On Work and Leisure
Give me a place to stand, and I shall move the earth.
—Archimedes
1
Give me a place to sit, and I shall watch.
—Anonymous
2
I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.
—Jerome K. Jerome, 1889
Somebody has to do something, and it’s just incredibly pathetic that it has to be us.
—Jerry Garcia, 1988
We can’t all be heroes because somebody has to sit on the curb and clap as they go by.
—Will Rogers
3
The reason why worry kills more people than work is that more people worry than work.
—Robert Frost, 1914
Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of
them all - the apathy of human beings.
—Helen Keller, 1927
The gods help them that help themselves.
—Aesop
4
1
As quoted by Pappus of Alexandria (in *340 AD).
2
Sometimes “attributed” to an “Archimedes’ friend”.
3
As quoted, without a date, by Jacob Morton Braude in 1969.
4
From his fable Hercules and the Wagoner, written in the mid-fifth century BC.
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
K. K. Likharev (ed.), Essential Quotes for Scientists and Engineers,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63332-5_3
15
Give me a place to stand, and I shall move the earth.
—Archimedes
1
Give me a place to sit, and I shall watch.
—Anonymous
2
I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.
—Jerome K. Jerome, 1889
Somebody has to do something, and it’s just incredibly pathetic that it has to be us.
—Jerry Garcia, 1988
We can’t all be heroes because somebody has to sit on the curb and clap as they go by.
—Will Rogers
3
The reason why worry kills more people than work is that more people worry than work.
—Robert Frost, 1914
Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of
them all - the apathy of human beings.
—Helen Keller, 1927
The gods help them that help themselves.
—Aesop
4
1
As quoted by Pappus of Alexandria (in *340 AD).
2
Sometimes “attributed” to an “Archimedes’ friend”.
3
As quoted, without a date, by Jacob Morton Braude in 1969.
4
From his fable Hercules and the Wagoner, written in the mid-fifth century BC.
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
K. K. Likharev (ed.), Essential Quotes for Scientists and Engineers,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63332-5_3
15