Quote

Men are idolaters, and want something to look at and kiss and hug, or throw themselves down before they always did, they always will and if you don't make it of wood, you must make it of words.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

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Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Age: 93 †
Born: 1841
Born: March 8
Died: 1935
Died: March 6
Judge
Jurist
Lawyer
Philosopher
Politician
University Teacher
Boston
Massachusetts
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Oliver W. Holmes
Jr.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr
Holmes
Oliver Wendell
Jr.
Oliver Wendell
Jr. Holmes
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Jr
Oliver Holmes
Jr.
Oliver Wendell Holmes
jr.
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Jr.
Always
Kissing
Men
Fantasy
Words
Idolaters
Look
Hug
Looks
Wood
Must
Kiss
Something
Woods
Make
Throw

More quotes by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

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Science is the topography of ignorance. From a few elevated points we triangulate vast spaces, inclosing infinite unknown details. We cast the lead, and draw up a little sand from abysses we may never reach with our dredges.
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Liberty is often a heavy burden on a man. It involves the necessity for perpetual choice which is the kind of labor men have always dreaded.
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To us who remain behind is left this day of memories. Every year--in the full tide of spring, at the height of the symphony of flowers and love and life--there comes a pause, and through the silence we hear the lonely pipe of death.
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To brag little, to lose well, / To crow gently if in luck, / To pay up, to own up, / To shut up if beaten, / Are the virtues of a sportingman.
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A new and valid idea is worth more than a regiment and fewer men can furnish the former than command the latter.
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The advice of the elders to young men is very apt to be as unreal as a list of the hundred best books.
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Apologizing - a very desperate habit - one that is rarely cured. Apology is only egotism wrong side out.
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Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.
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I have no respect for the passion of equality, which seems to me merely idealizing envy - I don't disparage envy, but I don't accept it as legitimately my master.
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The root of joy, as of duty, is to put all one's powers towards some great end.
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A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged it is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and time in which it is used.
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Beware of making your moral staple consist of the negative virtues.
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In my opinion, economists and sociologists are the people to whom we ought to turn more than we do for instruction in the grounds and foundations of all rational decisions.
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My right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins.
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The joy of life is to put out one's power in some natural and useful or harmless way. There is no other. And the real misery is not to do this.
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In order to know whether a human being is young or old, offer it food of different kinds at short intervals. If young, it will eat anything at any hour of the day or night.
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Life is a fatal complaint, and an eminently contagious one.
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Research and writing are lonely occupations. It is easy to become discouraged in solitary confinement.
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For my part I think it is a less evil that some criminals should escape, than that the government should play an ignoble part.
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To have doubted one's own first principles is the mark of a civilized man.
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