The greatest pleasure I know is to do a good action by stealth, and to have it found out by accident.
Charles Lamb (1775-1834) Welsh-English essayist
“Table Talk, by the Late Elia,” London Athenaeum (4 Jan 1834)
(Source)
Take every birthday with a grain of salt. This works much better if the salt accompanies a large margarita.
John Wagner (b. 1949) American-British cartoonist ("Maxine")
Maxine
For all my rational Western intellect and education, I was for the moment overwhelmed by a primitive sense of living in a world ordered by a malign and perverted god, and it coloured my view of everything that afternoon — even the coconuts. The villagers sold us some and split them open for us. They are almost perfectly designed. You first make a hole and drink the milk, and then you split open the nut with a machete and slice off a segment of the shell, which forms a perfect implement for scooping out the coconut flesh inside. What makes you wonder about the nature of this god character is that he creates something that is so perfectly designed to be of benefit to human beings and then hangs it twenty feet above their heads on a tree with no branches.
Douglas Adams (1952-2001) English writer
Last Chance to See, ch. 2 (1990)
We are all imperfect. We can not expect perfect government.
William Howard Taft (1857-1930) US President (1909-13) and Chief Justice (1921-1930)
Speech, Board of Trade and Chamber of Commerce, Washington, DC (8 May 1909)
Do your duty, and leave the outcome to the Gods.
Pierre Corneille (1606-1684) French tragedian
Horace, Act 2, sc. 8 (1640)
It is easier to write ten volumes of philosophy than to put one principle into practice.
Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) Russian novelist and moral philosopher
Diary (1847-03-17)
(Source)
From his earliest diary entry, when he was 18.Variants:
- "It is easier to produce ten volumes of philosophical writing than to put one principle into practice."
- "It is easier to write ten volumes on theoretical principles than to put one principle into practice."
Teachers need our active support and encouragement. They are doing one of the most necessary and exacting jobs in the land. They are developing our most precious national resource: our children, our future citizens.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Speech, Centennial Celebration Banquet, National Education Association (4 Apr 1957)
Would you persuade, speak of Interest, not of Reason.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman, scientist, philosopher, aphorist
Poor Richard (1734 ed.)
(Source)
Blessed are the cracked, for they let in the light.
Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan (1918-2002) Anglo-Irish comedian, writer, actor
(Attributed)
How do you finish them? You finish them. There’s no magic answer, I’m afraid. This is how you do it: you sit down at the keyboard and you put one word after another until it’s done. It’s that easy, and that hard.
Neil Gaiman (b. 1960) British author, screenwriter, fabulist
Blog entry (2004-05-02), “Pens, Rules, Finishing Things, and Why Stephin Merritt is not Grouchy”
(Source)
On finishing stories.
However highly we must value courage and steadfastness in war, and however little prospect of victory there is for him who cannot resolve to seek it by the exertion of all his strength, still there is a point beyond which perseverance can only be called desperate folly, and therefore cannot be approved by any critic.
[Wie hoch auch der Wert des Mutes und der Standhaftigkeit im Kriege angeschlagen werden muß, und wie wenig Aussicht der zum Siege hat, der sich nicht entschließen kann, ihn mit der ganzen Kraftanstrengung zu suchen, so gibt es doch einen Punkt, über den hinaus das Verharren nur eine verzweiflungsvolle Torheit genannt und also von keiner Kritik gebilligt werden kann.]
Karl von Clausewitz (1780-1831) Prussian soldier, historian, military theorist
On War [Vom Kriege], Book 4, ch. 9 “The Battle: Its Decision [Die Hauptschlacht. Ihre Entscheidung],” (4.9) (1832) [tr. Jolles (1943)]
(Source)
(Source (German)). Alternate translations:However highly we must esteem courage and firmness in war, and however little prospect there is of victory to him who cannot resolve to seek it by the exertion of all his power, still there is a point beyond which perseverance can only be termed desperate folly, and therefore can meet with no approbation from any critic.
[tr. Graham (1873)]No matter how highly rated the qualities of courage and steadfastness may be in war, no matter how small the chance of victory may be for the leader who hesitates to go for it with all the power at his disposal, there is a point beyond which persistence becomes desperate folly, and can therefore never be condoned.
[tr. Howard & Paret (1976)]
Liberty, like charity, must begin at home.
James Bryant Conant (1893-1978) American chemist, academic, diplomat
“Our Fighting Faith, Our Unique Heritage,” address, Harvard (20 Jun 1942)
Fantasy is an exercise bicycle for the mind. It might not take you anywhere, but it tones up the muscles that can.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Interview in Leonard Marcus, The Wand in the World: Conversations with Writers of Fantasy (2006)
(Source)
This quotation is sometimes given with "But I may be wrong" as a following sentence, but that does not appear in the original.
Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn, my God, do you learn.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
(Attributed)
There are several variants, but no citation for this quotation. See Pliny the Younger.
Wall Street, where enough is never enough.
Alison Leigh Cowan (contemp.) American journalist
“Divorce, Wall Street Style,” New York Times (22 Jan 1989)
[The commander] must always think and plan two battles ahead — the one he is prepared to fight and the next one — so that the success gained in one battle can be used as a springboard for the next.
Bernard Montgomery (1887-1976) British military leader
The Memoirs of Field-Marshal Montgomery, ch. 6 (1958)
My test of the real worth of a man as a preacher is when his congregation go away, saying, not, “What a beautiful sermon!” but “I will do something.”
