Much unhappiness has come into the world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821-1881) Russian novelist
(Attributed)
Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty—power is ever stealing from the many to the few…. The hand entrusted with power becomes … the necessary enemy of the people. Only by continual oversight can the democrat in office be prevented from hardening into a despot: only by unintermitted Agitation can a people be kept sufficiently awake to principle not to let liberty be smothered in material prosperity.
Wendell Phillips (1811-1884) American abolitionist, orator, social activist
Speech in Boston (28 Jan 1852)
I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish — where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source — where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials — and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Speech, Greater Houston Ministerial Association (12 Sep 1960)
(Source)
What constitutes the bulwark of our own liberty and independence? It is not our frowning battlements, our bristling sea coasts, the guns of our war steamers, or the strength of our gallant and disciplined army. These are not our reliance against a resumption of tyranny in our fair land. All of them may be turned against our liberties, without making us stronger or weaker for the struggle. Our reliance is in the love of liberty which God has planted in our bosoms. Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men, in all lands, every where. Destroy this spirit, and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Speech, Edwardsville, Illinois (11 Sep 1858)
I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.
Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC-AD 65) Roman statesman, philosopher, playwright [Lucius Annaeus Seneca]
Moral Essays, “On Tranquility of Mind [De Tranquillitate Animi]“
Alt trans. by W.B. Langsdorf (1900): "Should I be surprised that dangers which have always surrounded me should at last attack me? A great part of mankind, when about to sail, do not think of a storm. I shall never be ashamed of a reporter of bad news in a good cause."
One generation plants the trees, and another gets the shade.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Chinese proverb
I don’t think necessity is the mother of invention — invention, in my opinion, arises directly from idleness, possibly also from laziness. To save oneself trouble.
Agatha Christie (1890-1976) English writer
An Autobiography (1977)
Nobody will ever deprive the American people of the right to vote except the American people themselves — and the only way they could do this is by not voting.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) American lawyer, politician, statesman, US President (1933-1945)
Radio address (5 Oct 1944)
Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Inaugural address (20 Jan 1961)
(Source)
One of the seven quotations by JFK at his grave site in Arlington National Ceremony.
The only difference between the Democrats and the Republicans is that the Democrats allow the poor to be corrupt, too.
Oscar Levant (1906-1972) American pianist, composer, actor, wit
(Attributed)
Though collecting quotations could be considered as merely an ironic mimetism — victimless collecting, as it were … in a world that is well on its way to becoming one vast quarry, the collector becomes someone engaged in a pious work of salvage. The course of modern history having already sapped the traditions and shattered the living wholes in which precious objects once found their place, the collector may now in good conscience go about excavating the choicer, more emblematic fragments.
Susan Sontag (1933-2004) American essayist, novelist, activist
On Photography, “Melancholy Objects” (1977).
I have ever thought religion a concern purely between our god and our consciences, for which we were accountable to him, and not to the priests. I never told my own religion, nor scrutinised that of another. I never attempted to make a convert, nor wished to change another’s creed. I have ever judged of the religion of others by their lives: and by this test, my dear Madam, I have been satisfied yours must be an excellent one, to have produced a life of such exemplary virtue and correctness. For it is in our lives, and not from our words, that our religion must be read. By the same test the world must judge me.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter to Margaret Bayard Smith (6 Aug 1816)
(Source)
Most of us lead lives of chaotic improvisation from day to day, bawling for peace while plunging grimly into fresh disorders.
Edward Abbey (1927-1989) American anarchist, writer, environmentalist
A Voice Crying in the Wilderness (1991)
(Source)
Can any of you seriously say the Bill of Rights could get through Congress today? It wouldn’t even get out of committee.
F. Lee Bailey (1933-2021) American criminal lawyer, writer [Francis Lee Bailey, Jr.]
Congressional testimony
Quoted in Newsweek (17 Apr 1967)
Religion either makes men wise and virtuous, or it makes them set up false pretences to both.
William Hazlitt (1778-1830) English writer
The Round Table, ch. 32 “On Religious Hypocrisy” (1817)
Full text.
The true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedients, and by parts.
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) Anglo-Irish statesman, orator, philosopher
Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol (3 Apr 1777)
“What is the best type of Jihad [struggle]?” He answered: “Speaking truth before a tyrannical ruler.”
