Oliver Wendell Holmes Quotes - SimplyNeo Quotes

"When I think of talking, it is of course with a woman. For talking at its best being an inspiration, it wants a corresponding divine quality of receptiveness, and where will you find this but in a woman?"

"The morning cup of coffee has an exhilaration about it which the cheering influence of the afternoon or evening cup of tea cannot be expected to reproduce."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

"The best of a book is not the thought which it contains, but the thought which it suggests; just as the charm of music dwells not in the tones but in the echoes of our hearts"

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

"The books we read should be chosen with great care, that they may be, as an Egyptian king wrote over his library,'The medicines of the soul"

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

"Men do not quit playing because they grow old; they grow old because they quit playing."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

"I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving - we must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it - but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

"Nothing is so common-place as to wish to be remarkable."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

"Every now and then a man's mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

"What refuge is there for the victim who is oppressed with the feeling that there are a thousand new books he ought to read, while life is only long enough for him to attempt to read a hundred?"

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

Life

"A man's mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" Greatness is not in where we stand, but in what direction we are moving. We must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it -- but sail we must and not drift, nor lie at anchor."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" What lies behind us and what lies before us are small matters compared to what lies within us."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" Consciously or unconsciously we all strive to make the kind of a world we like."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" Old age is fifteen years older than I am.

(also attributed to Bernard Baruch in slightly different form)

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" The riders in a race do not stop short when they reach the goal. There is a little finishing canter before coming to a standstill. There is time to hear the kind voice of friends and to say to one's self: "The work is done.""

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

Friendship

" A man may fulfill the object of his existence by asking a question he cannot answer, and attempting a task he cannot achieve."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" To have doubted one's own first principles is the mark of a civilized man."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" The mode by which the inevitable comes to pass is effort."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" It's faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

Life

" On every stem, on every leaf ... and at the root of everything that grew, was a professional specialist in the shape of grub, caterpillar, aphis, or other expert, whose business it was to devour that particular part."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" The world has to learn that the actual pleasure derived from material things is of rather low quality on the whole and less even in quantity than it looks to those who have not tried it."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

" Insanity is often the logic of an accurate mind overtasked."

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes