To serve is beautiful, but only if it is done with joy and a whole heart and a free mind.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
To My Daughters, with Love, ch. 15 “Men and Women” (1967)
(Source)
The old — like children — talk to themselves, for they have reached that hopeless wisdom of experience which knows that though one were to cry it in the streets to multitudes, or whisper it in the kiss to one’s beloved, the only ears that can ever hear one’s secret are one’s own.
Eugene O'Neill (1888-1953) Irish American playwright, Nobel laureate
Lazarus Laughed (1927)
Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist.
Kenneth Ewart Boulding (1910-1993) American economist, educator, poet, philosopher
Hearings on the Energy Reorganization Act (HR 11510), US House of Representatives (1973)
Did God set grapes a-growing, do you think,
And at the same time make it sin to drink?
Give thanks to Him who foreordained it thus —
Surely He loves to hear the glasses clink!Omar Khayyám (1048-1123) Persian poet, mathematician, philosopher, astronomer [عمر خیام]
Rubáiyát [رباعیات] [tr. Le Gallienne (1897), # 91]
(Source)
Given LeGallienne's paraphrasing, I am unable to align this with an original quatrain or other translations.
Gratitude is the sign of noble souls.
Aesop (620?-560? BC) Legendary Greek storyteller
Fables [Aesopica], “Androcles” (6th C BC) [tr. Jacobs (1894)]
(Source)
So long as you have food in your mouth, you have solved all questions for the time being.
Franz Kafka (1883-1924) Czech-Austrian Jewish writer
“Investigations of a Dog” (1922)
If we meet someone who owes us a debt of gratitude we remember the fact at once. How often we can meet someone to whom we owe a debt of gratitude without thinking of it at all!
[Begegnet uns jemand, der uns Dank schuldig ist, gleich fällt es uns ein. Wie oft können wir jemand begegnen, dem wir Dank schuldig sind, ohne daren zu denken.]
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) German poet, statesman, scientist
Elective Affinities [Die Wahlverwandtschaften], Part 2, ch. 4, “From Ottilie’s Journal [Aus Ottiliens Tagebuche]” (1809) [tr. Hollingdale (1971)]
(Source)
(Source (German)). Alternate translation:If we meet a person who is under an obligation to us, we remember it immediately. But how often may we meet people to whom we are ourselves under obligation without its ever occurring to us.
[Niles ed. (1872)]
Cultivated mind is the guardian genius of Democracy, and while guided and controlled by virtue, the noblest attribute of man. It is the only dictator that freemen acknowledge, and the only security which freemen desire.
Mirabeau Buonaparte Lamar (1798-1859) Texas politician, poet, diplomat, soldier
First Message to Congress of the Republic of Texas, Houston (21 Dec 1838)
Frequently quoted by Lyndon Johnson, often paraphrased as "The educated mind is the guardian genius of democracy. It is the only dictator that free men recognize, and the only ruler that free men desire." Rendered in Latin ("Disciplina praesidium civitatis"), it is the motto of the University of Texas.
The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of man.
- That there is one only God, and he is all perfect.
- That there is a future state of rewards and punishments.
- That to love God with all thy heart and thy neighbor as thyself is the sum of religion.
These are the great points on which he endeavored to reform the religion of the Jews. But compare with these the demoralizing dogmas of Calvin.
- That there are three Gods.
- That good works, or the love of our neighbor, are nothing.
- That faith is every thing, and the more incomprehensible the proposition, the more merit in its faith.
- That reason in religion is of unlawful use.
- That God, from the beginning, elected certain individuals to be saved, and certain others to be damned; and that no crimes of the former can damn them; no virtues of the latter save.
Now, which of these is the true and charitable Christian? He who believes and acts on the simple doctrines of Jesus? Or the impious dogmatists as Athanasius and Calvin? Verily I say these are the false shepherds foretold as to enter not by the door into the sheepfold, but to climb up some other way. They are mere usurpers of the Christian name, teaching a counter-religion made up of the deliria of crazy imaginations, as foreign from Christianity as is that of Mahomet.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter (1822-06-26) to Benjamin Waterhouse
(Source)
It’s my rule never to lose my temper till it would be detrimental to keep it.
