Nero Quotes

Then there was David, lording it up at Buckingham Palace, thinking he was king of the shit heap. That guy was definitely nuts, like every dictator that had gone before him. Nero, Caligula, Henry the Eighth, Napoleon, Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Margaret Thatcher, Colonel Gaddafi, that crazy North Korean bastard who was in Team America, Kim Jong whatever. ~ Charlie Higson

If one kiss screwed up our friendship," he whispered, "what the hell did we just do? ~ Lisa Kessler

Courtesy is one's own affair, but decency is a debt to life ~ Rex Stout

When Nero, with a casual quip, declared 'mushrooms to be the food of the gods, since it was by means of a mushroom that Claudius has become a god',66 it ~ Tom Holland

If the lines are even, then we pick the line that has the least scary people in it."
"Jesus Christ." Elle heard Nero say.
"For fuck's sake," Amo chimed in.
"Motherfuckers," Vincent added. ~ Sarah Brianne

It is not difficult to pretend that Jesus never lived. The attempt to prove it, however, invariably produces the opposite conclusion. In the Jewish literature of the first century the existence of Jesus is not attested to with any certainty, and in the Greek and Latin literature of the same period there is no evidence for it at all. Of the two passages in his Antiquities in which the Jewish writer Josephus makes incidental mention of Jesus, one was undoubtedly interpolated by Christian copyists. The first pagan witness to His existence is Tacitus, who, during the reign of Trajan in the second decade of the second century A.D., reports in his Annals (XV.44) that the founder of the "Christian" sect (which Nero accused of causing the great fire at Rome) was executed under the government of Tiberius by the procurator of Judea, Pontius Pilate. Since ~ Albert Schweitzer

Soon dinner will run into bed-time, and we shall all eat reclining like the ancient Romans
about whose digestion, you know, I have often wondered. Whether a dose of rhubabrb might have made a difference to Nero or Caligula is a question you might ponder, my dear, next time you go through your Tacitus. ~ Jude Morgan

Nothing in this world is perpetual; Every thing, however seemingly firm, is in continual flux and change: The world itself gives symptoms of frailty and dissolution: How contrary to analogy, therefore, to imagine, that one single form, seeming the frailest of any, and subject to the greatest disorders, is immortal and indissoluble? What a daring theory is that! How lightly, not to say how rashly, entertained! How to dispose of the infinite number of posthumous existences ought also to embarrass the religious theory. Every planet, in every solar system, we are at liberty to imagine people with intelligent, mortal beings: At least we can fix on no other supposition. For these, a new universe must, every generation, be created beyond the bounds of the present universe: or one must have been created at first so prodigiously wide as to admit of this continual influx of beings. Ought such bold suppositions to be received by any philosophy: and that merely on the pretext of a bare possibility? When it is asked, whether Agamemnon, Thersites, Hannibal, Nero, and every stupid clown, that ever existed in Italy, Scythia, Bactria, or Guinea, are now alive; can any man think, that a scrutiny of nature will furnish arguments strong enough to answer so strange a question in the affirmative? The want of argument, without revelation, sufficiently establishes the negative. Quanto facilius, says Pliny, certiusque sibi quemque credere, ac specimen securitatis antegenitali sumere experimento. Our ~ David Hume

Aren't you afraid they'll arrest you? (Shahara)
I wasn't a convict, Dagan. I was an illegally purchased slave. My owner has no legal claim on me. And I'm no longer a kid learning my powers. I'm a full-grown man with an ax I want to bury in the forehead of anyone dumb enough to come at me. I defy the bastards to try something now. (Nero) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

As C. S. Lewis reminds us: In all our discussions of Hell we should keep steadily before our eyes the possible damnation, not of our enemies nor of our friends (since both these disturb the reason) but of ourselves. This [doctrine] is not about your wife or son, nor about Nero or Judas Iscariot; it is about you and me. ~ Iain M. Duguid

When, sometime around my fortieth birthday, I was struck by the urge to try to write a novel, I was vastly comforted to learn that Rex Stout didn't write his first Nero Wolfe tale until he was forty-seven, and that he proceeded to write them right up to his death at the age of eighty-eight. It was considerably less comforting to learn that he typically completed a novel in thirty-eight days, and that he always got it right on the first try. P. G. Wodehouse once said, "Stout's supreme triumph was the creation of Archie Goodwin." That's how I've always felt about it, too. When I returned those first Rex Stout books to my librarian, I said to her, "Do you have any more of these Archie Goodwin stories?" She smiled, I recall, and said, "Why, yes. Dozens. ~ Rex Stout

I did not blame the poor girl. Truly. But getting her to trust my friendship, to trust anyone after her stepfather, Nero, was like training a wild squirrel to eat out of one's hand. Any loud noise was liable to cause her to flee, or bite, or both.
(I realize that's not a fair comparison. Meg bites much harder than a wild squirrel.) ~ Rick Riordan

Sympathy, conscience, disgust, despair, repentance, and atonement are for us repellent debauchery. To sit down and let oneself be hypnotized by one's own navel, to turn up one's eyes and humbly offer the back of one's neck to Gletkin's revolver - that is an easy solution. The greatest temptation for the like of us is: to renounce violence, to repent, to make peace with oneself. Most great revolutionaries fell before this temptation, from Spartacus to Danton and Dostoevsky; they are the classical form of betrayal of the cause. The temptations of God were always more dangerous for mankind than those of Satan. As long as chaos dominates the world, God is ananachronism; and every compromise with one's own conscience is perfidy. When the accursed inner voice speaks to you, hold your hands over your ears. ..." He felt for the bottle behind him and poured out an other glass. Rubashov noticed that the bottle was already half empty. You also could do with a little solace, he thought.

"The greatest criminals in history," Ivanov went on, "are not of the type Nero and Fouché, but of the type Gandhi and Tolstoy. Gandhi's inner voice has done more to prevent the liberation of India than the British guns. To sell oneself for thirty pieces of silver is an honest transaction; but to sell oneself to one's own conscience is to abandon mankind. History is a priori amoral; it has no conscience. To want to conduct history according to the maxims of the Sunday school means to leave every ~ Arthur Koestler

No problem, but just know that no one steals from Nero. He knows who you are and he will hunt you down and make you pay in ways you can't imagine – including this whole brain squeeze thing he does that will leave you with a migraine so bad, you'll wish you could bleed out your eyes to stop the pain. He's nasty that way. (Syn) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

Man's brain, enlarged fortuitously, invented words in an ambitious effort to learn how to think, only to have them usurped by his emotions. But we still try.
Nero Wolf in Death of a Dude. ~ Rex Stout

Darkdoom? Darkdoom did this?" Nero was visibly surprised. He placed a hand on his forehead, rubbing his temples. "Oh, why is it always the bald ones? ~ Mark Walden

Can you remember, Acte ... how much easier our belief in Nero made life for us in the old days? And can you remember the paralysis, the numbness that seized the whole world when Nero died? Didn't you feel as if the world had grown bare and colorless all of a sudden? Those people on the Palatine have tried to steal our Nero from us, from you and me. Isn't splendid to think that we can show them they haven't succeeded? They have smashed his statues into splinters, erased his name from all the inscriptions, they even replaced his head on that huge statue in Rome with the peasant head of old Vespasian. Isn't it fine to teach them that all that hasn't been of the slightest use? Granted that they have been successful for a few years. For a few years they have actually managed to banish all imagination from the world, all enthusiasm, extravagance, everything that makes life worth living. But now, with our Nero, all these things are back again. ~ Lion Feuchtwanger

It's not evil that's ruining the earth, but mediocrity. The crime is not that Nero played while Rome burned, but that he played badly. ~ Ned Rorem

The avoidance of idiocy should be the primary and constant concern of every intelligent person, - Nero Wolfe ~ Rex Stout

Baudelaires had visited the office of Vice Principal Nero and learned about all of the academy's strict and unfair rules. When they worked ~ Lemony Snicket

Nero took another look at the screens, then turned around and headed up to the top command level, where Rael was trying to coordinate the entire mess they were currently mired in. Mostly, that just amounted to watching helplessly while their teams went about their jobs, but Nero supposed it was the thought that mattered. As ~ Evan Currie

