#idleness

It has been said that idleness is the parent of mischief, which is very true; but mischief itself is merely an attempt to escape from the dreary vacuum of idleness. ↗

— George Borrow

#been #dreary #escape #idleness #itself

Research! A mere excuse for idleness; it has never achieved, and will never achieve any results of the slightest value. ↗

— Benjamin Jowett

#achieved #any #excuse #idleness #mere

I don't think necessity is the mother of invention. Invention, in my opinion, arises directly from idleness, possibly also from laziness - to save oneself trouble. ↗

— Agatha Christie

#arises #directly #i #idleness #in my opinion

Trouble springs from idleness, and grievous toil from needless ease. ↗

— Benjamin Franklin

#grievous #idleness #needless #springs #toil

But most of all, as summer slanted to an end, he was learning to love idleness, idleness no longer as stretches of freedom reclaimed by stealth here and there from involuntary labour, surreptitious thefts to be enjoyed sitting on his heels before a flowerbed with the fork dangling from his fingers, but as a yielding up of himself to time, to a time flowing slowly like oil from horizon to horizon over the face of the world, washing over his body, circulating in his armpits and his groin, stirring his eyelids. He was neither pleased nor displeased when there was work to do; it was all the same. He could lie all afternoon with his eyes open, staring at the corrugations in the roof-iron and the tracings of rust; his mind would not wander, he would see nothing but the iron, the lines would not transform themselves into pattern or fantasy; he was himself, lying in his own house, the rust was merely rust, all that was moving was time, bearing him onward in its flow. ↗

— J.M. Coetzee

#time #freedom

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. ↗

— Dorothy Parker

#contentment #curiosity #doubt #envy #foes

Idleness for me is not a giving up on life but a spirited grabbing hold of it. ↗

— Tom Hodgkinson

#living #life

Writing is a dreadful labor, yet not so dreadful as Idleness. ↗

— Thomas Carlyle

#idleness #labor #writing #yet

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

#living #life

It is rather hard to be accused of shiftlessness and idleness when the accuser closes the avenue of labour and industrial pursuits to us. ↗

— George H. White

#accuser #avenue #closes #hard #idleness