Sean O'Casey (1880-1964) Irish playwright [b. John Casey, a.k.a. Seán O'Cathaseaigh]
“The Plough and the Stars” [1926]
It is more from carelessness about truth than from intentional lying, that there is so much falsehood in the world.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Comment (31 Mar 1778)
In James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)
At all events, the next best thing to being witty one’s self, is to be able to quote another’s wit.
Christian Nestell Bovee (1820-1904) American epigrammatist, writer, publisher
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought, Vol. 2 (1862)
Shared joyse are doubled; shared sorrows are halved.
Nor can a man dupe others long, who has not duped himself first.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
Journal (1852)
(Source)
Often rendered: "A man cannot dupe others long, who has not duped himself first."
The ideal world of our revolutionaries […] is a flaming sense of the immediacy of the idea, a feeling that there is something in all men better than their present fate, and a conviction that what is, not only ought not, but need not be.
Crane Brinton (1898-1968)
The Anatomy of Revolution, 2.3 (1952)
We still hadn’t learned, though, that growing up is all about getting hurt. And then getting over it. You hurt. You recover. You move on. Odds are pretty good you’re just going to get hurt again. But each time, you learn something. Each time, you come out of it a little stronger, and at some point you realize that there are more flavors of pain than coffee. There’s the little empty pain of leaving something behind — graduating, taking the next step forward, walking out of something familiar and safe into the unknown. There’s the big, whirling pain of life upending all of your plans and expectations. There’s the sharp little pains of failure, and the more obscure aches of successes that didn’t give you what you thought they would. There are the vicious, stabbing pains of hopes being torn up. The sweet little pains of finding others, giving them your love, and taking joy in their life as they grow and learn. There’s the steady pain of empathy that you shrug off so you can stand beside a wounded friend and help them bear their burdens. And if you’re very, very lucky, there are a very few blazing hot little pains you feel when you realized that you are standing in a moment of utter perfection, an instant of triumph, or happiness, or mirth which at the same time cannot possibly last — and yet will remain with you for life.
Jim Butcher (b. 1971) American author
White Night, ch. 31 (2008)
The true way is along a rope that is not spanned high in the air, but only just above the ground. It seems intended more to cause stumbling than to be walked upon.
[Der wahre Weg geht über ein Seil, das nicht in der Höhe gespannt ist, sondern knapp über dem Boden. Es scheint mehr bestimmt stolpern zu machen, als begangen zu werden.]
Franz Kafka (1883-1924) Czech-Austrian Jewish writer
Notebook, Aphorism #1 [tr. Kaiser and Wilkins]
(Source)
It is a fundamental human right, a privilege of nature, that every man should worship according to his own convictions.
Tertullian (c. AD 160-225) Carthaginian Christian writer, theologian [Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus]
Ad Scapulam (AD 202)
If two men on the same job agree all the time, then one is useless. If they disagree all the time, then both are useless.
Darryl F. Zanuck (1902-1979) American film producer, writer, actor, director
In “Sayings of the Week”, The Observer (13 Oct 1949)
He who imagines he can do without the world, deceives himself much: but he who fancies the world cannot do without him, is under a far greater deception.
[Celui qui croit pouvoir trouver en soi-même de quoi se passer de tout le monde se trompe fort; mais celui qui croit qu’on ne peut se passer de lui se trompe encore davantage.]François VI, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) French epigrammatist, memoirist, noble
Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales [Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims], ¶201 (1665-1678) [ed. Carvill (1835), ¶81]
(Source)
Appeared in the 1st ed. (1665). In manuscript, the first part "Celui qui croit pouvoir trouver en soi-même de quoi se passer de tout le monde" reads "Celui qui croit pouvoir se passer de tout le monde" ("He who believes that he can find in himself enough to do without everyone" reads "He who believes he can do without everyone.").
(Source (French)). Alternate translations:He that fansies such a sufficiency in himself, that he can live without all the World, is mightily mistaken; but he that imagines himself so necessary, that other people cannot live without him, is a great deal more mistaken.
[tr. Stanhope (1694), ¶202]He who imagines he can do without the world deceives himself much; but he who fancies the world cannot do without him is still more mistaken.
[pub. Donaldson (1783), ¶93; ed. Lepoittevin-Lacroix (1797), ¶192]He who thinks he can find in himself the means of doing without others is much mistaken; but he who thinks that others cannot do without him is still more mistaken.
[ed. Gowens (1851), ¶210]He who thinks he has the power to content the world greatly deceives himself, but he who thinks that the world cannot be content with him deceives himself yet more.