Nero, you are an example to all the children on this shuttle. Because most of them are so foolish, they think it is better to keep their stupidest thoughts to themselves. You, however, understand the profound truth that you must reveal your stupidity openly. To hold your stupidity inside you is to embrace it, to cling to it, to protect it. But when you expose your stupidity, you give yourself the chance to have it caught, corrected, and replaced with wisdom. Be brave, all of you, like Nero Boulanger, and when you have a thought of such surpassing ignorance that you think it's actually smart, make sure to make some noise, to let your mental limitations squeak out some whimpering fart of a thought, so that you have a chance to learn. ~ Orson Scott Card

I wish I could play fiddle by firelight.
That last one had been the wish of a guy named Nero. Just went to show that you had to be careful what you wished for. ~ Kiernan Kelly

Instead of beseeching men to be reconciled to God, we find ministers wasting their time in giving Sunday lectures about all kinds of subjects. Rome is burning and Nero is playing his fiddle. Souls are perishing and minsters are amusing them. ~ Todd Friel

Don't be disgusting.
Don't dare me. I majored in disgusting at Gulag Community College. Lucrezia Borgia taught cooking, and Madame Defarge taught knitting. Emperor Nero taught violin and also led the cheerleading squad. I skipped all my classes and failed with distinction. ~ Gregory Maguire

Nero, we need to talk. Chloe will not get off my ass. I told her," Amo looked right at Chloe in the eyes, "to walk beside me, but she refuses to even say a word to me."
　　"T-that's how I walk!" Chloe blurted.
　　Elle started laughing; it was too hard not to.
　　"Oh, now you can talk because Elle's around." Elle only laughed harder.
"I blame you!" He pointed at Elle. ~ Sarah Brianne

You're the one who likes cigars right? Try smoking this. ~ Franco Nero

Hey, babe, can I sit here?" Elle turned her head and saw Nero standing there, holding a tray.
　　Did he just really ask that, and did he just really call me 'babe'?
　　"Are you serious? Sit here?" Elle pointed to the chair beside her.
　　"Yes, I was talking directly to you, wasn't I?" Nero was definitely a smartass.
　　"No, you clearly weren't because my name isn't 'babe'. I bet you don't even know my name. So, no, you cannot sit here, Nero. ~ Sarah Brianne

Currently he was going through the entire Nero Wolfe series by Rex Stout, He'd just finished Murder by the Book and was in the process of downloading Triple Jeopardy to his e-reader when the alarm went off. ~ Keith R.A. DeCandido

If Nero had played a better fiddle, Rome might never have burned. ~ Marty Rubin

The ghost of the heart of manred Cain
And the more murderous brain
Of Man, still redder Nero that conceived the death
Of his mother Earth, and tore
Her womb, to know the place where he was conceived. ~ Edith Sitwell

Women don't require motives that are comprehensible to my intellectual processes.
(Nero Wolfe) ~ Rex Stout

Though they love people, the Christians are enemies of our life, our gods and our crimes; hence she fled from me, as from a man who belongs to our [Roman] society, and with whom she would have to share a life counted criminal by Christians ... I should not have stopped her from believing in her Christ, and would myself have reared an altar to Him in the atrium. What harm could one more god do me? Why might I not believe in Him, - I who do not believe over much in the old gods? ... It would not be difficult for me even to renounce other gods, for no reasoning mind believes in them at present. But it seems that all this is not enough yet for the Christians. It is not enough to honor Christ, one must also live according to His teachings; and here thou art on the shore of a sea which they command thee to wade through.
Quo Vadis ~ Henryk Stanczyk

