Hostility towards Microsoft is not difficult to find on the Net, and it blends two strains: resentful people who feel Microsoft is too powerful, and disdainful people who think it’s tacky. This is all strongly reminiscent of the heyday of Communism and Socialism, when the bourgeoisie were hated from both ends: by the proles, because they had all the money, and by the intelligentsia, because of their tendency to spend it on lawn ornaments. Microsoft is the very embodiment of modern high-tech prosperity — it is, in a word, bourgeois — and so it attracts all of the same gripes.
Neal Stephenson (b. 1959) American novelist
“Class Struggle on the Desktop,” In the Beginning … Was the Command Line (1999)
NEWT: My mommy always said there were no monsters — no real ones — but there are.
RIPLEY: Yes, there are, aren’t there?
NEWT: Why do they tell little kids that?
RIPLEY: Most of the time it’s true.James Cameron (b. 1954) Canadian film director, producer, screenwriter
Aliens (1986)
What starts the process, really, are laughs and slights and snubs. But if you are reasonably intelligent and if your anger is deep and strong enough, you learn you can change those attitudes by excellence, personal gut performance, while those who have everything are sitting on their fat butts.
Richard M. Nixon (1913-1994) American politician, writer, US President (1967-74)
(Attributed)
Remark to Ken Clawson. Quoted in Tom Marganthau, "The Rise and Fall and Rise and Fall and Rise of Nixon," Newsweek (2 May 1994)
The best way to repent for a wrong is by not repeating it.
Thomas Szasz (1920-2012) Hungarian-American psychiatrist, educator
Psychiatric Slavery, ch. 5 (1977)
You’ll never get mixed up if you simply tell the truth. Then you don’t have to remember what you have said, and you never forget what you have said.
Sam Rayburn (1882-1961) American lawyer and politician
(Attributed)
In W. B. Ragsdale, "An Old Friend Writes of Rayburn", U.S. News & World Report (23 Oct 1961).
The married state, with and without the affection suitable to it, is the completest image of heaven and hell we are capable of receiving in this life.
Richard Steele (1672-1729) Irish writer and politician
Spectator, #479 (9 Sep 1712)
Who loves not wine, women, and song
Remains a fool his whole life long.[Wer nicht liebt Weib, Wein und Gesang,
A Der bleibt ein Narr sein Leben lang.]Martin Luther (1483-1546) German religious reformer
(Attributed)
Attributed in Matthias Claudius, Der Wandsbecker Bothe (1775). Inscription in the Luther Room, Wartburg, Germany.
GOMEZ: I would die for her. I would kill for her. Either way, what bliss.
Caroline Thompson (b. 1956) American novelist, screenwriter, film director, producer
The Addams Family (1991) [with Larry Wilson]
BOSWELL. But what do you think of supporting a cause which you know to be bad?
JOHNSON. “Sir, you do not know it to be good or bad till the Judge determines it. … It is his business to judge; and you are not to be confident in your own opinion that the cause is bad, but to say all you can for your client, and then hear the Judge’s opinion.Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Comment (Spring 1768)
On being a lawyer. In James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)
It is against Stupidity in every shape and form that we have to wage our eternal battle. But how can we wonder at the want of sense on the part of those who have had no advantages, when we see such plentiful absence of that commodity on the part of those who have had all the advantages?
William Booth (1829–1912), British evangelist, founder of the Salvation Army
In Darkest England, and the Way Out, Part 1, ch. 5 (1890)
Senescence begins
And middle age ends
The day your descendents
Outnumber your friends.Ogden Nash (1902-1971) American poet
“Crossing the Border”
We cannot be kind to each other here for an hour;
We whisper, and hint, and chuckle, and grin at a brother’s shame;
However we brave it out, we men are a little breed.Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) English poet
“Maud; A Monodra” (1856)
Wherever the people are well informed they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter to Richard Price (8 Jan 1789)
(Source)
Keep your old love letters. Throw away your old bank statements.
Mary Schmich (b. 1953) American newspaper columnist
“Advice, Like Youth, Probably Just Wasted on the Young,” Chicago Tribune (1 Jul 1997)
The animosities of sovereigns are temporary, and may be allayed; but those which seize the whole body of people, and of a people too, dictate their own measures, produce calamities of long duration.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter (1786-05-06) to C. W. F. Dumas
(Source)
Counsel is irksome when the Matter is past Remedy.
