It is easier for a man to be loyal to his club than to his planet; the by-laws are shorter, and he is personally acquainted with the other members.
E. B. White (1899-1985) American author, critic, humorist [Elwyn Brooks White]
(Attributed)
We never really grow up … we just learn how to act in public.
Bryan White (b. 1974) American singer-songwriter
(Attributed)
You shouldn’t say it is not good. You should say, you do not like it; and then, you know, you’re perfectly safe.
James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) American artist
(Attributed)
Two and two continue to make four, in spite of the whine of the amateur for three, or the cry of the critic for five.
James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) American artist
Whistler v. Ruskin (1871)
People are morons. I don’t have any other explanation. I really don’t.
Joss Whedon (b. 1964) American screenwriter, author, producer [Joseph Hill Whedon]
(Attributed)
(on Hollywood)
Though not always called upon to condemn ourselves, it is always safe to suspect ourselves.
Richard Whately (1787-1863) English logician, theologian, archbishop
(Attributed)
It is one thing to wish to have the truth on our side; and another to wish sincerely to be on the side of truth.
Richard Whately (1787-1863) English logician, theologian, archbishop
(Attributed)
A man who gives his children habits of industry provides for them better than by giving them a fortune.
Richard Whately (1787-1863) English logician, theologian, archbishop
(Attributed)
Honesty is the best policy, but he who acts on that principle is not an honest man.
Richard Whately (1787-1863) English logician, theologian, archbishop
(Attributed)
In spite of illness, in spite even of the arch-enemy sorrow, one can remain alive long past the usual date of disintegration if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in big things, and happy in small ways.
Edith Wharton (1862-1937) American novelist
(Attributed)
Another unsettling element in modern art is that common symptom of immaturity, the dread of doing what has been done before.
Edith Wharton (1862-1937) American novelist
(Attributed)
If only we’d stop trying to be happy, we could have a pretty good time.
Edith Wharton (1862-1937) American novelist
(Attributed)
The word “idiot” comes from a Greek root meaning private person. Idiocy is the female defect: intent on their private lives, women follow their fate through a darkness deep as that cast by malformed cells in the brain. It is no worse than the male defect, which is lunacy: men are so obsessed by public affairs that they see the world as by moonlight, which shows the outlines of every object but not the details indicative of their nature.
Rebecca West (1892-1983) British author, journalist, literary critic, travel writer [pseud. for Cicily Isabel Fairfield]
Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, Prologue (1941)
(Source)
Sometimes oddly paraphrased, "The main difference between men and women is that men are lunatics and women are idiots."
I believe in censorship. After all, I made a fortune out of it.
Mae West (1892-1980) American film actress
(Attributed)
Humanity either makes, or breeds, or tolerates all its afflictions.
H.G. Wells (1866-1946) British writer [Herbert George Wells]
(Attributed)
The books we think we ought to read are poky, dull, and dry;
The books that we would like to read we are ashamed to buy;
The books that people talk about we never can recall;
And the books that people give us, oh, they’re the worst of all.Carolyn Wells (1869-1942) American author
“On Books”
Living in the lap of luxury isn’t bad, except you never know when luxury is going to stand up.
Orson Welles (1915-1985) American writer, director, actor
(Attributed)
Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason.
Orson Welles (1915-1985) American writer, director, actor
(Attributed)
In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed — they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love, five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did they produce …? The cuckoo clock.
Orson Welles (1915-1985) American writer, director, actor
The Third Man
Miracles sometimes occur, but one has to work terribly hard for them.
Chaim Weizmann (1874-1952) Russian-Israeli scientist, Zionist leader
(Attributed)
All sins are attempts to fill voids.
Simone Weil (1909-1943) French philosopher
Gravity and Grace [La Pesanteur et la Grâce], “To Desire Without An Object” (1947) [ed. Thibon] [tr. Crawford/von der Ruhr (1952)]
(Source)
It is not then, in the glare of public, but in the shade of private life, that we are to look for the man. Private life is always real life. … It is the private virtues that lay the foundation of all human excellence.
