One ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together it is much safer to be feared than loved, if one of the two has to be wanting. … And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared; for love is held by a chain of obligation, which men being selfish, is broken whenever it serves their purpose, but fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails.
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) Italian politician, philosopher, political scientist
The Prince, ch. 17 (1513) [tr. Ricci (1903)]
(Source)
Alt. trans.: "Is it better to be loved than feared, or the reverse? The answer is that it is desirable to be both, but because it is difficult to join them together, it is much safer for a prince to be feared than loved, if he is to fail in one of the two. ... Men have less hesitation in injuring one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared, for love is held by a chain of duty which, since men are bad, they break at every chance for their own profit; but fear is held by a dread of punishment that never fails you." [tr. Gilbert (1958)]
I am not interested in picking up crumbs of compassion thrown from the table of someone who considers himself my master. I want the full menu of rights.
Desmond Tutu (1931-2021) South African cleric, Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, Nobel Laureate
Today, NBC TV (9 Jan 1985)
Fanatics fear liberty more than they fear persecution.
Ernest Renan (1823-1892) French philosopher, writer, historian, political theorist
The Hibbert Lectures, preface (1880)
Respect for the freedom of others is the highest duty of man. To love this freedom and to serve it — such is the only virtue. That is the basis of all morality, and there can be no other.
Mikhail Bakunin (1814-1876) Russian anarchist, political theorist
The Political Philosophy of Bakunin: Scientific Anarchism, 3.3 [ed. G. P. Maxmoff] (1953)
There is no more lovely, friendly and charming relationship, communion or company than a good marriage.
Martin Luther (1483-1546) German religious reformer
Table Talk, #292 (1566) [tr. Hazlitt (1857)]
Love may forgive all infirmities and love still in spite of them: but Love cannot cease to will their removal.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
The Problem of Pain (1940)
Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.
Harry S Truman (1884-1972) US President (1945-1953)
Special Message to Congress on the Internal Security of the United States (8 Aug 1950)
Full text.
Well-timed silence hath more eloquence than speech.
Martin Farquhar Tupper (1810-1889) English poet
“Of Discretion,” Proverbial Philosophy (1838-1849)
Ideologies separate us. Dreams and anguish bring us together.
Eugène Ionesco (1912-1994) Romanian-French dramatist
(Attributed)
Boys’ll be boys, an’ so’ll a lot o’ middle-aged men.
Frank McKinney "Kin" Hubbard (1868-1930) American caricaturist and humorist
Abe Martin: Hoss Sense and Nonsense (1926)
The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually we stand on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land, to add something to the extent and the solidity of our possessions.
T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“On the Reception of the Origin of Species” (1887)
Full text.
The slowest kiss makes too much haste.
Thomas Middleton (1580-1627) English Jacobean playwright and poet
A Chaste Maid in Cheapside, ch. 4 (1607)
Believe me, you will find more lessons in the woods than in books. Trees and stones will teach you what you cannot learn from masters.
[Experto crede: aliquid amplius invenies in silvis, quam in libris. Ligna et lapides docebunt te, quod a magistris audire non possis.]
Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153) French religious, Doctor of the Church, saint
Letter 106, Sec. 2
In Edward Churton, The Early English Church (1841).
What is life but an experiment? and mortality but an exercise? with reference to results beyond.
Walt Whitman (1819-1892) American poet
Leaves of Grass, Preface (1872) (1855-1892)
I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma: but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest.
Winston Churchill (1874-1965) British statesman and author
BBC broadcast, London (1 Oct 1939)
No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.
H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American writer and journalist [Henry Lewis Mencken]
Notes on Journalism, Chicago Tribune (19 Sep 1926)
Popularly, "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people."
Righteous Indignation: Your own wrath as opposed to the shocking bad temper of others.
Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915) American writer, businessman, philosopher
The Roycroft Dictionary (1914)
(Source)
There is a batty degree of triumphalism loose in this country right now. We are brushing off world opinion as though it mattered not a whit what other people think of us.