And please, whatever you do, don't tell us that what we do, either in love or lust, is unnatural. For one thing if what you mean by that is that animals don't do it, then you are quite simply in factual error.
There are plenty of activities or qualities we could list that are most certainly unnatural if you are so mad as to think that humans are not part of nature, or so dull-witted as to believe that 'natural' means 'all natures but human nature': mercy, for example, is un¬natural, an altruistic, non-selfish care and love for other species is unnatural; charity is unnatural, justice is unnatural, virtue is unnatural, indeed - and this surely is the point - the idea of virtue is unnatural, within such a foolish, useless meaning of the word 'natural'. Animals, poor things, eat in order to survive: we, lucky things, do that too, but we also have Abbey Crunch biscuits, Armagnac, selle d'agneau, tortilla chips, sauce béarnaise, Vimto, hot buttered crumpets, Chateau Margaux, ginger-snaps, risotto nero and peanut-butter sandwiches - these things have nothing to do with survival and everything to do with pleasure, connoisseurship and plain old greed. Animals, poor things, copulate in order to reproduce: we, lucky things, do that too, but we also have kinky boots, wank-mags, leather thongs, peep-shows, statuettes by Degas, bedshows, Tom of Finland, escort agencies and the Journals of Anaïs Nin - these things have nothing to do with reproduction and everything to do with ~ Stephen Fry

I know, 0 Caesar, that thou art awaiting my arrival with impatience, that thy true heart of a friend is yearning day and night for me. I know that thou art ready to cover me with gifts, make me prefect of the pretorian guards, and command Tigellinus to be that which the gods made him, a mule-driver in those lands which thou didst inherit after poisoning Domitius. Pardon me, however, for I swear to thee by Hades, and by the shades of thy mother, thy wife, thy brother, and Seneca, that I cannot go to thee. Life is a great treasure. I have taken the most precious jewels from that treasure, but in life there are many things which I cannot endure any longer. Do not suppose, I pray, that I am offended because thou didst kill thy mother, thy wife, and thy brother; that thou didst burn Eome and send to Erebus all the honest men in thy dominions. No, grandson of Chronos. Death is the inheritance of man; from thee other deeds could not have been expected. But to destroy one's ear for whole years with thy poetry, to see thy belly of a Domitius on slim legs whirled about in a Pyrrhic dance; to hear thy music, thy declamation, thy doggerel verses, wretched poet of the suburbs, - is a thing surpassing my power, and it has roused in me the wish to die. Eome stuffs its ears when it hears thee; the world reviles thee. I can blush for thee no longer, and I have no wish to do so. The howls of Cerberus, though resembling thy music, will be less offensive to me, for I have never been the friend ~ Henryk Sienkiewicz

I don't know what it is but every time I see you I feel such a strong urge, to be near you, to protect you, to hold you in my arms and never let you go.
Luke Nero - The Witchlings-Midnight curse ~ Amanda Turner

When I told [Lily Rowan] I wouldn't be able to make it to the Polo Grounds tomorrow, she began to call Wolfe names, and thought of several new ones that showed her wide experience and fine feeling for words. ~ Rex Stout

There were many, many other 'Django' films following mine, with other actors and directors, but there is only one 'Django.' ~ Franco Nero

Left love behind many years ago. Now it rests under a cross in the cemetery in Tombstone. ~ Franco Nero

The absolute ruler may be a Nero, but he is sometimes a Titus or Marc Aurelius; the people is often Nero, but never Marc Aurelius. ~ Antoine Rivarol

The possession of unlimited power will make a despot of almost any man. There is a possible Nero in the gentlest human creature that walks. ~ Thomas Bailey Aldrich

The adventures of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, a team generally regarded as seeking justice, can be compared to the adventures of Rex Stout's two most famous characters, Nero Wolf and Archie Goodwin. ~ James Grady

There is frequently another way to look at things and we are encouraged to do exactly that if we want to grow as a nation, however when we mess with the principles of what made our country great we are in danger of upsetting the apple cart. Many civilized countries that did, lost their freedom in a rapid downhill spiral. Nero fiddled as Rome burned. Cubans lost out by electing Fidel Castro and the Germans and Italians, wanting a better life, voted for Mussolini and Hitler. ~ Captain Hank Bracker, "Seawater One"

Nero noticed his friends gawking. "Hey, fuckers, move your eyes to someone else."
　　"Damn, Nero, you were right. Elle is just so heartbroken." Amo couldn't hold in his laughter.
　　Nero leaned up from the car and ran his hands through his hair. He turned back to them and saw Vincent closing his eyes, whispering something.
　　"What the hell are you doing?"
　　Vincent whispered something else before he opened his eyes. "I was just thanking God for leggings. ~ Sarah Brianne