Thomas Fuller (1654-1734) English physician, preacher, aphorist, writer
Gnomologia: Adages and Proverbs, #1181 (1732)
(Source)
Judgement is to be made of actions in according to the times in which they were performed.
Plutarch (AD 46-127) Greek historian, biographer, essayist [Mestrius Plutarchos]
“Poplicola and Colon Compared,” Parallel Lives [tr. Dryden (1693)]
You aren’t learning anything when you’re talking.
Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-1973) American politician, educator, US President (1963-69)
(Attributed)
(Source)
Sometimes given as "You ain't learning anything when you're talking."
Reported, not as a quote, but as a sign on his wall while a US Senator, in Leslie Carpenter, "A Man of Complexity," Boston Herald (1963-12-01), read into the Congressional Record, House of Representatives (1963-12-03) by House Speaker John W. McCormack (D-RI).
The world has actually been wired together by digital communications systems for a century and a half. Nothing that has happened during that time compares in its impact to the first exchange of messages between Queen Victoria and President Buchanan in 1858. That was so impressive that a mob of celebrants poured into the streets of New York and set fire to City Hall.
Neal Stephenson (b. 1959) American novelist
“Mother Earth Mother Board,” Wired, 4.12 (1996)
Personalize your sympathies; depersonalize you antipathies.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
More Lay Thoughts of a Dean (1931)
That wealth and greatness are often regarded with the respect and admiration which are due only to wisdom and virtue; and that the contempt, of which vice and folly are the only proper objects, is often most unjustly bestowed upon poverty and weakness, has been the complaint of moralists in all ages.
Adam Smith (1723-1790) Scottish economist
The Theory of Moral Sentiments, 1.3.3 (1759)
If a man repents of his evil deeds, and then returns to the same deeds, he has not truly repented.
The Talmud (AD 200-500) Collection of Jewish rabbinical writings
In Louis J. Newman, comp., The Talmudic Anthology, ch. 282 (1945)
A jackass can kick a barn down, but it takes a carpenter to build one.
Sam Rayburn (1882-1961) American lawyer and politician
Comment (c. 1953)
Said during a filmed conversation with reporters, reported in S. Rayburn, Speak, Mister Speaker (1978)
No man was ever so completely skilled in the conduct of life, as not to receive new information from age and experience ….
Richard Steele (1672-1729) Irish writer and politician
The Spectator, #544 (24 Nov 1712)
Men hold the anniversaries of their birth, of their marriage, of the birth of their first-born, and they hold — although they spread no feast, and ask no friends to assist — many another anniversary besides. On many a day in every year does a man remember what took place on that self-same day in some former year, and chews the sweet or bitter herb of memory, as the case may be.
Alexander Smith (1830-1867) Scottish poet
Dreamthorp (1863)
These will not be hindered from accomplishing at their best speed the distance which they have to go, either by snow, or rain, or heat, or by the darkness of night.
Herodotus (c.484-c.420 BC) Greek historian
The Persian Wars, 8.98 [tr. Rawlinson (1942)]
Of the Persian messengers. The U.S. Postal Service adopted a variation on this motto: "Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds."
DUKE SENIOR: Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head.William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
As You Like It, Act 2, sc. 1, l. 12ff (2.1.12-14) (1599)
(Source)
I love to see two truths at the same time. Every good comparison gives the mind this advantage.
[J’aime à voir deux vérités à la fois. Toute bonne comparaison donne à l’esprit cet avantage.]
Joseph Joubert (1754-1824) French moralist, philosopher, essayist, poet
Pensées [Thoughts], Introduction, “L’auteur Peint par Lui-Même [The Author’ Self-Portrait]” (1850 ed.) [tr. Auster (1983)], 1796]
(Source)
(Source (French)). Alternate translations:I like to see two truths at once. Every good comparison gives the mind this advantage.
[tr. Calvert (1866), "Notice"]I like to see two truths at once. Every good comparison gives the mind that advantage.
[tr. Collins (1928)]
We need not be theologians to see that we have shifted responsibility for making the world interesting from God to the newspaperman.