M.L. Weems (1759-1825) American clergyman and author [Mason Locke Weems]
The Life of George Washington (1800)
Revenge has no more quenching effect on emotions than salt water has on thirst.
Walter Weckler (1758-1843) American lexicographer
(Attributed)
Newsweek
A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many bad measures.
Daniel Webster (1782-1852) American statesman, lawyer, orator
(Attributed)
All battles are fought by scared men who would have rather have been somewhere else.
John Wayne (1907-1979) American actor, director [b. Marion Michael Morrison]
(Attributed)
We cherish our friends not for their ability to amuse us, but for ours to amuse them.
Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966) English novelist
(Attributed)
Everyone tries to define this thing called Character. It’s not hard. Character is doing what’s right when nobody’s looking.
Julius Caesar "J. C." Watts, Jr. (b. 1957) American writer, politician
(Attributed)
Do not expect to arrive at certainty in every subject which you pursue. There are a hundred things wherein we mortals … must be content with probability, where our best light and reasoning will reach no farther.
Isaac Watts (1674-1748) English theologian and hymnodist
(Attributed)
No one imagines that a symphony is supposed to improve in quality as it goes along, or that the whole object of playing it is to reach the finale. The point of music is discovered in every moment of playing and listening to it. It is the same, I feel, with the greater part of our lives, and if we are unduly absorbed in improving them we may forget altogether to live them.
This is more or less what I would do if I had the power to dream every night of anything I wanted. Some months I would probably fulfill all the more obvious wishes. There might be palaces and banquets, players and dancing girls, fabulous bouts of love, and sunlit gardens beside lakes, with mountains beyond. There would next be long conversations with sages, contemplation of supreme works of art, hearing and playing music, voyages to foreign lands, flying out into space to see the galaxies, and delving into the atom to watch the wiggling wavicles. But the night would come when I might want to add a little spice of adventure — perhaps a dream of dangerous mountain climbing, of rescuing a princess from a dragon, or, better, an unpredictable dream in which I do not know what will happen. Once this has started, I might get still more daring. I would wish to dream whole lifetimes, packing seventy years into a single night. I would dream that I am not dreaming at all, that I will never wake up, that I have completely lost myself somewhere down the tangled corridors of the mind, and, finally, that I am in such excruciating agony that when I wake up, it will be better than all possible dreams.
Alan Watts (1915-1973) Anglo-American philosopher, writer
Beyond Theology, ch. 2 “Is It Serious?” (1964)
You know that if you get in the water and have nothing to hold on to, but try to behave as you would on dry land, you will drown. But if, on the other hand, you trust yourself to the water and let go, you will float. And this is exactly the situation of faith.
Alan Watts (1915-1973) Anglo-American philosopher, writer
The Way of Liberation
CALVIN: It’s not denial. I’m just very selective about the reality I accept.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes (28 Sep. 1992)
CALVIN: I like maxims that don’t encourage behavior modification.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: I’m a simple man, Hobbes.
HOBBES: You?? Yesterday you wanted a nuclear powered car that could turn into a jet with laser-guided heat-seeking missiles!
CALVIN: I’m a simple man with complex tastes.Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: I’ve noticed that comic book superheroes usually fight evil maniacs with grandiose plans to destroy the world. Why don’t superheroes go after more subtle, realistic bad guys?
HOBBES: Yeah, the superhero could attend council meetings and write letters to the editor, and stuff.
CALVIN: Hmmm … I think I see the problem.
HOBBES: “Quick! To the Bat-Fax!”Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: Tigers don’t worry about much, do they?
HOBBES: Nope. That’s one of the perks of being feral.Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: I love Saturday morning cartoons. What classic humor! This is what entertainment is all about. … Idiots, explosives and falling anvils.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: My life needs a rewind/erase button.
HOBBES: And a volume control.Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: Why should I have to work for everything?! It’s like saying I don’t deserve it!
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don’t realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: The only skills I have the patience to learn are those that have no real application in life.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: If Mom and Dad cared about me at all, they’d buy me some infra-red nighttime vision goggles.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: I’m a genius, but I’m a misunderstood genius.
HOBBES: What’s misunderstood about you?
