It Has Been Said Twice

IT HAS BEEN SAID TWICE and collected by NICOLAS STARKOVSKY* While reading Perspectives avidly and faithfully since 1967, I have noticed that some of the aphorisms in IT HAS BEEN SAID have appeared twice. It does not matter whether repetition was caused by inattention or purpose: the repeated quotes are among the best. The following quotations have been repeated verbatim (vol. and issue nos. in parentheses): "It is always best to do a thing wrong the first time."—Osler (26:2, 28:3) "Science is the topography of ignorance."—O. W. Holmes (26:2, 31:4) "Imagination is more important than knowledge."—A. Einstein (28:3, 30:3) "I thank the dear God a thousand times that he allowed me to become an atheist."—G. C. Lichtenberg (24:1, 32:1) "The society which scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water."—J. W. Gardner (29:1, 29:4) Like anything that's alive, quotations are subject to mutations and, eventually, to evolution. As they enter the public domain, they may betray the original thought of the author. Examples of such mutations, with changes indicated between square brackets, are: "If [when] you steal from one author, it's plagiarism; if you steal from many, it's research."—W. Mizner (28:4, 29:2) "Next to knowing when to seize an opportunity, the most important thing in life is to know [knowing] when to forgo an advantage."—-Disraeli (21:3, 26:2) *Address: 6352 Silas Burke Street, Burke, Virginia 22015. Material appearing under this title is collected with the aim of making the serious a bit less serious, the ponderous a bit less heavy, and the reading hours a bit more fun. Toward this goal we invite a guest editor of this feature for each issue. Will readers volunteer to share their senses of humor by collecting or recollecting items that have brought smiles to their faces? We invite your participation. Originals are also welcomed. Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 35, 2 ¦ Winter 1992 249 "If the Lord Almighty had consulted me before embarking upon [on] the Creation, I should [would] have recommended something simpler."—Alphonso X of Castile (22:3, 28:2) "The average Ph.D. thesis is nothing but [is but] a transference of bones from one graveyard to another."—J. F. Dobie (29:2, 33:1) After undergoing cosmetic changes, some quotations lose their author and join the ranks of the "anonymous," thus posing as proverbs: "Statistics is like a bikini. What they reveal is suggestive. What they conceal is vital."—A. Koestler (27:4) "Statistics are like a bikini, what they reveal is suggestive but what they conceal is vital."—Anon. (29:4) "To crib from one book is plagiarism: to crib from a dozen is research."— A. A. Thomson (26:2) "To copy from one book is plagiarism. To copy from three is research."— Anon. (30:4) In a reverse process, some "anonymous" quotations are illegally (?) adopted: "To be successful, a physician should have gray hair and hemorrhoids—gray hair to make him look distinguished and hemorrhoids to give him a look of concern."—Anon. (23:4) "It is a good thing for a physician to have prematurely gray hair and itching piles. The first makes him appear to know more than he does, and the second gives him an expression of concern, which the patient interprets as being on his behalf."—A. Benson Cannon (27:1) "Millions yearn [long] for immortality who do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday after."—Anon. (29:4) and S. Ertz (33:1) "To be humane, we must ever be ready to pronounce that wise, ingenious and modest statement, "I do not know."—Galileo (27:3) "The average value of conversations could be enormously improved by the constant use of four simple words: ? do not know.'"—André Maurois (32:2) A final remark: the attentive reading of hundreds of quotations suggests that they are almost all tautological, being contained, like Euclid's geometry and Murphy...