Idleness Quotes
Quotes tagged as "idleness"
Showing 1-30 of 152
![Dorothy Parker](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1188820565i/24956._UY200_CR39,0,200,200_.jpg)
“Inventory:
"Four be the things I am wiser to know:
Idleness, sorrow, a friend, and a foe.
Four be the things I'd been better without:
Love, curiosity, freckles, and doubt.
Three be the things I shall never attain:
Envy, content, and sufficient champagne.
Three be the things I shall have till I die:
Laughter and hope and a sock in the eye.”
― The Complete Poems of Dorothy Parker
"Four be the things I am wiser to know:
Idleness, sorrow, a friend, and a foe.
Four be the things I'd been better without:
Love, curiosity, freckles, and doubt.
Three be the things I shall never attain:
Envy, content, and sufficient champagne.
Three be the things I shall have till I die:
Laughter and hope and a sock in the eye.”
― The Complete Poems of Dorothy Parker
![John Lubbock](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1398869672i/415473._UX200_CR0,29,200,200_.jpg)
“Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.”
― The Use Of Life
― The Use Of Life
![Tim Winton](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1240750986i/19929.jpg)
“It’s how I fill the time when nothing’s happening. Thinking too much, flirting with melancholy.”
― Breath
― Breath
![John Lennon](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1207677340i/19968._UX200_CR0,19,200,200_.jpg)
“Everybody seems to think I'm lazy
I don't mind, I think they're crazy.
Running everywhere at such a speed
Till they find there's no need.”
―
I don't mind, I think they're crazy.
Running everywhere at such a speed
Till they find there's no need.”
―
![Søren Kierkegaard](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1651453632i/6172._UX200_CR0,41,200,200_.jpg)
“Idleness, we are accustomed to say, is the root of all evil. To prevent this evil, work is recommended.... Idleness as such is by no means a root of evil; on the contrary, it is truly a divine life, if one is not bored....”
― Either/Or: A Fragment of Life
― Either/Or: A Fragment of Life
![Vincent van Gogh](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1651442680i/34583._UX200_CR0,26,200,200_.jpg)
“There is a great difference between one idler and another idler. There is someone who is an idler out of laziness and lack of character, owing to the baseness of his nature. If you like, you may take me for one of those. Then there is the other kind of idler, the idler despite himself, who is inwardly consumed by a great longing for action who does nothing because his hands are tied, because he is, so to speak, imprisoned somewhere, because he lacks what he needs to be productive, because disastrous circumstances have brought him forcibly to this end. Such a one does not always know what he can do, but he nevertheless instinctively feels, I am good for something! My existence is not without reason! I know that I could be a quite a different person! How can I be of use, how can I be of service? There is something inside me, but what can it be? He is quite another idler. If you like you may take me for one of those.”
― The Letters of Vincent van Gogh
― The Letters of Vincent van Gogh
![Erik Pevernagie](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1629325665i/14170911._UX200_CR0,18,200,200_.jpg)
“As we are whiling away days of idleness, time may flow rashly through the screen of our thoughts and veil the relevance of individual fragments in our story. The clock of reality can arrest us, though, and compel us to confront the demands of the truth. ("Non mais, t'as vu l'heure !")”
―
―
![Jerome K. Jerome](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1335971515i/3352._UX200_CR0,29,200,200_.jpg)
“It is in our faults and failings, not in our virtues, that we touch one another and find sympathy. We differ widely enough in our nobler qualities. It is in our follies that we are at one.”
― Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow
― Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow
![Samuel Johnson](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1209488222i/22191._CR0,21,200,200_.jpg)
“If you are idle, be not solitary; if you are solitary be not idle.”
― The Life of Samuel Johnson LL.D. Vol 3
― The Life of Samuel Johnson LL.D. Vol 3
![Albert Camus](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1686463588i/957894._UY200_CR46,0,200,200_.jpg)
“He knew now that it was his own will to happiness which must make the next move. But if he was to do so, he realized that he must come to terms with time, that to have time was at once the most magnificent and the most dangerous of experiments. Idleness is fatal only to the mediocre.”
