See Also:INTELLIGENCE

1. As reasonable as Latin —Anne Sexton
2. Beyond rationality … like stepping out into deep space, or going to the center of the world, or both at once —Susan Engberg
3. Common sense is as rare as genius —Ralph Waldo Emerson

   See Also:RARITY

4. Human reason is like a drunken man on horseback; set it up on one side, and it tumbles over on the other —Martin Luther
5. Like precious stones, his sensible remarks derive their value from their scarcity —W. S. Gilbert
6. Logic, like whisky, loses its beneficial effect when taken in too large quantities —Lord Dunsany
7. A mind all logic is like a knife all blade. It makes the hand bleed that uses it —Rabindranath Tagore
8. Reason in man is rather like God in the world —St. Thomas Aquinas
9. Reason is a bladder on which you may paddle like a child as you swim in summer waters; but, when the winds rise and the waves roughen, it slips from under you, and you sink —Walter Savage Landor
10. Reason is like the sun, of which the light is constant, uniform, and lasting —Samuel Johnson
11. Sense, like charity, begins at home —Alexander Pope

    Pope’sMoral Essays can be credited with the first of many “Charity begins at home” comparisons.

    See Also:CHANGE,EDUCATION,PEACEFULNESS,SENSE

12. Tried to size up the situation reasonably, to tote odds like a paramutual —Jonathan Valin

rhyme or reason Sense, justification, explanation, cause, motivation; reasonableness, reason. Therhyme of the phrase remains as a superfluous alliterative element, providing added emphasis. Apparently it originally referred to amusement or entertainment, since works written in verse were considered aimed toward those ends; thereason of the phrase meant instruction or enlightenment, the supposed province of prose. Today the words usually appear in negative structures or contexts denoting their absence:without rhyme or reason, neither rhyme nor reason, what possible rhyme or reason? The expression was used in this sense of ‘reasonableness’ only as early as 1664 by Henry More:

An anecdote frequently recounted about Sir Thomas More, however, indicates that the phrase may have been in common parlance by the 15th century. A budding author, on requesting the learned man’s opinion of a work, was told to convert it to rhyme. Having done so, he submitted it to Sir Thomas’ judgment once again, upon which the scholarly wit devastatingly remarked, “That will do. ’Tis rhyme now, anyway, whereas before ’twas neither rhyme nor reason.”