If it only made hardware, nobody

would buy it.  If it only maintained systems, people would treat it like a

servant.  But because it combines all of these things, people think it one

of the gods!  By not seeking to strive, it conquers without effort."

        -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"

Fortune Cookie

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure dome decree:

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

Through caverns measureless to man

Down to a sunless sea.

So twice five miles of fertile ground

With walls and towers were girdled round:

And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,

Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;

And here were forest ancient as the hills,

Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

        -- S. T. Coleridge, "Kubla Kahn"

Fortune Cookie

"I have devised seven separate explanations, each of which would cover the facts as far as we know them. But which of these is correct can only be determined by the fresh information which we shall no doubt find waiting for us. Well, there is the tower of the cathedral, and we shall soon learn all that Miss Hunter has to tell."

Arthur Conan Doyle     The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

"It is not indiscreet," returned Morcerf, with the simplicity of conviction. "You have guessed rightly. These are our arms, that is, those of my father, but they are, as you see, joined to another shield, which has gules, a silver tower, which are my mother's. By her side I am Spanish, but the family of Morcerf is French, and, I have heard, one of the oldest of the south of France."

Alexandre Dumas, Pere     The Count of Monte Cristo

Chiefs of Achaia, and thou, chief of all, Great Agamemnon! Many of our host Lie slain, whose blood sprinkles, in battle shed, The banks of smooth Scamander, and their souls Have journey'd down into the realms of death. To-morrow, therefore, let the battle pause As need requires, and at the peep of day With mules and oxen, wheel ye from all parts The dead, that we may burn them near the fleet. So, home to Greece returning, will we give The fathers' ashes to the children's care. Accumulating next, the pile around, One common tomb for all, with brisk dispatch We will upbuild for more secure defence Of us and of our fleet, strong towers and tall Adjoining to the tomb, and every tower Shall have its ponderous gate, commodious pass Affording to the mounted charioteer. And last, without those towers and at their foot, Dig we a trench, which compassing around Our camp, both steeds and warriors shall exclude, And all fierce inroad of the haughty foe.

BOOK VII.     The Iliad by Homer

As when the waves by Zephyrus up-heaved Crowd fast toward some sounding shore, at first, On the broad bosom of the deep their heads They curl on high, then breaking on the land Thunder, and o'er the rocks that breast the flood Borne turgid, scatter far the showery spray; So moved the Greeks successive, rank by rank, And phalanx after phalanx, every Chief His loud command proclaiming, while the rest, As voice in all those thousands none had been Heard mute; and, in resplendent armor clad, With martial order terrible advanced. Not so the Trojans came. As sheep, the flock Of some rich man, by thousands in his court Penn'd close at milking time, incessant bleat, Loud answering all their bleating lambs without, Such din from Ilium's wide-spread host arose. Nor was their shout, nor was their accent one, But mingled languages were heard of men From various climes. These Mars to battle roused, Those Pallas azure-eyed; nor Terror thence Nor Flight was absent, nor insatiate Strife, Sister and mate of homicidal Mars, Who small at first, but swift to grow, from earth Her towering crest lifts gradual to the skies. She, foe alike to both, the brands dispersed Of burning hate between them, and the woes Enhanced of battle wheresoe'er she pass'd.

BOOK IV.     The Iliad by Homer

"I follow you." Monte Cristo entered the tower, which was divided into three stories. The tower contained implements, such as spades, rakes, watering-pots, hung against the wall; this was all the furniture. The second was the man's conventional abode, or rather sleeping-place; it contained a few poor articles of household furniture--a bed, a table, two chairs, a stone pitcher--and some dry herbs, hung up to the ceiling, which the count recognized as sweet pease, and of which the good man was preserving the seeds; he had labelled them with as much care as if he had been master botanist in the Jardin des Plantes.

Alexandre Dumas, Pere     The Count of Monte Cristo

He said, and to his chariot join'd his steeds Swift, brazen-hoof'd, and mailed with wavy gold; He put on golden raiment, his bright scourge Of gold receiving rose into his seat, And lash'd his steeds; they not unwilling flew Midway the earth between and starry heaven. To spring-fed Ida, mother of wild beasts, He came, where stands in Gargarus his shrine Breathing fresh incense! there the Sire of all Arriving, loosed his coursers, and around Involving them in gather'd clouds opaque, Sat on the mountain's head, in his own might Exulting, with the towers of Ilium all Beneath his eye, and the whole fleet of Greece.

BOOK VIII.     The Iliad by Homer

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