If there is a God who will damn his children forever, I would rather go to hell than to go to heaven and keep the society of such an infamous tyrant. I make my choice now. I despise that doctrine. It has covered the cheeks of this world with tears. It has polluted the hearts of children, and poisoned the imaginations of men.
Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899) American lawyer, agnostic, orator
“The Liberty of Man, Woman, and Child” (1877)
(Source)
What is repugnant to every human being is to be reckoned always as a member of a class and not as an individual person.
Dorothy Sayers (1893-1957) English author, translator
“Are Women Human?”, Address to a Women’s Society (1938)Full text.
I tell you the past is a bucket of ashes.
Carl Sandburg (1878-1967) American poet, biographer
“Prairie” (1918)
Great minds are related to the short span of time wherein they live as are large buildings to the narrow plot of ground on which they stand. Thus large buildings are not seen to their full extent because we are too close to them.
[Zu der kurzen Spanne Zeit, in der sie leben, verhalten sich die großen Geister wie große Gebäude zu einem engen Plage, auf dem sie stehn. Man sieht nämlich diese nicht in ihrer Größe, weil man zu nahe davor steht.]
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) German philosopher
Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. 2, ch. 20 “On Judgement, Criticism, Approbation, and Fame [Über Urtheil, Kritik, Beifall und Ruhm],” § 242 (1851) [tr. Payne (1974)]
(Source)
(Source (German)). Alternate translation:Compared with the short span of time they live, men of great intellect are like huge buildings, standing on a small plot of ground. The size of the building cannot be seen by anyone, just in front of it.
[tr. Saunders (1890)]Great minds are related to the brief span of time during which they live as great buildings are to a little square in which they stand: you cannot see them in all their magnitude because you are standing too close to them.
[tr. Hollingdale (1970)]
The test of democracy and civilization is to treat with fairness the individual’s right to self-expression, even when you can neither understand nor approve of it.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
Radio address (14 Oct 1941)
I’m not an atheist. I don’t think I can call myself a pantheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds. We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn’t know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent human being toward God. We see the universe marvelously arranged and obeying certain laws but only dimly understand these laws. Our limited minds grasp the mysterious force that moves the constellations.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-American physicist
In G. Viereck, Glimpses of the Great (1930)
(Source)
Note this passage is not present in the Saturday Evening Post interview that was the basis for that chapter of Viereck's book.
Highly intelligent and well-informed people disagree on every political issue. Therefore, intelligence and knowledge are useless for making decisions, because if any of that stuff helped, then all the smart people would have the same opinions. So use your “gut instinct” to make voting choices. That is exactly like being clueless, but with the added advantage that you’ll feel as if your random vote preserved democracy.
Scott Adams (b. 1957) American cartoonist
“Ask Dogbert”
It is absurd to think that the only way to tell if a poem is lasting is to wait and see if it lasts. The right reader of a good poem can tell the moment it strikes him that he has taken an immortal wound — that he will never get over it.
Robert Frost (1874-1963) American poet
“The Poetry of Amy Lowell,” The Christian Science Monitor (16 May 1925)
To do a job effectively, one must set priorities. Too many people let their “in” basket set the priorities. On any given day, unimportant but interesting trivia pass through an office; one must not permit these to monopolize his time. The human tendency is to while away time with unimportant matters that do not require mental effort or energy. Since they can be easily resolved, they give a false sense of accomplishment. The manager must exert self-discipline to ensure that his energy is focused where it is truly needed.
Hyman Rickover (1900-1986) US Navy Admiral
(Attributed)Quoted in T. Rockwell, The Rickover Effect (1992)
And if we are to open employment opportunities in this country for members of all races and creeds, then the Federal Government must set an example …. The President himself must set the key example. I am not going to promise a Cabinet post or any other post to any race or ethnic group. That is racism in reverse at its worst. So I do not promise to consider race or religion in my appointments if I am successful. I promise only that I will not consider them.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Speech at Wittenberg College, Springfield, Ohio (17 Oct 1960)
The proposal of any new law or regulation which comes from [businessmen], ought always to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never to be adopted till after having been long and carefully examined, not only with the most scrupulous, but with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men, whose interest is never exactly the same with that of the public, who have generally an interest to deceive and even to oppress the public, and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and oppressed it.
