“You put a spell on the dog,” I said as we left the house.
“Just a small one,” said Nightingale.
“So magic is real,” I said. “Which makes you a … what?”
“A wizard.”
“Like Harry Potter?”
Nightingale sighed. “No,” he said. “Not like Harry Potter.”
“In what way?”
“I’m not a fictional character,” said Nightingale.Ben Aaronovitch (b. 1964) British author
Rivers of London [Midnight Riot] (2011)
The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves — in their separate, and individual capacities. In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere.
The desirable things which the individuals of a people can not do, or can not well do, for themselves, fall into two classes: those which have relation to wrongs, and those which have not. Each of these branch off into an infinite variety of subdivisions. The first — that in relation to wrongs — embraces all crimes, misdemeanors, and non-performance of contracts. The other embraces all which, in its nature, and without wrong, requires combined action, as public roads and highways, public schools, charities, pauperism, orphanage, estates of the deceased, and the machinery of government itself.
From this it appears that if all men were just, there still would be some, though not so much, need of government.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Fragment (1 Jul 1854?)
(Source)
In Roy P. Basler (ed.), Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Vol. 2 (1953). The date, by Nicolay and Hay, is deemed arbitrary.
We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and these interests it is our duty to follow.
Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston (1784-1865) British statesman, Prime Minister (1855-58, 1859-65) [Lord Palmerston]
Speech, House of Commons (1 Mar 1848)
If individuality has no play, society does not advance; if individuality breaks out of all bounds, society perishes.
T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Administrative Nihilism” (1871)
The coldest depth of Hell is reserved for people who abandon kittens.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Friday [Friday Jones] (1982)
Carol herself was an uneasy and dodging agnostic. When she ventured to Sunday School and heard the teachers droning that the genealogy of Shamsherai was a valuable ethical problem for children to think about; when she experimented with the Wednesday prayer-meeting and listened to store-keeping elders giving unvarying weekly testimony in primitive erotic symbols and such gory Chaldean phrases as “washed in the blood of the lamb” and “a vengeful God…” then Carol was dismayed to find the Christian religion, in America, in the twentieth century, as abnormal as Zoroastrianism — without the splendor.
But when she went to church suppers a felt the friendliness, saw the gaiety with which the sisters served cold ham and scalloped potatoes; when Mrs. Champ Perry cried to her, on an afternoon call, ‘”My dear, if you just knew how happy it makes you to come into abiding grace,” then Carol found the humanness behind the sanguinary and alien theology.
Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) American novelist, playwright
Main Street (1920)
SYDNEY: Even though a number of people have tried, no one has yet found a way to drink for a living.
Jean Kerr (1922-2003) American author and playwright [b. Bridget Jean Collins]
Poor Richard, Act 1 (1965)
The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the Blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics. Everyone! “Father, the atheists?” Even the atheists. Everyone! And this Blood makes us children of God of the first class. We are created children in the likeness of God and the Blood of Christ has redeemed us all. And we all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace. If we, each doing our own part, if we do good to others, if we meet there, doing good, and we go slowly, gently, little by little, we will make that culture of encounter: We need that so much. We must meet one another doing good. “But I don’t believe, Father, I am an atheist!” But do good: We will meet one another there.
Francis I (b. 1936) Argentinian Catholic Pope (2013- ) [b. Jorge Mario Bergoglio]
Homily (22 May 2013)
(Source)
Leaders I feel should guide as far as they can — and then vanish. Their ashes should not choke the fire they have lit.
H.G. Wells (1866-1946) British writer [Herbert George Wells]
Experiment in Autobiography, ch. 9, sec. 2 “The Samurai — In Utopia and in the Fabian Society (1905-1909)” (1934)
(Source)
Variant: "Leaders should lead as far as they can and then vanish. Their ashes should not choke the fire they have lit."
Between grief and nothing I will take grief.
William Faulkner (1897-1962) American novelist
The Wild Palms (1939)
Human nature is at once sublime and horrible, holy and satanic. Apart from the accumulation of knowledge and experience, which are external and precarious acquisitions, there is no proof that we have changed much since the first stone age.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
Let us not be afraid to help each other — let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and Senators and Congressmen and Government officials but the voters of this country.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) American lawyer, politician, statesman, US President (1933-1945)
Speech, Marietta, Ohio (8 Jul 1938)
(Source)
It was involuntary. They sank my boat.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
(Attributed)
When asked how he became a war hero. In A. Schlesinger, Jr., A Thousand Days, 4.9 (1965)
Men are more ready to repay an injury than a benefit because gratitude is a burden and revenge a pleasure.