[tr. Bund/Friswell (1871), ¶201]The man who thinks he can do without the world errs; but the man who thinks the world can [sic] do without him is in still greater error.
[tr. Heard (1917), ¶206]It is a great mistake for a man to suppose that he can dispense with the world; but it is a much greater one to suppose that the world cannot dispense with him.
[tr. Stevens (1939), ¶201]A man who believes that his inner resources are such that he can dispense with his fellow-men is committing a serious mistake: it is not, however, so serious as that of the man who believes himself indispensable to others.
[tr. FitzGibbon (1957), ¶201]The man who thinks he can do without the world is indeed mistaken; but the man who thinks the world cannot do without him is mistaken even worse.
[tr. Kronenberger (1959), ¶201]The man who thinks he can find enough in himself to be able to dispense with everybody else makes a great mistake, but the man who thinks he is indispensable to others makes an even greater.
[tr. Tancock (1959), ¶201]He who believes that he can make do without any one else in the world, is very mistaken; but he who believes that nobody in the world could make do without him, deceives himself still more greatly.
[tr. Whichello (2016) ¶201]
The organization of science into disciplines sets up a series of ghettos with remarkable distances of artificial social space between them.
Kenneth Ewart Boulding (1910-1993) American economist, educator, poet, philosopher
Image and Environment, Introduction (1973)
No good thing is pleasant to possess without friends to share it.
Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC-AD 65) Roman statesman, philosopher, playwright [Lucius Annaeus Seneca]
Moral Letters to Lucilius [Epistulae morales ad Lucilium], letter 6 “On Sharing Knowledge,” sec. 4 [tr. Gummere (1918)]
Is it not strange that men are so keen to fight for a religion and so unkeen to live according to its precepts?
Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier, or not having been at sea.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Comment (10 Apr 1778)
In James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)
The great obstacle to progress is prejudice.
Christian Nestell Bovee (1820-1904) American epigrammatist, writer, publisher
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought, Vol. 2 (1862)
O servant, where dost thou seek Me?
Lo! I am beside thee.
I am neither in temple nor in mosque: I am neither in Kaaba nor in Kailash:
Neither am I in rites and ceremonies, nor in Yoga and renunciation.
If thou art a true seeker, thou shalt at once see Me: thou shalt meet Me in a moment of time.Kabir Jayanti (1440-1518) Indian Sufi mystic and poet
Songs of Kabîr, Song 1 (1915) [tr. Tagore]
Alt. trans. by Robert Bly (1977):Are you looking for me? I am in the next seat. My shoulder is against yours. You will not find me in the stupas, not in Indian shrine rooms, nor in synagogues, nor in cathedrals: not in masses, nor kirtans, not in legs winding around your own neck, nor in eating nothing but vegetables. When you really look for me, you will see me instantly -- you will find me in the tiniest house of time.
[The reformer] wants his conscience to be your guide.
Lawrence J. Peter (1919-1990) American educator, management theorist
Peter’s Quotations (1977)
You will hear everlastingly, in all discussions about newspapers, companies, aristocracies, or party politics, this argument that the rich man cannot be bribed. The fact is, of course, that the rich man is bribed; he has been bribed already. That is why he is a rich man.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
Orthodoxy, ch. 7 “The Eternal Revolution” (1908)
I tell you all this because it’s worth recognizing that there is no such thing as an overnight success. You will do well to cultivate the resources in yourself that bring you happiness outside of success or failure. The truth is, most of us discover where we are headed when we arrive. At that time, we turn around and say, yes, this is obviously where I was going all along. It’s a good idea to try to enjoy the scenery on the detours, because you’ll probably take a few.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Commencement Address, Kenyon College (20 May 1990)
(Source)
Children are taught to fear and obey; the avarice, pride, or timidity of parents teaches children economy, arrogance, or submission. They are also encouraged to be imitators, a course to which they are already only too much inclined. No one thinks of making them original, courageous, independent.
Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715-1747) French moralist, essayist, soldier
Reflections and Maxims [Réflexions et maximes] (1746) [tr. Lee (1903)]
(Source)
Nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of oneself.
T. S. Eliot (1888-1965) American-British poet, critic, playwright [Thomas Stearns Eliot]
“Shakespeare and the Stoicism of Seneca” (1927)
That is the essence of science: ask an impertinent question, and you are on the way to a pertinent answer.
