Williamsburg is an authentic colonial restored place in Virginia where people in authentic uncomfortable clothing demonstrate how horrible it was to live in historical colonial times.
Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist
(Attributed)
You can say any foolish thing to a dog, and the dog will give you this look that says, “My God, you’re right! I never would’ve thought of that!”
Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist
(Attributed)
Pornography is like tooth decay, eating slowly away at the molars of our morals, and if it is not stopped we will wind up as a toothless nation, gumming at the raw meat of international competition while the drool of decadence dribbles down our collective chin and messes up the clean tablecloth of our children’s futures.
Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist
(Attributed)
An entire new continent can emerge from the ocean in the time it takes for a Web page to show up on your screen. Contrary to what you may have heard, the Internet does not operate at the speed of light; it operates at the speed of the DMV.
Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist
(Attributed)
Probably the question asked most often is: Do one-celled animals have orgasms? The answer is yes, they have orgasms almost constantly, which is why they don’t mind living in pools of warm slime.
Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist
“Sex and the Single Amoeba”
Puns are little ‘plays on words’ that a certain breed of person loves to spring on you and then look at you in a certain self-satisfied way to indicate that he thinks that you must think that he is by far the cleverest person on Earth now that Benjamin Franklin is dead, when in fact what you are thinking is that if this person ever ends up in a lifeboat, the other passengers will hurl him overboard by the end of the first day even if they have plenty of food and water.
Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist
“Why Humor is Funny”
If there really is a God who created the entire universe with all of its glories, and He decides to deliver a message to humanity, He WILL NOT use, as His messenger, a person on cable TV with a bad hairstyle.
Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist
Dave Barry Turns 50, “Sixteen Things That it Took Me 50 Years to Learn” (1998)
If it is your time, love will track you down like a cruise missile.
Lynda Barry (b. 1956) American cartoonist, author, teacher
Big Ideas (1983)
People have criticized me because my security detail is larger than the president’s. But you must ask yourself: are there more people who want to kill me than who want to kill the president? I can assure you there are.
Marion Barry (1936-2014) American politician
Attributed
What right does Congress have to go around making laws just because they deem it necessary?
Marion Barry (1936-2014) American politician
Attributed
People blame me because these water mains break, but I ask you, if the water mains didn’t break, would it be my responsibility to fix them then? WOULD IT!?!
Marion Barry (1936-2014) American politician
Attributed
First, it was not a strip bar, it was an erotic club. And second, what can I say? I’m a night owl.
Marion Barry (1936-2014) American politician
Comment to reporters after traffic accident (1988)
I’m one of those mayors whose management style is to allow free and unlimited debate up to a point.
Marion Barry (1936-2014) American politician
Attributed
Sex: the thing that takes up the least amount of time and causes the most amount of trouble.
John Barrymore (1882-1942) American actor
Attributed
A man must properly pay the fiddler. In my case it so happened that a whole symphony orchestra had to be subsidized.
John Barrymore (1882-1942) American actor
(Attributed)
Those who so glibly dismiss as “mere legal technicalities” the procedural guarantees of the Constitution limiting law-enforcement activities forget that nothing is more basic to civil liberty than freedom from arbitrary arrest and imprisonment by policemen who are masters, not servants, of the law. The most characteristic symbol of the police state is the ominous rap on the door at night. Freedom from the fear of that rap is the basic condition for the exercise of every other form of freedom.
Alan Barth (1906-1979) American journalist
The Rights of Free Men (1984)
You never realize how short a month is until you pay alimony.
John Barrymore (1882-1942) American actor
(Attributed)
Every man has a right to his opinion, but no man has a right to be wrong in his facts.
Bernard Baruch (1870-1965) American businessman and statesman
(Attributed)
In Alfred Montapert (ed.), Distilled Wisdom (1964).
We didn’t all come over on the same ship, but we’re all in the same boat.
Bernard Baruch (1870-1965) American businessman and statesman
(Attributed)
The test and use of a man’s education is that he finds pleasure in the exercise of his mind.
Jacques Barzun (1907-2012) French-American historian, educator, polymath
Saturday Evening Post, “Science vs the Humanities” (3 May 1958)
The greatest blessing of our democracy is freedom. But in the last analysis, our only freedom is the freedom to discipline ourselves.
Bernard Baruch (1870-1965) American businessman and statesman
Baruch, The Public Years (1960)
The greatest weakness of most humans is their hesitancy to tell others how much they love them while they’re still alive.
Orlando A. Battista (1917-1995) Canadian-American chemist, aphorist
(Attributed)
One of the most lasting pleasures you can experience is the feeling that comes over you when you genuinely forgive an enemy
Orlando A. Battista (1917-1995) Canadian-American chemist, aphorist
(Attributed)
An error doesn’t become a mistake until you refuse to correct it.
Orlando A. Battista (1917-1995) Canadian-American chemist, aphorist
How to Enjoy Work and Get More Fun Out of Life (1957)
The fellow who says he’ll meet you halfway usually thinks he’s standing on the dividing line.
Orlando A. Battista (1917-1995) Canadian-American chemist, aphorist
(Attributed)
In necessary things, unity; in disputed things, liberty; in all things, charity.