Molly Ivins (1944-2007) American writer, political columnist [Mary Tyler Ivins]
“Blast from the Past,” Creators Syndicate (19 Nov 2002)
Full text.
It is my firm belief that there should be separation of church and state in the United States — that is, that both church and state should be free to operate, without interference from each other in their respective areas of jurisdiction. We live in a liberal, democratic society which embraces wide varieties of belief and disbelief. There is no doubt in my mind that the pluralism which has developed under our Constitution, providing as it does a framework within which diverse opinions can exist side by side and by their interaction enrich the whole, is the most ideal system yet devised by man. I cannot conceive of a set of circumstances which would lead me to a different conclusion.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Letter to Glenn L. Archer (23 Feb 1959)
Old Tom Bombadil is a merry fellow,
Bright blue his jacket is, and his boots are yellow.
None has ever caught him yet, for Tom, he is the master:
His songs are stronger songs, and his feet are faster.J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
The Lord of the Rings, Vol. 1: The Fellowship of the Ring, Book 1, ch. 8 “Fog on the Barrow-Downs” (1954)
(Source)
Experience teaches only the teachable ….
Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) English novelist, essayist and critic
“Tragedy and the Whole Truth,” Music at Night and Other Essays (1931)
Our youth we can have but to-day,
We may always find time to grow old.George Berkeley (1685-1753) Irish philosopher, Anglican bishop
“Can Love Be Controlled by Advice?”
[Worf with a hangover, groans with his head down on the table.]
GUINAN: Worf? Are you all right?
WORF: Romulan ale should be illegal.
GEORDI: It is.
WORF: Then it should be more illegal.Rick Berman (b. 1945) American screenwriter, producer
Star Trek: Nemesis (2002) [with John Logan, Brent Spiner]
For this is also a miracle, not onely to produce effects against, or above Nature, but before Nature; and to create Nature as great a miracle, as to contradict or transcend her. Wee doe too narrowly define the power of God, restraining it to our capacities. I hold that God can doe all things, how he should work contradictions I do not understand, yet dare not therefore deny.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Religio Medici, Part 1, sec. 27 (1643)
(Source)
All government is an ugly necessity.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
A Short History of England (1917)
It is well to seem merciful, faithful, humane, sincere, religious, and also to be so; but you must have the mind so disposed so that when it is needful to be otherwise you may be able to change to the opposite qualities.
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) Italian politician, philosopher, political scientist
The Prince, ch. 18 (1513) [tr. Ricci (1903)]
The combination of some data and an aching desire for an answer does not ensure that a reasonable answer can be extracted from a given body of data.
John Tukey (1915-2000) American mathematician and statistician
“Sunset Salvo,” The American Statistician (Feb 1986)
Full text.
The mind of man can never be wholly barren. Through our whole lives we are subject to successive impressions; for, either new ideas are continually flowing in, or traces of the old ones are marked deeper. If, therefore, you be not acquiring good principles be assured that you are acquiring bad ones; if you be not forming virtuous habits you are, how insensibly soever to yourselves, forming vicious ones …
Joseph Priestley (1733-1804) British theologian, Dissenting clergyman, scientist, political theorist
Institutes of Natural and Revealed Religion, Vol. 1 “The Dedication” (Mar 1772) (1772-74)
You were born together, and together you will be forevermore. …
But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.Kahlil Gibran (1883-1931) Lebanese-American poet, writer, painter [Gibran Khalil Gibran]
The Prophet, “On Marriage” (1923)
Love is something more stern and splendid than mere kindness.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
The Problem of Pain (1940)
My choice early in life was either to be a piano-player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there’s hardly any difference.
Harry S Truman (1884-1972) US President (1945-1953)
(Attributed)
Widely quoted in respectable biographies of Truman, but unsourced. Sometimes paraphrased: "Being a politician is like being a piano player in a whorehouse."
If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about the answers.
Thomas Pynchon (b. 1937) American novelist
Gravity’s Rainbow (1973)
Our hair
Grows grizzled, and we are not what we were.
Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.