By the way, you guys seriously screwed up just now. (Nero)
We know. (They said in unison.)
Yeah, well, what you don't know is how grateful your girl is to you. I just thought you should know that you guys are a hero to her ... and she thinks we're all idiots. (Nero) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

Lo!" I said. "I arrived at Camp Half-Blood as Lester Papadopoulos!"
"A pathetic mortal!" Calypso chorused. "Most worthless of teens!"
I glared at her, but I didn't dare stop my performance again. "I overcame many challenges with my companion, Meg McCaffrey!"
"He means his master!" Calypso added. "A twelve-year-old girl! Behold her pathetic slave, Lester, most worthless of teens!"
The policeman huffed impatiently. "We know all this. The emperor told us."
"Shh," said Nanette. "Be polite."
I put my hand over my heart. "We secured the Grove of Dodona, an ancient Oracle, and thwarted the plans of Nero! But, alas, Meg McCaffrey fled from me. Her evil stepfather had poisoned her mind!"
"Poison!" Calypso cried. "Like the breath of Lester Papadopoulos, most worthless of teens!"
I resisted the urge to push Calypso into the flower bed.
Meanwhile, Leo was making his way towards the bulldozer under the guise of an interpretive dance routine, spinning and gasping and pantomiming my words. He looked like a hallucinating ballerina in boxer shorts, but the blemmyae politely got out of his way.
"Lo!" I shouted. "From the Oracle of Dodona we received a prophecy - a limerick most terrible!"
"Terrible!" Calypso chorused. "Like the skills of Lester, most worthless of teens!"
"Vary your adjectives," I grumbled, then continued for my audience: "We travelled west in search of another Oracle, along the way fighting many fearsome foes! The Cyc ~ Rick Riordan

No matter how many men you kill, you can't kill your successor. ~ Seneca.

Thanks for outing me. (Alix)
Anytime, cupcake. Now I'm taking my psychic ass to bed. That door spanked me. (Nero) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

They say that Nero started the fire himself because he needed a suitable backdrop for his concert. ~ Victor Borge

Thus Nero went up and down Greece and challenged the fiddlers at their trade. Aeropus, a Macedonian king, made lanterns; Harcatius, the king of Parthia, was a mole-catcher; and Biantes, the Lydian, filed needles. ~ Jeremy Taylor

If you're a big Hollywood star, you make one movie a year at the most. I can make five in Europe. ~ Franco Nero

I'm telling you right now I could make him pop an aneurysm and no one would know. (Nero)
Doesn't that kind of murder bother you at all? (Alix)
Given everything people have done to me in my life, little girl, especially in my childhood when I was helpless against them, humanity is lucky I'm not on a perpetual killing spree. As for the Merjacks ... I owe them a debt that no amount of violence on my part will settle. So, no. Nothing about killing him would bother me. (Nero) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

Someone who was a part of my life. Probably the only one that really mattered. ~ Franco Nero

What he likes most about proprietary trading is that it requires considerably less time than other high-paying professions; in other words it is perfectly compatible with his non-middle-class work ethic. Trading forces someone to think hard; those who merely work hard generally lose their focus and intellectual energy. In addition, they end up drowning in randomness; work ethics, Nero believes, draw people to focus on noise rather than the signal ~ Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Nature has arranged that when you overcome a given inertia the resulting momentum is proportionate. If I were to begin borrowing money I would end by devising means of persuading the Secretary of the Treasury to lend me the gold reserve. ~ Rex Stout

We haven't done anything. That has devolved into a partisan bickering of the kind that says Nero was fiddling while Rome burned. ~ Michael Scheuer

Nero would be long since forgotten without his outbursts of bloody clowning. ~ Emil Cioran, A Short History of Decay ~ Emil Cioran

Nero wasn't worried at all when he heard the utterance of the Delphic Oracle: "Beware the age of seventy-three." Plenty of time to enjoy himself still. He's thirty. The deadline the god has given him is quite enough to cope with future dangers. ~ C.P. Cavafy