Jacob Bronowski (1908-1974) Polish-English humanist and mathematician
The Ascent of Man ch. 4 (1973)
No Man is the worse for knowing the worst of himself.
Thomas Fuller (1654-1734) English physician, preacher, aphorist, writer
Gnomologia: Adages and Proverbs, #3601 (1732)
(Source)
People have become so rigid; their opinions seem to them like themselves. When that happens (and it has happened) people can’t change their minds. If you are identified by your opinions — if that is the very basis of yourself — how can you change your mind?
Fran Lebowitz (b. 1950) American journalist
Interview with Susannah McNeely, Ruminator (Aug/Sep 2005)
It is as natural and as right for a young man to be imprudent and exaggerated, to live in swoops and circles, and beat about his cage like any other wild thing newly captured, as it is for old men to turn gray, or mothers to love their offspring, or heroes to die for something worthier than their lives.
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) Scottish essayist, novelist, poet
“Crabbed Age and Youth” (c. 1874)
Hadst thou not Greek enough to understand thus much: The end of Man is an Action and not a Thought, though it were the noblest.
Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Sartor Resartus, Book 2, ch. 6 (1831)
(Source)
From Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1.3.6 ("The end aimed at is not knowledge but action").
When two men in business always agree, one of them is unnecessary.
William Wrigley, Jr. (1861-1932) American industrialist
(Attributed)
Let sleeping dogs lie — who wants to rouse ’em?
Charles Dickens (1812-1870) English writer and social critic
David Copperfield, ch. 39 (1850)
Even personal tastes are learned, in the matrix of a culture or a subculture in which we grow up, by very much the same kind of process by which we learn our common values. Purely personal tastes, indeed, can only survive in a culture which tolerates them, that is, which has a common value that private tastes of certain kinds should be allowed.
Kenneth Ewart Boulding (1910-1993) American economist, educator, poet, philosopher
“Economics As A Moral Science,” American Economic Review (Mar 1969)
(Source)
In political institutions, almost everything we call an abuse was once a remedy.
Joseph Joubert (1754-1824) French moralist, philosopher, essayist, poet
Pensées (1838) [ed. Auster (1983)]
Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all — the apathy of human beings.
For Modes of Faith, let graceless zealots fight;
His can’t be wrong whose life is in the right.Alexander Pope (1688-1744) English poet
An Essay on Man, 3.305 (1734)
Our anger and annoyance are more detrimental to us than the things themselves which anger or annoy us.
Marcus Aurelius (AD 121-180) Roman emperor (161-180), Stoic philosopher
Meditations, Book 11, #15 [tr. Staniforth (1964)]
(Source)
Alternate translations:How many things may and do oftentimes follow upon such fits of anger and grief; far more grievous in themselves, than those very things which we are so grieved or angry for.
[tr. Casaubon (1634)]Consider that our anger and impatience often proves much more mischievous than the provocation could possibly have done.
[tr. Collier (1701), #18]Consider how much more pain is brought on us by the anger and vexation caused by such acts than by the acts themselves, at which we are angry and vexed.
[tr. Long (1862)]Consider that our anger and impatience often prove much more mischievous than the things about which we are angry or impatient.
[tr. Zimmern (1887)]How much more grievous are what fits of anger and the consequent sorrows bring than the actual things are which produce in us those angry fits and sorrows.
[tr. Farquharson (1944)]Anger and the sorrow it produces are far more harmful than the things that make us angry.
[tr. Needleman/Piazza (2008)]
He that attempts to change the course of his own life very often labors in vain; and how shall we do that for others, which we are seldom able to do for ourselves?
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia, ch. 29 (1759)
(Source)
There is, indeed, no wild beast more to be dreaded than a communicative man having nothing to communicate.
Christian Nestell Bovee (1820-1904) American epigrammatist, writer, publisher
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought, Vol. 1 (1862)
Admire the diamond that can bear the hits of a hammer. Many deceptive preachers, when critically examined, turn out to be false.
Kabir Jayanti (1440-1518) Indian Sufi mystic and poet
Bijak, Sakhi, 168 [tr. Malaiya]
All Reformers, however strict their social conscience, live in houses just as big as they can pay for.
Logan Pearsall Smith (1865-1946) American-English essayist, editor, anthologist
Afterthoughts, ch. 3 (1931)
The rich man is not one who is in possession of much, but one who gives much.