Daniel J. Boorstin (1914-2004) American historian, professor, attorney, writer
The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America, ch. 1 (1961)
I do not necessarily conquer my anger because I do not show that I am angry. Anger ventilated often hurries towards forgiveness; anger concealed often hardens into revenge.
Edward George Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873) English novelist and politician
Caxtoniana, ch. 20 “On Self-Control” (1862-1863)
(Source)
GIRL SCOUT: Is this made from real lemons?
WEDNESDAY: Yes.
GIRL SCOUT: I only like all-natural foods and beverages, organically grown, with no preservatives. Are you sure they’re real lemons?
PUGSLEY: Yes.
GIRL SCOUT: Well, I’ll tell you what. I’ll buy a cup if you buy a box of my delicious Girl Scout cookies. Do we have a deal?
WEDNESDAY: Are they made from real Girl Scouts?Caroline Thompson (b. 1956) American novelist, screenwriter, film director, producer
The Addams Family (1991) [with Larry Wilson]
A lawyer has no business with the justice or injustice of the cause which he undertakes, unless his client asks his opinion, and then he is bound to give it honestly. The justice or injustice of the cause is to be decided by the judge. Consider, sir; what is the purpose of courts of justice? It is, that every man may have his cause fairly tried, by men appointed to try causes. A lawyer is not to tell what he knows to be a lie: he is not to produce what he knows to be a false deed; but he is not to usurp the province of the jury and of the judge, and determine what shall be the effect of evidence — what shall be the result of legal argument.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
In James Boswell, Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, 15 Aug 1773 (1786)
The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook.
Julia Child (1912-2004) American chef and writer
Quoted in Nancy Verde Barr, Backstage with Julia, ch. 3 (2007)
(Source)
From the earliest times, the old have rubbed it into the young that they are wiser than they, and before the young had discovered what nonsense this was they were old too, and it profited them to carry on the imposture.
W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) English novelist and playwright [William Somerset Maugham]
Cakes and Ale, ch. 11 (1930)
ANTONY: Through this the well-belovèd Brutus stabbed,
And, as he plucked his cursèd steel away,
Mark how the blood of Caesar followed it,
As rushing out of doors to be resolved
If Brutus so unkindly knocked or no;
For Brutus, as you know, was Caesar’s angel.
Judge, O you gods, how dearly Caesar loved him!
This was the most unkindest cut of all.William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Julius Caesar, Act 3, sc. 2, l. 188ff (3.2.188-195) (1599)
(Source)
Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it’s natural manure.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter to William Stephens Smith (13 Nov 1787)
(Source)
Remember compliments you receive. Forget the insults. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.
Mary Schmich (b. 1953) American newspaper columnist
“Advice, Like Youth, Probably Just Wasted on the Young,” Chicago Tribune (1 Jul 1997)
Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs.
Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855) British novelist [pseud. Currer Bell]
Jane Eyre, ch. 6 (1847)
If you would lift me, you must be on higher ground.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
“Eloquence,” Atlantic Monthly (1858-09)
It is indeed desirable to be well descended, but the glory belongs to our ancestors.
Plutarch (AD 46-127) Greek historian, biographer, essayist [Mestrius Plutarchos]
“Of the Training of Children,” Morals
Whether we are New Dealer, Old Dealer, Liberty Leaguer or Red, whether we agree or not, we still have the right to think and speak how we feel.
Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-1973) American politician, educator, US President (1963-69)
Speech (1939-09-15), Chamber of Commerce Barbeque, Smithville, Texas
I don’t like sewing machines. I don’t understand how a needle with a thread going through the tip of it can interlock the thread by jamming itself into a little goddamn spool. It’s contrary to nature and it irritates me.
Neal Stephenson (b. 1959) American novelist
Zodiac, ch. 9 (1988)
They would not get a scratch with a pin to save the universe. They are more affected by the overturning of a plate of turtle soup than by the starving of a whole country.