T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Favorite comment
Inscribed on his memorial at Ealing. Quoted in Nature (30 Oct 1902).
Castles in the air — they are so easy to take refuge in. And so easy to build, too.
Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) Norwegian poet and playwright
The Master Builder, Act 3 [Hilda] (1892)
Pet peeve time: for the contingent out there who sneer at heroes like Superman and Wonder Woman and Captain America, those icons who still, at their core, represent selfless sacrifice for the greater good, and who justify their contempt by saying, oh, it’s so unrealistic, no one would ever be so noble … grow up. Seriously. Cynicism is not maturity, do not mistake the one for the other. If you truly cannot accept a story where someone does the right thing because it’s the right thing to do, that says far more about who you are than these characters.
Greg Rucka (b. 1969) American comic book writer and novelist
Ineffable Aether (blog), “Light in the Dark” (24 Aug 2011)
Full text.
Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo.
H.G. Wells (1866-1946) British writer [Herbert George Wells]
The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman, 9.2 (1914)
Our life seems like a trial run.
Jules Renard (1864-1910) French writer
Journal (Jul 1899) [tr. Bogan and Roget (1964)]
I think a curse should rest on me — because I love this war. I know it’s smashing and shattering the lives of thousands every moment — and yet — I can’t help it — I enjoy every second of it.
Winston Churchill (1874-1965) British statesman and author
Letter (1916)
Every step in human progress, from the first feeble stirrings in the abyss of time, has been opposed by the great majority of men. Every valuable thing that has been added to the store of man’s possessions has been derided by them when it was new, and destroyed by them when they had the power. They have fought every new truth ever heard of, and they have killed every truth-seeker who got into their hands.
H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American writer and journalist [Henry Lewis Mencken]
“Homo Neanderthalensis,” Baltimore Evening Sun (29 Jun 1925)
Full text.
All the works of Nature are Miracles, and nothing makes them appear otherwise but our Familiarity with them.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902) English novelist, satirist, scholar
Prose Observations. “Nature” [ed. de Quehen (1979)]
It is not said that evil arts were ever practised in Gondor, or that the Nameless One was ever named in honour there; and the old wisdom and beauty brought out of the West remained long in the realm of the sons of Elendil the Fair, and they linger there still. Yet even so it was Gondor that brought about its own decay, falling by degrees into dotage, and thinking that the Enemy was asleep, who was only banished not destroyed. Death was ever present, because the Númenoreans still, as they had in their Old Kingdom, and so lost it, hungered after endless life unchanging. Kings made tombs more splendid than houses of the living and counted old names in the rolls of their descent dearer than the names of sons. Childless lords sat in aged halls musing on heraldry; in secret chambers withered men compounded strong elixirs, or in high cold towers asked questions of the stars. And the last king of the line of Anárion had no heir.
J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
The Lord of the Rings, Vol. 2: The Two Towers, Book 4, ch. 5 “The Window on the West” [Faramir] (1954)
(Source)
I met, not long ago, a young man who aspired to become a novelist. Knowing that I was in the profession, he asked me to tell him how he should set to work to realize his ambition. I did my best to explain. “The first thing,” I said, “is to buy quite a lot of paper, a bottle of ink, and a pen. After that you merely have to write.”
Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) English novelist, essayist and critic
“Sermons in Cats,” Music at Night and Other Essays (1931)
(Source)
Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
“Self-Reliance,” Essays: First Series (1841)
Certain it is, that there is no kind of affection so pure and angelic as that of a father to a daughter. he beholds her, both wise and without regard to her sex. In love to our wives there is desire, to our sons there is ambition; but in that to our daughters, there is something which there are no words to describe.
Joseph Addison (1672-1719) English essayist, poet, statesman
The Spectator #449 (5 Aug 1712)
(Source)
We hand folks over to God’s mercy, and show none ourselves.
George Eliot (1819-1880) English novelist [pseud. of Mary Ann Evans]
Adam Bede, ch. 42 (1859)
The whole truth is generally the ally of virtue; a half-truth is always the ally of some vice.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
Illustrated London News (11 Jun 2010)
Whoever desires to found a state and give it laws must start with assuming that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature, whenever they may find occasion for it.