Tacitus (c.56-c.120) Roman historian, orator, politician [Publius or Gaius Cornelius Tacitus]
(Attributed)
In Machiavelli, The Discourses, 1.29 (1517) [tr. Detmold (1940)]
What you fear to believe, your children will believe.
James Richardson (b. 1950) American poet
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten-Second Essays, #340 (2001)
An inventor fails 999 times, and if he succeeds once, he’s in. He treats his failures simply as practice shots.
Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958) American inventor, engineer, researcher, businessman
(Attributed)
Today’s so-called “conservatives” don’t even know what the word means. They think I’ve turned liberal because I believe a woman has a right to an abortion. That’s a decision that’s up to the pregnant woman, not up to the pope or some do-gooders or the Religious Right. It’s not a conservative issue at all.
Barry Goldwater (1909-1998) American politician
Interview, Los Angeles Times (1994)
We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was “legal” and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was “illegal.”
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) American clergyman, civil rights leader, social activist, preacher
Letter from Birmingham Jail (16 Apr 1963)
(Source)
No man was ever more than about nine meals away from crime or suicide.
Eric Sevareid (1912-1992) American journalist [Arnold Eric Sevareid]
“A New Kind of Leadership,” speech, Conference on Vision Care, Washington, DC (26 Apr 1974)
For more discussion of this and other closely parallel quotations, see: There Are Only Nine Meals Between Mankind and Anarchy – Quote Investigator.
POLLY PEACHUM: The law is simply and solely made for the exploitation of those who do not understand it or of those who, for naked need, cannot obey it.
Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956) German poet, playwright, director, dramaturgist
Die Dreigroschenoper [The Three-Penny Opera], Act 3, sc. 1 (1928)
Alt. trans.: "The law was made for one thing alone, for the exploitation of those who don't understand it, or are prevented by naked misery from obeying it."
I have one word to say upon the subject of profound writers, who are grown very numerous of late; and I know very well the judicious world is resolved to list me in that number. I conceive therefore, as to the business of being profound, that it is with writers as with wells — a person with good eyes may see to the bottom of the deepest, provided any water be there: and often when there is nothing in the world at the bottom besides dryness and dirt, though it be but a yard and a-half under-ground, it shall pass, however, for wondrous deep upon no wiser reason than because it is wondrous dark.
Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) English writer and churchman
A Tale of a Tub (1704)
Thou canst not prevent the birds from flying above they head, but thou canst prevent their building their nests in thy hair.
Martin Luther (1483-1546) German religious reformer
Letter to Hieronymous Weller (1530)
(Source)
On temptation, attributed to "a wise oracle."
The more lies are told, the more important it becomes for the liars to justify themselves by deep moral commitments to high-sounding objectives that mask the pursuit of money and power.
Bertram M. Gross (1912-1997) American social scientist, academic, bureaucrat
Friendly Fascism: The New Face of Power in America, ch. 9 (1980)
Heaven will solve our problems, but not, I think, by showing us subtle reconciliations between all our apparently contradictory notions. The notions will all be knocked from under our feet. We shall see that there never was any problem.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
A Grief Observed (1961)
Sometimes I wonder whether if I’d been the one that went for coffee and not Leslie May my life would have been much less interesting and certainly much less dangerous. Could it have been anyone, or was it destiny? When I’m considering this I find it helpful to quote the wisdom of my father, who once told me, “Who knows why the fuck anything happens?”
Ben Aaronovitch (b. 1964) British author
Rivers of London [Midnight Riot] (2011)
Don’t wait for a light to appear at the end of the tunnel, stride down there … and light the bloody thing yourself.
Sara Henderson (1936-2005) Australian pastoralist and author
The Strength in Us All (1994)
There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.
George Washington (1732-1799) American military leader, Founding Father, US President (1789-1797)
Farewell Address (17 Sep 1796) [with A. Hamilton]
It is not by wearing down into uniformity all that is individual in themselves, but by cultivating it and calling it forth, within the limits imposed by the rights and interests of others, that human beings become a noble and beautiful object of contemplation; and as the works partake the character of those who do them, by the same process human life also becomes rich, diversified, and animating, furnishing more abundant aliment to high thoughts and elevating feelings, and strengthening the tie which binds every individual to the race, by making the race infinitely better worth belonging to. In proportion to the development of his individuality, each person becomes more valuable to himself, and is therefore capable of being more valuable to others
John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) English philosopher and economist
On Liberty, ch. 3 “Of Individuality, as One of the Elements of Well-Being” (1859)
Why do men with little souls have to have big weapons?
