Thomas Browne quotes - page 2

Life itself is but the shadow of death, and souls departed but the shadows of the living. (Thomas Browne)
A little water makes a sea, a small puff of wind a Tempest. View quote
Thomas Browne
The noblest Digladiation is in the Theatre of ourselves. View quote
Thomas Browne
They that endeavour to abolish vice destroy also virtue, for contraries, though they destroy one another, are yet the life of one another. View quote
Thomas Browne
We term sleep a death, and yet it is waking that kills us, and destroys those spirits that are the house of life. View quote
Thomas Browne
I am in no way facetious, nor disposed for the mirth and galliardize of company, yet in one dream I can compose a whole Comedy, behold the action, apprehend the jests, and laugh myself awake at the conceits thereof. View quote
Thomas Browne
I intend no Monopoly, but a Community in Learning; I study not for my own sake only, but for theirs that study not for themselves. View quote
Thomas Browne
I can cure the gout or stone in some, sooner than Divinity, Pride, or Avarice in others. View quote
Thomas Browne
And surely, he that hath taken the true Altitude of Things, and rightly calculated the degenerate state of this Age, is not like to envy those that shall live in the next, much less three or four hundred Years hence, when no Man can comfortably imagine what Face this World will carry. View quote
Thomas Browne
There is no man alone, because every man is a Microcosm, and carries the whole world about him. View quote
Thomas Browne
Half our days we pass in the shadow of the earth; and the brother of death exacteth a third part of our lives. (Thomas Browne)
What song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he hid himself among women, though puzzling questions, are not beyond all conjecture. View quote
Thomas Browne
Men that look no further than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto life, and quarrel with their constitutions for being sick; but I that have examined the parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that fabric hangs, do wonder that we are not always so; and considering the thousand doors that lead to death, do thank my God that we can die but once. View quote
Thomas Browne
I love to lose myself in a mystery to pursue my reason to an O altitudo. View quote
Thomas Browne
But man is a Noble Animal, splendid in ashes, and pompous in the grave, solemnizing Nativities and Deaths with equal lustre, nor omitting Ceremonies of Bravery, in the infamy of his nature. Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible Sun within us. View quote
Thomas Browne
Not to be content with Life is the unsatisfactory state of those which destroy themselves; who being afraid to live, run blindly upon their own Death, which no Man fears by Experience. View quote
Thomas Browne
That some have never dreamed is as improbable as that some have never laughed. View quote
Thomas Browne
To ruminate upon evils, to make critical notes upon injuries, and be too acute in their apprehensions, is to add unto our own tortures, to feather the arrows of our enemies, to lash ourselves with the scorpions of our foes, and to resolve to sleep no more. View quote
Thomas Browne
I believe the world grows near its end, yet is neither old nor decayed, nor will ever perish upon the ruins of its own principles. View quote
Thomas Browne
Times before you, when even the living men were Antiquities; when the living might exceed the dead, and to depart this world, could not be properly said, to go unto the greater number. View quote
Thomas Browne
Rich with the spoils of Nature. (Thomas Browne)
By compassion we make others' misery our own, and so, by relieving them, we relieve ourselves also. View quote
Thomas Browne
I am not so much afraid of death, as ashamed thereof; 'tis the very disgrace and ignominy of our natures, that in a moment can so disfigure us that our nearest friends, Wife, and Children stand afraid and start at us. View quote
Thomas Browne
A Dialogue between two Infants in the womb concerning the state of this world, might handsomely illustrate our ignorance of the next, whereof methinks we yet discourse in Plato's Den, and are but Embryon Philosophers. View quote
Thomas Browne
Death is the cure for all diseases. View quote
Thomas Browne