When Paul was taken in chains from his filthy Roman dungeon and beheaded at the order of the opulent madman Nero, two representatives of humanity faced off, one of the best and one of the worst. One lived for prosperity on earth, the other didn't. One now lives in prosperity in heaven, the other doesn't. We remember both men for what they truly were, which is why we name our sons Paul and our dogs Nero. ~ Randy Alcorn

Paul was Nero's prisoner, but Nero was much more God's. ~ William Gurnall

More people saying what they believe would be a great improvement. Because I often do I am unfit for common intercourse.-Nero Wolfe in Blood Will Tell ~ Rex Stout

Of all the difficulties in a state, the temper of a true government most felicifies and perpetuates it; too sudden alterations distemper it. Had Nero tuned his kingdom as he did his harp, his harmony had been more honorable, and his reign more prosperous. ~ Francis Quarles

They heard Hugo ask if the plan for the hors d'oeuvres was still in operation, and they heard Colette ask about plucking the feathers off crows, and they heard Kevin complain that he didn't know whether to hold the birdpaper in his right hand or his left hand, and they heard Mr. Lesko insult Mrs. Morrow, and the bearded man sing a song to the woman with the crow-shaped hat, and they heard a man call for Bruce and a woman call for her mother and dozens of people whisper to and shout at, argue with and agree upon, angrily accuse and meekly defend, furiously compliment and kindly insult dozens of other people, both inside and outside the Hotel Denouement, whose names the Baudelaires recognized, forgot, and had never heard before. Each story had its story, and each story's story was unfathomable in the Baudelaire orphans' short journey, and many of the stories' stories are unfathomable to me, even after all these lonely years and all this lonely research. Perhaps some of these stories are clearer to you, because you have spied upon the people involved. Perhaps Mrs. Bass has changed her name and lives near you, or perhaps Mr. Remora's name is the same, and he lives far away. Perhaps Nero now works as a grocery store clerk, or Geraldine Julienne now teaches arts and crafts. Perhaps Charles and Sir are no longer partners, and you have had the occasion to study one of them as he sat across from you on a bus, or perhaps Hugo, Colette, and Kevin are still comrades, and you have followe ~ Lemony Snicket

[Christians] are people such as the world has not seen hitherto, and their teaching is of a kind that the world has not heard up to this time ... ~ Henryk Stanczyk

When I review Xerxes' achievements, I praise him, not for having yoked the Hellespont, but for having crossed it. But I can see that Nero will neither sail through the Isthmus nor complete his digging. ~ Apollonius Of Tyana

Tiberius Nero Blackthorn. I think his parents may have gone a little overboard. It's like naming someone Magnificent Bastard. ~ Cassandra Clare

Punishment [by Nero] was inflicted on the Christians, a class of men given to a new and mischievous superstition. ~ Suetonius

Praise be to Nero's Neptune The Titanic sails at dawn And everybody's shouting "Which Side Are You On?" And Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot Fighting in the captain's tower While calypso singers laugh at them And fishermen hold flowers. ~ Bob Dylan

For our law has in it a turn of humour or touch of fancy which Nero and Herod never happened to think of; that of actually punishing homeless people for not sleeping at home. ~ G.K. Chesterton

You're still the best kisser."
"You make me want to be. ~ Lisa Kessler

They say the eyes are the apertures to the soul. If that is so, I feared Locusta's soul was far darker than even Nero's. ~ Katlyn Charlesworth

Letter from Philippus of Athens to Lucius Annaeus Seneca: Yet the Empire of Rome that [Octavius] created has endured the harshness of a Tiberius, the monstrous cruelty of a Caligula, and the ineptness of a Claudius. And now our new Emperor is one whom you tutored as a boy, and to whom you remain close in his new authority; let us be thankful for the fact that he will rule in the light of your wisdom and virtue, and let us pray to the gods that, under Nero, Rome will at last fulfill the dream of Octavius Caesar. ~ John Edward Williams

I'm afraid it's not nonsense," Genghis said, shaking his turbaned head and continuing his story. "As I was saying before the little girl interrupted me, the baby didn't dash off with the other orphans. She just sat there like a sack of flour. So I walked over to her and gave her a kick to get her moving."