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Friday [Friday Jones] (1982)
The doctor asserted, “Sure religion is a fine influence — got to have it to keep the lower classes in order — fact, it’s the only thing that appeals to a lot of these fellows and makes ’em respect the rights of property. And I guess this theology is O.K.; lot of wise old coots figured it out, and they knew more about it than we do.” He believed in the Christian religion, and never thought about it; he believed in the church, and seldom went near it; he was shocked by Carol’s lack of faith, and wasn’t quite sure what was the nature of the faith that she lacked.
Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) American novelist, playwright
Main Street (1920)
The Lord created us in His image and likeness, and we are the image of the Lord, and He does good and all of us have this commandment at heart: do good and do not do evil. All of us. “But, Father, this is not Catholic! He cannot do good.” Yes, he can. He must. Not can: must! Because he has this commandment within him. Instead, this “closing off” that imagines that those outside, everyone, cannot do good is a wall that leads to war and also to what some people throughout history have conceived of: killing in the name of God. That we can kill in the name of God. And that, simply, is blasphemy. To say that you can kill in the name of God is blasphemy.
Francis I (b. 1936) Argentinian Catholic Pope (2013- ) [b. Jorge Mario Bergoglio]
Homily (22 May 2013)
(Source)
Things said or done long years ago,
Or things I did not do or say
But thought that I might say or do,
Weigh me down, and not a day
But something is recalled,
My conscience or my vanity appalled.William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) Irish poet and dramatist
“Vacillation,” st. 4 (1932), The Winding Stair and Other Poems (1933)
(Source)
You learn to know a pilot in a storm.
Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC-AD 65) Roman statesman, philosopher, playwright [Lucius Annaeus Seneca]
Moral Essays, “On Providence” (4.5) [tr. Basore (1928)]
Beneath the dingy uniformity of international fashions in dress, man remains what he has always been — a splendid fighting animal, a self-sacrificing hero, and a bloodthirsty savage.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
I feel about airplanes the way I feel about diets. It seems to me that they are wonderful things for other people to go on.
Jean Kerr (1922-2003) American author and playwright [b. Bridget Jean Collins]
“Mirror, Mirror on the Wall,” The Snake Has All the Lines (1958)
Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made.
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) German philosopher
“Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose [Idee zu einer allgemeinen Geschichte in weltbürgerlicher Absicht]” (1784)
The hero saves us. Praise the hero! Now, who will save us from the hero?
Cato the Elder (234-149 BC) Roman politician and orator [Marcus Portius Cato]
Speech in the Roman Senate
It may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you’re gonna have to serve somebody.Bob Dylan (b. 1941) American singer, songwriter
“Gotta Serve Somebody” (1979)
Even at the movies, we laugh together, we weep alone.
James Richardson (b. 1950) American poet
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten-Second Essays (2001)
If I want to stop a research program I can always do it by getting a few experts to sit in on the subject, because they know right away that it was a fool thing to try in the first place.
Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958) American inventor, engineer, researcher, businessman
(Attributed)
You must remember that some things that are legally right are not morally right.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
Remark to potential client (1840s?), refusing his case involving a $600 claim against a widow with six children. In F. Brown, The Every-Day Life of Abraham Lincoln, 2.6 (1887).
There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate — died of malnutrition — because the food must rot, must be forced to rot.
In the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.
John Steinbeck (1902-1968) American writer
The Grapes of Wrath, ch. 25 (1939)
The essence of leadership is to get others to do something because they think you want it done and because they know it is worth while doing — that is what we are talking about.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Speech, Republican Campaign Picnic, Gettysburg (12 Sep 1956)
Pride, ill nature, and want of sense, are the three great sources of ill manners.
Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) English writer and churchman
A Treatise on Good Manners and Good Breeding (1754)
Ya got trouble, folks!
Right here in River City.
Trouble with a capital “T”
And that rhymes with “P”
And that stands for pool!Meredith Willson (1902-1984) American composer, songwriter, flutist, conductor, playwright
“(Ya Got) Trouble,” The Music Man (1957)
Perseverance is the hard work you do after you get tired of doing the hard work you already did.