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) Italian politician, philosopher, political scientist
The Discourses on Livy, Book 1, Introduction (1517) [tr. Detmold (1882)]
Alt. trans.: "It is necessary for him who lays out a state and arranges laws for it to presuppose that all men are evil and that they are always going to act according to the wickedness of their spirits whenever they have free scope." [Discourse upon the First Ten Books of Livy, Book 1, ch. 3 (1513-18) [tr. Gilbert]]
We all make mistakes — but they must never be mistakes which result from faintness of heart or abandonment of moral principle.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) American lawyer, politician, statesman, US President (1933-1945)
Fourth Inaugural Address (20 Jan 1945)
The principle of the mind does not differ from that of the body, which cannot be sustained without constant nourishment.
Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715-1747) French moralist, essayist, soldier
Reflections and Maxims [Réflexions et maximes], #194 (1746) [tr. Stevens (1940)]
The right word may be effective, but no word was ever as effective as a rightly timed pause.
Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
Mark Twain’s Speeches, Introduction [ed W.D. Howells (1923 ed.)]
What is there in the vale of life
Half so delightful as a wife,
When friendship, love, and peace combine
To stamp the marriage bond divine?William Cowper (1731-1800) English poet
“Love Abused,” letter to Mary Unwin (27 Jul 1780)
‘You come of the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve,’ said Aslan. ‘And that is both honour enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor in earth.’
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
Prince Caspian (1951)
I don’t believe in anti-anything. A man has to have a program; you have to be for something, otherwise you will never get anywhere.
Harry S Truman (1884-1972) US President (1945-1953)
Lecture, Columbia University (28 Apr 1959)
Moderation is a virtue only in those who are thought to have a choice.
Henry Kissinger (1923-2024) German-American diplomat
White House Years, ch. 7 (1979)
“It’s always best on these occasions to do what the mob do.”
“But suppose there are two mobs?” suggested Mr. Snodgrass.
“Shout with the largest,” replied Mr. Pickwick.Charles Dickens (1812-1870) English writer and social critic
Pickwick Papers, ch. 13 (1837)
I am forty years old now, and forty years, after all, is a whole lifetime; after all, that is extremely old age. To live longer than forty years is bad manners; it is vulgar, immoral.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821-1881) Russian novelist
Notes from Underground, 1.1 (1864) [tr. Matlaw (1960)]
Science seems to me to teach in the highest and strongest manner the great truth which is embodied in the Christian conception of entire surrender to the will of God. Sit down before fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing. I have only begun to learn content and peace of mind since I have resolved at all risks to do this.
T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Letter to Charles Kingsley (23 Sep 1860)
Full text.
Oh courage … oh yes! If only one had that … Then life might be livable, in spite of everything.
Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) Norwegian poet and playwright
Hedda Gabler, Act 2 [Hedda] (1890)
It is a man’s own fault, it is from want of use, if his mind grows torpid in old age.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Comment (9 Apr 1778)
In James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)
There is no grievance that is a fit object of redress by mob law.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
“The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions,” Address to Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield (27 Jan 1838)
Life is a score we play at sight, not merely before we have divined the intentions of the composer, but even before we have mastered our own instruments; even worse, a large part of the score has been only roughly indicated, and we must improvise the music for our particular instrument, over long passages. On these terms the whole operation seems one of endless difficulty and frustration; and indeed, were it not for the fact that some of the passages have been played so often by our predecessors that, when we come to them, we seem to recall some of the score and can anticipate the natural sequence of the notes, we might often give up in sheer despair. The wonder is not that so much cacophony appears in our actual individual lives, but that there is any appearance of harmony and progression.
Lewis Mumford (1895-1990) American writer, philosopher, historian, architect
The Conduct of Life, 9.5 (1951)
The Fathers who invented it [democracy], if they could return from Hell, would never recognize it. It was conceived as a free government of free men; it has become simply a battle of charlatans for the votes of idiots.