"Excellent idea!" Nero said. "What a wonderful story this is! And then what happened?"

"Well, at first it seemed like I'd kicked a big hole in the baby," Genghis said, his eyes shining, "which seemed lucky, because Sunny was a terrible athlete and it would have been a blessing to put her out of her misery."

Nero clapped his hands. "I know just what you mean, Genghis," he said. "She's a terrible secretary as well."

"But she did all that stapling," Mr. Remora protested.
"Shut up and let the coach finish his story," Nero said.

"But when I looked down," Genghis continued, "I saw that I hadn't kicked a hole in a baby. I'd kicked a hole in a bag of flour! I'd been tricked!"

"That's terrible!" Nero cried. ~ Lemony Snicket

Youth is terrible: it is a stage trod by children in buskins and a variety of costumes mouthing speeches they've memorized and fanatically believe but only half understand. And history is terrible because it so often ends up a playground for the immature; a playground for the young Nero, a playground for the young Bonaparte, a playground for the easily roused mobs of children whose simulated passions and simplistic poses suddenly metamorphose into a catastrophically real reality. ~ Milan Kundera

In The Bloudy Tenent, Williams points out that Constantine "did more to hurt Christ Jesus than the raging fury of the most bloody Neroes." at least under the Christian persecutor Nero, who was rumored to have had the Apostle Paul beheaded and Saint Peter crucified upside down, Christianity was a pure (if hazardous) way of life. But when Constantine himself converted to Christianity, that's when the Church was corrupted and perverted by the state. Williams explains that under Constantine, "the gardens of Christ's churches turned into the wildernesss of national religion, and the world (under Constantine's dominion) to the most unchristian Christendom." Legalizing, legitimizing the Church turned Christianity into just another branch of government enforced by "the sword of civil power," i.e., through state-sponsored violence. ~ Sarah Vowell

We go to Italy every winter, and my husband's mother has a bingo party on Christmas. Every woman brings a dish: lentils, cavolo nero, tons of beans, polenta, every type of cheese, bruschetta, fresh vegetables, and local olive oil and wine. ~ Debi Mazar

If, as you believe there is an Almighty, Omnipresent, Omniscient God, who created the earth or universe, please let me know, first of all, as to why he created this world. This world which is full of woe and grief, and countless miseries, where not even one person lives in peace ... Where is God? What is He doing? Is He getting a diseased pleasure out of it? A Nero! A Genghis Khan! Down with Him! ~ Bhagat Singh

And you take care, too, Shahara. Remember the lies we tell ourselves to survive seldom bring peace to our souls. (Nero) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

Everyone has a first love, and mine was the western. When I was a child and dreamed of the movies, it was always as a cowboy on a white horse. ~ Franco Nero

Is this Nero Wolfe's house?" The voice got me one-half awake. "Yes. Archie Goodwin." "This is Sarah Jaffee. I'm awfully sorry, Mr. Goodwin, did I wake you up?" "Not quite. Go ahead and finish it. ~ Rex Stout

So, suspecting that Nero had a contract on her, she got herself Mithridatized against the poisons that would have been available to her son's underlings. Like Mithridates, Agrippina eventually died by more mechanical methods as her son (supposedly) had assassins slay her, thus providing us with the small but meaningful lesson that one cannot be robust against everything. And, two thousand years later, nobody has found a method for us to get "fortified" against swords. ~ Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I have undertaken to to find an explanation for something that can't possibly be explained-Nero Wolfe ~ Rex Stout

Pliny the Elder, who when Rome was burning requested Nero to play You Picked a Fine Time to Leave Me, Lucille. Never got a dinner! ~ Red Buttons

What?' Otto said as he finished soldering one of the contact points on the device in front of him. 'It's not like we're being trained to follow the rules here. If anything, I think Nero should reward us for our determination and initiative.'