Muhammad (570-632) Arabian merchant, prophet, founder of Islam [Mohammed]
Hadith, Riyadh us-Saleheen, vol. 1:195
Every man, wherever he goes, is encompassed by a cloud of comforting convictions, which move with him like flies on a summer day.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
Sceptical Essays, “Dreams and Facts” (1928)
You have a lifetime to work, but children are only young once.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Polish proverb
The legislature, like the executive, has ceased to be even the creature of the people: it is the creature of pressure groups, and most of them, it must be manifest, are of dubious wisdom and even more dubious honesty. Laws are no longer made by a rational process of public discussion; they are made by a process of blackmail and intimidation, and they are executed in the same manner. The typical lawmaker of today is a man wholly devoid of principle — a mere counter in a grotesque and knavish game…. If the right pressure could be applied to him he would be cheerfully in favor of chiropractic, astrology or cannibalism.
H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American writer and journalist [Henry Lewis Mencken]
“The Library,” The American Mercury (May 1930)
Book review of The Dissenting Opinions of Mr. Justice Holmes (1930)
I did not obey your instructions. No. I conformed to the instructions of truth and Nature, and maintained your interest, against your opinions, with a constancy that became me. A representative worthy of you ought to be a person of stability. I am to look, indeed, to your opinions, — but to such opinions as you and I must have five years hence. I was not to look to the flash of the day. I knew that you chose me, in my place, along with others, to be a pillar of the state, and not a weathercock on the top of the edifice, exalted for my levity and versatility, and of no use but to indicate the shiftings of every fashionable gale.
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) Anglo-Irish statesman, orator, philosopher
Speech at Bristol, previous to the election (6 Sep 1780)
When most the world applauds you, most beware;
‘Tis often less a blessing than a snare.
If all that Americans want is security, they can go to prison. They’ll have enough to eat, a bed and a roof over their heads. But if an American wants to preserve his dignity and his equality as a human being, he must not bow his neck to any dictatorial government.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Speech to Luncheon Clubs, Galveston, Texas (8 Dec 1949)
A great nation is not led by a man who simply repeats the talk of the street-corners or the opinions of the newspapers. A nation is led by a man who hears more than those things; or who, rather, hearing those things, understands them better, unites them, puts them into a common meaning; speaks, not the rumors of the street, but a new principle for a new age; a man in whose ears the voices of the nation do not sound like the accidental and discordant notes that come from the voice of a mob, but concurrent and concordant like the united voices of a chorus, whose many meanings, spoken by melodious tongues, unite in his understanding in a single meaning and reveal to him a single vision, so that he can speak what no man else knows, the common meaning of the common voice. Such is the man who leads a great, free, democratic nation.
Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924) US President (1913-20), educator, political scientist
Address, “Abraham Lincoln: A Man of the People,” Chicago (12 Feb 1909)
The politician in my country seeks votes, affection and respect, in that order …. With few notable exceptions, they are simply men who want to be loved.
Edward R. Murrow (1908-1965) American journalist
Address, London Guildhall (19 Oct 1959)
Sex is like the game of bridge: if you don’t have a good partner, you need a good hand.
Woody Allen (b. 1935) American comedian, writer, director [b. Allan Steward Konigsberg]
(Attributed)
Love seems the swiftest, but it is the slowest of all growths. No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century.
Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
Mark Twain’s Notebook [ed. Paine (1935)]
If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of the potential, for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible. Pleasure disappoints, possibility never. And what wine is so sparkling, what so fragrant, what so intoxicating, as possibility!
Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) Danish philosopher, theologian
Either/Or, vol. 1, “Diapsalmata” (1843
It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow.
James Madison (1751-1836) American statesman, political theorist, US President (1809-17)
The Federalist #62 (27 Feb 1788)
Full text.
I never knew how to worship until I knew how to love.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
(Attributed)
It doesn’t seem to me that this fantastically marvelous universe, this tremendous range of time and space and different kinds of animals, and all the different planets, and all these atoms with all their motions, and so on, all this complicated thing can merely be a stage so that God can watch human beings struggle for good and evil — which is the view that religion has. The stage is too big for the drama.
Richard Feynman (1918-1988) American physicist
Viewpoint interview by Bill Stout, KNXT (1 May 1959)
Reprinted in Perfectly Reasonable Deviations from the Beaten Track, ed. by Michelle Feynman, Appendix I (2006).
An idealist believes the short run doesn’t count. A cynic believes the long run doesn’t matter. A realist believes that what is done or left undone in the short run determines the long run.
Sydney J. Harris (1917-1986) Anglo-American columnist, journalist, author
“Thoughts at Large,” column, Chicago Sun-Times
Earliest reference in Readers Digest (May 1979)
In any great organization it is far, far safer to be wrong with the majority than to be right alone.
