Pipistrello's Commonplace Book

I have heard that jugglers visit you - beware what happens. A man turning to jugglers will soon have a wife whose name is poverty. When the jugglers speak to you, pretend not to hear and think of other things. St. Bernard of Clairvaux, C12th founder of the Cistercian Order

Oh! the mocking diablery in strings, wisps of untidy hair, queer trimmings, and limp hats. Alas! that they should have such impish power to detract from the dignity of woman and render man absurd. Dorothy Quigley, What Dress Makes Of Us,   1897

In Books lies the soul of the whole of Past Time; the articulate audible voice of the Past, when the body and material substance of it has altogether vanished like a dream. Thomas Carlyle, On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History , 1841 

If a man is a good man, and an honest man, it is no matter where he was born, and if those who have lately made so much noise about country and party, had been scholars to Gaffer Gingerbread, he would have knocked their heads together for being such Boobies. The Renowned History of Giles Gingerbread , 1768