Voltaire

Voltaire

1759 · Paris, France · Ferney · The words of an old man who farms a small plot with his children

Work keeps three great evils away from us: boredom, vice and want.

le travail éloigne de nous trois grands maux, l'ennui, le vice, et le besoin.

Candide, chapter 30

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Jerome K. Jerome

1889 · London, England

I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours. I love to keep it by me: the idea of getting rid of it nearly breaks my heart.

Three Men in a Boat, chapter 15

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Duauf Tuauf

c. 20th century BC · ancient Egypt · Telling his son why learning to write is better

I have watched the blacksmith at the door of his furnace. His hands are like crocodiles' hide, and he stinketh worse than fishes' eggs.

"The Teaching of Duauf for His Son Pepi" · in place of the original: the English translation by E. A. Wallis Budge (1914)

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Sarojini Naidu

1905 · Hyderabad, India

Lightly, O lightly we bear her along, She sways like a flower in the wind of our song; She skims like a bird on the foam of a stream, She floats like a laugh from the lips of a dream.

"Palanquin Bearers," in The Golden Threshold

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Fan Chengda 范成大

1186 · Suzhou, Southern Song China

By day they go out to weed the fields, by night they twist hemp. The sons and daughters of the village each do their share. The little grandchildren do not yet know how to plough or weave, but in the shade of the mulberry they too are learning to plant melons.

晝出耘田夜績麻，村莊兒女各當家。 童孫未解供耕織，也傍桑陰學種瓜。

"Miscellaneous Pleasures of the Fields in the Four Seasons," summer

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Kahlil Gibran

1923 · Bsharri, Lebanon · New York, USA

Work is love made visible.

The Prophet, "On Work"

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