Quotes from Hilaire Belloc

There is not anything that can so suddenly flood the mind with shame as the conviction of ignorance, yet we are all ignorant of nearly everything there is to be known.

Oh, my friends, be warned by me, That breakfast, dinner, lunch and tea, Are all human frame requires.

Of old when folk lay sick and sorely tried The doctors gave them physic, and they died. But here's a happier age: for now we know Both how to make men sick and keep them so.

The moment a man talks to his fellows he begins to lie.

Money gives me pleasure all the time.

From quiet homes and first beginning, Out to the undiscovered ends, There's nothing worth the wear of winning, But laughter and the love of friends.

Protest against Industrial Capitalism from one aspect or another is universal: so was the protest against the condition of European religion at the beginning of the sixteenth century.

An institute run with such knavish imbecility that if it were not the work of God it would not last a fortnight.

The grace of God is courtesy.

Of courtesy, it is much less Than courage of heart or holiness, Yet in my walks it seems to me That the Grace of God is in courtesy.

Whatever happens, we have gotThe Maxim gun, and they have not.

I am writing a book about the Crusades so dull that I can scarcely write it.

The Microbe is so very small You cannot make him out at all, But many sanguine people hope To see him through a microscope.

Before the curse of statistics fell upon mankind we lived a happy, innocent life, full of merriment and go and informed by fairly good judgment.

Ownership is not a general feature of our society, determining its character. On the contrary, dependence on a precarious wage at the will of others is the general feature of our society.

Every major question in history is a religious question. It has more effect in molding life than nationalism or a common language.

Be content to remember that those who can make omelettes properly can do nothing else.

The pilgrim is humble and devout, and human, and charitable, and ready to smile and admire; therefore, he should comprehend the whole of his way, the people in it, and the hills and the clouds, and the habits of the various cities.

Loss and possession, death and life are one, There falls no shadow where there shines no sun.

Any subject can be made interesting, and therefore any subject can be made boring.

Is there no Latin word for Tea? Upon my soul, if I had known that I would have let the vulgar stuff alone.

For every time she shouted "Fire!" They only answered "Little liar!" And therefore when her aunt returned, Matilda, and the house, were burned.

If we are to be happy, decent and secure of our souls: drink some kind of fermented liquor with one's food; go on the water from time to time; dance on occasions, and sing in a chorus.

Of all fatiguing, futile, empty trades, the worst, I suppose, is writing about writing.