St. John Chrysostom (c. 347-407) Syrian prelate, preacher, Church Father
Homilies (AD 388?)
A real job is a job you hate. I designed car ads and grocery ads in the windowless basement of a convenience store, and I hated every single minute of the 4½ million minutes I worked there. My fellow prisoners at work were basically concerned about how to punch the time clock at the perfect second where they would earn another 20 cents without doing any work for it. […] It was a rude shock to see just how empty and robotic life can be when you don’t care about what you’re doing, and the only reason you’re there is to pay the bills.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Commencement Address, Kenyon College (20 May 1990)
(Source)
Patience is the art of hoping.
[La patience est l’art d’espérer.]
Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715-1747) French moralist, essayist, soldier
Reflections and Maxims [Réflexions et maximes] (1746) [tr. Lee (1903)]
Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky.
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) Indian Bengali poet, philosopher [a.k.a. Rabi Thakur, Kabiguru]
(Attributed)
The grand aim of all science is to cover the greatest number of empirical facts by logical deduction from the smallest number of hypotheses or axioms.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-American physicist
In Lincoln Barnes, “The Meaning of Einstein’s New Theory,” Life (9 Jan 1950)
Observe all men; thy self most.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman, scientist, philosopher, aphorist
Poor Richard’s Almanack (Aug 1740)
There are certain men you could put in the middle of the jungle, and they would come out with a million dollars. It’s an aptitude. It’s a kind of combination of character and personality. If I think of a few guys who made a lot of money, if they lost all their money they would make it again. They are moneymakers. They are abstract thinkers. They’re not held back by being interested in real life. I came out of a movie once with a man who’s made a lot of money, and I said, “You know what’s wrong with that movie?” And he said: “Sure, I know what’s wrong with that movie. That movie cost $22 million. For $22 million I could buy an office building in Chicago.” I think that sums it up.
Fran Lebowitz (b. 1950) American journalist
Interview with James Atlas, “What They Look Like to the Rest of Us,” New York Times Magazine (19 Nov 1995)
(Source)
Age may have one side, but assuredly Youth has the other. There is nothing more certain than that both are right, except perhaps that both are wrong. Let them agree to differ; for who knows but what agreeing to differ may not be a form of agreement rather than a form of difference?
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) Scottish essayist, novelist, poet
“Crabbed Age and Youth” (c. 1874)
It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.
Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
(Attributed)
Self-deception once yielded to, all other deceptions follow naturally more and more.
Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
“The Hero as King,” On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History (1841)
Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Anonymous
Inscribed on a cannon near the grave of John Bradshaw, in Jamaica. Bradshaw presided over the 1649 trial of King Charles I, and sentenced him to death.
We’re all human. We’re all of us equally naked before the jaws of pain.
Jim Butcher (b. 1971) American author
White Night, ch. 26 (2008)
I think we ought to read only the kind of books that wound and stab us. If the book we are reading doesn’t wake us up with a blow on the head, what are we reading it for? So that it will make us happy, as you write? Good Lord, we would be happy precisely if we had no books, and the kind of books that make us happy are the kind we could write ourselves if we had to. But we need the books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea inside us. That is my belief.
[Ich glaube, man sollte überhaupt nur solche Bücher lesen, die einen beißen und stechen. Wenn das Buch, das wir lesen, uns nicht mit einem Faustschlag auf den Schädel weckt, wozu lesen wir dann das Buch? Damit es uns glücklich macht, wie Du schreibst? Mein Gott, glücklich wären wir eben auch, wenn wir keine Bücher hätten, und solche Bücher, die uns glücklich machen, könnten wir zur Not selber schreiben. Wir brauchen aber die Bücher, die auf uns wirken wie ein Unglück, das uns sehr schmerzt, wie der Tod eines, den wir lieber hatten als uns, wie wenn wir in Wälder verstoßen würden, von allen Menschen weg, wie ein Selbstmord, ein Buch muß die Axt sein für das gefrorene Meer in uns. Das glaube ich.]
Franz Kafka (1883-1924) Czech-Austrian Jewish writer
Letter (1904-01-27) to Oskar Pollak [tr. Winston (1977)]
(Source)
This passage (in translation) is frequently only partially quote, particularly the final "ice axe" line, making parallel translations difficult. I have tried to give as full quotations as I could find.
