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1

Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.

HOLMES--Poet at the Breakfast Table. VIII.

2

The first thing naturally when one enters a scholar's study or library, is to look at his books. One gets a notion very speedily of his tastes and the range of his pursuits by a glance round his book-shelves.

HOLMES-Poet at the Breakfast Table. VIII.

3

What a place to be in is an old library! It seems as though all the souls of all the writers that have bequeathed their labours to these Bodleians were reposing here as in some dormitory, or middle state. I do not want to handle, to profane the leaves, their winding-sheets. I could as soon dislodge a shade. I seem to inhale learning, walking amid their foliage; and the odor of their old moth-scented coverings is fragrant as the first bloom of those sciential apples which grew amid the happy orchard.

LAMB-Essays of Elia. Oxford in the Vacation.

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I expect to pass through this world but once. Any good therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

Author unknown. General proof lies with STEPHEN GRELLET as author. Not found in his writings. Same idea found in The Spectator. (Addison.) No. I. Vol. I. March 1. 1710. CANON JEPSON positively claimed it for EMERSON. Attributed to EDWARD COURTENAY, due to the resemblance of the Earl's epitaph. See Literary World,

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Every man's life is a fairy-tale written by God's fingers.

HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN-Preface to Works.

15

And by a prudent flight and cunning save

A life which valour could not, from the grave. A better buckler I can soon regain,

But who can get another life again?

ARCHILOCHUS See PLUTARCH's Morals. Vol. I. Essay on the Laws, etc., of the Lacedemonians.

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5

The World's a bubble, and the Life of Man less than a span:

In his conception wretched, from the womb so to the tomb;

Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years with cares and fears.

Who then to frail mortality shall trust,
But limns the water, or but writes in dust.
BACON-Life. Preface to the Translation of
Certain Psalms. For "Man's a Bubble," see
PETRONIUS under MAN. For "Writ in
Water," see BEAUMONT under DEEDS.
(See also BROWNE, COOKE, GORDON, OMAR,
POPE, YOUNG, also BACON. P. 9121)

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12

Loin des sépultures célebres

Vers un cimitière isolé

Mon cœur, comme un tambour voilé Va battant des marches funèbres.

To the solemn graves, near a lonely cemetery, my heart like a muffled drum is beating funeral marches.

BAUDELAIRE-Les Fleurs du Mal. Le Guignon. (See also LONGFELLOW)

13

Our lives are but our marches to the grave. BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER-The Humorous Lieutenant. Act III. Sc. 5. L. 76.

14

We sleep, but the loom of life never stops and the pattern which was weaving when the sun went down is weaving when it comes up to-mor

row.

HENRY WARD BEECHER-Life Thoughts. P. 12.

15

The day is short, the work is much.

Saying of BEN SYRA. (From the Hebrew.)

16

We are all but Fellow-Travelers,
Along Life's weary way;

If any man can play the pipes,
In God's name, let him play.

JOHN BENNETT-Poem in The Century.

17

Life does not proceed by the association and addition of elements, but by dissociation and division.

HENRI BERGSON-Creative Evolution. Ch. I.

18

For life is tendency, and the essence of a tendency is to develop in the form of a sheaf, creating, by its very growth, divergent directions among which its impetus is divided.

HENRI BERGSON-Creative Revolution. Ch. II.

19

Nasci miserum, vivere pœna, angustia mori.

It is a misery to be born, a pain to live, a trouble to die.

ST. BERNARD Ch. III.

20

Alas, how scant the sheaves for all the trouble, The toil, the pain and the resolve sublime

A few full ears; the rest but weeds and stubble, And withered wild-flowers plucked before their time.

A. B. BRAGDON-The Old Campus.

21

For life is the mirror of king and slave,

"Tis just what we are and do;

Then give to the world the best you have, And the best will come back to you. MADELEINE BRIDGES-Life's Mirror.

22

There are loyal hearts, there are spirits brave, There are souls that are pure and true; Then give to the world the best you have, And the best will come back to you. MADELEINE BRIDGES-Life's Mirror.

23

Life, believe, is not a dream, So dark as sages say;

Oft a little morning rain Foretells a pleasant day! CHARLOTTE BRONTË-Life.

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