Top 45 Quotes & Sayings by Clarence Day

You can't sweep other people off their feet, if you can't be swept off your own.

The ant is knowing and wise, but he doesn't know enough to take a vacation.

There is an art of reading, as well as an art of thinking, and an art of writing.

Age should not have its face lifted, but it should rather teach the world to admire wrinkles as the etchings of experience and the firm line of character.

If you don't go to other men's funerals, they won't go to yours.

Too many moralists begin with a dislike of reality.

If your parents didn't have any children, there's a good chance that you won't have any.

We talk of our mastery of nature, which sounds very grand; but the fact is we respectfully adapt ourselves, first, to her ways.

Creatures whose mainspring is curiosity enjoy the accumulating of facts far more than the pausing at times to reflect on those facts.

Ants are good citizens, they place group interests first.

A moderate addiction to money may not always be hurtful; but when taken in excess it is nearly always bad for the health.

Information's pretty thin stuff unless mixed with experience.

We must make the best of those ills which cannot be avoided.

Reason is the servant of instinct.

It is fair to judge peoples by the rights they will sacrifice most for.

Ants are good citizens; they place group interest first. But they carry it so far, they have few or no political rights. An ant doesn't have the vote, apparently; he just has his duties.

This is a hard and precarious world, where every mistake and infirmity must be paid for in full.

The world of books is the most remarkable creation of man.

Be adorable always to each other; respect is everlasting.

As time goes on, new and remoter aspects of truth are discovered which can seldom be fitted into creeds that are changeless.

Real friendships among men are so rare that when they occur they are famous.

Elephants suffer from too much patience. Their exhibitions of it may seem superb,-such power and such restraint, combined, are noble,-but a quality carried to excess defeats itself.

Knowledge is power. Unfortunate dupes of this saying will keep on creating, ambitiously, till they have stunned their native initiative and made their thoughts weak.

The egg it is the source of all. Tis everyone's ancestral hall. The bravest chief that ever fought, The lowest thief that e'er was caught, The harlot's lip, the maiden's leg, They each and all came from an egg.

The artistic impulse seems not to wish to produce finished work. It certainly deserts us half-way, after the idea is born; and if we go on, it is labor.

The poets of each generation seldom sing a new song. They turn to themes men always have loved, and sing them in the mode of their times.

I was different unique and always happy. At school this attracted playground harassment. Nowadays, while I remain effervescent, quicker to perceive enmity I reserve my warmest touches and smiles for those who smolder with envy.

The worshipper of energy is too physically energetic to see that he cannot explore certain higher fields until he is still.

The test of a civilized person is first self-awareness, and then depth after depth of sincerity in self-confrontation.

Will and wisdom are both mighty leaders. Our times worship will.

Ants are good citizens: they place group interests first.

Father expected a good deal of God. He didn't actually accuse God of inefficiency, but when he prayed his tone was loud and angry, like that of a dissatisfied guest in a carelessly managed hotel.

The world of books is the most remarkable creation of man. Nothing else that he builds ever lasts. Monuments fall; nations perish; civilizations grow old and die out; and, after an era of darkness, new races build others. But in the world of books are volumes that have seen this happen again and again, and yet live on, still young, still as fresh as the day they were written, still telling men's hearts of the hearts of men centuries dead.

The egg it is the source of all To everyone's ancestral hall.

A universe capable of giving birth to many such accidents is-- blind or not-- a good world to live in, a promising universe.

Every maiden's weak and willin' When she meets the proper villian.

Babies are unreasonable; they expect far too much of existence. Each new generation that comes takes one look at the world, thinks wildly, "Is this all they've done to it?" and bursts into tears.

As to modesty and decency, if we are simians we have done well, considering: but if we are something else-fallen angels-we have indeed fallen far.

Dogs have more love than integrity. They've been true to us, yes, but they haven't been true to themselves.

The first thing the world does to a genius is to make him lose all his youth.

The creatures that want to live a life of their own, we call wild. If wild, then no matter how harmless, we treat them as outlaws, and those of us who are specially well brought up shoot them for fun.

The real world is not easy to live in. It is rough; it is slippery. Without the most clear-eyed adjustments we fall and get crushed. A man must stay sober; not always, but most of the time.

Tender are a mother's dreams, But her babe's not what he seems. See him plotting in his mind To grow up some other kind.

It is possible that our race may be an accident, in a meaningless universe, living its brief life uncared for, on this dark, cooling star: but even so - and all the more - what marvelous creatures we are! What fairy story, what tale from the Arabian Nights of the jinns, is a hundredth part as wonderful as this true fairy story of simians! It is so much more heartening, too, than the tales we invent. A universe capable of giving birth to many such accidents is - blind or not - a good world to live in, a promising universe. . . . We once thought we lived on God's footstool, it may be a throne.

When eras die, their legacies Are left to strange police. Professors in New England guard The glory that was Greece.