I know it’s difficult for you to understand this now, Pete. But you’ve got the majority of your life ahead of you — and one day you’ll find that these high school years will be a tiny, distant memory. The scars, of course, are yours to keep forever.
Tom Batiuk (b. 1947) American cartoonist
Funky Winkerbean (2 Jun 2001)
Dangers bring fears, and fears more dangers bring.
Richard Baxter (1615-1691) English Puritan clergyman and writer
Love Breathing Thanks and Praise (1681)
Bilbo thought to kill the creature, but pity stayed his hand.
‘It’s a pity I’ve run out of bullets,’ he thought.Henry N. Beard (b. 1945) American writer and humorist
Bored of the Rings, with Douglas C. Kenney
I am convinced that the world is not a mere bog in which men and women trample themselves and die. Something magnificent is taking place here amidst the cruelties and tragedies, and the supreme challenge to intelligence is that of making the noblest and best in our curious heritage prevail.
Charles Beard (1874-1948) American historian
(Attributed)
In Will Durant, On the Meaning of Life (1932)
Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad with power;
The mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceedingly small;
The bee fertilizes the flower it robs;
When it is dark enough, you can see the stars.Charles Beard (1874-1948) American historian
Summary of human history, in reply to George S. Counts
Half the work that is done in this world is to make things appear what they are not.
Elias Root Beadle (1812-1879) American cleric, philosopher
(Attributed)
Perennial: Any plant which, had it lived, would have bloomed year after year.
Henry N. Beard (b. 1945) American writer and humorist
Gardening: A Gardener’s Dictionary (1982)
with Roy McKie
Boggies are an unattractive but annoying people whose numbers have increased rather precipitously since the bottom fell out of the fairy-tale market. Slow and sullen, and yet dull, they prefer to lead simple lives of pastoral squalor. They don’t like machines more complicated than a garrote, a blackjack, or a Luger, and they have always been shy of the ‘big folk’ or ‘biggers’ as they call us. As a rule they avoid us, except on rare occasions when a hundred or so will get together to dry-gulch a lone farmer or hunter. They seldom exceed three feet in height, but are fully capable of overpowering creatures half their size when they get the drop on them. … Their beginnings lie far back in the Good Ole Days when the planet was populated with the kind of colorful creatures you have to drink a quart of Old Overcoat to see nowadays.
Henry N. Beard (b. 1945) American writer and humorist
Bored of the Rings (1969) [with Douglas C. Kenney]
I believe that, if ever I had to practice cannibalism, I might manage if there were enough tarragon around.
James Beard (1903-1985) American gastronome and writer
( 23 Jan. 1985)
Recalled on his death
We cannot expect you to be with us all the time, but perhaps you could be good enough to keep in touch now and again.
Sir Thomas Beecham (1879-1961) British conductor
To a musician during a rehearsal
ESTRAGON: I can’t go on like this.
VLADIMIR: That’s what you think.Samuel Beckett (1906-1989) American playwright
Waiting for Godot (1952)
You cannot avoid paradise. You can only avoid seeing it.
You’ve achieved success in your field when you don’t know whether what you’re doing is work or play.
Warren Beatty (b. 1937) American actor
(Attributed)
Vigilance is not only the price of liberty, but of success of any sort.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
(Attributed)
If men had wings and bore black feathers, few of them would be clever enough to be crows.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
(Attributed)
Doctrine is nothing but the skin of truth set up and stuffed.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
Life Thoughts (1858)
The ignorant classes are the dangerous classes. Ignorance is the womb of monsters.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit (1859)
Young love is a flame; very pretty, often very hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. The love of the older and disciplined heart is as coals, deep burning, unquenchable.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
Notes from Plymouth Pulpit (1859)
Mirth is God’s medicine. Everybody ought to bathe in it. Grim care, moroseness, anxiety — all this rust of life ought to be scoured off by the oil of mirth. It is better than emery. Every man ought to rub himself with it.
Happiness is not the end of life, character is.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
Life Thoughts: Gathered from the Extemporaneous Discourses of Henry Ward Beecher (1858)
Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anyone else expects of you.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
(Attributed)
Riches are not an end of life, but an instrument of life.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit (1887)
There is tonic in the things that men do not love to hear. Free speech is to a great people what the winds are to oceans … and where free speech is stopped miasma is bred, and death comes fast.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit (1887)
Where is human nature so weak as in the bookstore?
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American clergyman and orator
“Subtleties of Book Buyers,” Star Papers (1855)
A man is only as good as what he loves.
Saul Bellow (1915-2005) Canadian-American writer
Seize the Day (1956)
A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep.
SAGRAMORE: If there were aught I could say, aught I could do to save thee…
HANK: Well, ain’t there aught?
SAGRAMORE: Naught.Edmund Beloin (1910-1992) American screenwriter, producer
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (1949)
(book by Mark Twain)
It took me fifteen years to discover that I had no talent for writing, but I couldn’t give it up because by that time I was too famous.
Robert Benchley (1889-1945) American humorist
(Attributed)
In Nathaniel Benchley, Robert Benchley, ch. 1 (1955)
Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn’t the work he is supposed be doing at that moment.
Robert Benchley (1889-1945) American humorist
(Attributed)
In Robert E. Drennan, The Algonquin Wits (1968)