John Kenneth Galbraith (1908-2006) Canadian-American economist, diplomat, author
The Guardian (28 Jul 1989)
On the whole, human beings want to be good, but not too good, and not quite all the time.
George Orwell (1903-1950) English writer [pseud. of Eric Arthur Blair]
“The Art of Donald McGill,” Horizon, London (Sep 1941)
A great statesman is he who knows when to depart from traditions, as well as when to adhere to them.
John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) English philosopher and economist
Considerations on Representative Government, ch. 5 (1861)
Justice is itself the great standing policy of civil society; and any eminent departure from it, under any circumstances, lies under the suspicion of being no policy at all.
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) Anglo-Irish statesman, orator, philosopher
“Reflections on the Revolution in France” (1790)
(Source)
Perfectionism, no less than isolationism or imperialism or power politics, may obstruct the paths to international peace. Let us not forget that the retreat to isolationism a quarter of a century ago was started not by a direct attack against international cooperation but against the alleged imperfections of the peace.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) American lawyer, politician, statesman, US President (1933-1945)
State of the Union address (6 Jan 1945)
A good End cannot sanctifie evil Means; nor must we ever do Evil, that Good may come of it. Some Folks think they may Scold, Rail, Hate, Rob and Kill too; so it be but for God’s sake. But nothing in us unlike him, can please him.
William Penn (1644-1718) English writer, philosopher, politician, statesman
Fruits of Solitude, #537-539 (1682)
(Source)
It is idle to talk always of the alternative of reason and faith. Reason is itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our thoughts have any relation to reality at all.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
Orthodoxy, ch. 3, “The Suicide of Thought” (1909)
Although humans tend to view sex as mainly a fun recreational activity sometimes resulting in death, in nature it is a far more serious matter.
Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist
Dave Barry’s Complete Guide to Guys (1996)
Even a paranoid has some real enemies.
Henry Kissinger (1923-2024) German-American diplomat
(Attributed)
In Newsweek (13 Jun 83)
First, is the dangers of futility; the belief there is nothing one man or one woman can do against the enormous array of the world’s ills — against misery and ignorance, injustice and violence. Yet many of the world’s great movements, of thought and action, have flowed from the work of a single man.
Robert Francis Kennedy (1925-1968) American politician
“Day of Affirmation,” address, University of Capetown, South Africa (6 Jun 1966)
My position as regards the monied interests can be put in a few words. In every civilized society property rights must be carefully safeguarded; ordinarily and in the great majority of cases, human rights and property rights are fundamentally and in the long run, identical; but when it clearly appears that there is a real conflict between them, human rights must have the upper hand; for property belongs to man and not man to property.
Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer, US President (1901-1909)
Speech (1910-04-23), “Citizenship in a Republic,” Sorbonne, Paris, France
(Source)
Gratis paenitet esse probum
[A man is sorry to be honest for nothing.]Ovid (43 BC-AD 17) Roman poet [Publius Ovidius Naso]
Ex Ponto, Bk 2, ch 3
Trans. Henry T. Riley. Alt. translation (Bartlett): "It is annoying to be honest to no purpose."
Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home—so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any map of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person: the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
Remarks on “In Your Hands” booklet, United Nations Commission on Human Rights, New York (27 Mar 1958)
For children are innocent and love justice, while most of us are wicked and naturally prefer mercy.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
The Coloured Lands (1938)
Administrivia: Busy, busy, busy
Sorry about the gap in posting new quotes here — life’s been busy, and I’ve hardly been spending any time online the past week or so. Regular posting will resume shortly.
The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds.
John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946) English economist
The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, Preface (1936)
An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it is also more nourishing.
H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American writer and journalist [Henry Lewis Mencken]
A Little Book in C Major, ch. 2, § 3 (1916)
(Source)
Variants:IDEALIST: one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup.
A Book of Burlesques, "The Jazz Webster" (1924)An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup.
Chrestomathy, ch. 30 "Sententiae" (1949)
When people put their ballots in the boxes, they are, by that act, inoculated against the feeling that the government is not theirs. They then accept, in some measure, that its errors are their errors, its aberrations their aberrations, that any revolt will be against them. It’s a remarkably shrewd and rather conservative arrangement when one thinks of it.
