Freebsd Fortunes 5

Nature to all things fixed the limits fit,
And wisely curbed proud man's pretending wit.
As on the land while here the ocean gains,
In other parts it leaves wide sandy plains;
Thus in the soul while memory prevails,
The solid power of understanding fails;
Where beams of warm imagination play,
The memory's soft figures melt away.
                -- Alexander Pope (on runtime bounds checking?)

Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.
                -- Francis Bacon

Near the Studio Jean Cocteau
On the Rue des Ecoles
lived an old man
with a blind dog
Every evening I would see him
guiding the dog along
the sidewalk, keeping
a firm grip on the leash
so that the dog wouldn't
run into a passerby
Sometimes the dog would stop
and look up at the sky
Once the old man
noticed me watching the dog
and he said, "Oh, yes,
this one knows
when the moon is out,
he can feel it on his face"
                -- Barry Gifford

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you
want to test a man's character, give him power.
                -- Abraham Lincoln

Nearly every complex solution to a programming problem that I
have looked at carefully has turned out to be wrong.
                -- Brent Welch

Necessity has no law.
                -- St. Augustine

Necessity hath no law.
                -- Oliver Cromwell

Necessity is a mother.

"Necessity is the mother of invention" is a silly proverb.  "Necessity
is the mother of futile dodges" is much nearer the truth.
                -- Alfred North Whitehead

Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
                -- William Pitt, 1783