H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American writer and journalist [Henry Lewis Mencken]
Baltimore Evening Sun (26 Apr 1937)
I do think unpunctuality is a vile habit, and all my life I have tried to break myself of it.
Winston Churchill (1874-1965) British statesman and author
My Early Life: A Roving Commission, ch. 7 “Hounslow” (1930)
It is simply untrue that all our institutions are evil, … that all politicians are mere opportunists, that all aspects of university life are corrupt. Having discovered an illness, it’s not terribly useful to prescribe death as a cure.
George McGovern (1922-2012) American historian, author, politician
(Attributed)
Thus says the Lord of hosts: Render true judgments, show kindness and mercy to one another; do not oppress the widow, the orphan, the alien, or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.
But they refused to listen and turned a stubborn shoulder and stopped their ears in order not to hear. They made their hearts adamant in order not to hear the law and the words that the Lord of hosts had sent by his spirit through the former prophets. Therefore great wrath came from the Lord of hosts.The Bible (The Old Testament) (14th - 2nd C BC) Judeo-Christian sacred scripture [Tanakh, Hebrew Bible], incl. the Apocrypha (Deuterocanonicals)
Zechariah 7:9-12 [NRSV (2021 ed.)]
(Source)
Alternate translations:Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Execute true judgment, and shew mercy and compassions every man to his brother:
And oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart.
But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear.
Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which the Lord of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the Lord of hosts.
[KJV (1611)]Yahweh Sabaoth says this. He said, "Apply the law fairly, and practice kindness and compassion towards one another. Do not oppress the widow and the orphan, the settler and the poor man, and do not secretly plan evil against one another." But they would not pay attention; they turned a petulant shoulder; they stopped their ears rather than hear; they made their hearts adamant rather than listen to the teaching and the words that Yahweh Sabaoth had sent by his spirit through the prophets in the past. This aroused great anger on the part of of Yahweh Sabaoth overtook them.
[JB (1966)]“Long ago I gave these commands to my people: ‘You must see that justice is done, and must show kindness and mercy to one another. Do not oppress widows, orphans, foreigners who live among you, or anyone else in need. And do not plan ways of harming one another.’
“But my people stubbornly refused to listen. They closed their minds and made their hearts as hard as rock. Because they would not listen to the teaching which I sent through the prophets who lived long ago, I became very angry."
[GNT (1976)]'Yahweh Sabaoth says this. He said, "Apply the law fairly, and show faithful love and compassion towards one another.
Do not oppress the widow and the orphan, the foreigner and the poor, and do not secretly plan evil against one another."
But they would not listen; they turned a rebellious shoulder; they stopped their ears rather than hear;
they made their hearts adamant rather than listen to the teaching and the words that Yahweh Sabaoth had sent -- by his spirit -- through the prophets in the past; and consequently the fury of Yahweh Sabaoth overtook them.
[NJB (1985)]The Lord of heavenly forces proclaims:
Make just and faithful decisions; show kindness and compassion to each other! Don’t oppress the widow, the orphan, the stranger, and the poor; don’t plan evil against each other! But they refused to pay attention. They turned a cold shoulder and stopped listening.
They steeled their hearts against hearing the Instruction and the words that the Lord of heavenly forces sent by his spirit through the earlier prophets. As a result, the Lord of heavenly forces became enraged.
[CEB (2011)]Thus said GOD of Hosts: Execute true justice; deal loyally and compassionately with one another.
Do not defraud the widow, the orphan, the stranger, and the poor; and do not plot evil against one another. --
But they refused to pay heed. They presented a balky back and turned a deaf ear.
They hardened their hearts like adamant against heeding the instruction and admonition that GOD of Hosts sent to them by divine spirit through the earlier prophets; and a terrible wrath issued from GOD of Hosts.
[RJPS (2023 ed.)]