Adam Smith (1723-1790) Scottish economist
The Wealth of Nations, Book I, ch. xi (conclusion) (1776)
The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
What I Believe (1925)
Do nothing secretly; for Time sees and hears all things, and discloses all.
Sophocles (496-406 BC) Greek tragic playwright
Hipponous, frag. 280Alt. trans.: "Hide nothing, for time, which sees all and hears all, exposes all." (Cited as "Fragments, l. 284 (Hipponoos)")
Eccentricity is not, as dull people would have us believe, a form of madness. It is often a kind of innocent pride, and the man of genius and the aristocrat are frequently regarded as eccentrics because genius and aristocrat are entirely unafraid of and uninfluenced by the opinions and vagaries of the crowd.
Edith Sitwell (1887-1964) English poet
Taken Care Of : The Autobiography of Edith Sitwell, ch. 15 (1965)
The search for scapegoats eases our consciences but does not eradicate our evils. It causes us to kill the sinners and keep their sins.
Ralph W. Sockman (1889-1970) American Methodist clergyman
Preface to Peace, Part I, “Barriers to be Removed,” Rockwell Lecture on Religious Subjects, Rice Institute (25 Apr 1944)Full text.
I am not one of those who think that the people are never in the wrong. They have been so, frequently and outrageously, both in other countries and in this. But I do say, that in all disputes between them and their rulers, the presumption is at least upon a par in favour of the people.
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) Anglo-Irish statesman, orator, philosopher
“Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents” (23 Apr 1770)
He exits, pursued by a bear.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Winter’s Tale, Act 3, sc. 3, l. 64 (3.3.64) [Stage Direction] (1611)
(Source)
Variant: "Exit, pursued by a Bear."
Our obligations to our country never cease but with our lives.
John Adams (1735-1826) American lawyer, Founding Father, statesman, US President (1797-1801)
Letter to Benjamin Rush (18 Apr 1808)
Mr. Chairman, almost everything about a human creature is ridiculous, except its ability to suffer bravely and die gallantly for whatever it loves and believes in. The validity of that belief, the appropriateness of that love, is irrelevant; it is the bravery and the gallantry that count.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Job: A Comedy of Justice, ch. 28 [Lucifer to Koshchei] (1984)
And what do all the great words come to in the end, but that? I love you — I am at rest with you — I have come home.
Dorothy Sayers (1893-1957) English author, translator
Busman’s Honeymoon, ch. 16 [Peter to Harriet] (1937)
Of all the diversions of life, there is none so proper to fill up its empty spaces as the reading of useful and entertaining authors.
Joseph Addison (1672-1719) English essayist, poet, statesman
The Spectator, #94 (18 Jun 1711)
When childhood dies, its corpses are called adults and they enter society, one of the politer names of hell. That is why we dread children, even if we love them. They show us the state of our decay.
The choice is with us still, but the civilization now in jeopardy is all humanity. As the ancient myth makers knew, we are children equally of the earth and the sky. In our tenure of this planet we’ve accumulated dangerous evolutionary baggage — propensities for aggression and ritual, submission to leaders, hostility to outsiders — all of which puts our survival in some doubt. But we’ve also acquired compassion for others, love for our children and desire to learn from history and experience, and a great soaring passionate intelligence — the clear tools for our continued survival and prosperity. Which aspects of our nature will prevail is uncertain, particularly when our visions and prospects are bound to one small part of the small planet Earth. But up there in the cosmos, an inescapable perspective awaits.
Carl Sagan (1934-1996) American scientist and writer
Cosmos (1980)
The worst human conflicts are conflicts between righteous men who are too self-righteous to know how evil they are. They are conflicts between nations and cultures who do not recognize how partial and relative is every value of human devotion. It is the human effort to make our partial values absolute which is always the final sin in human life; and it always results in the most bloody of human conflicts.
Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971) American theologian and clergyman
Doom and Dawn [with George S. Eddy] (1936)
Decisions are made by people who have time, not people who have talent.
Scott Adams (b. 1957) American cartoonist
Dilbert (26 Oct 2007)
The republic is a dream.
Nothing happens unless first a dream.Carl Sandburg (1878-1967) American poet, biographer
“Washington Monument by Night” (1922)
I have found, Minister, that “chance” usually has its own feelings as to just what is being left to it, and has a habit of inserting itself into matters at its whim.
