"Books are delightful when prosperity happily smiles; when adversity threatens, they are inseparable comforters. They give strength to human compacts, nor are grave opinions brought forward without books. Arts and sciences, the benefits of which no mind can calculate, depend upon books."

"You, O Books, are the golden vessels of the temple, the arms of the clerical militia with which the missiles of the most wicked are destroyed; fruitful olives, vines of Engaddi, fig-trees knowing no sterility; burning lamps to be ever held in the hand."

"But the images of men's wits and knowledges remain in books, exempted from the wrong of time, and capable of perpetual renovation."

"Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested."

"Books must follow sciences, and not sciences books."

"The Wise (Minstrel or Sage,) out of their books are clay; But in their books, as from their graves they rise. Angels—that, side by side, upon our way, Walk with and warn us!"

"Hark, the world so loud, And they, the movers of the world, so still!"

"We call some books immortal! Do they live? If so, believe me, TIME hath made them pure. In Books, the veriest wicked rest in peace."

"All books grow homilies by time; they are Temples, at once, and Landmarks."

"There is no Past, so long as Books shall live!"

"In you are sent The types of Truths whose life is THE TO COME; In you soars up the Adam from the fall; In you the FUTURE as the PAST is given— Ev'n in our death ye bid us hail our birth;— Unfold these pages, and behold the Heaven, Without one grave-stone left upon the Earth."

"Some said, John, print it, others said, Not so; Some said, It might do good, others said, No."

"Go now, my little book, to every place Where my first pilgrim has but shown his face. Call at their door: if any say "Who's there?" Then answer thou "Christiana is here.""

"In the poorest cottage are Books: is one Book, wherein for several thousands of years the spirit of man has found light, and nourishment, and an interpreting response to whatever is Deepest in him."

"It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds, and these invaluable means of communication are in the reach of all. In the best books, great men talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours."

"Go, litel boke! go litel myn tregedie!"

"And as for me, though than I konne but lyte, On bokes for to rede I me delyte, And to hem yeve I feyth and ful credence, And in myn herte have hem in reverence So hertely, that ther is game noon. That fro my bokes maketh me to goon, But yt be seldome on the holy day. Save, certeynly, when that the monthe of May Is comen, and that I here the foules synge, And that the floures gynnen for to sprynge, Farwel my boke, and my devocion."

"It is saying less than the truth to affirm that an excellent book (and the remark holds almost equally good of a Raphael as of a Milton) is like a well-chosen and well-tended fruit tree. Its fruits are not of one season only. With the due and natural intervals, we may recur to it year after year, and it will supply the same nourishment and the same gratification, if only we ourselves return to it with the same healthful appetite."

"Books should, not Business, entertain the Light; And Sleep, as undisturb'd as Death, the Night."

"The monument of vanished mindes."

"Give me a book that does my soul embrace And makes simplicity a grace— Language freely flowing, thoughts as free— Such pleasing books more taketh me Than all the modern works of art That please mine eyes and not my heart."

"Books should to one of these four ends conduce, For wisdom, piety, delight, or use."

"He ate and drank the precious words, His spirit grew robust; He knew no more that he was poor, Nor that his frame was dust. He danced along the dingy days, And this bequest of wings Was but a book. What liberty A loosened spirit brings!"

"There is no frigate like a book To take us lands away, Nor any coursers like a page Of prancing poetry. This traverse may the poorest take Without oppress of toll; How frugal is the chariot That bears a human soul."

"Golden volumes! richest treasures, Objects of delicious pleasures! You my eyes rejoicing please, You my hands in rapture seize! Brilliant wits and musing sages, Lights who beam'd through many ages! Left to your conscious leaves their story, And dared to trust you with their glory; And now their hope of fame achiev'd, Dear volumes! you have not deceived!"

"Homo unius libri, or, cave ab homine unius libri."

"Not as ours the books of old— Things that steam can stamp and fold; Not as ours the books of yore— Rows of type, and nothing more."

"The spectacles of books."

"Of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh."

"Books are the best things, well used: abused, among the worst."

"In every man's memory, with the hours when life culminated are usually associated certain books which met his views."

"There are many virtues in books, but the essential value is the adding of knowledge to our stock by the record of new facts, and, better, by the record of intuitions which distribute facts, and are the formulas which supersede all histories."

"We prize books, and they prize them most who are themselves wise."

"The princeps copy, clad in blue and gold."

"Now cheaply bought, for thrice their weight in gold."

"How pure the joy when first my hands unfold The small, rare volume, black with tarnished gold."

"Books are necessary to correct the vices of the polite; but those vices are ever changing, and the antidote should be changed accordingly—should still be new."

"In proportion as society refines, new books must ever become more necessary."

"I armed her against the censures of the world; showed her that books were sweet unreproaching companions to the miserable, and that if they could not bring us to enjoy life, they would at least teach us to endure it."

"I have ever gained the most profit, and the most pleasure also, from the books which have made me think the most: and, when the difficulties have once been overcome, these are the books which have struck the deepest root, not only in my memory and understanding, but likewise in my affections."

"Thou art a plant sprung up to wither never, But, like a laurell, to grow green forever."

"The foolishest book is a kind of leaky boat on a sea of wisdom; some of the wisdom will get in anyhow."

"Dear little child, this little book Is less a primer than a key To sunder gates where wonder waits Your "Open Sesame!""

"Medicine for the soul."

"Now go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book."

"Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book!"

"My desire is … that mine adversary had written a book."

"Blest be the hour wherein I bought this book; His studies happy that composed the book, And the man fortunate that sold the book."

"Pray thee, take care, that tak'st my book in hand, To read it well; that is to understand."