Learning is like rowing upstream; not to advance is to drop back.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Chinese proverb
“The counsel of Gandalf was not founded on foreknowledge of safety, for himself or for others,” said Aragorn. “There are some things that it is better to begin than to refuse, even though the end may be dark.”
J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
The Lord of the Rings, Vol. 2: The Two Towers, Book 3, ch. 2 “The Riders of Rohan” (1954)
(Source)
After silence that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.
Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) English novelist, essayist and critic
“The Rest is Silence,” Music at Night and Other Essays (1931)
(Source)
Any man who can drive safely while kissing a pretty girl is simply not giving the kiss the attention it deserves.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-American physicist
(Spurious)
Found in various humorous sources (with or without Einstein's name) dating back to the 1920s. More info here.
Let us all be brave enough to die the death of a martyr, but let no one lust for martyrdom.
Mohandas Gandhi (1869-1948) Indian philosopher and nationalist [Mahatma Gandhi]
In Young India (13 Jan 1927)
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.
The Bible (The New Testament) (AD 1st - 2nd C) Christian sacred scripture
Matthew 5:7 (KJV)
It is terrible to contemplate how few politicians are hanged.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
The Cleveland Press (1 Mar 1921)
When the act accuses him, the result should excuse him.
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) Italian politician, philosopher, political scientist
The Discourses on Livy, Book 1, ch. 19 (1517) [tr. Detmold (1882)]
Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive. With them, we can make a joint effort to solve the problems of the whole humankind.
The Dalai Lama (b. 1935) Tibetan Buddhist spiritual leader [The 14th Dalai Lama; a/k/a Lhama Thondup / Lhama Dhondrub; b. Tenzin Gyatso]
(Attributed)
“I did this,” says my Memory. “I cannot have done this,” says my Pride, and remains inexorable. In the end — Memory yields.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) German philosopher and poet
Beyond Good and Evil [Jenseits von Gut und Böse], No. 68 (1886)
Frequently quoted by Freud.
The dread of loneliness is greater than the fear of bondage, so we get married.
Cyril Connolly (1903-1974) English intellectual, literary critic and writer.
The Unquiet Grave, “Ecce Gubernator” (1945)
People blush at praise — not only praise of their bodies, but praise of anything that is theirs.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
A Preface to “Paradise Lost” (1942)
Whenever you have an efficient government you have a dictatorship.
Harry S Truman (1884-1972) US President (1945-1953)
Lecture at Columbia University (28 April 1959)
I used to think that the brain was the most wonderful organ in my body. Then I realized who was telling me this.
Emo Philips (b. 1956) American actor, stand-up comedian, writer, producer [b. Phil Soltanec]
(Attributed)
The most compelling reason for most people to buy a computer for the home will be to link it to a nationwide communications network. We’re just in the beginning stages of what will be a truly remarkable breakthrough for most people –– as remarkable as the telephone.
Having stripped myself of all illusions, I have gone mad.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) German philosopher and poet
My Sister and I, 5.12 [tr. Levi (1951)]
Written in an asylum.
We have not the slightest objection to believe anything you like, if you will give us good grounds for belief; but, if you cannot, we must respectfully refuse, even if that refusal should wreck morality and insure our own damnation several times over. We are quite content to leave that to the decision of the future. The course of the past has impressed us with the firm conviction that no good ever comes of falsehood, and we feel warranted in refusing even to experiment in that direction.
T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Agnosticism and Christianity” (1899)
Full text.
Many a man can save himself if he admits he’s done wrong and takes his punishment.
Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) Norwegian poet and playwright
A Doll’s House, Act 1 [Torvald Helmer] (1879)
You don’t pay back your parents. You can’t. The debt you owe them gets collected by your children, who hand it down in turn. It’s a sort of entailment. Or if you don’t have children of the body, it’s left as a debt to your common humanity. Or to your God, if you possess or are possessed by one.
Lois McMaster Bujold (b. 1949) American author
A Civil Campaign (1999)
If all the good people were clever;
And all clever people were good,
The world would be nicer than ever
We thought that it possibly could.But somehow ’tis seldom or never
The two hit it off as they should,
The good are so harsh to the clever,
The clever, so rude to the good!Elizabeth Wordsworth (1840–1932) English poet, novelist, author
“Good and Clever,” st. 1-2 (1890)
(Source)
Life’s a tough proposition, and the first hundred years are the hardest.
Wilson Mizner (1876-1933) American screenwriter and wit
(Attributed)
In Alva Johnston, The Legendary Mizners, ch. 4 (1953)
I have taken more good from alcohol than alcohol has taken from me.
Winston Churchill (1874-1965) British statesman and author
(Attributed)
Democracy is the theory that intelligence is dangerous. It assumes that no idea can be safe until those who can’t understand it have approved it. It defines truth as anything which at least fifty-one men in every hundred believe. Thus it is firmly committed to the doctrines that one bath a week is enough, that “I seen” is the past tense of “I see,” and that Friday is an unlucky day.
H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American writer and journalist [Henry Lewis Mencken]
“Pertinent and Impertinent,” Smart Set (Jun 1913) [as Owen Hatteras]
(Source)
HENRY HIGGINS: The great secret, Eliza, is not having bad manners or good manners or any other particular sort of manners, but having the same manner for all human souls.
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) British playwright and critic
Pygmalion, Act 5 (1912)
Those whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make famous.
Joyce Carol Oates (b. 1938) American author
“Down the Road,” New Yorker (27 Mar 1985)
See Euripides.
Men are either learned or learning: the rest are blockheads.
Muhammad (570-632) Arabian merchant, prophet, founder of Islam [Mohammed]
(Attributed)
Quoted in Ralph Waldo Emerson, Journal (1845), at the opening of the Concord Free Library (CPL 11.504 13)
Many folk like to know beforehand what is to be set on the table; but those who have laboured to prepare the feast like to keep their secret; for wonder makes the words of praise louder.
J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
The Lord of the Rings, Vol. 3: The Return of the King, Book 6, ch. 4 “The Steward and the King” [Gandalf] (1955)
(Source)
It is a bit embarrassing to have been concerned with the human problem all one’s life and find at the end that one has no more to offer by way of advice than “Try to be a little kinder.”
Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) English novelist, essayist and critic
(Attributed)
Widely quoted but without a good citation. Variant: "It is a little embarrassing that, after 45 years of research and study, the best advice I can give to people is to be a little kinder to each other." This version was quoted by his wife, Laura Huxley, in the biography This Timeless Moment (1968).
If you ask what these experiences are, they are conversations with the unseen, voices and visions, responses to prayer, changes of heart, deliverances from fear, inflowings of help, assurances of support, whenever certain persons set their own internal attitude in certain appropriate ways.
William James (1842-1910) American psychologist and philosopher
“The Pragmatic Method”, Address, Philosophical Unon of the University of California (26 Aug 1898)
Full text.
PORTIA: The quality of mercy is not strained.
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
’Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The thronèd monarch better than his crown.
His scepter shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptered sway.
It is enthronèd in the hearts of kings;
It is an attribute to God Himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God’s
When mercy seasons justice.William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Merchant of Venice, Act 4, sc. 1, l. 190ff (4.1.190-203) (1597)
(Source)
The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
Illustrated London News (14 Jan 1911)
As against the “invisible hand” of Adam Smith, there has to be a visible hand of politicians whose objective is to have the kind of society that is caring and humane.
Pierre Trudeau (1919–2000) Canadian politician
Memoirs, Part 3 “1974-1979, Victory And Defeat” (1993)
Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace. I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter. I won’t have any money to leave behind. I won’t have the fine and luxurious things of life to leave behind. But I just want to leave a committed life behind.
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) American clergyman, civil rights leader, social activist, preacher
Sermon, Ebenezer Baptist Church (4 Feb 1968)
Full text. Adaptation by King of the 1952 homily "Drum-Major Instincts" by J. Wallace Hamilton.Paraphrased on the MLK memorial in Washington, DC, as, "I was a drum major for justice, peace and righteousness"; the inscription was later removed.
