Virtue issimply happiness, and happiness is a by-product of function.You are happy when you are functioning.

-Burroughs,William S(eward)
  Painting and Guns,'The Creative Observer'.

The more books we read, the sooner we perceive that the only function of a writer isto producea masterpiece. No other task is of any consequence.

-Connolly, Cyril Vernon
  The Unquiet Grave, pt.1.

The function of criticism is the reeducation of perception of works of art† The conception that its business is to appraise, to judge in the legal and moral sense, arrests the perception of those who are influenced by the criticism that assumes this task.

-Dewey,John
  Art as Experience.

The economic services that it can render are picayune compared to the moral effect that it produces, and its true function is to create in two or more persons a feeling of solidarity.

-Durkheim, EŁ  mile
  Of labour. The Division of Labor in Society (translated by George Simpson,1933).

I should like to know what is the proper function of women, if it isnot tomakereasons for husbandstostayat home, and still stronger reasons for bachelors to go out.

-Eliot, George pseudonym of  MaryAnn Evans
  The Mill on the Floss, bk.6, ch.6.

The function of poetry is religious invocation of the Muse; its use is the experience of mixed exaltation and horror that her presence excites.

-Graves, Robert von Ranke
 The White Goddess, foreword.

A parler humainement, la mort a un bel endroit, qui est de mettre fin a'   la vieillesse. To speak humanely, death has a useful function: it puts an end to old age.

-La Bruye'  re,Jean de
  Les Caracte'  res ou les m½urs de ce sie'  cle,'De l'homme', no.45.

The function of news is to signalize an event, the functionoftruth istobring to lightthehiddenfacts, toset them into relationwith each other, and make a picture of reality on which men can act.Only at those points, where social conditions take recognizable and measurable shape, do the body of truth and the body of news coincide.

-Lippmann,Walter
  Public Opinion, ch.23.

Dessa civiliza c° a‹  o so¤   pode sair quem tem como fun c° a‹  o especial a de sair: a um cientista e¤   dada a licen c° a, a um padre e¤   dada a permissa‹  o. Mas na‹  o a uma mulher que nem sequer tem as garantias de um t|¤tulo. Only he whose special function is departure can depart from that civilization: a scientist isgiven license, a priest isgiven permission. But these are not given to a woman who does not even have the guarantee of a title.

-Lispector, Clarice
  A Paixa‹  o Segundo G.H. ( The Passion  According to G.H.).

The function of kings consists primarily of using good sense, which always comes naturally and easily.Our work is sometimes less difficult than our amusements.

-Louis XIV knownas the Great or leRoiSoleil [theSunKing]
Me¤  moires for the Instruction of the Dauphin.

   Science is intimately integrated with the whole social structure and cultural tradition. They mutually support one anotheröonly in certain types of society can science flourish, and conversely without a continuous and healthy development and application of science such a society cannot function properly.

-Parry, Sir Charles Hubert Hastings
The Social System, ch.8.

The function of literature through all its mutations, has been to make us aware of the particularity of selves, and thehigh authorityof theself in its quarrel with its society and its culture. Literature is in that sense subversive.

-Trillin, Calvin Marshall
  Beyond Culture, introduction.

   A balance, an ennobling interchange Of action from without and from within; The excellence, pure function, and best power Both of the object seen, and eye that sees.

-Wordsworth,William
^1805  The Prelude, bk.13, l.375^8 (published1850).

Still glides the stream, and shall for ever glide; The Form remains, the function never dies; While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise, We Men, who in our morn of youth defied The elements, must vanish;öbe it so!

-Wordsworth,William
  The River Duddon, no.34,'After-Thought', l.5^9.