'Can you fit "determination and initiative" on a headstone?' Laura asked as she leant in to examine Otto's handiwork. ~ Mark Walden

It strikes me, sir, that you are nearing the point where even a grateful American might tell you to go to the devil.-Nero Wolfe to an FBI Agent ~ Rex Stout

Shucked and boiled in water, sweet corn is edible and nutritious; roasted in the husk in the hottest possible oven for forty minutes, shucked at the table, and buttered and salted, nothing else, it is ambrosia. No chef's ingenuity and imagination have ever created a finer dish. ~ Rex Stout

I'm sure that Nero didn't set fire to Rome. It was the Christian-Bolsheviks who did that, just as the Commune set fire to Paris in 1871 and the Communists set fire to the Reichstag in 1932. ~ Adolf Hitler

If any man has left us for fear of Nero, I shall not account him a coward; but I shall hail as a philosopher any man who has been superior to this fear, and I shall teach him all I know. ~ Apollonius Of Tyana

Custer was a child once. He didn't spend his childhood killing Indians and stealing their homeland. Nero didn't spend his childhood burning Rome to the ground. Everybody was a child once. No child was born hating the world around him. You had to learn that trait. You had to pick it up from the worst pockets of the universe, the filthiest recesses of society, where the people who learned it before you deposited it when they were done. ~ Rose Christo

Nero drove them out at full throttle, under heavy pursuit. The transport went careening down the street, sending pedestrians and other vehicles in all directions.
"Nero!" Darling shouted. "Some of us aren't suicidal back here."
"Then strap your ass down. Or lose it." Nero jerked to the right.
This time, Darling landed on Hauk.
Hauk put him back on his feet. "Nuh-uh. You have to buy me dinner before you crawl on top of me, baby. No one gets a free ride on the Hauk train. ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

To pronounce French properly you must have within you a deep antipathy, not to say scorn, for some of the most sacred of the Anglo-Saxon prejudices. ~ Rex Stout

Men call their sons Paul and their dogs Nero today. ~ J. Vernon McGee

I could be a star and maybe make lots of money, or I could change roles all the time and have a more interesting - and longer - career. ~ Franco Nero

What if there is no dirt on Merjack?
Oh, I can answer this one. (Omari raised his hand like he was in a classroom, then dropped it to his side.) We all die. (Omari)
I just love teenage angst. By the way, chip, there are worse things in life than dying. (Nero)
Like what? (Omari)
Living as a slave. (Alix) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

And what thoughts or memories, would you guess, were passing through my mind on this extraordinary occasion? Was I thinking of the Sibyl's prophecy, of the omen of the wolf-cub, of Pollio's advice, or of Briseis's dream? Of my grandfather and liberty? Of my grandfather and liberty? Of my three Imperial predecessors, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, their lives and deaths? Of the great danger I was still in from the conspirators, and from the Senate, and from the Gaurds battalions at the Camp? Of Messalina and our unborn child? Of my grandmother Livia and my promise to deify her if I ever became Emperor? Of Postumus and Germanicus? Of Agrippina and Nero? Of Camilla? No, you would never guess what was passing through my mind. But I shall be frank and tell you what it was, though the confession is a shameful one. I was thinking, 'So, I'm Emperor, am I? What nonsense! But at least I'll be able to make people read my books now. Public recitals to large audiences. And good books too, thirty-five years' hard work in them. It wont be unfair. Pollio used to get attentive audiences by giving expensive dinners. He was a very sound historian, and the last of the Romans. My history of Carthage is full of amusing anecdotes. I'm sure that they'll enjoy it. ~ Robert Graves

"What is the matter with you?"
　　Nero kept his voice calm and low so no one could hear their conversation. "I don't like you pouring coffee and serving food to all these fucking men. The only coffee I want you pouring is mine. ~ Sarah Brianne

Oh Lion in a peculiar guise,
Sharp Roman road to Paradise,
Come eat me up, I'll pay thy toll
With all my flesh, and keep my soul. ~ Stevie Smith

They never let you live it down. One little mistake!- Nero ~ Robert Asprin

The Rome he has been trained to serve, the Rome of Augustus and Germanicus, was gone. In its place stood Neronopolis, ruled by a megalomaniac brat. ~ James Romm

For better or worse, our pasts and experiences are what define us. But they don't have to rule us. In time, all hurts can be forgiven. It's only when you add to them that they can't. - Nero ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon