Saadi سعدی
1258 · Shiraz, Persia
Everyone who came built a new house, then left and handed the place on to another.
هر که آمد عمارتی نو ساخت
رفت و منزل به دیگری پرداختThe Rose Garden (Gulistan), preface
In the same thread
Al-Maarri أبو العلاء المعري
early 11th century · Maarra, Syria · Following the lines that say the earth is made of the bodies of those who died before
Walk, if you can, slowly through the air, not strutting over the remains of God's servants.
سر ، إن اسطعت ، في الهواء رويدا
لا اختيالا على رفات العبادThe elegy "Of no use, in my belief," Divan of al-Maarri
Wang Fanzhi 王梵志
c. 7th century · Tang China · The earthen dumplings are grave mounds, and the filling is people
Outside the city wall, the earthen dumplings; their filling is inside the city. One apiece for everyone: do not complain that they have no taste.
城外土饅頭，餡草在城裏。
一人喫一個，莫嫌沒滋味。A poem of Wang Fanzhi, as quoted and handed down by Huang Tingjian of the Song
Li Bai 李白
c. 733 · Tang China · Drinking with his cousins on a spring night in a garden of peach blossom
Heaven and earth are an inn for all things, and time is a traveller passing through a hundred ages. This floating life is like a dream: how much joy can we have?
夫天地者，萬物之逆旅也；光陰者，百代之過客也。而浮生若夢，爲歡幾何？"Preface to a Spring Night Banquet in the Peach and Plum Garden"
Pindar Πίνδαρος
446 BC · Thebes, ancient Greece
Creatures of a day! What is someone? What is no one? Man is a dream of a shadow.
ἐπάμεροι· τί δέ τις; τί δʼ οὔ τις; σκιᾶς ὄναρ
ἄνθρωπος.Pythian Ode 8
1 in 100 Billion · The social network of those who came before us