John Kenneth Galbraith (1908-2006) Canadian-American economist, diplomat, author
The Age of Uncertainty, ch. 12 (1977)
(Source)
Men do not differ much about what things they will call evils; they differ enormously about what evils they will call excusable.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
Illustrated London News (23 Oct 1909)
One writes of scars healed, a loose parallel to the pathology of the skin, but there is no such thing in the life of an individual. There open wounds, shrunk sometimes to the size of a pinprick, but wounds still. The marks of suffering are more comparable to the loss of a finger, or of the sight of an eye. We may not miss them, either, for one minute in a year, but if we should there is nothing to be done about it.
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) American writer [Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald]
Tender Is the Night, Bk. 3, ch. 13 (1934)
Want of foresight, unwillingness to act when action would be simple and effective, lack of clear thinking, confusion of counsel until the emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong — these are the features which constitute the endless repetition of history.
Winston Churchill (1874-1965) British statesman and author
Speech, House of Commons (2 May 1935)
The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary; men alone are quite capable of every wickedness.
Joseph Conrad (1857-1924) Polish-English novelist [b. Teodor Josef Konrad Korzeniowski]
Under Western Eyes, Part 2, ch. 4 (1911)
(Source)
But the only real reason for being a progressive is that things naturally tend to grow worse. The corruption in things is not only the best argument for being progressive; it is also the only argument against being conservative. The conservative theory would really be quite sweeping and unanswerable if it were not for this one fact. But all conservatism is based upon the idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change.
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
Orthodoxy, ch. 7 “The Eternal Revolution” (1908)
Full text.
At the heart of that western freedom and democracy is the belief that the individual man, the child of God, is the touchstone of value, and all society, groups, the state, exist for his benefit. Therefore the enlargement of liberty for individual human beings must be the supreme goal and the abiding practice of any western society.
Robert Francis Kennedy (1925-1968) American politician
“Day of Affirmation,” address, University of Capetown, South Africa (6 Jun 1966)
In politics, as in religion, it is equally absurd to aim at making proselytes by fire and sword. Heresies in either can rarely be cured by persecution.
Alexander Hamilton (1757-1804) American statesman, author
The Federalist # 1
In a real dark night of the soul it is always three o’clock in the morning, day after day.
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) American writer [Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald]
The Crack-Up (1936)
Richard did not believe in angels. He never had believed in angels. He was damned if he was going to start now. Still, it was much easier not to believe in something when it was not actually looking directly at you, and saying your name.
Neil Gaiman (b. 1960) British author, screenwriter, fabulist
Neverwhere, ch. 9 (2006 ed.)
(Source)
In the original 1996 edition, the first two sentences are elided: "Richard did not believe in angels, he never had."
Hell is not punishment. It’s training.
Shunryū Suzuki (1905-1971) Japanese Zen Buddhist master
(Attributed)
When the people are too much attached to savage independence, to be tolerant of the amount of power to which it is for their good that they should be subject, the state of society (as already observed) is not yet ripe for representative government.
John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) English philosopher and economist
Considerations on Representative Government, ch. 6 (1861)
The enemy of the conventional wisdom is not ideas but the march of events.
John Kenneth Galbraith (1908-2006) Canadian-American economist, diplomat, author
The Affluent Society, ch. 2, sec. 4 (1958)
The trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
The Magician’s Nephew (1955)
Undoubtedly the stories about them [hard-boiled detectives] had a fantastic element. Such things happened, but not so rapidly, nor to so close-knit a group of people, nor within so narrow a frame of logic. This was inevitable because the demand was for constant action; if you stopped to think you were lost. When in doubt, have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand.
To the press alone, chequered as it is with abuses, the world is indebted for all the triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity over error and oppression.
James Madison (1751-1836) American statesman, political theorist, US President (1809-17)
The Virginia Report of 1799
"Report on Resolutions," a report of the resolutions of the Virginia House of Delegates in 1799, submitted by a committee headed by Madison.
I did not let the fear of death govern my life, and my reward was, I had my life. You are going to let the fear of poverty govern your life; and your reward will be that you will eat, but you will not live.
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) British playwright and critic
Heartbreak House, Act 2 [Capt. Shotover] (1919)
In context.
Four things greater than all things are, —
Women and Horses and Power and War.Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) English writer
“The Ballad of the King’s Jest,” st. 5
Lead and inspire people. Don’t try to manage and manipulate people. Inventories can be managed but people must be led.
H. Ross Perot (1930-2019) American entrepreneur, politician, reformer [Henry Ross Perot, Sr.]
(Attributed)
“I beseech ye in the bowels of Christ, think that ye may be mistaken.” I should like to have that written over the portals of every church, every school, and every court house, and, may I say, of every legislative body in the United States. I should like to have every court begin, “I beseech ye in the bowels of Christ, think that we may be mistaken.”
