Samuel Butler

Samuel Butler
Samuel Butlerwas an iconoclastic Victorian-era English author who published a variety of works. Two of his most famous pieces are the Utopian satire Erewhon and a semi-autobiographical novel published posthumously, The Way of All Flesh. He is also known for examining Christian orthodoxy, substantive studies of evolutionary thought, studies of Italian art, and works of literary history and criticism. Butler made prose translations of the Iliad and Odyssey, which remain in use to this day...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth4 December 1835
I really do not see much use in exalting the humble and meek; they do not remain humble and meek long when they are exalted.
It is our less conscious thoughts and our less conscious actions which mainly mould our lives and the lives of those who spring from us.
Man is the only animal that laughs and has a state legislature.
God and the Devil are an effort after specialization and the division of labor.
Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.
Men are seldom more commonplace than on supreme occasions.
The only living works are those which have drained much of the author's own life into them.
Any fool can paint a picture, but it takes a wise man to be able to sell it.
[P]oetry resembles metaphysics: one does not mind one's own, but one does not like anyone else's.
Christ was only crucified once and for a few hours. Think of the hundreds of thousands whom Christ has been crucifying in a quiet way ever since.
He has spent his life best who has enjoyed it most. God will take care that we do not enjoy it any more than is good for us.
It is not he who gains the exact point in dispute who scores most in controversy - but he who has shown the better temper.
My main wish is to get my books into other people's rooms, and to keep other people's books out of mine.
The oldest books are only just out to those who have not read them.