William Hazlitt (1778-1830) English writer
“On Respectable People,” Table Talk (1822)
There will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
The Bible (The New Testament) (AD 1st - 2nd C) Christian sacred scripture
Luke 15:7
It has always been my ambition since childhood to live such a life that one day my fellow citizens would call me to membership in this popular branch of the greatest lawmaking body in the world. Out of their confidence and partiality they have done this. It is now my sole purpose here to help enact such wise and just laws that our common country will by virtue of these laws be a happier and a more prosperous country. I have always dreamed of a country which I believe this should be and will be, and that is one in which the citizenship is an educated and patriotic people, not swayed by passion and prejudice, and a country that shall know no East, no West, no North, no South, but inhabited by a people liberty loving, patriotic, happy, and prosperous, with its lawmakers having no other purpose than to write such just laws as shall in the years to come be of service to human kind yet unborn.
Sam Rayburn (1882-1961) American lawyer and politician
Maiden speech. House of Representatives (6 May 1913)
Congressional Record, vol. 50, p. 1249.
Among all the diseases of the mind there is not one more epidemical or more pernicious than the love of flattery.
Richard Steele (1672-1729) Irish writer and politician
The Spectator, #238 (3 Dec 1711)
Remember this: Arrogance and envy are not different qualities: they are merely different manifestations of the same qualities. The rich man who looks down upon or oppresses the poor man is the very man who, if poor, would envy and hate the man who is richer. Conversely, the poor man who regards with bitter and malignant envy the man who is better off, who preaches the doctrine of hate toward that man, is himself the man who, if it had happened that he were rich, would grind down the faces of those who were less well off than he.
Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer, US President (1901-1909)
“The Cuban Dead,” speech, Arlington National Cemetery (12 Apr 1907)
(Source)
Speech at the dedication of the 1st US Voluntary Cavalry ("Rough Riders") monument.
I don’t know what you think about anniversaries. I like them, being always minded to drink my cup of life to the bottom, and take my chance of the sweets and bitters.
T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Aphorisms and Reflections From the Works of T. H. Huxley, ed. Henrietta A. Huxley (1907)
Questions show the mind’s range, and answers, its subtlety.
[Les questions montrent l’étendue de l’esprit, et les réponses sa finesse.]Joseph Joubert (1754-1824) French moralist, philosopher, essayist, poet
Pensées [Thoughts], ch. 4 “De la Nature des Esprits [On the Nature of Minds],” ¶ 62 (1850 ed.) [tr. Lyttelton (1899), ch. 3, ¶ 21]
(Source)
(Source (French))
While confirmed as an entry in the French, I was unable to find translations other than Lyttelton's in my various sources.
Since the Creator had made the facts of the after-life inaccessible to man, He must not have required that man understand death in order to live fruitfully.
Daniel J. Boorstin (1914-2004) American historian, professor, attorney, writer
The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson, Notes (1948)
ANGER: Of the Seven Deadly Sins, anger is possibly the most fun. To lick your wounds, to smack your lips over grievances long past, to roll over your tongue the prospect of bitter confrontations still to come, to savor to the last toothsome morsel both the pain you are given and the pain you are giving back — in many ways it is a feast fit for a king. The chief drawback is that what you are wolfing down is yourself. The skeleton at the feast is you.
Alcohol is nicissary f’r a man so that now an’ thin he can have a good opinion iv himsilf, ondisturbed be th’ facts.
[Alcohol is necessary for a man so that now and then he can have a good opinion of himself, undisturbed by the facts.]
Finley Peter Dunne (1867-1936) American humorist and journalist
“Mr. Dooley on Alcohol,” Chicago Tribune (26 Apr 1914)
To be of no church is dangerous. Religion, of which the rewards are distant, and which is animated only by faith and hope, will glide by degrees out of the mind unless it be invigorated and reimpressed by external ordinances, by stated calls to worship, and the salutary influence of example.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Lives of the English Poets, “Milton” (1781)
(Source)
A cookbook is only as good as its poorest recipe.
Julia Child (1912-2004) American chef and writer
Quoted in Frank Prial, “Light’s Still on Julia Child,” New York Times (1997-10-08)
(Source)
Apparently a phrase she used frequently, as she drew on numerous cookbooks as source material and reference for her own. Another use can be found in an interview with Mike Sager, "What I've Learned: Julia Child," Esquire (1 Jun 2000).