(Source (German)). Alternate translations:Altogether, I think we ought to read only books that bite and sting us. If the book we are reading doesn't shake us awake like a blow to the skull, why botehr reading it in the first place? So that it can make us happy, as you put it? Good God, we'd be just as happy if we had no books at all; books that make us happy we could, in a pinch, also write ourselves. What we need are books that hit us like a most painful misfortune, like the death of someone we loved more than we love ourselves, that make us feel as though we had been banished to the woods, far from any human presence, like a suicide. A book must be the ax for the frozen sea within us. That is what I believe.
[tr. Pawel (1984)]If the book we are reading does not wake us, as with a fist hammering on our skulls, then why do we read it? Good God, we also would be happy if we had no books and such books that make us happy we could, if need be, write ourselves. What we must have are those books that come on us like ill fortune, like the death of one we love better than ourselves, like suicide. A book must be an ice axe to break the sea frozen inside us.
[E.g. (1987)]The books we need are the kind that act upon us like a misfortune, that make us suffer like the death of someone we love more than ourselves, that make us feel as though we were no the verge of suicide, or losrt in a forest remote from all human habitation -- a book should serve as the ax for the frozen sea within us.
[tr. Rahv (1952)]A book should be an ice-axe to break the frozen sea within us.
[E.g.]A book must be an ice-axe to break the seas frozen inside our soul.
[E.g.]
Thou hast seen many sorrows, travel-stained pilgrim of the world,
But that which hath vexed thee most, hath been the looking for evil;
And though calamities have crossed thee, and misery been heaped on thy head,
Yet ills that never happened, have chiefly made thee wretched.Martin Farquhar Tupper (1810-1889) English poet
Proverbial Philosophy, “Of Anticipation” (1839)
(Source)
Liking and esteeming others merely for their agreement with us in religion, opinion, and manner of living is only a less offensive kind of self-adoration.
Thomas Adam (1701-1784) English clergyman and religious writer
Private Thoughts on Religion, ch. 10 “Charity” (1824)
We live, as we dream — alone.
Joseph Conrad (1857-1924) Polish-English novelist [b. Teodor Josef Konrad Korzeniowski]
Heart of Darkness, ch. 1 (1902)
In the imagination of those who are sensitive to the realities of our era, the earth has become a spaceship, and this, perhaps, is the most important single fact of our day. For millennia, the earth in men’s minds was flat and illimitable. Today, as a result of exploration, speed, and the explosion of scientific knowledge, earth has become a tiny sphere, closed, limited, crowded, and hurtling through space to unknown destinations. This change in man’s image of his home affects his behaviour in many ways, and is likely to affect it much more in the future.
Kenneth Ewart Boulding (1910-1993) American economist, educator, poet, philosopher
“Earth as a Spaceship,” Lecture, Washington State University (10 May 1965)
(Source)
When I had the strength, I did not have the patience. I have the patience today and I no longer have the power.
Joseph Joubert (1754-1824) French moralist, philosopher, essayist, poet
Pensées [Thoughts], 1812 (1850 ed.) [tr. Auster (1983)]
(Source)
Not found in other collections.
A lot of young writers wait for inspiration. The inspiration only hits you at the desk.
Robert Anderson (1917-2009) American playwright, screenwriter, theater producer
Tea and Sympathy (1953)
Do unsavory armpits and bad breath make you angry? What good will it do you? Given the mouth and armpits the man has got, that condition is bound to produce these odors. “After all, though, the fellow is endowed with reason, and he is perfectly able to understand what is offensive if he gives any thought to it.” Well and good: but you yourself are also endowed with reason; so apply your reasonableness to move him to a like reasonableness; expound, admonish. If he pays attention, you will have worked a cure, and there will be no need for passion; leave that to actors and streetwalkers.
Marcus Aurelius (AD 121-180) Roman emperor (161-180), Stoic philosopher
Meditations, Book 5, #28
Life is a progress from want to want, not from enjoyment to enjoyment.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Comment (May 1776)
In James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)
There is probably no hell for authors in the next world — they suffer so much from critics and publishers in this.
Christian Nestell Bovee (1820-1904) American epigrammatist, writer, publisher
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought, Vol. 1, “Authors” (1862)
(Source)
Rituals? Ridiculous! My only ritual is to sit close enough to the typewriter so that my fingers touch the keys.
Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) Russian-American author, polymath, biochemist
Interview on “All Things Considered,” NPR, in Susan Stamberg, Every Night at Five (1982)
(Source)
Lighthouses don’t go running all over an island looking for boats to save; they just stand there shining.
Anne Lamott (b. 1954) American novelist and non-fiction writer
Bird by Bird, ch. 5 (1995)
Riches are a trust. …
Power is a trust. …
Talents are a trust too; that is the condition of their increase. They must be put out to use, or they will ruin the steward.Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
Journal (1831-07-21)
You may be surprised to find how quickly daily routine and the demands of “just getting by” absorb your waking hours. You may be surprised to find how quickly you start to see your politics and religion become matters of habit rather than thought and inquiry. You may be surprised to find how quickly you start to see your life in terms of other people’s expectations rather than issues. You may be surprised to find out how quickly reading a good book sounds like a luxury.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Commencement Address, Kenyon College (20 May 1990)
(Source)
The favorites of fortune or of fame topple from their pedestals before our eyes without diverting us from ambition.
Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715-1747) French moralist, essayist, soldier
Reflections and Maxims [Réflexions et maximes] (1746) [tr. Lee (1903)]
A lot of people, when they think about writers, probably imagine people wasting time in cafés, drinking a lot and smoking too many cigarettes, and working when the inspiration — whatever that is — seizes them. But writing is rigorous. Writing, for me at least, takes a lot of concentrated work and effort. It takes dedication and the willingness to do the work even when that feeling of inspiration isn’t there at all.
Karl Iagnemma (b. 1972) American writer and research scientist
“The Dual Life of Karl Iagnemma,” Interview, NOVA (PBS) (1 Sep 2006)
(Source)
We conclude that, in the field of public education, the doctrine of “separate but equal” has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.
Earl Warren (1891-1974) American jurist and politician; Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (1953-69)
Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954) [unanimous opinion]
(Source)
How little do we know that which we are!
How less what we may be!
In the Soviet Union, capitalism triumphed over communism. In this country, capitalism triumphed over democracy.
Fran Lebowitz (b. 1950) American journalist
Social Studies (1981)
Some people swallow the universe like a pill; they travel on through the world, like smiling images pushed from behind. For God’s sake give me the young man who has brains enough to make a fool of himself!
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) Scottish essayist, novelist, poet
“Crabbed Age and Youth” (c. 1874)
Property has its duties as well as its rights.
Thomas Drummond (1797-1840) Scottish army officer, civil engineer, public official.
Letter to the Earl of Donoughshire (22 May 1838)
Further, a little self-control at the right moment may prevent much subsequent compulsion at the hands of others.
[Daß jedoch ein kleiner, an der rechten Stelle angebrachter Selbstzwang nachmals vielem Zwange von außen vorbeugt.]
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) German philosopher
Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. 1, “Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life [Aphorismen zur Lebensweisheit],” ch. 5 “Counsels and Maxims [Paränesen und Maximen],” § 2.15 (1851) [tr. Saunders (1890)]
(Source)
Source (German). Alternate translation:Nevertheless, a little self-restraint applied at the right place afterwards prevents much restraint from without.
[tr. Payne (1974), 2.15]
The difference between reactionary repression and revolutionary repression is the difference between cat shit and dog shit.
Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) Russian novelist and moral philosopher
Adapted. In Theodore Roszak, The Making of the Counter Culture, Appendix (1969)
Many things are not as they seem: The worst things in life never are.
Jim Butcher (b. 1971) American author
White Night, ch. 1 (opening line) (2008)
The people that once bestowed commands, consulships, legions, and all else, now meddles no more and longs eagerly for just two things — bread and circuses!
[Nam qui dabat olim imperium, fasces, legiones, omnia, nunc se continet atque duas tantum res anxius optat, panem et circenses.]
Juvenal (c.55-127) Roman satirist [Decimus Junius Juvinalis]
Satires, Satire 10, l. 78-79
Alt. trans.: "The people long for only two things: bread and circuses."
TV executives think that the programs with the highest ratings are what TV viewers want, rather than what they settle for.
Pauline Kael (1919-2001) American movie critic
“Why Are Movies So Bad? Or, The Numbers” (23 Jun 1980)
(Source)
If you wish to appear agreeable in society, you must consent to be taught many things which you know already.
