I either want less corruption, or more chance to participate in it.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots
The time for action is past! Now is the time for senseless bickering!
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #1019
I could do great things, if I weren’t so busy doing little things.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #0828
I try to take one day at a time, but sometimes several days attack me at once.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #1520
Please don’t lie to me, unless you’re absolutely sure I’ll never find out the truth.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots
Life is the only game in which the object of the game is to learn the rules.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #1409
What I like most about myself is that I is that I’m so understanding when I do something wrong.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #1189
Sometimes I make a mental note, but then forget where I put it.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #2836
It’s hopeless! Tomorrow there’ll be even more books I should have read than there are today.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #2918
I may not be totally perfect, but parts of me are excellent.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #0433
Been through Hell? Whaddya bring back for me?
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots
Why is everybody behaving as if there were no reason to panic?
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #0305
My life has a superb cast but I can’t figure out the plot.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #0144
The one function that TV news performs very well is that, when there is no news, we give it to you with the same emphasis as if there were.
David Brinkley (1920-2003) American broadcast journalist
(Attributed)
Life may have no meaning. Or even worse, it may have a meaning of which I disapprove.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #1347
I don’t have any solution, but I certainly admire the problem.
Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #0759
No good revolutionary leader would ever bunt.
Crane Brinton (1898-1968)
The Anatomy of Revolution, 7.4 (1952)
The least questioned assumptions are often the most questionable.
Paul Broca (1824-1880) French pathologist, neurosurgeon, anthropologist
“Quelques propositions sur les tumeurs dites cancéreuses” (16 Apr 1849)
ELWOOD: Years ago my mother used to say to me, she’d say, “In this world, Elwood, you must be” — she always called me Elwood — “In this world, Elwood, you must be oh so smart or oh so pleasant.” Well, for years I was smart. I recommend pleasant. You may quote me.
Oscar Brodney (1905-2008) American screenwriter, lawyer
Harvey (1950) [with Mary Chase]
ELWOOD: Well, I’ve wrestled with reality for 35 years, Doctor, and I’m happy to state I finally won out over it.
Oscar Brodney (1905-2008) American screenwriter, lawyer
Harvey (1950)
with Mary Chase (playwright)
No science is immune to the infection of politics and the corruption of power.
Jacob Bronowski (1908-1974) Polish-English humanist and mathematician
Encounter (Jul. 1971)
There is always a “but” in this imperfect world.
Anne Brontë (1820-1849) British novelist, poet [pseud. Acton Bell]
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, ch. 22 [Helen] (1848)
But he that dares not grasp the thorn
Should never crave the rose.
Feeling without judgement is a washy draught indeed; but judgement untempered by feeling is too bitter and husky a morsel for human deglutition.
Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855) British novelist [pseud. Currer Bell]
Jane Eyre (1847)
Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to assail the last. To pluck the mask from the face of the Pharisee, is not to lift an impious hand to the Crown of Thorns.
Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855) British novelist [pseud. Currer Bell]
Jane Eyre, Preface, 2nd edition (21 Dec 1847)
I’ve dreamt in my life dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas: they’ve gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the color of my mind.
Emily Brontë (1818-1848) British novelist, poet [pseud. Ellis Bell]
Wuthering Heights (1847)
Love is like the wild-rose briar;
Friendship is like the holly-tree.
The holly is dark when the rose briar blooms,
But which will bloom most constantly?Emily Brontë (1818-1848) British novelist, poet [pseud. Ellis Bell]
“Love and Friendship” (1839)
Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later.
Frederick P. Brooks, Jr. (b. 1931) American computer scientist, academician
The Mythical Man-Month (1975)
Look, I really don’t want to wax philosophic, but I will say that if you’re alive, you’ve got to flap your arms and legs, you’ve got to jump around a lot, you’ve got to make a lot of noise, because life is the very opposite of death.
Mel Brooks (b. 1926) American comedic actor, writer, producer [b. Melvyn Kaminsky]
(Attributed)
Tragedy is if I cut my finger. Comedy is if you walk into an open sewer and die.
Mel Brooks (b. 1926) American comedic actor, writer, producer [b. Melvyn Kaminsky]
New Yorker, “Profiles: Frolics and Detours of a Short Hebrew Man” (by Kenneth Tynan) (30-Oct-1978)
Humor is just another defense against the universe.
Mel Brooks (b. 1926) American comedic actor, writer, producer [b. Melvyn Kaminsky]
(Attributed)
O, do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men! Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers equal to your tasks.
Phillips Brooks (1835-1893) American clergyman, hymnist
“Going Up to Jerusalem,” Selected Sermons [ed. William Scarlett (1949)]
The true way to be humble is not to stoop till thou art smaller than thyself, but to stand at thy real height against some higher nature that will show thee what the real smallness of thy greatness is.
Phillips Brooks (1835-1893) American clergyman, hymnist
(Attributed)
Character may be manifested in the great moments, but it is made in the small ones.
Phillips Brooks (1835-1893) American clergyman, hymnist
(Attributed)
Great is Truth and it shall prevail.
[Magna est veritas et prævalebit.]
