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Oxford Book of Aphorisms

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This is an ideal book for the coffee table, guest bedroom, or bathroom, but also one that will stand proudly on the bookshelf next to Bartlett's Famous Quotations and other prestigious literary reference books. The entries are witty, entertaining, often quite profound, and well organized throughout. The sources are varied but nearly all of the names are widely recognizable.

An aphorism is defined as "a short, pithy statement containing a truth of general import." In the introduction to this volume John Gross offers several distinguishing characteristics of the aphorism. Though the term `maxim' is often used as its synonym, an aphorism is considered more speculative, and sometimes more subversive than a maxim. While aphorisms offer insights and wisdom, they differ from proverbs in that they are not apocryphal. And while they are universal, they also generally bear the personal mark of the author.

Goethe, Nietzsche, Chekhov, Voltaire, Spinoza, Wilde, Yeats, James...but a few of the authors included in this book.

To give a flavor of the kinds of entries, consider these from the chapter on religion.

"Probably no invention came more easily to man than Heaven."

"Heathen, n. A benighted creature who has the folly to worship something that he can see and feel."

"If God created us in his own image, we have more than reciprocated."

And if you don't like those, there are fifty other chapters to choose from.

An Aphorism is the concise statement of a moral or philosophical principle. It offers a comment on some recurrent aspect of life, clothed in terms which are meant to be permanently or universally applicable.

In 'The Oxford Book of Aphorisms', John Gross selects a wide variety of aphorisms that are placed into 58 categories, such as: Mankind, Life, Self-Doubt, Friends & Foes, Happiness & Sorrow, Illusion & Reality, Death, and The Afterlife.

Each category usually runs under 10 pages or so of collected aphorisms. This facilitates ease of research when seeking views on a particular topic.

In the chapter on aphorisms, we find: 'A perfectly healthy sentence is extremely rare'. Indeed, this is a rare book.

After reading this book I guarantee you'll be a few IQ points higher up on the intelligence scale. So what are you waiting for? Order it now, you don't wanna die without having read this. I'll share with you some of my favorite quotes from various subjects in the book, so here goes:

"Even while a thing is in the act of coming into existence, some part of it has already ceased to be." -Marcus Aurelius, 2nd Century

"Religions are kept alive by heresies, which are really sudden explosions of faith." -Gerald Brenan

"The bird a nest, the spider a web, man friendship." -Blake

"Until death, it is all life." -Cervantes

"Liberty is the right to do what the law permits." -Montesquieu

"Oh well, no matter what happens, there's always death." -Napoleon<P This book in all of its logicalness is a great moral teacher and guide to inquisitve thinking- more than I can say about certain books. I shall depart with one final quote, which I feel is apt in answering my earlier question: "God's contempt for human minds is evidenced by miracles. He judges them unworthy of being drawn to Him by other means than those of stupefaction and the crudest modes of sesnsibility." -Valery

This book has been with me since before I left college, decades ago. I dip into it frequently, and the wisdom contained within always reveals something new. John Gross did a first class job of collecting--and referencing and indexing--all of these great quotes. This book, so rewarding in itself, is also a great introduction to many wonderful writers and thinkers. It's docked one star for having a slight cynical tinge--a few quotes from Tryon Edwards and a few more from Caleb Colton and Augustus Hare would have evened things up. Give this to your favorite brooding young person.

The author has managed to compile a great collection of aphorisms that are clever and entertaining. This isn't a book of silly or funny expressions but still manages to show just how witty the language can be. From ancient philosophers to present day authors there are quotes that express a lot in a few short words. This is a very useful tool for writers.

If I had read this book when I went to college, my life would be different today. The aphorist is the great thinker of mankind; the reader will learn more from one page of this book than most humans learn in a lifetime. Not only do the aphorisms allow one to view hidden truths, they are also the impetus for one to think for oneself. I wrote a book named Excape From The Human Race, and it wasn't until after reading The Oxford Book of Aphorisms that I realized what I had actually written. The human race should listen to the many aphorists in this book: They know what they're talking about because they took the trouble to think first.

The book is dark verging on sardonic, reflecting the dark, sardonic nature of the best epigrams of our age. I was inspired to respond in the margins to a number of them, and I can't think of a better response to epigrams in general, than for them to get under your prickly skin to the extent that you might write your own ironic counterstatements. Bloodshed begets bloodshed, and so we might say (ironically) that this sort of bitterness begets bitterness. But it may very well be the most brilliant bitterness you've known.

Some of my favorite quotes with my responses--representative in the extreme:

"Where they burn books they will also in the end burn human bodies"--Heine, <<Almansor: A Tragedy>>, 1823

"Where they burn human beings, they will also, in the end, burn the wrong book"--Eucaleh Terrapin

"A secret may sometimes be best kept by keeping the secret of its being a secret"--Sir Henry Taylor, <<The Statesman>>, 1823

"Thus the wisest proverb is common sense"--Eucaleh Terrapin

"Freedom produces jokes, and jokes produce freedom"--Jean Paul Richter, Introduction to Aesthetics, 1823

"But to be witty is to be serious about other comedians"--Eucaleh Terrapin

"Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again," noted Andre Gide in 1891, opening this outstanding collection of classical and modern aphorisms.

My well-worn copy has been highlighted, marked, and frequently consulted over the last few years. It's a portable treasure of insights and insanities, both providing pleasures and possibilities. And, as one would expect from an Oxford collection, the this exceptional academic book includes the context and date for each quote. As a life-long lover of quotations and proverbs, I strongly recommend this authoritative collection of aphorisms.

This book contains a remarkably rich collection of aphorisms. Anyone who enjoys writers such as Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Gracian, Lichtenberg, and Wilde should pick up this volume.

Those are the bitter pills of civilization. Like other bitter pills, they have great healing power. As a matter of fact, if the World took more notice of those pearls of wisdom, produced by outstanding minds, from Heraclitus to the Huxleys, policies might be less absurd and mass actions less disastrous than they actually are.