To read is to surrender oneself to an endless displacement of curiosity and desire from one sentence to another, from one action to another, from one level of a text to another. – David Lodge, born on this date in 1935

May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds. – Edward Paul Abbey, born on this date in 1927

Books are the carriers of civilization...They are companions, teachers, magicians, bankers of the treasures of the mind. Books are humanity in print. – Barbara Wertheim Tuchman, born on this date in 1912

You and I have to rejoice that we have not to answer for our fathers’ crimes, neither shall we do right to charge them one to another. We can only regret it, and flee from it, ... – William Apess, born on this date in 1798

A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold In settings of silver. Like an earring of gold and an ornament of fine gold Is a wise rebuker to an obedient ear. Proverbs 25:11-12

Life is too short to read a bad book. – James Joyce, born on this date in 1882

Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, and riches take wings. Only one thing endures and that is character. – Horace Greeley, born in Amherst, NH on this date in 1811

Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility. ― Dietrich Bonhoeffer, born on this date in 1906, hanged in 1945

Silence is only frightening to people who are compulsively verbalizing. – William S. Burroughs, born on this date in 1914

You can trust the moon to move the mighty ocean You can trust the sun to shine upon the land You take the little that you know and you do the best you can And leave the rest to the quiet faith of man Bill Staines, born on this date in 1947

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, .... ― Ronald Reagan, born on this date in 1911

There are books of which the backs and covers are by far the best parts. ― Charles Dickens, born on this date in 1812

Like the cold of snow in time of harvest Is a faithful messenger to those who send him, For he refreshes the soul of his masters. Proverbs 25:13

These are the times that try men's souls. – Thomas Paine, born on this date in 1737

A book reads the better which is our own, and has been so long known to us, that we know the topography of its blots, and dog's ears, and can trace the dirt in it to having read it at tea with buttered muffins. – Charles Lamb, born on this date in 1775

Libraries store the energy that fuels the imagination. They open up windows to the world and inspire us to explore and achieve, and contribute to improving our quality of life. Libraries change lives for the better. – Sidney Sheldon, born on this date in 1917

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves. — Abraham Lincoln, born on this date in 1809

I should be inclined ... to consider the world and this life as the mighty process of God, not for the trial, but for the creation and formation of mind, a process necessary to awaken inert, chaotic matter into spirit, ... – Thomas Malthus, born on this date in 1766

Amor vincit omnia. — Geoffrey Chaucer

Love is not affectionate feeling, but a steady wish for the loved person’s ultimate good as far as it can be obtained. — C.S. Lewis