Often given (perhaps from other occurrences) as "A cookbook is only as good as its worst recipe." For example, her obituary by Regina Schrambling, "Julia Child, the French Chef for a Jell-O Nation, Dies at 91," New York Times (13 Aug 2004).
A man assumes that a woman’s refusal is just part of a game. Or, at any rate, a lot of men assume that. When a man says no, it’s no. When a woman says no, it’s yes, or at least maybe. There is even a joke to that effect. And little by little, women begin to believe in this view of themselves.
Erica Jong (b. 1942) American writer, poet
Fear of Flying, ch. 16 (1973)
If there’s nobody in your way, it’s because you’re not going anywhere.
Robert Francis Kennedy (1925-1968) American politician
(Attributed)
Variation: If there's nobody in your way, it's probably because you're not going anywhere.
TITUS: These words are razors to my wounded heart.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Titus Andronicus, Act 1, sc. 4, l. 320 (1.4.320) (c. 1590)
(Source)
I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, & as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions indeed generally establish the incroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions, as not to discourage them too much. It is a medecine necessary for the sound health of government.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter to James Madison (30 Jan 1787)
(Source)
Referring to Shays' Rebellion. See his contemporaneous letter to Abigail Adams.
Don’t waste your time on jealousy. Sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind. The race is long and, in the end, it’s only with yourself.
Mary Schmich (b. 1953) American newspaper columnist
“Advice, Like Youth, Probably Just Wasted on the Young,” Chicago Tribune (1 Jul 1997)
He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper.
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) Anglo-Irish statesman, orator, philosopher
Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790)
It was observed of Elizabeth that she was weak herself, but chose wise counsellors; to which it was replied, that to choose wise counsellors was, in a prince, the highest wisdom.
Charles Caleb "C. C." Colton (1780-1832) English cleric, writer, aphorist
Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Vol. 1, § 57 (1820)
(Source)
We hope that the world will not narrow into a neighborhood before it has broadened into a brotherhood.
Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-1973) American politician, educator, US President (1963-69)
Speech (1963-12-17), Pageant of Peace Ceremonies, Washington, D.C.
(Source)
Johnson used this phrase many times in the early '60s to refer to how, as the world "shrank" through advances in travel (including for weapons), it had not resolved the ongoing problems within humanity, only brought them closer. Other examples:We live in a world which has narrowed into a neighborhood before it broadened into a brotherhood.
[Reported (1961-08-01)]The world has narrowed to a neighborhood before it has broadened to brotherhood.
[Speech, New York City (1963-12-17)]
See also King (1954).
Any property that’s open to common use gets destroyed. Because everyone has incentive to use it to the max, but no one has incentive to maintain it.
Neal Stephenson (b. 1959) American novelist
Zodiac, ch. 8 (1988)
Bureaucracy is the epoxy that greases the wheels of progress.
James H. Boren (1925-2010) American bureaucrat, humorist, speaker
When in Doubt, Mumble: A Bureaucrat’s Handbook (1972)
My political view is democracy. Everyone should be respected as an individual, but no one idolized.
The gates of repentance are always open.
The Talmud (AD 200-500) Collection of Jewish rabbinical writings
Midrash
In Louis J. Newman, comp., The Talmudic Anthology, ch. 282 (1945)
A little in drink, but at all times yr faithful husband.
Richard Steele (1672-1729) Irish writer and politician
Letters to His Wife, 27 Sep 1708 (1707-1712)
He had not learned that the majority in a democracy has no more right to tyrannize over a minority than, under a different system, the latter would have to oppress the former; and that, if there is a moral principle at stake, the saying that the voice of the people is the voice of God may be quite as untrue, and do quite as much mischief, as the old theory of the divine right of kings.
Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer, US President (1901-1909)
Thomas Hart Benton, ch. 6 (1886)
(Source)
Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.
Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
(Attributed)
I must save this government if possible. What I cannot do, of course I will not do; but it may as well be understood, once for all, that I shall not surrender this game leaving any available card unplayed.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Letter to Reverdy Johnson (26 Jul 1862)
Prosperity is no just scale; adversity is the only balance to weigh friends.
Plutarch (AD 46-127) Greek historian, biographer, essayist [Mestrius Plutarchos]
(Attributed)
In Watson Adams, The Rule of Life: or a Collection of Select Moral Sentences (1834)
Writing is closer to thinking than to speaking.
