Preston

“You cannot begin to deal with terms, propositions, and arguments—the elements of thought—until you can penetrate beneath the surface of language.”
― Mortimer J. Adler, How to Read a Book

“You must tackle books that are beyond you, or, as we have said, books that are over your head. Only books of that sort will make you stretch your mind. And unless you stretch, you will not learn.”
― Mortimer J. Adler, How to Read a Book

“In fact, far from being phonetic, hieroglyphs were designed to be indecipherable unless you possessed the key to their meaning. The Egyptian priests, who were guardians of this information, patrolled the borders of their knowledge in order to keep this tool in their own hands. Ever since, the mastery of writing and reading has been an act of power”
― Susan Wise Bauer, The History of the Ancient World: From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome

“[20] nam est certe aliquid consummata eloquentia, neque ad earn pervenire natura humani ingenii prohibet. quod si non contingat, altius tamen ibunt, qui ad summa nitentur, quam qui, praesumpta desperatione quo velint evadendi, protinus circa ima substiterint. [20] Perfect eloquence is assuredly a reality, which is not beyond the reach of human intellect. Even if we fail to reach it, those whose aspirations are highest, will attain to greater heights than those who abandon themselves to premature despair of ever reaching the goal and halt at the very foot of the ascent.”
― Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, Complete Works of Quintilian