Learned Hand (1872-1961) American jurist
Testimony, US Senate Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, Special Subcommittee on the Establishment of a Commission on Ethics in Government (1951-06-28)
(Source)
This was a favorite phrase of Hand's regarding his own judicial philosophy. Quoting Oliver Cromwell's letter to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland (Aug 1650) before the Battle of Dunbar.
Collected as "Morals in Public Life" in Irving Dillard, ed., The Spirit of Liberty (1952).
I’ve come up with a set of rules that describe our reactions to technologies:
- Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.
- Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.
- Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things.
Douglas Adams (1952-2001) English writer
The Salmon of Doubt (2002)
Administrivia: State of the WIST
Things are running pretty stable as far as visitors goes. I wouldn’t mind seeing more, but I’m seeing enough traffic to make it worthwhile for me.
I’ve been pretty consistent with putting 3+ quotes up every weekday — and not just quotes but quotes with some research into where it was actually said. I’ve been going through multiple sources to keep a (hopefully) good variety. Remember, if you subscribe via e-mail, you’ll get those quotes delivered straight to your in-box.
I keep seeing Google and Yahoo both indexing pages, so hopefully more folks will continue to find WIST.
One thing that I have been light on is feedback. A few comments, but not as much as the visitor stats would warrant. Feel free, then, to comment on quotes you like, suggest new ones, to link back to a particular quote, or to comment on posts like this as to what you’d like to see here at WIST.
I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.
Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) British writer and physician
“A Scandal in Bohemia” [Holmes] (1891)
Full text. Sometimes conflated with "No, no: I never guess. It is a shocking habit -- destructive to the logical faculty." from The Sign of the Four.
If the artist works only when he feels like it, he’s not apt to build up much of a body of work. Inspiration far more often comes during the work than before it, because the largest part of the job of the artist is to listen to the work, and to go where it tells him to go.
Madeleine L'Engle (1918-2007) American writer
Walking on Water (1980)
Laws are partly formed for the sake of good men, in order to instruct them how they may live on friendly terms with one another, and partly for the sake of those who refuse to be instructed, whose spirit cannot be subdued, or softened, or hindered from plunging into evil.
Plato (c.428-347 BC) Greek philosopher
Laws, Book IX [Athenian Stranger] (360 BC)
Translated by Benjamin Jowett. Full text.
It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world, and moral courage so rare.
Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
The Autobiography of Mark Twain, Vol. 2, 15 January 1907 (2010)
(Source)
All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.
John Kenneth Galbraith (1908-2006) Canadian-American economist, diplomat, author
The Age of Uncertainty, ch. 12 (1977)
Courage — without which all other virtues are useless.
[I]t is contrary to the principles of reason and justice that any should be compelled to contribute to the maintenance of a church with which their consciences will not permit them to join, and from which they can derive no benefit; for remedy whereof, and that equal liberty as well religious as civil, may be universally extended to all the good people of this commonwealth.
George Mason (1725-1792) American statesman, Founding Father [George Mason IV]
Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776)
But there is one feature I notice that is generally missing in Cargo Cult Science. That is the idea that we all hope you have learned in studying science in school — we never explicitly say what this is, but just hope that you catch on by all the examples of scientific investigation. It is interesting, therefore, to bring it out now and speak of it explicitly. It’s a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty — a kind of leaning over backwards. For example, if you’re doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid — not only what you think is right about it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you’ve eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked — to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.
Richard Feynman (1918-1988) American physicist
“Cargo Cult Science,” commencement address, California Institute of Technology (1974)
(Source)
To teach is to learn.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Japanese proverb
And what is this liberty which must lie in the hearts of men and women? It is not the ruthless, the unbridled will; it is not freedom to do as one likes. That is the denial of liberty, and leads straight to its overthrow. A society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few; as we have learned to our sorrow.
Learned Hand (1872-1961) American jurist
“The Spirit of Liberty,” speech, “I Am an American Day,” New York (1941-05-21)
(Source)
We are lonesome animals. We spend all our life trying to be less lonesome. One of our ancient methods is to tell a story begging the listener to say — and to feel — ”Yes, that’s the way it is, or at least that’s the way I feel it. You’re not as alone as you thought.”
John Steinbeck (1902-1968) American writer
“In Awe of Words,” The Exonian, 75th anniversary edition, Exeter University (1930)
“What a brain, Mister Vandemar. Keen and incisive isn’t the half of it. Some of us are so sharp,” he said as he leaned in closer to Richard, went up on tiptoes into Richard’s face, “we could just cut ourselves.”