CALVIN: Nobody thinks I’m a genius.Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: Weekends don’t count unless you spend them doing something completely pointless.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: Reality continues to ruin my life.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
If your knees aren’t green by the end of the day, you ought to seriously re-examine your life.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: I used to hate writing assignments, but now I enjoy them. I realized that the purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity. With a little practice, writing can be an intimidating and impenetrable fog!
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
HOBBES: Do you think there’s a God?
CALVIN: Well somebody’s out to get me!Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: It’s psychosomatic. You need a lobotomy. I’ll get a saw.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: I’m being educated against my will! My rights are being trampled!
HOBBES: Is it a right to remain ignorant?
CALVIN: I don’t know, but I refuse to find out!Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocketship underpants don’t help.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: I think life should be more like TV. I think all of life’s problems ought to be solved in thirty minutes with simple homilies, don’t you? I think weight and oral hygiene ought to be our biggest concerns. I think we should all have powerful, high-paying jobs, and everyone should drive fancy sports cars. All our desires should be instantly gratified. Women should always wear tight clothes, and men should carry powerful handguns. Life overall should be more glamorous, thrill-packed, and filled with applause, don’t you think?
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
TEACHER: Explain Newton’s First Law of Motion in your own words.
CALVIN: Yakka foob mog. Grug pubbawup zink wattoom gazork. Chumble spuzz.Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: A little rudeness and disrespect can elevate a meaningless interaction to a battle of wills and add drama to an otherwise dull day.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
I’d say that crossed the line from Ironic Coincidence to Evil Omen.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes (11 May 1990)
CALVIN: I don’t know which is worse, … that everyone has his price, or that the price is always so low.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
HOBBES: Did you ask your Mom if you could jump off the roof?
CALVIN: Questions I know the answers to I don’t need to ask, right?Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
HOBBES: A new decade is coming up.
CALVIN: Yeah, big deal! Hmph. Where are the flying cars? Where are the Moon colonies? Where are the personal robots and the zero gravity boots, huh? You call this a new decade?! You call this the future?? Ha! Where are the rocket packs? Where are the disintegration rays? Where are the floating cities?
HOBBES: Frankly, I’m not sure people have the brains to manage the technology they’ve got.
CALVIN: I mean, look at this! We still have the weather?! Give me a break!Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes
CALVIN: Dad, how do people make babies?
CALVIN’S DAD: Most people just go to Sears, buy the kit, and follow the assembly instructions.
CALVIN: I came from Sears??
CALVIN’S DAD: No, you were a Blue Light Special at K Mart. Almost as good, and a lot cheaper.
CALVIN: AAUUGHHH!
CALVIN’S MOM [off panel]: Dear, what are you telling Calvin now?!
CALVIN: Do you believe our destinies are determined by the stars?
HOBBES: Nah.
CALVIN: Oh, I do.
HOBBES: Really? How come?
CALVIN: Life’s a lot more fun when you’re not responsible for your actions.Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Weirdos from Another Planet (1990)
CALVIN: I try to make everyone’s day a little more surreal.
CALVIN: Know what’s weird? Day by day nothing seems to change. But pretty soon, everything is different.
HOBBES: First, your heart falls into your stomach and splashes your innards. All the moisture makes you sweat profusely. This condensation shorts the circuits to your brain, and you get all woozy. When your brain burns out altogether, your mouth disengages and you babble like a cretin until she leaves.
CALVIN: That’s love?!?
HOBBES: Medically speaking.
CALVIN: Heck, that happened to me once, but I figured it was cooties!!
HOBBES: Why waste time learning, when ignorance is instantaneous?
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin and Hobbes (1990-11-15)
CALVIN: There’s no problem so awful that you can’t add some guilt to it and make it even worse!
CALVIN (walking through snowy field): You know, Hobbes, it seems the only time most people go outside is to walk their cars. We have houses, electricity, plumbing, heat …. Maybe we’re so sheltered and comfortable that we’ve lost touch with the natural world and forgotten our place in it. Maybe we’ve lost our awe of nature. That’s why I want to ask you, as a tiger, a wild animal close to nature, what do you think we’re put on Earth to do. What’s our purpose in life? Why are we here?