Charles Maurice, Prince de Talleyrand-Périgord (1754-1838) French statesman
Reminiscences of Prince Talleyrand (1850)
Better be alone than in bad company.
John Clarke (d. 1658) British educator
Proverbs: English and Latine [Paroemiologia Anglo-Latina] (1639)
We face the dilemma … that if everyone gets his desserts, some may be driven from the table: and if everyone comes to the table, some may not get their desserts. In practice, this seems to be resolved by the establishment of a social minimum as reflected for instance, in the poor law, in social security and various welfare services. The principle of dessert come into play above this social minimum. That is to say, society lays a modest table at which all can sup and a high table at which the deserving can feast.
Kenneth Ewart Boulding (1910-1993) American economist, educator, poet, philosopher
“Social Justice in Social Dynamics” (1962)
The great inconvenience of new books is that they prevent us from reading the old ones.
[C’est le grand inconvénient des livres nouveaux: ils nous empêchent de lire les anciens.]
Joseph Joubert (1754-1824) French moralist, philosopher, essayist, poet
Pensées [Thoughts], ch. 18 “Du Siècle [On the Age],” ¶ 57 (1850 ed.) [tr. Auster (1983), 1808]
(Source)
(Source (French)). Alternate translations:The great drawback in new books is that they prevent our reading older ones.
[tr. Attwell (1896), ¶ 250]That is the great drawback of new books: they keep us from reading the old.
[tr. Collins (1928), ch. 17]
It’s a job. It’s not a hobby. You don’t write the way you build a model airplane. You have to sit down and work, to schedule your time and stick to it. Even if it’s just for an hour or so each day. You have to get a babysitter and make the time. If you’re going to make writing succeed you have to approach it as a job. You don’t wait for inspiration. The Muse does not do your work for you.
Rosellen Brown (b. 1939) American author and teacher
(Attributed)
[The] flight from and hatred of technology is self-defeating. The Buddha, the Godhead, resides quite as comfortably in the circuits of a digital computer or the gears of a cycle transmission as he does at the top of a mountain or in the petals of a flower. To think otherwise is to demean the Buddha — which is to demean oneself.
Robert Pirsig (1928-2017) American philosopher, writer
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, ch. 1 (1974)
The least pain in our little finger gives us more concern and uneasiness than the destruction of millions of our fellow-beings.
William Hazlitt (1778-1830) English writer
“American Literature — Dr. Channing” in The Edinburgh Review (Oct 1829)
Usually when people are sad, they don’t do anything. They just cry over their condition. But when they get angry, they bring about a change.
Malcolm X (1925-1965) American revolutionary, religious leader [b. Malcolm Little]
Malcolm X Speaks, ch. 9 “With Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer” (1965)
No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Comment (5 Apr 1776)
In James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)
What sweeter than this in the world!
Friend met friend and the lover joined his Beloved.Abu Said ibn Abi 'I-Khayr (AD 967-1049) Persian Sufi mystic and poet [a.k.a., Abusa'id Abolkhayr, Abū-Sa'īd Abul-Khayr, Sheikh Abusaeid or Abu Sa'eed]
Poem
Unless the reformer can invent something which substitutes attractive virtues for attractive vices, he will fail.
Walter Lippmann (1889-1974) American journalist and author
A Preface to Politics, ch. 2 (1914)
Everyone asks if a man is rich, no one if he is good.
Euripides (485?-406? BC) Greek tragic dramatist
(Attributed)
Quoted in Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholia, 1.2.4.6 (1621-51).
If you ever want to find out just how uninteresting you really are, get a job where the quality and frequency of your thoughts determine your livelihood. I’ve found that the only way I can keep writing every day, year after year, is to let my mind wander into new territories. To do that, I’ve had to cultivate a kind of mental playfulness.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Commencement Address, Kenyon College (20 May 1990)
(Source)
It is not true that equality is a law of nature. Nature has made nothing equal; her sovereign law is subordination and dependence.
[Il est faux que l’égalité soit une loi de la nature. La nature n’a rien fait d’égal; la loi souveraine est la subordination et la dépendance.]
Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715-1747) French moralist, essayist, soldier
Reflections and Maxims [Réflexions et maximes] (1746) [tr. Lee (1903)]
Avarice is fear sheathed in gold.
Paul Eldridge (1888-1982) American educator, novelist, poet
“Lanterns in the Night,” Maxim 42, The Jewish Forum (Aug 1948)