His ignorance was as remarkable as his knowledge. Of contemporary literature, philosophy and politics he appeared to know next to nothing. Upon my quoting Thomas Carlyle, he inquired in the naivest way who he might be and what he had done. My surprise reached a climax, however, when I found incidentally that he was ignorant of the Copernican Theory and of the composition of the Solar System. That any civilized human being in this nineteenth century should not be aware that the earth travelled round the sun appeared to me to be such an extraordinary fact that I could hardly realize it. You appear to be astonished, he said, smiling at my expression of surprise. Now that I do know it I shall do my best to forget it. To forget it! You see, he explained, I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands upon it. Now the skillful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones. But the Solar System! I protested. What the deuce is it to me? he interrupted impatiently: you say that we go round the sun. If we went round the moon it would not make a pennyworth of difference to me or to my work.
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Americans will listen, but they do not care to read. War and Peace must wait for the leisure of retirement, which never really comes: meanwhile it helps to furnish the living room. Blockbusting fiction is bought as furniture. Unread, it maintains its value. Read, it looks like money wasted. Cunningly, Americans know that books contain a person, and they want the person, not the book.
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An idea ran back and forward in his head like a blind man, knocking over the solid furniture.
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Children are guilty of unpardonable rudeness when they spit in the face of a companion; neither are they excusable who spit from windows or on walls or furniture.
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And of the other things death is a new office building filled with modern furniture, A wise thing, but which has no purpose for us.
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How full of trifles everything is! It is only one's thoughts that fill a room with something more than furniture.
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Cats regard people as warm-blooded furniture.
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We love a great find. It's amazing how many people throw out perfectly good furniture. A little imagination and elbow grease can make all the difference in the world.
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A gentleman doesn't pounce he glides. If a woman sits on a piece of furniture which permits your sitting beside her, you are free to regard this as an invitation, though not an unequivocal one.
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I say let me never be complete. I say let me never be content. I say deliver me from Swedish furniture. I say deliver me from clever art. I say deliver me from clear skin and perfect teeth. I say you have to give up. I say evolve and let the chips fall where they may.
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The only preparations I made were getting ice, batteries, and canned foods. I also place my lawn furniture inside so that the wind will not blow it away.
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People are the common denominator of progress. So... no improvement is possible with unimproved people, and advance is certain when people are liberated and educated. It would be wrong to dismiss the importance of roads, railroads, power plants, mills, and the other familiar furniture of economic development.... But we are coming to realize... that there is a certain sterility in economic monuments that stand alone in a sea of illiteracy. Conquest of illiteracy comes first.
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Give me the free and poor inheritance Of our own kind, not furniture...
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There was once a man in China who liked pictures of dragons. His clothing and his furniture were therefore accordingly adorned with dragons. This deep affection for their kind was brought to the attention of the Dragon Lord, who one day sent a real dragon to stand outside the man's window. It is said that he probably died of fright.
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We are living in a world today where lemonade is made from artificial flavors and furniture polish is made from real lemons...
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No animal should ever jump up on the dining-room furniture unless absolutely certain that he can hold his own in the conversation.
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Books are not made for furniture, but there is nothing else that so beautifully furnishes a house.
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Cats regard people as warmblooded furniture.
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Science is a first-rate piece of furniture for a man's upper chamber, if he has common sense on the ground floor
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A man should keep his little brain attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber room of his library, where he can get it if he wants it.
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Rain usually makes me feel mellow. Curl up in the corner time, slow down, smell the furniture. Today it just makes me feel wet.
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We always had dogs, so I understood all the joy and the love animals are capable of giving. It's crazy to me that some people have dogs in thier homes, but they treat them more like furniture.
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While history offers us many stories worth telling, some belong to other people, who paid for them with their lives. We may retell their stories badly or well. We may embellish them or get them wrong. But we should not do so blithely, just as we should not scrawl slogans on other people's houses, or stride into their living rooms to replace the furniture. Thinking that we can is not novel history. It's novel morality, unworthy of artists and storytellers.
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It's all fleeting. As fame is fleeting, so are all the trappings of fame fleeting. The money, the clothes, the furniture.
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That's when I started breaking into people's houses. I don't steel anything, I just rearranged their furniture.
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We live in a world where lemonade is made from aritificial flavoring and furniture polish is made from real lemons
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If most of us are ashamed of shabby clothes and shoddy furniture, let us be more ashamed of shabby ideas and shoddy philosophies.
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The problem is never how to get new, innovative thoughts into your mind, but how to get old ones out. Every mind is a building filled with archaic furniture. Clean out a corner of your mind and creativity will instantly fill it.
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Science is a first-rate piece of furniture for a man's upper chamber, if he has common sense on the ground floor.
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Science is a first-rate piece of furniture for a man's upper chamber, if it has common sense on the ground floor.
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