Takuan Soho

None are so old as those who have outlived enthusiasm.

It is tact that is golden, not silence.

The best place to find God is in a garden. You can dig for him there.

Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.

We rarely find anyone who can say he has lived a happy life, and who, content with his life, can retire from the world like a satisfied guest.

Ice-cream is exquisite – what a pity it isn’t illegal.

At the entrance of a second person, hypocrisy begins.

There is no love sincerer than the love of food.

The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost the power of reason.

A broken heart is a very pleasant complaint for a man in London if he has a comfortable income.

There is no such whetstone, to sharpen a good wit and encourage a will to learning, as is praise.

It is seldom that the miserable of the world can help regarding their misery as a wrong inflicted by those who are less miserable.

Part of her mystery is how she is calm in the storm and anxious in the quiet.

Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail. What you gain at one end you lose at the other. It’s like feeding a dog on his own tail. It won’t fatten the dog.

The joy in life is to be used for a purpose. I want to be used up when I die.