The great men among the ancients understood very well how to reconcile manual labour with affairs of state, and thought it no lessening to their dignity to make the one the recreation to the other. That indeed which seems most generally to have employed and diverted their spare hours, was agriculture. Gideon among the Jews was taken from threshing, as well as Cincinnatus amongst the Romans from the plough, to command the armies of their countries...and, as I remember, Cyrus thought gardening so little beneath the dignity and grandeur of a throne, that he showed Xenophon a large field of fruit trees all of his own planting . . . Delving, planting, inoculating, or any the like profitable employments would be no less a diversion than any of the idle sports in fashion, if men could be brought to delight in them.

|
I nauseate walking; 'tis a country diversion; I loathe the country

|
Murphy's Laws of Combat
When in doubt, empty your magazine.
Never forget that your weapon was made by the lowest bidder.
If your attack is going well, then it's an ambush.
Try to look uninportant because the bad guys may be low on ammo.
The enemy diversion you are ignoring, is the main attack.
The easy way is always mined.
Friendly fire - isn't.
If the enemy is in range - SO ARE YOU.
Things that must be together to work, usually aren't shipped together.
Tracers work both ways.
The only thing more accurate than incoming fire is incoming friendly fire.
Make it tough for the enemy to get in, and you can't get out.
Professional soldiers are predictable, but the world is full of amateurs.
Murphy was a grunt.

|
People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.

|
Housework is a breeze. Cooking is a pleasant diversion. Putting up a retaining wall is a lark. But teaching is like climbing a mountain.

|
Although reading the classics in Latin in school may be not as fulfilling as it would be at a more mature age, few scientists can afford the time for such diversion later in life.

|
Without [diversion] we would be in a state of weariness, and this weariness would spur us on to seek a more solid means of escaping from it. B...

|
Iraq is no diversion. It is a place where civilization is taking a decisive stand against chaos and terror, we must not waver.

|
If our condition were truly happy, we would not seek diversion from it in order to make ourselves happy.

|