Common sense appears to be only another name for the thoughtlessness of the unthinking. It is made of the prejudices of childhood, the idiosyncracies of individual character, and the opinion of the newspapers.
W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) English novelist and playwright [William Somerset Maugham]
“Clinical Notes,” American Mercury (Nov 1924)
Do as most do; and few will speak ill of thee.
Thomas Fuller (1654-1734) English physician, preacher, aphorist, writer
Introductio ad Prudentiam, Vol. 1, # 135 (1725)
(Source)
Our Creator would never have made such lovely days, and have given us the deep hearts to enjoy them, above and beyond all thought, unless we were meant to be immortal.
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) American writer
“The Old Manse,” Mosses from an Old Manse (1846)
Avoid shame but do not seek glory — nothing so expensive as glory.
Sydney Smith (1771-1845) English clergyman, essayist, wit
Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith, by His Daughter, Lady Holland, Vol. 1, ch. 4 (1855)
(Source)
Noted as his "favorite motto."
I’ve never been convinced that there’s any meaningful division between high culture and pop culture — I think there’s good stuff out there, and there’s stuff that’s not much good, and that Sturgeon’s Law applies to high culture and popular culture: 90% of it will be crap, which means that 10% of it will be amazing.
Hereby it is manifest that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every man against every man.
No man on earth is truly free,
All are slaves of money or necessity.
Public opinion or fear of prosecution
forces each one, against his conscience,
to conform.Euripides (485?-406? BC) Greek tragic dramatist
Hecuba, l. 860 [tr. W.Arrowsmith (1956)]
We have left undone those things which we ought to have done, and we have done those things we ought not to have done.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Book of Common Prayer, “Morning Prayer (General Confession)” (1662)
We relish news of our heroes, forgetting that we are extraordinary to somebody too.
Helen Hayes (1900-1993) American actress
(Attributed)
Everything matters more than we think it does, and, at the same time, nothing matters so much as we think it does. The merest spark may set all Europe in a blaze, but though all Europe be set in a blaze twenty times over, the world will wag itself right again.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902) English novelist, satirist, scholar
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler, “Sparks” (1912)
(Source)
History suggests only that capitalism is a necessary condition for political freedom. Clearly it is not a sufficient condition.
Milton Friedman (1912-2006) American economist, intellectual
Capitalism and Freedom, ch. 1 (1962)
Youk’n hide de fier, but w’at you gwine do wid de smoke?
Joel Chandler Harris (1848-1908) American writer
Plantation Proverbs
Self-confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
Lives of the English Poets, “Pope” (1781)
(Source)
Advances in medicine and agriculture have saved vastly more lives than have been lost in all the wars in history.
Carl Sagan (1934-1996) American scientist and writer
The Demon-Haunted World, ch. 1 “The Most Precious Thing” (1995)
Most people sell their souls, and live with a good conscience on the proceeds.
Logan Pearsall Smith (1865-1946) American-English essayist, editor, anthologist
Afterthoughts, “Other People” (1931)
It is natural for the mind to believe, and for the will to love; so that, for want of true objects, they must attach themselves to false.
Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) French scientist and philosopher
Pensées, # 81 (1670) [tr. W. Totter (1931)]
Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Stranger in a Strange Land [Jubal] (1961)Not in the "Uncut" 1991 re-issue; Heinlein added this line in place of other cuts in the first edition manuscript.
Then there are the fanatical atheists whose intolerance is of the same kind as the intolerance of the religious fanatics and comes from the same source. They are like slaves who are still feeling the weight of their chains which they have thrown off after hard struggle. They are creatures who -— in their grudge against the traditional “opium of the people” -— cannot hear the music of the spheres. The Wonder of nature does not become smaller because one cannot measure it by the standards of human morals and human aims.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-American physicist
Letter (7 Aug 1941) [Einstein Archive, reel 54-927]
It is an interesting question how far men would retain their relative rank if they were divested of their clothes.
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) American philosopher and writer
Walden, “Economy” (1854)
If competition has its evils, it prevents greater evils. … It is the common error of Socialists to overlook the natural indolence of mankind; their tendency to be passive, to be the slaves of habit, to persist indefnitely in a course once chosen. Let them one attain any state of existence which they consider tolerable, and the danger to be apprehended is that they will thenceforth stagnate. … Competition may not be the best conceivable stimulus, but it is at present a necessary one, and no one can foresee the time when it will not be indspensable to progress.
John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) English philosopher and economist
Principles of Political Economy, 4.7.7 (1848)
Deep down, below the surface of the average man’s conscience, he hears a voice whispering, “There is something not right,” no matter how much his rightness is supported by public opinion or by the moral code.
Carl Jung (1875-1961) Swiss psychologist
“Introduction to Wickes’s Analyse der Kinderseele” (1931), The Development of Personality [tr. R. Hull (1954)]
He that’s cheated twice by the same Man is an Accomplice with the Cheater.
Thomas Fuller (1654-1734) English physician, preacher, aphorist, writer
Gnomologia: Adages and Proverbs, #2281 (1732)
(Source)
Circumstances reveal us to others and still more to ourselves.
François VI, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) French epigrammatist, memoirist, noble
Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales [Maxims], #345 (1665-1678) [tr. L. Tancock (1959)]
Vanity asks the question — is it popular? Conscience asks the question — is it right?
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) American clergyman, civil rights leader, social activist, preacher
Sermon, Passion Sunday, National Cathedral, Washington, DC (31 Mar 1968)
See also this.
… [T]he great thing to learn about life is, first, not to do what you don’t want to do, and, second, to do what you do want to do.
Margaret C. Anderson (1886-1973) American editor, memoirist
My Thirty Years’ War, ch. 1 (1930)
Of course, in politics, just as anywhere else in life, it is impossible and it would not be sensible always to say everything bluntly. Yet that does not mean one has to lie. What is needed here are tact, instinct and good taste.
Václav Havel (1936-2011) Czech playwright, essayist, dissident, politician
International Herald Tribune (29 Oct 1991)
Man is not the creature of circumstances, circumstances are the creatures of men. We are free agents, and man is more powerful than matter.
Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) English politician and author
Vivian Grey Part 6, ch. 7 (1826)
How DO we know that the people we meet are not computers programmed to simulate people?
Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983) American architect, engineer
I Seem To Be a Verb (1970)
Every one of us has a bad conscience, which he tries to escape by going to sleep as quickly as possible.
Franz Kafka (1883-1924) Czech-Austrian Jewish writer
In G. Janouch, Conversations with Kafka [tr. G. Rees (1953)]
Romance and poetry, ivy, lichens and wallflowers need ruin to make them grow.
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) American writer
The Marble Faun, Preface (1860)
It is a bore, I admit, to be past seventy, for you are left for execution, and are daily expecting the death-warrant; but, as you say, it is not anything very capital we quit. We are, at the close of life, only hurried away from stomach-aches, pains in the joints, from sleepless nights and unamusing days, from weakness, ugliness, and nervous tremors; but we shall all meet again in another planet, cured of all our defects.
Sydney Smith (1771-1845) English clergyman, essayist, wit
Letter (1842-09-13) to Lady Holland
(Source)
If thou confesseth thy Sins and amendest not, thou mocketh God.
Thomas Fuller (1654-1734) English physician, preacher, aphorist, writer
Introductio ad Prudentiam, Vol. 1, # 661 (1725)
(Source)
Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
[Semper in absentes felicior aestus amantes.]
Propertius (50-16 BC) Roman elegiac poet [Sextus Propertius]
Elegies II, xxxiii, 43
The shield against the stingings of conscience is the universal practice of our contemporaries. Again, it is very easy to be as wise and good as your companions.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
“Uses of Great Men,” Representative Men Lecture 1, Boston (1845-12-11)
(Source)
When traveling with someone, take large does of patience and tolerance with your morning coffee.
Helen Hayes (1900-1993) American actress
(Attributed)
The superpowers often behave like two heavily armed blind men feeling their way around a room, each believing himself in mortal peril from the other, whom he assumes to have perfect vision. Each side should know that frequently uncertainty, compromise and incoherence are the essence of policy-making. Yet each tends to ascribe to the other a consistency, foresight and coherence that its own experience belies. Of course, over time even two armed blind men in a room can do enormous damage to each other, not to speak of the room.
Henry Kissinger (1923-2024) German-American diplomat
White House Years, ch. 13 (1979)
I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience neither right nor safe. Here I stand. I can do no other, so help me God. Amen.
Martin Luther (1483-1546) German religious reformer
Speech before the Diet of Worms (18 Apr 1521)
Think of how many religions attempt to validate themselves with prophecy. Think of how many people rely on these prophecies, however vague, however unfulfilled, to support or prop up their beliefs. Yet has there ever been a religion with the prophetic accuracy and reliability of science? … No other human institution comes close.
Carl Sagan (1934-1996) American scientist and writer
The Demon-Haunted World, ch. 1 “The Most Precious Thing” (1995)
The mere process of growing old together will make the slightest acquaintance seem a bosom friend.
Logan Pearsall Smith (1865-1946) American-English essayist, editor, anthologist
All Trivia, “Last Words” (1933)
It ain’t those parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.
Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
(Attributed)
Divine Providence sends the chiefest benefits under the mask of calamities.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
“The Fortune of the Republic,” lecture, Boston (1878-03-30)
Final version of a lecture first given in 1863, and his last public speech.
I’ve never done a single thing I’ve wanted to do in my whole life! I don’t know’s I’ve accomplished anything except just get along.
Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) American novelist, playwright
Babbitt, 34.6 [George F. Babbitt] (1922)
Ben, the ethics of sex is a thorny problem. Each of us is forced to grope for a solution he can live with — in the face of a preposterous, unworkable, and evil code of so-called ‘morals.’ Most of us know the code is wrong; almost everybody breaks it. But we pay Danegeld by feeling guilty and giving lip service. Willy-nilly, the code rides us, dead and stinking, an albatross around the neck.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Stranger in a Strange Land [Jubal] (1961)
(Source)
In the 1960 "uncut" edition, the passage reads as: "Ben, the ethics of sex is a thorny problem because each of us has to find a solution pragmatically compatible with a preposterous, utterly unworkable, and evil public code of so-called "morals." Most of us know, or suspect, that the public code is wrong, and we break it. Nevertheless we pay Danegeld by giving it lip service in public and feeling guilty about breaking it in private. Willy-nilly, that code rides us, dead and stinking, an albatross around the neck."
The blame is his who chooses: God is blameless.
Socrates (c.470-399 BC) Greek philosopher
In Plato, Republic, Book 10, sec. 617
Religion consists in a set of things which the average man thinks he believes and wishes he was certain of.
Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
Mark Twain’s Notebook, 1879 [ed. Paine (1935)]
Letters are expectation packaged in an envelope.
Shana Alexander (1925-2005) American journalist
“The Surprises of the Mail,” Life (30 Jun 1967)
Self-confidence is at the root of most of our confidence in others.
François VI, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) French epigrammatist, memoirist, noble
Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales [Maxims], #624 (1665-1678) [tr. L. Tancock (1959)]
Life seems to be an experience in ascending and descending. You think you’re beginning to live for a single aim — for self-development, or the discovery of cosmic truths — when all you’re really doing is to move from place to place as if devoted primarily to real estate.
Margaret C. Anderson (1886-1973) American editor, memoirist
The Fiery Fountains, Part 1 (1951)
Despite all the political misery I am confronted with every day, it still is my profound conviction that the very essence of politics is not dirty; dirt is brought in only by wicked people. I admit that this is an area of human activity where the temptation to advance through unfair actions may be stronger than elsewhere, and which thus makes higher demands on human integrity. But it is not true at all that a politician cannot do without lying or intriguing. That is sheer nonsense, often spread by those who want to discourage people from taking an interest in public affairs.
Václav Havel (1936-2011) Czech playwright, essayist, dissident, politician
Interview, International Herald Tribune (29 Oct 1991)
We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not only because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Speech, Rice University, Houston, Texas (12 Sep 1962)
All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened and after you are finished reading one you will feel that all that happened to you and afterwards it all belongs to you; the good and the bad, the ecstasy, the remorse, and sorrow, the people and the places and how the weather was. If you can get so that you can give that to people, then you are a writer.
Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) American writer
“Old Newsman Writes: A Letter from Cuba,” Esquire (Dec 1934)
May God prevent us from becoming “right-thinking men” — that is to say, men who agree perfectly with their own police.
Thomas Merton (1915-1968) French-American religious and writer [a.k.a. Fr. M. Louis]
(Attributed)Quoted in I. Shenker, "Thomas Merton Is Dead at 53," New York Times (11 Dec 1968)
The only sensible ends of literature are, first, the pleasurable toil of writing; second, the gratification of one’s family and friends; and, lastly, the solid cash.
Preaching has become a bye-word for long and dull conversation of any kind; and whoever wishes to imply, in any piece of writing, the absence of everything agreeable and inviting, calls it a sermon.
Sydney Smith (1771-1845) English clergyman, essayist, wit
Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith, by His Daughter, Lady Holland, Vol. 1, ch. 3 (1855)
(Source)
The erotic instinct is something questionable, and will always be so whatever a future set of laws may have to say on the matter. It belongs, on the one hand, to the original animal nature of man, which will exist as long as man has an animal body. On the other hand, it is connected with the highest forms of the spirit. But it blooms only when the spirit and instinct are in true harmony. If one or the other aspect is missing, then an injury occurs, or at least there is a one-sided lack of balance which easily slips into the pathological. Too much of the animal disfigures the civilized human being, too much culture makes a sick animal.
Carl Jung (1875-1961) Swiss psychologist
The Psychology of the Unconscious (1943)
When Jesus tells us about his Father, we distrust him. When he shows us his Home, we turn away. But when he confides to us that he is “acquainted with Grief,” we listen, for that also is an Acquaintance of our own.
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) American poet
(Attributed)In Kathleen Norris, "The Difference: October 1," The Cloister Walk (1996)
Success, recognition, and conformity are the bywords of the modern world where everyone seems to crave the anesthetizing security of being identified with the majority.
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) American clergyman, civil rights leader, social activist, preacher
Strength to Love, ch. 2 “Transformed Non-Conformist” (1963)
(Source)
The salvation of this human world lies nowhere else than in the human heart, in the human power to reflect, in human meekness and human responsibility.
Václav Havel (1936-2011) Czech playwright, essayist, dissident, politician
Interview, International Herald Tribune (21 Feb 1990)
Always use the chain of command to issue orders, but if you use the chain of command for information, you’re dead.
Hyman Rickover (1900-1986) US Navy Admiral
(Attributed)Quoted in Bill Walsh, "Information, Please!" <i>Forbes ASAP</i> (27 Feb 1995)
It is better to risk sparing a guilty person than to condemn an innocent one.
[Il vaut mieux hasarder de sauver un coupable que de condamner un innocent.]
Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
Zadig (1747)
First our pleasures die — and then
Our hopes, and then our fears — and when
These are dead, the debt is due,
Dust claims dust — and we die too.Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) English poet
“Death,” st. 3 (1820)
Every one of us is precious in the cosmic perspective. If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another.
Carl Sagan (1934-1996) American scientist and writer
Cosmos (1980)
We need two kinds of acquaintances, one to complain to, while to the others we boast.
Logan Pearsall Smith (1865-1946) American-English essayist, editor, anthologist
Afterthoughts, “Other People” (1931)
We believe, first and foremost, that which makes us feel that we are fine fellows.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
Unpopular Essays, “An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish” (1950)
Nothing is impossible until it is sent to a committee.
James H. Boren (1925-2010) American bureaucrat, humorist, speaker
“Boren’s Rule,” in L. J. Peter, Peter’s People, ch. 8 (1979)
Perhaps the best function of parenthood is to teach the young creature to love with safety, so that it may be able to venture unafraid when later emotion comes; the thwarting of the instinct of love is the root of all sorrow and not sex only but divinity itself is insulted when it is repressed.
Freya Stark (1893-1993) Franco-British explorer, travel writer [Freya Madeline Stark]
Traveller’s Prelude, ch. 10 (1950)
How can cosmic religious feeling be communicated from one person to another, if it can give rise to no definite notion of a God and no theology? In my view, it is the most important function of art and science to awaken this feeling and keep it alive in those who are receptive to it.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-American physicist
“Religion and Science,” New York Times Magazine (9 Nov 1930)
(Source)
Most books on witchcraft will tell you that witches work naked. This is because most books on witchcraft are written by men.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Good Omens, 3. “Wednesday” (1990) [with Neil Gaiman]
(Source)
The visible is a shadow cast by the invisible.
Plato (c.428-347 BC) Greek philosopher
(Attributed)Quoted in Martin Luther King, Jr, Strength to Love, ch. 9 (1963)
If I have lost confidence in myself, I have the Universe against me.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
Journal (1843-11)
The tragedy of modern man is not that he knows less and less about the meaning of his own life, but that it bothers him less and less.
Václav Havel (1936-2011) Czech playwright, essayist, dissident, politician
Letters to Olga (1988)
The man in charge must concern himself with details. If he does not consider them important, neither will his subordinates. Yet “the devil is in the details.” It is hard and monotonous to pay attention to seemingly minor matters. In my work, I probably spend about ninety-nine percent of my time on what others may call petty details. Most managers would rather focus on lofty policy matters. But when the details are ignored, the project fails. No infusion of policy or lofty ideals can then correct the situation.
Hyman Rickover (1900-1986) US Navy Admiral
(Attributed)Quoted in T. Rockwell, The Rickover Effect (1992)
Happy the man who never puts on a face, but receives every visitor with that countenance he has on.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
Journal (1833-07-28)
The Bible may be the truth, but it is not the whole truth, nor is it nothing but the truth.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902) English novelist, satirist, scholar
Further Extracts from the Note-Books of Samuel Butler, ch. 1 (1934)
I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one’s business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind.
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) British playwright and critic
Letter to Ellen Terry (28 Aug 1896)
A decline in courage may be the most striking feature that an outside observer notices in the West today. The Western world has lost its civic courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country, in each government, in each political party, and, of course, in the United Nations. Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling and intellectual elites, causing an impression of a loss of courage by the entire society. There are many courageous individuals, but they have no determining influence on public life.
Political and intellectual functionaries exhibit this depression, passivity, and perplexity in their actions and in their statements, and even more so in their self-serving rationales as to how realistic, reasonable, and intellectually and even morally justified it is to base state policies on weakness and cowardice. And the decline in courage, at times attaining what could be termed a lack of manhood, is ironically emphasized by occasional outbursts and inflexibility on the part of those same functionaries when dealing with weak governments and with countries that lack support, or with doomed currents which clearly cannot offer resistance. But they get tongue-tied and paralyzed when they deal with powerful governments and threatening forces, with aggressors and international terrorists.
Should one point out that from ancient times decline in courage has been considered the beginning of the end?
Alexander Solzhenitsen (1918-2008) Russian novelist, emigre [Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn]
“A World Split Apart,” Commencement Address, Harvard (8 Jun 1978)
(Source)
In composing, as a general rule, run your pen through every other word you have written; you have no idea what vigor it will give your style.
Sydney Smith (1771-1845) English clergyman, essayist, wit
Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith, by His Daughter, Lady Holland, Vol. 1, ch. 11 (1855)
(Source)
Most of the members of the convent were old-fashioned Satanists, like their parents and grandparents before them. They’d been brought up to it and weren’t, when you got right down to it, particularly evil. Human beings mostly aren’t. They just get carried away by new ideas, like dressing up in jackboots and shooting people, or dressing up in white sheets and lynching people, or dressing up in tie-dye jeans and playing guitars at people. Offer people a new creed with a costume and their hearts and minds will follow.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Good Omens, 2. “Eleven Years Ago” (1990) [with Neil Gaiman]
(Source)
I always throw my golf club in the direction I’m going.
Ronald Reagan (1911-2006) US President (1981-89), politician, actor
(Attributed)Quoted by C. Matthews, Hardball: How Politics Is Played -- Told by One Who Knows the Game, ch. 6 (1988)
I fear that in this world one must be either hammer or anvil.
Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
Philosophical Dictionary, “Tyranny” (1764) [tr. Gay (1962)]
(Source)
Alt. trans.: "In this world we run the risk of having to choose between being either the anvil or the hammer." [Baskin (1961)]
Egocentrics are attracted to the inept. It gives them one more excuse for patting themselves on the back.
Helen Hayes (1900-1993) American actress
On Reflection, ch. 10 (1968)
man’s life is interesting primarily when he has failed — I well know. For it’s a sign that he tried to surpass himself.
Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929) French statesman, physician, journalist
Conversation wth Jean Martet (1 Jun 1928)
In J. Martet, Clemenceau, The Events of His Life as Told by Himself to His Former Secretary, Jean Martet, ch. 30 (1930) [tr. M. Waldman]
My body which my dungeon is,
And yet my parks and palaces.Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) Scottish essayist, novelist, poet
“My Body Which My Dungeon Is,” Underwoods (1887)
If we say, ‘We have no sin,’ we are deceiving ourselves, and truth has no place in us; if we acknowledge our sins, he is trustworthy and upright, so that he will forgive our sins and will cleanse us from all evil.
The Bible (The New Testament) (AD 1st - 2nd C) Christian sacred scripture
1 John 1:8-9 [NJB (1985)]
(Source)
Alternate translations:If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
[KJV (1611)]If we say we have no sin in us, we are deceiving ourselves and refusing to admit the truth; but if we acknowledge our sins, then God who is faithful and just will forgive our sins and purify us from everything that is wrong.
[JB (1966)]If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and there is no truth in us. But if we confess our sins to God, he will keep his promise and do what is right: he will forgive us our sins and purify us from all our wrongdoing.
[GNT (1976)]If we claim, “We don’t have any sin,” we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from everything we’ve done wrong.
[CEB (2011)]If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
[NRSV (2021 ed.)]
That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology, but that land is to be loved and respected is an extension of ethics.
Aldo Leopold (1887-1948) American conservationist, forester, ecologist
A Sand County Almanac, “Land Ethic” (1949)
How awful to reflect that what people say of us is true!
Logan Pearsall Smith (1865-1946) American-English essayist, editor, anthologist
Afterthoughts, “Life and Human Nature” (1931)
Allah will not be merciful to those who are not merciful to people.
Muhammad (570-632) Arabian merchant, prophet, founder of Islam [Mohammed]
Hadith, Sahih al-Bukhari, vol. 9, #473
Never before has man had such capacity to control his own environment, to end thirst and hunger, to conquer poverty and disease, to banish illiteracy and massive human misery. We have the power to make this world the best generation of mankind in the history of the world — or make it the last.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Address, United Nations (20 Sep 1963)
It is confession, not the priest, that gives us absolution.
Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) Irish poet, wit, dramatist
The Picture of Dorian Gray, ch. 8 (1891)
Pain and fear and hunger are effects of causes which can be foreseen and known: but sorrow is a debt which someone else makes for us.
Freya Stark (1893-1993) Franco-British explorer, travel writer [Freya Madeline Stark]
Perseus in the Wind, ch. 16 (1948).
It seems to me that the distinctions separating the social classes are false; in the last analysis they rest on force.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-American physicist
“What I Believe,” Forum and Century (Oct 1930)
(Source)
This phrase is not found in the parallel "The World As I See It [Mein Weltbild]" the next year.
When men grow virtuous in their old age, they only make a sacrifice to God of the devil’s leavings.
Alexander Pope (1688-1744) English poet
“Thoughts on Various Subjects,” Miscellanies in Prose and Verse, vol. 2 (1727)
I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatsoever I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no “brief candle” to me; it is a sort of splendid torch which I’ve got a hold of for the moment and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) British playwright and critic
“Art and Public Money,” speech, Municipal Technical College and School of Art, Brighton (1907-03-06)
(Source)
This is the "official" version that shows up in Archibald Henderson, George Bernard Shaw: His Life and Works, ch. 16 (1911), as the final words. A variant version from the reporter's notes was published in the Sussex Daily News (1907-03-07):I consider my life belongs to the whole community, and while I last it is my privilege to do what I can for it. I want to be worn out, because the harder I am working, the more I live. I enjoy like for its own sake. It is no "brief candle" for me. It is a sort of glorious torch, which I have got the hold of for the moment, and I want to make it blaze brighter before I hand it on to future generations.
For the "brief candle" reference, see Shakespeare.
This passage is sometimes quoted incorrectly preceded by a passage in the "Epistle Dedicatory to Archibald Henderson" to Man and Superman (1903). This error may have come from Stephen Covey, who identified the chimera as one of his favorite quotations.
Their lives were ruined, he thought; ruined by the fundamental error of their matrimonial union: that of having based a permanent contract on a temporary feeling which had no necessary connection with affinities that alone render a lifelong comradeship tolerable.
Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) English novelist, poet
Jude the Obscure, Part I, ch. 11 (1895)
If you are possessed by an idea, you find it expressed everywhere, you even smell it.
Thomas Mann (1875-1955) German writer, critic, philanthropist, Nobel laureate [Paul Thomas Mann]
Tonio Kröger (1903)Alt. trans. [B. Morgan]: "It is strange. If an idea gains control of you, you will find it expressed everywhere, you will actually smell it in the wind."
As we grow older, we should learn that these are two quite different things. Character is something you forge for yourself; temperament is something you are born with and can only slightly modify. Some people have easy temperaments and weak characters; others have difficult temperaments and strong characters. We are all prone to confuse the two in assessing people we associate with. Those with easy temperaments and weak characters are more likable than admirable; those with difficult temperaments and strong characters are more admirable than likable.
Sydney J. Harris (1917-1986) Anglo-American columnist, journalist, author
“Confusing ‘Character’ with ‘Temperament’,” Clearing the Ground (1986)
Religions, which condemn the pleasures of senses, drive men to seek the pleasures of power. Throughout history, power has been the vice of the ascetic.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
New York Herald Tribune Magazine (1928-05-06)
(Source)
All parts should go together without forcing. You must remember that the parts you are reassembling were disassembled by you. Therefore, if you can’t get them together again, there must be a reason. By all means, do not use a hammer.
(Other Authors and Sources)
IBM maintenance manual (1925)
Play: Work that you enjoy doing for nothing.
Evan Esar (1899-1995) American humorist
Esar’s Comic Dictionary (1943)