HOBBES: We’re here to devour each other alive.
CALVIN (in the house): Turn on the lights! Turn up the heat!Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes (6 Jan 1991)
CALVIN: Well, Hobbes, I guess there’s a moral to all this.
HOBBES: What’s that?
CALVIN: “Snow goons are bad news.”
HOBBES: That lesson certainly ought to be inapplicable elsewhere in life.
CALVIN: I like maxims that don’t encourage behavior modification.Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes (19 Jan 1991)
HOBBES: Have you an idea for your story yet?
CALVIN: No, I’m waiting for inspiration. You can’t just turn on creativity like a faucet. You have to be in the right mood.
HOBBES: What mood is that?
CALVIN: Last-minute panic.
CALVIN: When I grow up, I’m not going to read the newspaper and I’m not going to follow complex issues and I’m not going to vote. That way I can complain when the government doesn’t represent me. Then, when everything goes down the tubes, I can say the system doesn’t work and justify my further lack of participation.
HOBBES: An ingeniously self-fulfilling plan.
CALVIN: It’s a lot more fun to blame things than to fix them.
CALVIN: Oh, Great Altar of Passive Entertainment … Bestow upon me thy discordant images at such speed as to render linear thought impossible!
CALVIN: It’s not fair!
CALVIN’S DAD: The world isn’t fair, Calvin.
CALVIN: I know, but why isn’t it ever unfair in my favor?
CALVIN: God put me on Earth to accomplish a certain number of things. Right now I am so far behind I will never die.
Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
(Attributed)
Widely attributed to the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip, but searches for the actual comic have come up empty. For more information on references to this quote, see: "God put me on this earth to accomplish a certain…".
CALVIN: Where do we keep all our chainsaws, Mom?
Machines should work. People should think.
Thomas J. Watson (1856-1922) American businessman
(Attributed)
All the problems of the world could be settled if people were only willing to think. The trouble is that people very often resort to all sorts of devices in order not to think, because thinking is such hard work.
Thomas J. Watson (1856-1922) American businessman
(Attributed)
Be pitiful, for every man is fighting a hard battle.
John Watson (1850-1907) Scottish writer, preacher, theologian [pseud. Ian Maclaren]
The British Weekly (1897)
“Family” this and “family” that. If I had a family I’d be furious that moral busybodies are taking the perfectly good word family and using it as a code for censorship the same way “states’ rights” was used to disguise racism in the mid-sixties.
John Waters (b. 1946) American movie actor, director, screenwriter
(Attributed)
We are not entitled to deprive heretics of the life which God has given them simply because we believe them to be in the clutches of Satan. … Those who are our enemies on earth may, by the grace of God, be our superiors in Heaven.
Bishop Waso of Liège (AD 980-1048) Ecclesiastical leader in the Holy Roman Empire
(1045)
Every body and every thing conspire to make me as contented as possible in it; yet I have seen too much of the vanity of human affairs, to expect felicity from the splendid scenes of public life. I am still determined to be cheerful and to be happy, in whatever situation I may be; for I have also learnt, from experience, that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances. We carry the seeds of the one or the other about with us, in our minds, wheresoever we go.
Martha Washington (1731-1802) American socialite, wife of George Washington, First Lady (1789-1797)
Letter to Mercy Otis Warren (1789-12-26)
(Source)
While we are contending for our own Liberty, we should be very cautious of violating the Rights of Conscience in others, ever considering that God alone is the Judge of the Hearts of Men, and to him only in this Case, they are answerable.
George Washington (1732-1799) American military leader, Founding Father, US President (1789-1797)
Letter to Col. Benedict Arnold (14 Sep. 1775)
There is a rank due to the United States, among nations, which will be withheld, if not absolutely lost, by the reputation of weakness. If we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it; if we desire to secure peace, one of the most powerful instruments of our rising prosperity, it must be known that we are at all times ready for war.
George Washington (1732-1799) American military leader, Founding Father, US President (1789-1797)
Fifth Annual Message, Philadelphia (3 Dec 1793)
(Source)
Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.