Newt Gingrich (b. 1943) American politician [Newton Leroy Gingrich]
Renewing American Civilization, Lecture 2 “Personal Strength” (1993)
The best liar is he who makes the smallest amount of lying go the longest way.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902) English novelist, satirist, scholar
The Way of All Flesh, ch. 39 (1903)
There isn’t a way things should be. There’s just what happens, and what we do.
Remember, though we struggle against things because we are afraid of them, it is often the other way round — we get afraid because we struggle. Are you struggling, resisting? Don’t you think Our Lord says to you ‘Peace, child, peace. Relax. Let go. Underneath are the everlasting arms. Let go, I will catch you. Do you trust me so little?’ Of course, this may not be the end. Then make it a good rehearsal.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
Letter to Mary Willis Shelburne (17 Jun 1963)
Discussing the closeness of death.
No matter how unpredictable the future may be, we don’t win freedom through security systems, cryptography, interrogations and spot searches. We win freedom by having the courage and the conviction to live every day freely and to act as a free society, no matter how great the threats are on the horizon.
Cory Doctorow (b. 1971) Canadian-British blogger, journalist, activist, author
Little Brother (2008)
If crisis management requires cold and even brutal measures to show determination, it also imposes the need to show the opponent a way out. Grandstanding is good for the ego but bad for foreign policy. […] Many wars have started because no line of retreat was left open.
Whatever crushes individuality is despotism, by whatever name it may be called and whether it professes to be enforcing the will of God or the injunctions of men.
John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) English philosopher and economist
On Liberty, ch. 3 “Of Individuality, as One of the Elements of Well-Being” (1859)
(Source)
Unless you intend to kill him immediately thereafter, never kick a man in the balls. Not even symbolically. Or perhaps especially not symbolically.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Friday [Friday Jones] (1982)
In the manner of one who has just beheld a two-headed calf they repeated that they had “never heard such funny ideas!” They were staggered to learn that a real tangible person, living in Minnesota, and married to their own flesh-and-blood relation, could apparently believe that divorce may not always be immoral; that illegitimate children do not bear any special and guaranteed form of curse; that there are ethical authorities outside of the Hebrew Bible; that men have drunk wine yet not died in the gutter; that the capitalistic system of distribution and the Baptist wedding-ceremony were not known in the Garden of Eden; that mushrooms are as edible as corn-beef hash; that the word “dude” is no longer frequently used; that there are Ministers of the Gospel who accept evolution; that some persons of apparent intelligence and business ability do not always vote the Republican ticket straight; that it is not a universal custom to wear scratchy flannels next the skin in winter; that a violin is not inherently more immoral than a chapel organ; that some poets do not have long hair; and that Jews are not always pedlers or pants-makers.
“Where does she get all them the’ries?” marveled Uncle Whittier Small; while Aunt Bessie inquired, “Do you suppose there’s many folks got notions like hers? My! If there are,” and her tone settled the fact that there were not, “I just don’t know what the world’s coming to!”
SPOCK: Physical reality is consistent with universal laws. Where the laws do not operate, there is no reality.
Gene L. Coon (1924-1973) American screenwriter and television producer
Star Trek, 3×06 “Spectre of the Gun” (25 Oct 1968) [writing as Lee Cronin]
You never can tell when you do an act
Just what the result will be;
But with every deed you are sowing a seed,
Though the harvest you may not see.Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
“You Never Can Tell,” Custer And Other Poems (1896)
(Source)
Be the chief but never the lord.
Lao-tzu (604?-531? BC) Chinese philosopher, poet [also Lao-tse, Laozi]
The Way of Life, ch. 10 [tr. Blakney (1955)]
Public services have, to use the economist’s word, a strong redistributional effect. And this effect is strongly in favor of those with lower incomes. Those who clamor the loudest for public economy are those for whom public services do the least. Tax reduction that curtails or limits public services has a double effect in comforting the comfortable and afflicting the poor.
The most important thing about me is that I am a Catholic. It’s a superstructure within which you can work, like a sonnet.
Jean Kerr (1922-2003) American author and playwright [b. Bridget Jean Collins]
Interview, Time (14 Apr 1961)
I need some encouragement. I need to ask myself, “What would an Apollo astronaut do?” He’d drink three whiskey sours, drive his Corvette to the launchpad, then fly to the moon in a command module smaller than my Rover. Man those guys were cool.
Andy Weir (b. 1972) American programmer and writer
The Martian (2011)
No man is a hero to his valet.
Anne-Marie Bigot de Cornuel (1605-1694) French wit and aphorist
Lettres de Mlle Aïssé, 12.13 (1728)
See Goethe.