― A Happy Death
― A Happy Death
![Benedict of Nursia](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1394219597i/6430363._UX200_CR0,21,200,200_.jpg)
“Idleness is the enemy of the soul; and therefore the brethren ought to be employed in manual labor at certain times, at others, in devout reading.”
― The Rule of Saint Benedict
― The Rule of Saint Benedict
![Michel de Montaigne](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1649904459i/17241._UX200_CR0,36,200,200_.jpg)
“So it is with minds. Unless you keep them busy with some definite subject that will bridle and control them, they throw themselves in disorder hither and yon in the vague field of imagination... And there is no mad or idle fancy that they do not bring forth in the agitation.”
―
―
![C.G. Jung](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1471024439i/38285._UX200_CR0,14,200,200_.jpg)
“Were it not for the leaping and twinkling of the soul, man would rot away in his greatest passion, idleness.”
― The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious
― The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious
![E.M. Forster](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1402057803i/86404._UX200_CR0,37,200,200_.jpg)
“Every little trifle, for some reason, does seem incalculably important today, and when you say of a thing that 'nothing hangs on it,' it sounds like blasphemy. There's never any knowing—(how am I to put it?)—which of our actions, which of our idlenesses won't have things hanging on it for ever.”
― Where Angels Fear to Tread
― Where Angels Fear to Tread
![Lawrence Durrell](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1463722118i/8166._UY200_CR14,0,200,200_.jpg)
“I suppose the secret of his success is in his tremendous idleness which almost approaches the supernatural.”
― Justine
― Justine
![Anton Chekhov](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1650587503i/5031025._UX200_CR0,41,200,200_.jpg)
“Ivanov: I am a bad, pathetic and worthless individual. One needs to be pathetic, too, worn out and drained by drink, like Pasha, to be still fond of me and to respect me. My God, how I despise myself! I so deeply loathe my voice, my walk, my hands, these clothes, my thoughts. Well, isn't that funny, isn't that shocking? Less than a year ago I was healthy and strong, I was cheerful, tireless, passionate, I worked with these very hands, I could speak to move even Philistines to tears, I could cry when I saw grief, I became indignant when I encountered evil. I knew inspiration, I knew the charm and poetry of quiet nights when from dusk to dawn you sit at your desk or indulge you mind with dreams. I believed, I looked into the future as into the eyes of my own mother... And now, my God, I am exhausted, I do not believe, I spend my days and nights in idleness.”
― Ivanov
― Ivanov
![Tom Hodgkinson](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1250373295i/13793.jpg)
“Labour-saving devices just make us try to cram more pointless activities into each day, rather than doing the important thing, which is to enjoy our life.”
―
―
![Tom Hodgkinson](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1250373295i/13793.jpg)
“A conclusion I’ve come to at the Idler is that it starts with retreating from work but it’s really about making work into something that isn’t drudgery and slavery, and then work and life can become one thing.”
―
―
![Jane Lindskold](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1207327806i/36344._UX200_CR0,29,200,200_.jpg)
“For his part, Blind Seer had no difficulty accepting idleness. A wolf proverb stated: “Hunt when hungry, sleep when not, for hunger always returns.”
― Through Wolf's Eyes
― Through Wolf's Eyes
![Tom Hodgkinson](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1250373295i/13793.jpg)
“Our dreams take us into other worlds, alternative realities that help us make sense of day-to-day realities.”
― How to Be Idle
― How to Be Idle
![Émile Zola](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/authors/1544927603i/4750._UX200_CR0,38,200,200_.jpg)
“All his [Laurent's] great powerful body wanted was to do nothing, to wallow in never-ending idleness and self-indulgence. He would have liked to eat well, sleep well, satisfy his passions liberally, without stirring from one spot or risking the misfortune of a bit of fatigue.”
― Thérèse Raquin
― Thérèse Raquin
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