quotations about necessity
Necessity embitters the evils which it cannot cure.
LUC DE CLAPIERS, MARQUIS DE VAUVENARGUES
Reflections and Maxims
Necessity dominates inclination, will, and right.
NAPOLEON
attributed, Napoleon: In His Own Words
Great necessities call out great virtues.
ABIGAIL ADAMS
letter to John Quincy Adams, January 12, 1780
Necessity is a violent school-mistress.
MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE
Essays
Necessity relieves us from the embarrassment of choice.
LUC DE CLAPIERS, MARQUIS DE VAUVENARGUES
Reflections and Maxims
Necessity is the theme and inventress of nature, her curb and her eternal law.
LEONARDO DA VINCI
Thoughts on Art and Life
Where necessity speaks it demands.
RUSSIAN PROVERB
Necessity is the last and strongest weapon.
LIVY
Annales
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
WILLIAM PITT
speech, November 18, 1783
'Tis necessity
To which the gods must yield; and I obey,
Till I redeem it by some glorious way.
JOHN FLETCHER & PHILIP MASSINGER
The False One
In the first place, it is not improper to observe, that the law of cases of necessity is not likely to be well furnished with precise rules; necessity creates the law, it supersedes rules; and whatever is reasonable and just in such cases, is likewise legal; it is not to be considered as matter of surprise, therefore, if much instituted rule is not to be found on such subjects.
WILLIAM SCOTT
Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the High Court of Admiralty, Commencing with the Judgments of the Right Hon. Sir William Scott
Necessity [is the] mother of invention.
WILLIAM WYCHERLEY
Love in a Wood
Necessity resides in the way we talk about things, not in the things we talk about.
WILLARD VAN ORMAN QUINE
Ways of Paradox and Other Essays
Necessity knows no rules.
AUGUST STRINDBERG
Miss Julie
If necessity is the mother of invention then failure is the father of success.
ANDREW EBORN
"The Failure Awards for defunct branding", The Drum, August 15, 2017
In all the affairs of this world, and more particularly in war, we must often allow our plans to yield to necessity; and not from an over-anxiety to secure what is too difficult or even impossible, expose the whole to a most evident risk; nor is it less the duty of a bold commander to listen to the advice of the cautious than of the daring.
GUICCIARDINI
attributed, Day's Collacon
Hold it wise ...
To make a virtue of necessity.
GEOFFREY CHAUCER
"The Knight's Tale", Canterbury Tales
Necessity moderates more troubles than reason.
LUC DE CLAPIERS, MARQUIS DE VAUVENARGUES
Reflections and Maxims
Necessity never made a good bargain.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
Poor Richard's Almanac
Necessity first mothered invention. Now invention has little ones of her own, and they look just like grandma.
E. B. WHITE
The New Yorker, June 19, 1937