Quote Attributions
These are quotes that are generally incorrectly or incompletely attributed. Every so often, I decide I want to know where a quote is really from, and so I dig.
Bolded links will go to posts where I describe my research.
ADDENDUM 11 April 2024: Oh, hey, someone's been doing this already! So the next time you see a quote you are wondering about, go check if the Quote Investigator has researched it already. If I ever come across something QI hasn't researched (yet), I'll probably drop an entry here.
Do not be daunted
by the enormity
of the world's grief.
Do justly, now.
Love mercy, now.
Walk humbly, now.
You are not obligated
to complete the work,
but neither are you free
to abandon it.
-- Rabbi Rami Shapiro, from Wisdom of the Jewish Sages: A Modern Reading of the Pirke Avot (Bell Tower, New York, 1993), a loose translation/interpolation of the Pirke Avot. The passage in question is the last verse of Chapter II, and is said to be commentary by Rabbi Tarfon on Micah 6:8. The quote as given above is paraphrased from Shapiro's actual text.
Encourage the Beautiful, for the Useful encourages itself.
-- Commonly attributed to Goethe, but no known source. Earliest discovered appearance so far is in the British periodical The Leader, March 30, 1850 (first issue). The original use, plus credit to Goethe, tentatively attributed to George Henry Lewes, literary editor for The Leader from 1850-1854.