Peter David (b. 1956) American writer
Babylon 5: Legions of Fire III – Out of the Darkness, ch. 7 [Londo] (2000)
My position concerning God is that of an agnostic. I am convinced that a vivid consciousness of the primary importance of moral principles for the betterment and ennoblement of life does not need the idea of a law-giver, especially a law-giver who works on the basis of reward and punishment.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-American physicist
Letter to M. Berkowitz (25 Oct 1950) [Einstein Archive 59-215]
We do not move forward by curtailing people’s liberty because we are afraid of what they may do or say.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
The Nation Magazine (1940)
Where love rules, there is no will to power; and where power predominates, there love is lacking. The one is the shadow of the other.
Carl Jung (1875-1961) Swiss psychologist
The Psychology of the Unconscious (1943)
Zeus, who guided mortals to be wise,
has established his fixed law —
wisdom comes through suffering.
Trouble, with its memories of pain,
drips in our hearts as we try to sleep,
so men against their will
learn to practice moderation.
Favours come to us from gods
seated on their solemn thrones —
such grace is harsh and violent.τὸν φρονεῖν βροτοὺς ὁδώ-
σαντα, τὸν [πάθει μάθος]
θέντα κυρίως ἔχειν.
στάζει δ’ ἀνθ’ ὕπνου πρὸ καρδίας
μνησιπήμων πόνος· καὶ παρ’ ἄ-
κοντας ἦλθε σωφρονεῖν.
δαιμόνων δέ που χάρις βίαιος
σέλμα σεμνὸν ἡμένων.
Aeschylus (525-456 BC) Greek dramatist (Æschylus)
Agamemnon, ll. 175-183 [tr. Johnston (2007)]
(Source)
Alt. trans.:The first Hamilton alternate was used, slightly modified, by Robert Kennedy in his speech on the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. (4 Apr 1968). Kennedy's family used it as an epitaph on his grave Arlington National Cemetery: "Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget, falls drop by drop upon the heart, until in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom, through the awful grace of God."
- "It is through suffering that learning comes." [In Arnold Toynbee, "Christianity and Civilization" (1947), Civilization on Trial (1948)]
- "God, whose law it is that he who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget, falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despite, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God." [tr. Hamilton (1930)]
- "Guide of mortal man to wisdom, he who has ordained a law, knowledge won through suffering. Drop, drop -- in our sleep, upon the heart sorrow falls, memory’s pain, and to us, though against our very will, even in our own despite, comes wisdom by the awful grace of God." [tr. Hamilton (1937)]
See here for more discussion.
If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom — go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!
Samuel Adams (1722-1803) American revolutionary, statesman
Speech, State House, Philadelphia (1776-08-01)
(Source)
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.Robert Frost (1874-1963) American poet
“Fire and Ice” (1923)
A religious creed differs from a scientific theory in claiming to embody eternal and absolutely certain truth, whereas science is always tentative, expecting that modification in its present theories will sooner or later be found necessary, and aware that its method is one which is logically incapable of arriving at a complete and final demonstration.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
Religion and Science, ch. 1 “Ground of Conflict” (1935)
Open-mindedness is a virtue all praise and few possess. Prejudice is a sin everyone denounces and almost no one seriously confesses.
Ralph W. Sockman (1889-1970) American Methodist clergyman
“The Open Mind,” Protestantism: A Symposium, ed. William K. Anderson (1944)Full text.
Freedom of thought, which includes freedom of religious belief, is basic in a society of free men. It embraces the right to maintain theories of life and of death and of the hereafter which are rank heresy to followers of the orthodox faiths. Heresy trials are foreign to our Constitution. Men may believe what they cannot prove. They may not be put to the proof of their religious doctrines or beliefs. Religious experiences which are as real as life to some may be incomprehensible to others.
William O. Douglas (1898-1980) US Supreme Court justice (1939-75)
Majority opinion, United States v. Ballard, 322 U.S. 78 (1944)Full text.
I used to be afraid that writing and acting in comedies might be a frivolous occupation, but when I think about all the good that laughing does for people, I get the feeling that making people laugh can be noble work.
Alan Alda (b. 1936) American actor [b. Alphonso Joseph D'Abruzzo]
Commencement Speech, Connecticut College (1980)Full text.
Religious persecution may shield itself under the guise of a mistaken and over-zealous piety.
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) Anglo-Irish statesman, orator, philosopher
Speech (18 Feb 1788)
Quoted in E. A. Bond (ed.), Speeches ... in the Trial of Warren Hastings, vol. 1 (1859)
Don’t you know that silence supports the accuser’s charge?
Sophocles (496-406 BC) Greek tragic playwright
Trachiniae [The Women of Trachis], l. 813.
- Children read books, not reviews. They don’t give a hoot about the critics.
- Children don’t read to find their identity.
- They don’t read to free themselves from guilt, to quench their thirst for rebellion, or to get rid of alienation.
- They have no use for psychology.
- They detest sociology.
- They don’t try to understand Kafka or Finnegan’s Wake.
- They still believe in God, the family, angels, devils, witches, goblins, logic, clarity, punctuation, and other obsolete stuff.
- They love interesting stories, not commentary, guides, or footnotes.
- When a book’s boring, they yawn openly, without any shame or fear of authority.
- They don’t expect their beloved writer to redeem humanity. Young as they are, they know that it is not in his power. Only the adults have such childish illusions.
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904-1991) Polish-American writer, Nobel laureate (b. Icek-Hersz Zynger)
A Day of Pleasure: Stories of a Boy Growing Up in Warsaw, “Why I Write for Children” (1970)Often misattributed to Singer's Nobel lecture; the work was included in a book edition of his speech (1978).
There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism. … The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities.
Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer, US President (1901-1909)
Speech, Knights of Columbus, New York City (12 Oct 1915)
Whatever is well said by another, is mine.
Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC-AD 65) Roman statesman, philosopher, playwright [Lucius Annaeus Seneca]
Moral Letters to Lucilius [Epistulae morales ad Lucilium], letter 16 “On Philosophy, the Guide of Life,” sec. 7
Alt. trans.: "Whatever is well said by anyone is mine." [tr. Gummere (1918)]
The three most important things a man has are, briefly, his private parts, his money, and his religious opinions.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902) English novelist, satirist, scholar
Further Extracts from Note-books of Samuel Butler (1934)
Hypotheses:
- Something preposterous has happened to the world around me, or
- Something preposterous has happened to Alex Hergensheimer’s mind; he should be locked up and sedated.
I could not think of a third hypothesis; those two seemed to cover all bases. The second hypothesis I need not waste time on. If, I were raising snakes in my hat, eventually other people would notice and come around with a straitjacket and put me in a nice padded room.
So let’s assume that I am sane (or nearly so; being a little bit crazy is helpful). If I am okay, then the world is out of joint.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Job: A Comedy of Justice, ch. 2 [Alex] (1984)
It is the business of the Church to recognize that the secular vocation, as such, is sacred. Christian people, and particularly Christian clergy, must get it firmly into their heads that when a man or woman is called to a particular job of secular work, that is as true vocation as though he or she were called to specifically religious work. […] In nothing has the Church lost Her hold on reality as in Her failure to understand and respect the secular vocation. She has allowed work and religion to become separate departments, and is astounded to find that, as a result, the secular work of the world is turned to purely selfish and destructive ends …
Dorothy Sayers (1893-1957) English author, translator
Creed or Chaos? (1940)
I had rather live and love where death is king, than have eternal life where love is not.
Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899) American lawyer, agnostic, orator
“At a Child’s Grave” (8 Jan 1882)
(Source)
O, my Luve’s like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June;
O my Luve’s like the melodie
That’s sweetly play’d in tune.Robert Burns (1759-1796) Scottish national poet
“A Red Red Rose” (1796)Burns derived the text from various folk songs.
The public buys its opinions as it buys its meat, or takes in its milk, on the principle that it is cheaper to do this than to keep a cow. So it is, but the milk is more likely to be watered.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902) English novelist, satirist, scholar
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler, ch. 17 (1912)
He who is bent on doing evil can never want occasion.
Publilius Syrus (d. 42 BC) Assyrian slave, writer, philosopher [less correctly Publius Syrus]
Sententiae [Moral Sayings], # 459
There never has been security. No man has ever known what he would meet around the next corner; if life were predictable it would cease to be life, and be without flavor.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
Tomorrow Is Now (1963)
The Religion that is afraid of science dishonours God and commits suicide.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
Journal (1831-03-04)
Art is the signature of civilizations.
Beverly Sills (1929-2007) American opera singer [b. Belle Silverman]
NBC Television interview (4 May 1985)
Money is always to be found when men are to be sent to the frontiers to be destroyed: when the object is to preserve them, it is no longer so.
[On en trouve [l’argent] toujours quand il s’agit d’aller faire tuer des hommes sur la frontière: il n’y en a plus quand il faut les sauver.]
Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
Questions on the Encyclopedia [Questions sur l’Encyclopédie], “Charity [Charité]” (1770) [tr. Fleming]
(Source)
Referring to the scandalous conditions at the Hôtel Dieu charity hospital in Paris.
(Source (French)). Subsequently folded into later editions of the Philosophical Dictionary [Dictionnaire Philosophique].
There’s nothing more humbling than seeing your best quotes in a list, and thinking they could have been written by a coma patient with a keyboard and spasms.
Scott Adams (b. 1957) American cartoonist
Dilbert Blog, “Quotes” (26 Feb 2007)
Wherever one finds oneself inclined to bitterness, it is a sign of emotional failure: a larger heart, and a greater self-restraint, would put a calm autumnal sadness in the place of the instinctive outcry of pain.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
Letter to Lucy Donnelly (13 Apr 1903)Full text.
We love the things we love for what they are.
Thing that got me was not her list of things she hated, since she was obviously crazy as a Cyborg, but fact that always somebody agreed with her prohibitions. Must be a yearning deep in human heart to stop other people from doing as they please. Rules, laws — always for other fellow. A murky part of us, something we had before we came down out of trees, and failed to shuck when we stood up. Because not one of those people said: “Please pass this so that I won’t be able to do something I know I should stop.” Nyet, tovarishchee, was always something they hated to see neighbors doing. Stop them “for their own good” — not because speaker claimed to be harmed by it.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress [Manny] (1966)
The trade of authorship is a violent, and indestructible obsession.
George Sand (1804-1876) French novelist, feminist [pseud. for Aurore Dupin]
Letter (4 Mar 1831)
It is a human inclination to hope things will work out, despite evidence or doubt to the contrary. A successful manager must resist this temptation. This is particularly hard if one has invested much time and energy on a project and thus has come to feel possessive about it. Although it is not easy to admit what a person once thought correct now appears to be wrong, one must discipline himself to face the facts objectively and make the necessary changes — regardless of the consequences to himself. The man in charge must personally set the example in this respect. He must be able, in effect, to “kill his own child” if necessary and must require his subordinates to do likewise.
Hyman Rickover (1900-1986) US Navy Admiral
Quoted in T. Rockwell, The Rickover Effect, Part 3, ch. 2, epigraph (1992)
(Source)
I don’t oppose all wars. And I know that in this crowd today, there is no shortage of patriots, or of patriotism. What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. […] A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics.
Barack Obama (b. 1961) American politician, US President (2009-2017)
Speech at Anti-War Rally, Chicago (2 Oct 2002)Full text.
If we hate ourselves, we can never love others, for love is the gift of oneself. How will you make a gift of that which you hate?
William Sloane Coffin, Jr. (1924-2006) American minister, social activist
Credo, “Faith, Hope, Love” (2004)
(Source)
The truth is always the strongest argument.
Sophocles (496-406 BC) Greek tragic playwright
Phaedra, frag. 737
If we long for our planet to be important, there is something we can do about it. We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers.
Carl Sagan (1934-1996) American scientist and writer
Cosmos (1980)
The wind and waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators.
Edward Gibbon (1737-1794) English historian
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ch. 68 (1776-88)
Nothing that man does is eternal.
Peter F. Drucker (1909-2005) Austrian-American business consultant
“How to be an Effective Executive,” Nation’s Business (Apr 1961)
Most men ebb and flow in wretchedness between the fear of death and the hardship of life; they are unwilling to live, and yet they do not know how to die.
Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC-AD 65) Roman statesman, philosopher, playwright [Lucius Annaeus Seneca]
Moral Letters to Lucilius [Epistulae morales ad Lucilium], letter 4, sec. 6
A desire to be observed, considered, esteemed, praised, beloved, and admired by his fellows is one of the earliest, as well as the keenest dispositions discovered in the heart of man.
John Adams (1735-1826) American lawyer, Founding Father, statesman, US President (1797-1801)
“Discourses on Davila: A Series of Papers on Political History,” Gazette of the United States, #4 (1790-1791)
Bugs, Mr. Rico! Zillions of ’em!
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Starship Troopers, ch. 10 (1959)
A little nonsense now and then
Is relished by the wisest men.Joseph Addison (1672-1719) English essayist, poet, statesman
“Sir Roger on the Bench”
Never find your delight in another’s misfortune.
Publilius Syrus (d. 42 BC) Assyrian slave, writer, philosopher [less correctly Publius Syrus]
Sententiae [Moral Sayings], # 467
And then, do you know, I like to think that love is eternal; that if you really love the woman, for her sake, you will love her no matter what she may do; that if she really loves you, for your sake, the same; that love does not look at alterations, through the wrinkles of time, through the mask of years — if you really love her you will always see the face you loved and won. And I like to think of it. If a man loves a woman she does not ever grow old to him. And the woman who really loves a man does not see that he is growing older. He is not decrepit to her. He is not tremulous. He is not old. He is not bowed. She always sees the same gallant fellow that won her hand and heart. I like to think of it in that way, and as Shakespeare says: “Let Time reach with his sickle as far as ever he can; although he can reach ruddy cheeks and ripe lips, and flashing eyes, he can not quite reach love.” I like to think of it. We will go down the hill of life together, and enter the shadow one with the other, and as we go down we may hear the ripple of the laughter of our grandchildren, and the birds, and spring, and youth, and love will sing once more upon the leafless branches of the tree of age. I love to think of it in that way — absolute equals, happy, happy, and free, all our own.
Somehow or other, and with the best of intentions, we have shown the world the typical Christian in the likeness of a crashing and rather ill-natured bore—and this in the name of one who assuredly never bored a soul in those thirty-three years during which he passed through the world like a flame.
Dorothy Sayers (1893-1957) English author, translator
“The Dogma is the Drama” (1938)
Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you shall allow him to do so whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose, and you allow him to make war at pleasure. Study to see if you can fix any limit to his power in this respect. If today he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, “I see no probability of the British invading us”; but he will say to you, “Be silent: I see it if you don’t.”
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Letter to William Herndon (15 Feb 1848)
Full text.
One can judge from experiment, or one can blindly accept authority. To the scientific mind, experimental proof is all important and theory is merely a convenience in description, to be junked when it no longer fits. To the academic mind, authority is everything and facts are junked when they do not fit theory laid down by authority.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
“Life-Line” [Pinero] (1939)
It isn’t enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn’t enough to believe in it. One must work at it.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
Voice of America broadcast (11 Nov 1951)
I am very fond of truth, but not at all of martyrdom.
[J’aime fort la vérité, mais je n’aime point du tout le martyre.]Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
Letter to Jean le Rond d’Alembert (8 Feb 1776)
The world isn’t fair, but as long as it’s tilting in my direction I find that there’s a natural cap to my righteous indignation.
Scott Adams (b. 1957) American cartoonist
Dilbert Blog, “The Benefits of Getting Old” (Aug 2006)
If it is true that wars are won by believers, it is also true that peace treaties are sometimes signed by businessmen.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900-1944) French writer, aviator
“Letter to an American” (1944)
All government is an ugly necessity.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
A Short History of England (1917)
Home is the place where, when you have to go there,
They have to take you in.
Example is not the main thing in influencing others. It is the only thing.
Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965) Alsatian philosopher, physician, philanthropist, polymath
(Attributed)
Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made:
Our times are in His hand
Who saith, “A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God: see all nor be afraid!”Robert Browning (1812-1889) English poet
“Rabbi Ben Ezra,” st. 1 (1864)
Wisdom is a curse when wisdom does nothing for the man who has it.
Sophocles (496-406 BC) Greek tragic playwright
Oedipus Rex, l. 316 [Teiresias]
Alt trans: "How dreadful knowledge of the truth can be When there's no help in truth!"
Persecution is a bad and indirect way to plant religion.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Religio Medici, pt. I, sec. 25 (1643)
Oh the shark has pretty teeth, dear,
And he shows them pearly white.
Just a jack-knife has MacHeath, dea,r
And he keeps it out of sight.[Und der Haifisch, der had Zähne
Und die trägt er im Gesicht
Und MacHeath, der had ein Messer
Doch das Messer sieht man nicht.]Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956) German poet, playwright, director, dramaturgist
Die Dreigroschenoper [The Three-Penny Opera], Prologue, “The Ballad of Mackie the Knife” (1928)
English lyrics to "The Ballad of Mack the Knife" (Weill, Kurt / Berthold Brecht / Marc Blitzstein)
Alt: translation: "And the shark he has his teeth and / There they are for all to see / And MacHeath he has his knife but / No one knows where it may be."
You know that’s the tough part about a hero. He has to eat. We take care of them with too much newspaper space and not enough permanent endowment. We have great fellows back from the War that can show you two medals for every sack of flour they have in the house. They’ve got a foreign decoration for every American dollar they have. Heroing is one of the shortest-lifed professions there is.
Every great work, every big accomplishment, has been brought into manifestation through holding to the vision, and often just before the big achievement, comes apparent failure and discouragement.
Florence Scovel Shinn (1870-1940) American illustrator, metaphysicist
The Game of Life and How to Play It (1925)
Certainly nothing is unnatural that is not physically impossible.
Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816) Irish dramatist, satirist, politician
The Critic, act II, sc. i (1779)
Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness.
Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC-AD 65) Roman statesman, philosopher, playwright [Lucius Annaeus Seneca]
Moral Letters to Lucilius [Epistulae morales ad Lucilium], letter 83, sec. 18
Let the human mind loose. It must be loose. It will be loose. Superstition and dogmatism cannot confine it.
John Adams (1735-1826) American lawyer, Founding Father, statesman, US President (1797-1801)
Letter to John Quincy Adams (13 Nov 1816)
Man, being reasonable, must get drunk;
The best of life is but intoxication;
Glory, the grape, love, gold, in these are sunk
The hopes of all men, and of every nation.
When I read the several dates of the tombs, of some that died yesterday, and some six hundred years ago, I consider that great day when we shall all of us be contemporaries, and make our appearance together.
Joseph Addison (1672-1719) English essayist, poet, statesman
Thoughts in Westminster Abbey (1711)
No man is happy who does not think himself so.
Publilius Syrus (d. 42 BC) Assyrian slave, writer, philosopher [less correctly Publius Syrus]
Sententiae [Moral Sayings], # 584
Trouble shared is trouble halved.
Dorothy Sayers (1893-1957) English author, translator
The Five Red Herrings, ch. 9 [Wimsey] (1939)
I do not say, and I do not believe, that Christians are as bad as their creeds. In spite of church and dogma, there have been millions and millions of men and women true to the loftiest and most generous promptings of the human heart. They have been true to their convictions, and, with a self-denial and fortitude excelled by none, have labored and suffered for the salvation of men. Imbued with the spirit of self-sacrifice, believing that by personal effort they could rescue at least a few souls from the infinite shadow of hell, they have cheerfully endured every hardship and scorned every danger. And yet, notwithstanding all this, they believed that honest error was a crime. They knew that the Bible so declared, and they believed that all unbelievers would be eternally lost. They believed that religion was of God, and all heresy of the devil. They killed heretics in defence of their own souls and the souls of their children. They killed them because, according to their idea, they were the enemies of God, and because the Bible teaches that the blood of the unbeliever is a most acceptable sacrifice to heaven.
Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899) American lawyer, agnostic, orator
“Heretics and Heresies” (1874)
(Source)
There is not a passion so strongly rooted in the human heart as envy.
Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816) Irish dramatist, satirist, politician
The Critic Act I, sc. i (1779)
I have never felt that anything really mattered but the satisfaction of knowing that you stood for the things in which you believed and had done the very best you could.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
My Day (8 Nov 1944)
If she [America] forgets where she came from, if the people lose sight of what brought them along, if she listens to the deniers and mockers, then will begin the rot and dissolution.
Carl Sandburg (1878-1967) American poet, biographer
Remembrance Rock, epilogue, ch. 2 (1948)
It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.
[Il est défendu de tuer; tout meurtrier est puni, à moins qu’il n’ait tué en grande compagnie, et au son des trompettes.]
Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
Questions sur l’Encyclopédie, “Rights” (1771)
They say that dogs lick their own genitalia because they can. But I think it’s at least partially because they don’t have the Internet.
Scott Adams (b. 1957) American cartoonist
Dilbert Blog, “My day as a Neanderthal” (25 Oct 2006)