George Washington (1732-1799) American military leader, Founding Father, US President (1789-1797)
(Attributed)Unsourced. First attributed to "The First President of the United States" in "Liberty and Government" by W. M., in The Christian Science Journal (Nov 1902) ed. Mary Baker Eddy.
Variant: "Government is not reason, it is not eloquence — it is force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action."
More information here.
It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and, at no distant period, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a People always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence.
George Washington (1732-1799) American military leader, Founding Father, US President (1789-1797)
“Farewell Address” (17 Sep 1796)
Discipline is the soul of an army. It makes small numbers formidable; promises successes to the weak, and esteem to all.
George Washington (1732-1799) American military leader, Founding Father, US President (1789-1797)
(Attributed)
One man cannot hold another man down in the ditch without remaining down in the ditch with him.
Booker T. Washington (1856-1915) American educator, writer
Speech, Republican Club, New York City (12 Feb 1909)
(Source)
Sometimes paraphrased, "You can't hold a man down without staying down with him."
I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succeed.
There are two ways of exerting one’s strength; one is pushing down, the other is pulling up.
Booker T. Washington (1856-1915) American educator, writer
(Attributed)
The first measure of a free society is NOT that its government performs the will of the majority. That’s what we had in 1930s Germany, 1950s Georgia, and 1980s Iran. The FIRST measure of a free society is that its government protects the just freedoms of its minorities AGAINST the preferences, will and caprice of the majority.
Jim Warren (b. 1936) American mathematician, computer scientist, journalist, activist
(Attributed)
A citizen’s constitutional rights can hardly be infringed simply because a majority of the people choose that it be.
Earl Warren (1891-1974) American jurist and politician; Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (1953-69)
Lucas v. Colorado General Assembly, 377 U.S. 713, majority opinion (1964)
He who serves God with what costs him nothing, will do very little service, you may depend on it.
Susan Warner (1819-1885) American novelist
What She Could, Ch. 11 (1870)
What’s great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest. You can be watching TV and see Coca-Cola, and you know that the President drinks Coke, Liz Taylor drinks Coke, and just think, you can drink Coke, too. A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the Cokes are the same and all the Cokes are good. Liz Taylor knows it, the President knows it, the bum knows it, and you know it.
Andy Warhol (1928-1987) American artist, author
The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: From A to B and Back Again
The moment you label something, you take a step — I mean, you can never go back again to seeing it unlabelled.
Andy Warhol (1928-1987) American artist, author
The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: From A to B and Back Again
Sometimes the little times you don’t think are anything while they’re happening turn out to be what marks a whole period of your life.
Andy Warhol (1928-1987) American artist, author
The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: From A to B and Back Again
One man’s perfectly rational and objective decision making may be another man’s utter insanity.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Ron Ward
Trouble will come soon enough, and when he does come, receive him as pleasantly as possible. Like the tax collector, he is a disagreeable chap to have in one’s house, but the more amiably you greet him the sooner he will go away.
Artemus Ward (1834-1867) American humorist, editor, lecturer [pseud. of Charles Farrar Browne]
(Attributed)
“Thrice is he armed that hath his quarrel just” —
And four times he who gets his fist in fust.Artemus Ward (1834-1867) American humorist, editor, lecturer [pseud. of Charles Farrar Browne]
Shakespeare Up-to-Date
See Shakespeare.Also attributed to Josh Billings in Josh Billings: His Sayings (1865), and sometimes oddly credited to Romans 13:7.
SIR TE: Sometimes the greatest heroes are also the greatest idiots.
Hui-ling Wang (contemp.) Taiwanese screenwriter [Wáng Huìlíng, 王蕙玲]
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)
(with James Schamus, Kuo Jung Tsai; book by Du Lu Wang)
To carry a grudge is like being stung to death by one bee.
(Other Authors and Sources)
William H. Walton
A vortex of disturbed emotions is often dissipated by a sense of humour, and a heartfelt laugh.
J. Donald Walters (1926-2013) American yoga teacher, writer, musician [a.k.a. Swami Kriyananda]
(Attributed)
