A garland of quotations CXXII

Culled from the finest redundancies in literary history, and re-woven every Wednesday

Skullastic Book Fair this Sunday! June 1, 12–5, American Legion Post 16, Shelton CT! Free admission! Bring your friends!

A Soldier was bragging before Julius Cæsar, of the Wounds he received in his Face; Cæsar, knowing him to be a Coward, told him, he had best take heed, the next Time he ran away, how he look’d back.
•Joe Miller’s Jests or, The Wits Vade-Mecum (1739).

The best physic against the plague is to run away from it.
•Defoe, A Journal of the Plague Year, Written by a Citizen Who Continued All the While in London (1722).

”When could health have a bad result and disease a good one?”
“Why to be sure,” said Socrates, “in the case of a shameful expedition or a disastrous voyage or many other such events, when those who have taken part because they were able-bodied have perished, while those who have been excluded by infirmity have escaped.”
•Xenophon, Memorabilia (ca. 370 BC).

Rav Joseph said:
Ever let a man learn from the wise ways of the Creator.
For lo, the Holy One, blessed be he, left all the mountains and hills, and settled his Presence on Mount Siani [a small mountain],
and left all goodly trees, and settled his Presence on a thornbush.
•Sotah, 5a.

The silver fir tree and the bramble were arguing together. The fir was boastful and said:
“I am beautiful, slender and tall. I serve to construct the decks of warships and merchant ships. How dare you compare yourself to me?”
The bramble replied:
“If you would but remember the axes and saws that cut you, you too would prefer the life of a bramble.”
•Æsop

No tragic poet has had the audacity or lack of decency to introduce into his play the slaughter of the chorus.
•Ælian, Varia Historia (C3).

The fairer the rose is, the sooner it is bitten with caterpillars.
•Thomas Lodge, Rosalynde (1590).

When the authorities call out the troops, he [Crippled Shu] stands in the crowd waving good-by; when they get up a big work party they pass him over because he’s a chronic invalid.
•Zhuang Zhou (C4 BC).

In any case, what better gift can we hope for, than to be insignificant? What greater glory for a God, than to be absolved of the world.
•Borges, “A Vindication of Basilides the False” (1932).

Cripple me, father,
that I may not go here and there.
Blind me, father,
that I may not look at this and that.
Deafen me, father,
that I may not hear anything else.
•Basavanna, vacana 105 (C 12).

Bodily decrepitude is wisdom; young
We loved each other and were ignorant.
•Yeats, “After Long Silence” (1932).

Sources: Xenophon: Robin Waterfield, ed., Conversations of Socrates (Penguin, 1990); Sotah: Nahum N. Glatzer, Hammer on the Rock: A Midrash Reader (Shocken, 1977); Æsop: trans Olivia & Robert Temple, The Complete Fables (Penguin, 1998); Ælian: trans. N.G. Wilson, Historical Miscellany (Loeb) (Harvard UP, 1997); Zhuang Zhou: trans. Burton Watson, Chuang Tzu: Basic Writings (Columbia UP, 1964); Borges: Monegal & Reid, eds, Borges: A Reader (Dutton, 1981); Basavanna: in A. K. Ramanujan, Speaking of Siva (Penguin, 1973); Yeats: The Winding Stair and Other Poems (Macmillan, 1933); some of this material is copyrighted, and I plead only fair use.