Quote

A man can never have too much Time to himself, nor too little to do. Had I a little son, I would christen him Nothing-To-Do he should do nothing. Man, I verily believe, is out of his element as long as he is operative. I am altogether for the life contemplative.

Charles Lamb

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Charles Lamb
Age: 59 †
Born: 1775
Born: February 10
Died: 1834
Died: December 27
Literary Critic
Playwright
Poet
Writer
London
England
Life
Nothing
Operative
Much
Contemplative
Long
Altogether
Believe
Element
Never
Son
Would
Elements
Men
Littles
Time
Little
Verily

More quotes by Charles Lamb

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She unbent her mind afterwards - over a book.
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There are like to be short graces where the devil plays host.
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May be the truth is, that one pipe is wholesome, two pipes toothsome, three pipes noisome, four pipes fulsome, five pipes quarrelsome and that's the some on't.
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You do not play then at whist, sir? Alas, what a sad old age you are preparing for yourself!
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Milton almost requires a solemn service of music to be played before you enter upon him. But he brings his music, to which who listen had need bring docile thoughts and purged ears.
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It is good to love the unknown.
Charles Lamb
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A book reads the better which is our own, and has been so long known to us, that we know the topography of its blots, and dog's ears, and can trace the dirt in it to having read it at tea with buttered muffins.
Charles Lamb
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I am accounted by some people as a good man. How cheap that character is acquired! Pay your debts, don't borrow money, nor twist your kitten's neck off, nor disturb a congregation, etc., your business is done. I know things of myself, which would make every friend I have fly me as a plague patient.
Charles Lamb
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The laws of Pluto's kingdom know small difference between king and cobbler, manager and call-boy and, if haply your dates of life were conterminant, you are quietly taking your passage, cheek by cheek (O ignoble levelling of Death) with the shade of some recently departed candle-snuffer.
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Tis unpleasant to meet a beggar. It is painful to deny him and, if you relieve him, it is so much out of your pocket.
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Here cometh April again, and as far as I can see the world hath more fools in it than ever.
Charles Lamb
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Books of quick interest, that hurry on for incidents are for the eye to glide over only. It will not do to read them out. I could never listen to even the better kind of modern novels without extreme irksomeness.
Charles Lamb
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Is it a stale remark to say that I have constantly found the interest excited at a playhouse to bear an exact inverse proportion to the price paid for admission?
Charles Lamb
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My only books Were woman's looks,- And folly 's all they 've taught me.
Charles Lamb
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My theory is to enjoy life, but my practice is against it.
Charles Lamb
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Tis unpleasant to meet a beggar. It is painful to deny him and, if you relieve him, it is so much out of your pocket.
Charles Lamb
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Were I Diogenes, I would not move out of a kilderkin into a hogshead, though the first had had nothing but small beer in it, and the second reeked claret.
Charles Lamb
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No woman dresses below herself from mere caprice.
Charles Lamb
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I can scarce bring myself to believe, that I am admitted to a familiar correspondence, and all the license of friendship, with a man who writes blank verse like Milton.
Charles Lamb
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The pilasters reaching down were adorned with a glistering substance (I know not what) under glass (as it seemed), resembling - a homely fancy, but I judged it to be sugar-candy yet to my raised imagination, divested of its homelier qualities, it appeared a glorified candy.
Charles Lamb