Neil Gaiman (b. 1960) British author, screenwriter, fabulist
Neverwhere, ch. 2 [Mr. Croup] (1996)
(Source)
I am rarely happier than when spending entire day programming my computer to perform automatically a task that it would otherwise take me a good ten seconds to do by hand.
Douglas Adams (1952-2001) English writer
Last Chance to See, ch. 2 (1991)
If the gods think to speak outright to man, they will honorably speak outright; not shake their heads, and give an old wives’ darkling hint.
Herman Melville (1819-1891) American writer
Moby-Dick, ch. 133 [Ahab] (1851)
Decency, security and liberty alike demand that government officials shall be subjected to the same rules of conduct that are commands to the citizen. In a government of laws, existence of the government will be imperiled if it fails to observe the law scrupulously.
Louis Brandeis (1856-1941) American lawyer, activist, Supreme Court Justice (1916-39)
Olmstead v. United States, 277 US 438 (1928) [Dissent]
(Source)
The aim, if reached or not, makes great the life:
Try to be Shakespeare, leave the rest to fate.Robert Browning (1812-1889) English poet
“Bishop Bougram’s Apology” (1855)
It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free Country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its administration, to confine themselves within their respective Constitutional Spheres; avoiding in the exercise of the Powers of one department to encroach upon another.
George Washington (1732-1799) American military leader, Founding Father, US President (1789-1797)
“Farewell Address” (17 Sep 1796)
Full address
There is no man, however wise, who has not at some period in his youth said things, or lived in a way the consciousness of which is so unpleasant to him in later life that he would gladly, if he could, expunge it from his memory.
Marcel Proust (1871-1922) French author
“Seascape, with Frieze of Girls” [Elstir] Remembrance of Things Past, Vol. II Within a Budding Grove (1919)
trans. by Scott Moncrieff (1924)
Oh, what a tangled web do parents weave
When they think that their children are naive.Ogden Nash (1902-1971) American poet
“Baby, What Makes the Sky Blue?” (1940)
The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well, on the surface of a gas covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90 million miles away and think this to be normal is obviously some indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be.
Douglas Adams (1952-2001) English writer
Speech, Digital Biota 2 conference, Cambridge, UK (Sep 1998)
Full speech
The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.
James Madison (1751-1836) American statesman, political theorist, US President (1809-17)
The Federalist #47 (30 Jan 1788)
Richard had noticed that events were cowards: they didn’t occur singly, but instead they would run in packs and leap out at him all at once.
Neil Gaiman (b. 1960) British author, screenwriter, fabulist
Neverwhere, ch. 1 (1996; 2015 ed.)
(Source)
The doctrine of the separation of powers was adopted by the Convention of 1787, not to promote efficiency but to preclude the exercise of arbitrary power. The purpose was, not to avoid friction, but, by means of the inevitable friction incident to the distribution of the governmental powers among three departments, to save the people from autocracy.
Louis Brandeis (1856-1941) American lawyer, activist, Supreme Court Justice (1916-39)
Myers v. United States, 272 U.S. 293, (1926) [Dissent]
When a man is wrapped up in himself, he makes a pretty small package.
John Ruskin (1819-1900) English art critic, painter, writer, social thinker
(Attributed)
There is no safety in numbers, or in anything else.
James Thurber (1894-1961) American cartoonist and writer
“The Fairly Intelligent Fly,” The New Yorker (4 Feb 1939)
Whoever afflict us, whatever surround,
Life is a voyage that’s homeward-bound!Herman Melville (1819-1891) American writer
White-Jacket (1850)
Beauty is worse than wine, it intoxicates both the holder and beholder.
Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) English novelist, essayist and critic
(Attributed)
Sometimes attrib. to "Immermann."
I happen to prefer champagne to ditchwater, but there is no reason to suppose that the cosmos does.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841-1935) American jurist, Supreme Court Justice
(Attributed)
Quoted by William F Buckley, Jr., in The National Review, "Publisher's Statement" (first issue, 19 Nov 1955)
Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of Warre, where every man is Enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withall. In such condition, there is no place for Industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain; and consequently no Culture of the Earth; no Navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by Sea; no commodious Building; no Instruments of moving, and removing such things as require much force; no Knowledge of the face of the Earth; no account of Time; no Arts; no Letters; no Society; and which is worst of all, continuall feare, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.