All things are artificial, for nature is the art of God.
Thomas Browne (1605-1682) English physician and author
Religio Medici, Part 1, sec.16 (1642) [ed. Symonds (1886)]
(Source)
Harder to laugh at the comedy if it’s about you, harder to cry at the tragedy if it isn’t.
James Richardson (b. 1950) American poet
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten-Second Essays (2001)
If you have always done it that way, it is probably wrong.
Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958) American inventor, engineer, researcher, businessman
(Attributed)
Trading privacy for security is stupid enough; not getting any actual security in the bargain is even more stupid.
Cory Doctorow (b. 1971) Canadian-British blogger, journalist, activist, author
Little Brother (2008)
No law is stronger than is the public sentiment where it is to be enforced.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Letter to John J. Crittenden (22 Dec 1859)
He that feeds the hungry feeds God also.
The Talmud (AD 200-500) Collection of Jewish rabbinical writings
(Unreferenced)
The job of getting people really wanting to do something is the essence of leadership. And one of the things a leader needs occasionally is the inspiration he gets from the people he leads. The old tactical textbooks say that the commander always visits his troops to inspire them to fight. I for one soon discovered that one of the reasons for my visiting the front lines was to get inspiration from the young American soldier. I went back to my job ashamed of my own occasional resentments or discouragements, which I probably — at least I hope I concealed them.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Speech, Republican State Chairmen, Denver (10 Sep 1955)
Pedantry is properly the over-rating of any kind of knowledge we pretend to.
Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) English writer and churchman
A Treatise on Good Manners and Good Breeding (1754)
The voice of passion is better than the voice of reason.
The passionless cannot change history.Czesław Miłosz (1911-2004) Polish-Lithuanian poet, essayist, diplomat
“The Child of Europe” (1946)
(Source)
Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia, ch. 13 (1759)
I do not mind lying, but I hate inaccuracy.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902) English novelist, satirist, scholar
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler, ch. 19 [ed. Festing-Jones] (1907)
If you don’t turn your life into a story, you just become a part of someone else’s story.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents (2001)
The golden apple of selfhood, thrown among the false gods, became an apple of discord because they scrambled for it. They did not know the first rule of the holy game, which is that every player must by all means touch the ball and then immediately pass it on. To be found with it in your hands is a fault: to cling to it, death. But when it flies to and fro among the players too swift for eye to follow, and the great master Himself leads the revelry, giving Himself eternally to His creatures in the generation, and back to Himself in the sacrifice, of the Word, then indeed the eternal dance ‘makes heaven drowsy with the harmony’. All pains and pleasures we have known on earth are early initiations in the movements of that dance: but the dance itself is strictly incomparable with the sufferings of this present time. As we draw nearer to its uncreated rhythm, pain and pleasure sink almost out of sight. There is joy in the dance, but it does not exist for the sake of joy. It does not even exist for the sake of good, or of love. It is Love Himself, and Good Himself, and therefore happy. It does not exist for us, but we for it.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
The Problem of Pain (1940)
There are leaders and there are those who lead. Leaders hold a position of power or authority, but those who lead inspire us. Whether they’re individuals or organizations, we follow those who lead, not because we have to, but because we want to. We follow those who lead, not for them, but for ourselves.
Simon Sinek (b. 1973) British-American author and motivational speaker
“How great leaders inspire action,” TED Talk (Sep 2009)
(Source)
The most perilous moment is often when an adversary is seemingly prepared to retreat and then is jolted into new defiance by an assault on his self-esteem.
Henry Kissinger (1923-2024) German-American diplomat
Years of Upheaval, ch. 12 (1982)
Though all men be made of one metal, yet they be not cast all in one mold.
John Lyly (c. 1553-1606) was an English writer [also Lilly or Lylie]
Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit, “Euphues” (1579)
A man who is happy at home doesn’t lie awake nights worrying about the hereafter.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Job: A Comedy of Justice (1984)
It has not yet been recorded that any human being has gained a very large or permanent contentment from meditation upon the fact that he is better off than others.
Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) American novelist, playwright
Main Street (1920)
There is (usually) no crime in performing a jerk maneuver, or acting like a jerk. Everyone can, and has, acted like a jerk from time to time. It’s a regrettable but natural part of the human experience. But most people have the good sense to understand that acting like a jerk should not be a lifestyle choice, and that if you make it one, people will respond to you based on your choices.
