Norbert Guterman

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“The passages collected in this book have been "quotations" for well over a thousand years. Many of them exist only because they were "quoted," the works from which they are taken having been lost. In the case of the most celebrated poets whose works survive in toto or nearly so, a collection of passages which have never been quoted during the last two millennia would make a very slim book indeed.”

“For my part, I simply happen to enjoy the Latin language—the sound of its vowels and the forms of its inflections, its ruggedness, its majesty, and its conciseness. Even the comparatively diffuse Cicero, of whom Quintilian says that not a word can be added to his copious flow, seems a model of economy when one reads many a modern novel, speech, critical review, or even a presidential sentence.”