Joseph Joubert (1754-1824) French moralist, philosopher, essayist, poet
Pensées [Thoughts], 1791 entry [tr. Auster (1983)]
(Source)
I could not find an analog in other translations of the Pensées.
The Creator, who designed the human brain for activity, had insured the restlessness of all minds by enabling no single one to envisage all the qualities of the creation. Since no one by himself could aspire to a serene knowledge of the whole truth, all men had been drawn into an active, exploratory and cooperative attitude.
Daniel J. Boorstin (1914-2004) American historian, professor, attorney, writer
The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson, ch. 3, part 2 “The Happy Variety of Minds” (1948)
Our new Constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency, but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.
And when people ask me why I’m so healthy, I say, “Plenty of red meat and gin!”
Julia Child (1912-2004) American chef and writer
Interview in The World: Journal of the Unitarian Universalist Assoc. (1992)
(Source)
On her 80th birthday. "Red meat and gin" was frequently mentioned by Child in interviews when asked either (a) her comfort foods or (b) the secret of her longevity. She does not seem to have used it in her writing.
Examples:
- Long life: Interview with Rena Pederson
- Long life: Quoted in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, requoted in Reader's Digest (1997-01)
- Confort food: Source
‘Paradise Lost’ is one of the books which the reader admires and lays down, and forgets to take up again. None ever wished it longer than it is.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Lives of the English Poets, “Milton”(1781)
(Source)
Every country gets the circus it deserves. Spain gets bullfights. Italy gets the Catholic Church. America gets Hollywood.
Erica Jong (b. 1942) American writer, poet
“Take the Red–Eye …”, epigraph, How To Save Your Own Life (1977)
‘Yes,’ I answered you last night;
‘No,’ this morning, sir, I say.
Colors seen by candle-light,
Will not look the same by day.Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861) English poet
“The Lady’s ‘Yes'”, st. 1 (1844)
A man over ninety is a great comfort to all his elderly neighbors; he is a picket-guard at the extreme outpost; and the young folks of sixty and seventy feel that the enemy must get by him before he can come near their camp.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809-1894) American poet, essayist, scholar
The Guardian Angel (1867)
In all the ills which befall us, we look more at the intention than the effect. A tile which falls from the house may hurt more, but does not vex us so much as a stone thrown designedly by an ill-natured hand.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) French philosopher and writer
Reveries of a Solitary Walker (1782)
Don’t worry about the future. Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 p.m. on some idle Tuesday.
Mary Schmich (b. 1953) American newspaper columnist
“Advice, Like Youth, Probably Just Wasted on the Young,” Chicago Tribune (1 Jul 1997)
To profit from good advice requires more wisdom than to give it.
John Churton Collins (1848-1908) American literary academic
(Attributed)
In Logan Pearsall Smith, A Treasury of English Aphorisms (1928)
It has long seemed to me that it would be more honorable to our ancestors to praise them in words less, but in deeds, to imitate them more.
Horace Mann (1796-1859) American educator
Speech, Boston (4 Jul 1842)
Until justice is blind to color, until education is unaware of race, until opportunity is unconcerned with the color of men’s skins, emancipation will be a proclamation but not a fact. To the extent that the Proclamation of Emancipation is not fulfilled in fact, to that extent we shall have fallen short of assuring freedom to the free.
Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-1973) American politician, educator, US President (1963-69)
Speech (1963-05-30), Memorial Day, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
(Source)
(Source (Video))
Speaking during the 100th Anniversary of the (second) Emancipation Proclamation.
Though spoken while still Vice President, variations of these phrases became a rhetorical favorite of Johnson's through his presidency.
Any strategy that involves crossing a valley — accepting short-term losses to reach a higher hill in the distance — will soon be brought to a halt by the demands of a system that celebrates short-term gains and tolerates stagnation, but condemns anything else as failure. In short, a world where big stuff can never get done.
Neal Stephenson (b. 1959) American novelist
“Innovation Starvation,” World Policy Journal (Fall 2011)
GRANTAIRE: Red …
MARIUS: I feel my soul on fire!