Thomas Brooks (1608-1680) English Puritan divine, writer
The Crown and Glory of Christianity (1662)
Alternate translation: "Truth is mighty and will prevail."
Whenever people say “we mustn’t be sentimental,” you can take it they are about to do something cruel. And if they add, “we must be realistic,” they mean they are going to make money out of it.
Brigid Brophy (1929-1995) Anglo-Irish writer, novelist, playwright
Unlived Life
Americans have a lazy habit of defining themselves in terms of what they are against rather than what they believe in.
A. Whitney Brown (b. 1952) American comic actor, writer
(Attributed)
I am not a vegetarian because I love animals; I am a vegetarian because I hate plants.
A. Whitney Brown (b. 1952) American comic actor, writer
The Big Picture: An American Commentary (1991)
Appeasers believe that if you keep on throwing steaks to a tiger, the tiger will turn vegetarian.
Heywood Broun (1888-1939) American journalist, author
(Attributed)
(Source)
Quoted in Lin Yutang, The Wisdom of China and India (1942).
Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.
H. Jackson "Jack" Brown, Jr. (b. 1940) American writer
Life’s Little Instruction Book (1991)
Success is getting what you want. Happiness is liking what you get.
H. Jackson "Jack" Brown, Jr. (b. 1940) American writer
A Father’s Book of Wisdom (compiler) (1989)
The baby rises to its feet, takes a step, is overcome with triumph and joy — and falls flat on its face. It is a pattern for all that is to come! But learn from the bewildered baby. Lurch to your feet again. You’ll make the sofa in the end.
Pamela Brown (1924-1989) British writer, actress, television producer
The Swish of the Curtain (1938)
Think big thoughts but relish small pleasures.
H. Jackson "Jack" Brown, Jr. (b. 1940) American writer
Life’s Little Instruction Book (1991)
Morals are private. Decency is public.
Rita Mae Brown (b. 1944) American author, playwright
Starting from Scratch: A Different Kind of Writer’s Manual (1988)
I became a lesbian out of devout Christian charity. All those women out there are praying for a man and I gave them my share.
Rita Mae Brown (b. 1944) American author, playwright
Venus Envy (1993)
(Source)
Frequently paraphrased as: "My lesbianism is an act of Christian charity. All those women out there are praying for a man, and I'm giving them my share."
Never offend people with style when you can offend them with substance.
Sam W. Brown, Jr. (b. 1943) American activist, academic, diplomat
Washington Post (26 Jan. 1977)
There is surely a piece of divinity in us, something that was before the elements, and owes no homage to the sun.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Religio Medici, II.11 (1643)
I desire to exercise my faith in the most difficult point, for to credit ordinary and visible objects is not faith, but persuasion. Some believe the better for seeing Christ’s Sepulchre, and when they have seen the Red Sea, doubt not the miracle. Now contrarily I bless myself, and am thankful that I lived not in the days of miracles, that I never saw Christ nor His Disciples; I would not have been one of those Israelites that passed the Red Sea, nor one of Christ’s patients, on whom He wrought His wonders; then had my faith been thrust upon me, nor should I enjoy that greater blessing pronounced to all that believe and saw not.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Religio Medici, I.9 (1643)
But the iniquity of oblivion blindely scattereth her poppy, and deals with the memory of men without distinction to merit of perpetuity. […] Who knows whether the best of men be known? or whether there be not more remarkable persons forgot, then any that stand remembred in the known account of time?
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Hydriotaphia, or Urne-Buriall, ch. 5 (1658)
(Source)
There is another man within me that’s angry with me.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Religio Medici, II.7 (1643)
No man can justly censure or condemn another, because indeed no man truly knows another.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Religio Medici, II.4 (1643)
No, when the fight begins within himself,
A man’s worth something.Robert Browning (1812-1889) English poet
“Bishop Blougram’s Apology,” l. 693 (1855)
Men get opinions as boys learn to spell: by reiteration chiefly.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861) English poet
Aurora Leigh, Bk. VI (1857)
I have so fixed my contemplations on Heaven, that I have almost forgot the Idea of Hell, and am afraid rather to lose the joyes of the one than endure the misery of the other; to be deprived of them is a perfect hell, & needs me thinkes no addition to compleate our afflictions; that terrible terme hath never detained me from sin, nor do I owe any good action to the name thereof: I feare God, yet am not afraid of him, his mercies make me ashamed of my sins, before his judgements afraid thereof: these are the forced and secondary method of his wisedome, which he useth but as the last remedy, and upon provocation, a course rather to deterre the wicked, than incite the vertuous to his worship. I can hardly thinke there was ever any scared into Heaven, they goe the fairest way to Heaven, that would serve God without a Hell, other Mercenaries that crouch unto him in feare of Hell, though they terme themselves the servants, are indeed but the slaves of the Almighty.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Religio Medici, Part 1, sec. 52 (1643)
(Source)
Think not thy time short in this World since the World itself is not long. The created World is but a small Parenthesis in Eternity, and a short interposition for a time between such a state of duration, as was before it and may be after it.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Christian Morals, Part 3, sec. 24 (1716)
(Source)