John Scalzi (b. 1969) American writer
“Being a Jerk About the Hugos: Not as Effective a Strategy as You Might Think”, Whatever (blog) (24 Aug 2015)
(Source)
If you really want to judge the character of a man, look not at his great performances. Every fool may become a hero at one time or another. Watch a man do his most common actions; these are indeed the things which will tell you the real character of a great man.
Vivekananda (1863-1902) Indian Hindu monk, spiritual reformer, nationalist [b. Narendra Nath Datta]
Swami Vivekananda on Universal Ethics and Moral Conduct [ed. Swami Ranganathananda (1965)]
One should never forbid what one lacks the power to prevent.
Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) French emperor, military leader
(Attributed)
An aphorism he frequently used. See Sophocles.
Even the protective functions of the state are most important for those in the lower income brackets. Lethal serum and poison drugs do, one gathers, work rather democratically on rich and poor alike. But many of us could probably survive a certain amount of exploitation in our prescriptions, fraud in our food packaging, mendacity in our dental advertising, or thimblerigging in our securities. We live in parts of cities where epidemics are less likely. The family that struggles to make ends meet, the widow with life-insurance money around loose, the dwellers in urban tenements need the protection of an alert FTC, FDA, SEC, and Public Health Service.
Man is the only animal that learns by being hypocritical. He pretends to be polite and then, eventually, he becomes polite.
Jean Kerr (1922-2003) American author and playwright [b. Bridget Jean Collins]
Finishing Touches, Act 1 (1973)
It reminds me of growing up in Chicago and having to shovel snow. I’ll give my dad credit; he never claimed it was to build character or teach me the value of hard work. “Snowblowers are expensive,” he used to say. “You’re free.” Once, I tried to appeal to my mom. “Don’t be such a wuss,” she suggested.
Andy Weir (b. 1972) American programmer and writer
The Martian (2011)
When ye build yer triumphal arch to yer conquerin’ hero, Hinnisssey, build it out of bricks so the people will have somethin’ convanient to throw at him as he passes through.
Finley Peter Dunne (1867-1936) American humorist and journalist
“Fame”
Nature is but a name for an effect,
Whose cause is God.William Cowper (1731-1800) English poet
The Task, 6.123 (1785)
If a couple could see themselves twenty years later they might not recognize their love, but they would recognize their argument.
James Richardson (b. 1950) American poet
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten-Second Essays, # 20 (2001)
(Source)
In America we can say what we think, and even if we can’t think, we can say it anyhow.
Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958) American inventor, engineer, researcher, businessman
(Attributed)
Find out just what any people will quietly submit to, and you have found out the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them; and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.
Frederick Douglass (1817-1895) American abolitionist, orator, writer
Speech on West India Emancipation (4 Aug 1857)
The great can protect themselves, but the poor and humble require the arm and shield of the law.
Andrew Jackson (1767-1845) American politician, general, US President (1829-1837)
Letter to John Quincy Adams (26 Aug 1821)
Hunger makes a thief of any man.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
The Good Earth, ch. 15 (1931)
Government can do a great deal to aid the settlement of labor disputes without allowing itself to be employed as an ally of either side. Its proper role in industrial strife is to encourage the process of mediation and conciliation.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
State of the Union Message (2 Feb 1953)
Yet malice never was his aim;
He lashed the vice but spared the name.
No individual could resent,
Where thousands equally were meant.Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) English writer and churchman
“Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift,” l. 459 (1731)
Liquor doesn’t make you feel better. Just makes you not so worried about feeling bad.
James S. A. Corey (contemp.) American writer [pen name of Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck]
Leviathan Wakes, ch. 42 (2011) [with Ty Franck]
(Source)
You see, fellow-soldiers, that perseverance is more prevailing than violence, and that many things which cannot be overcome when they are together, yield themselves up when taken little by little.
Quintus Sertorius (c. 123-72 BC) Roman statesman and general
In Plutarch, Parallel Lives, “Sertorius,” sec. 16 [Dryden ed. (1693)]
(Source)
Alt. trans.: "You see, fellow-soldiers, that perseverance is worth more than energy, and that many things that cannot be overcome when they are together, yield themselves up when taken little by little."
I fear one lies more to one’s self than to anyone else.
Here’s some advice boy. Don’t put your trust in revolutions. They always come around again. That’s why they’re called revolutions.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Night Watch (2002)
“I suppose there are two views about everything,” said Mark.
“Eh? Two views? There are a dozen views about everything until you know the answer. Then there’s never more than one.”
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
That Hideous Strength (1945)