GRANTAIRE: Black …
MARIUS: My world if she’s not there!
CHORUS: Red …
MARIUS: The color of desire!
CHORUS: Black …
MARIUS: The color of despair!Alain Boublil (b. 1941) French musical theatre lyricist and librettist
Les Misérables, “Read and Black” [music by Claude-Michel Schönberg] (1980) [tr. Herbert Kretzmer (1985)]
SHYLOCK: He hath disgraced me and
hindered me half a million, laughed at my losses,
mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted
my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies —
and what’s his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not
a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions,
senses, affections, passions? Fed with the
same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to
the same diseases, healed by the same means,
warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer
as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not
bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you
poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall
we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will
resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian,
what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian wrong
a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian
example? Why, revenge! The villainy you teach me I
will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the
instruction.William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Merchant of Venice, Act 3, sc. 1, l. 53ff (3.1.53-72) (1597)
(Source)
Use, do not abuse; neither abstinence nor excess ever renders man happy.
Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
Sept discours en vers sur l’homme (1738)
Repentanse should be the effekt ov love — not fear.
[Repentance should be the effect of love — not fear.]
Josh Billings (1818-1885) American humorist, aphorist [pseud. of Henry Wheeler Shaw]
Everybody’s Friend, Or; Josh Billing’s Encyclopedia and Proverbial Philosophy of Wit and Humor, ch. 155 “Affurisms: Ink Lings” (1874)
(Source)
Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body.
Richard Steele (1672-1729) Irish writer and politician
The Tatler, #147 (1710)
There can be no effective control of corporations while their political activity remains. To put an end to it will be neither a short nor an easy task, but it can be done.
Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer, US President (1901-1909)
“The New Nationalism,” speech, Osawatomie, Kansas (31 Aug 1910)
(Source)
Bromidic though it may sound, some questions don’t have answers, which is a terribly difficult lesson to learn.
Katharine Graham (1917-2001) American newspaper publisher
Interview in “Ms.” (1974)
When the morning’s freshness has been replaced by the weariness of midday, when the leg muscles quiver under the strain, the climb seems endless, and, suddenly, nothing will go quite as you wish — it is then that you must not hesitate.
Dag Hammarskjöld (1905-1961) Swedish diplomat, author, UN Secretary-General (1953-61)
Markings (1956) [tr. Sjöberg and Auden (1964)]
In the adversity of our best friends we often find something which does not displease us.
François VI, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) French epigrammatist, memoirist, noble
Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales [Maxims] (1665-1678)
While the easiest way in metaphysics is to condemn all metaphysics as nonsense, the easiest way in morals is to elevate the common practice of the community into a moral absolute.
Daniel J. Boorstin (1914-2004) American historian, professor, attorney, writer
The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson, ch. 3 “The Physiology of Thought and Morals” (1948)
We must all hang together, or most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman, scientist, philosopher, aphorist
(Attributed)
Attributed remark at the signing of the Declaration of Independence (4 Jul 1776)
A man that does not know how to be angry does not know how to be good.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit (1887)
He drinks — but what’s drinking?
A mere pause from thinking!George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
The Deformed Transformed, Part 3, sc. 1 [Caesar] (1822)
(Source)
Singing of veterans after the war, in peacetime.
That was why most people led lives they hated, with people they hated. … How wonderful to have someone to blame! How wonderful to live with one’s nemesis! You may be miserable, but you feel forever in the right. You may be fragmented, but you feel absolved of all the blame for it. Take your life in your own hands, and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to blame.
Erica Jong (b. 1942) American writer, poet
“Intuition, extuition …”, How To Save Your Own Life (1977)
We now know that a life which goes excessively against natural impulse is one which is likely to involve effects of strain that may be quite as bad as indulgence in forbidden impulses would have been. People who live a life which is unnatural beyond a point are likely to be filled with envy, malice and all uncharitableness. They may develop strains of cruelty, or, on the other hand, they may so completely lose all joy in life that they have no longer any capacity for effort.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
Authority and the Individual, Lecture 1 (1949)
(Source)
Collection, with some edits, of the inaugural Reith Lectures, BBC, "Authority and the Individual," No. 1 "Social Cohesion and Human Nature" (1948-12-26).