François de Sales (1567-1622) French bishop, saint, writer [a.k.a. Francis de Sales, b. François de Boisy]
(Attributed)
(Source)
Sin? Sin like love was a word hard to define. It came in two bitter but vastly different flavors. The first lay in violating the taboos of your tribe … The other meaning of sin was easier to define because it was not molded by the murky concepts of religion and taboo: Sin is behavior that ignores the welfare of others.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Time Enough For Love (1973)
Step by step they were led to things which dispose to vice: the lounge, the bath, the elegant banquet. All this in their ignorance they called civilisation, when it was but a part of their servitude.
[Idque apud imperitos humanitas vocabatur, cum pars servitutis esset.]
Tacitus (c.56-c.120) Roman historian, orator, politician [Publius or Gaius Cornelius Tacitus]
Agricola, Book 1, para. 21 (AD 98) [tr. Church and Brodribb]
Alt. trans.: "Because they didn't know better, they called it 'civilization,' when it was part of their slavery."
We so want heroes, and we want to think that someone who is good and inspirational in some ways is good and inspirational in all ways — a dubious proposition even in modern times, let along fifty, a hundred, two hundred years ago or more. Which then lets us exercise that other instinctive desire: we so want villains ….
Graham Ericsson (b. 1947) American writer, aphorist
What Have You Done To Me Lately?, ch. 1 (2014)
Although men flatter themselves with their great actions, they are not so often the result of a great design as of chance.
François VI, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) French epigrammatist, memoirist, noble
Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales [Maxims] (1665-1678)
To tell a woman who is forty, “You look like sixteen,” is baloney. The blarney way of saying it is: “Tell me how old you are, I should like to know at what age women are most beautiful.”
Fulton Sheen (1895-1979) American Catholic archbishop, preacher, televangelist
Life Is Worth Living, s.5 (1957)
We believe we must be the family of America, recognizing that at the heart of the matter we are bound one to another, that the problems of a retired school teacher in Duluth are our problems; that the future of the child in Buffalo is our future; that the struggle of a disabled man in Boston to survive and live decently is our struggle; that the hunger of a woman in Little Rock is our hunger; that the failure anywhere to provide what reasonably we might, to avoid pain, is our failure.
Mario Cuomo (1932-2015) American politician
Keynote Address, Democratic National Convention (16 Jul 1984)
(Source)
“So what do we do if we get bitten by something deadly, then?” I asked.
He blinked at me as if I were stupid.
“Well what do you think you do?” he said. “You die of course. That’s what deadly means.”
Douglas Adams (1952-2001) English writer
Last Chance to See, ch. 2 (1990)
He died doing what he loved most: not being dead.
Joss Whedon (b. 1964) American screenwriter, author, producer [Joseph Hill Whedon]
Tweet (3 Oct 2014)
(Source)
Philosophy directs us first to seek the goods of the mind, and the rest will either be supplied, or are not much wanted.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626) English philosopher, scientist, author, statesman
Advancement of Learning, 8.2 (1605)
To work a Man to thy Bent: 1. Know his Inclinations. 2. Observe his Ends. 3. Search out his Weakness. And so thou mayst either draw or drive him.
Thomas Fuller (1654-1734) English physician, preacher, aphorist, writer
Introductio ad Prudentiam, #1068 (1725)
(Source)
Censorship, in my opinion, is a stupid and shallow way of approaching the solution to any problem. Though sometimes necessary, as witness a professional and technical secret that may have a bearing upon the welfare and very safety of this country, we should be very careful in the way we apply it, because in censorship always lurks the very great danger of working to the disadvantage of the American nation.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Speech, Associated Press luncheon, New York (24 Apr 1950)
Are you going to come along quietly, or am I going to have to use ear plugs?
Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan (1918-2002) Anglo-Irish comedian, writer, actor
The Goon Show, 9×12 “The Call of the West” (20 Jan 1959)
Variant: "Are you going to come along quietly, or do you want musical accompaniment?"
The best time for planning a book is while you’re doing the dishes.
Agatha Christie (1890-1976) English writer
(Attributed)
‘Tis Perseverance that prevails.
Thomas Fuller (1654-1734) English physician, preacher, aphorist, writer
Gnomologia: Adages and Proverbs, #5110 (1732)
(Source)
Nothing is more dreaded than the national government meddling with religion.
John Adams (1735-1826) American lawyer, Founding Father, statesman, US President (1797-1801)
Letter to Benjamin Rush (1812)
We who think we are about to die will laugh at anything.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Night Watch (2002)
Even while we kill and punish we must try to feel about the enemy as we feel about ourselves — to wish that he were not bad, to hope that he may, in this world or another, be cured: in fact, to wish his good. That is what is meant in the Bible by loving him: wishing his good, not feeling fond of him nor saying he is nice when he is not.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
Mere Christianity (1952)
Anyone can be heroic from time to time, but a gentleman is something which you have to be all the time. Which isn’t easy.
Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936) Italian novelist and dramatist
The Pleasure of Honesty (1917) [tr. Murray]
What makes a plan capable of producing results is the commitment of key people to work on specific tasks.
Peter F. Drucker (1909-2005) Austrian-American business consultant
Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, ch. 8 (1977 ed.)
Be what you wish others to become. Let yourself and not your words preach for you.
Henri-Frédéric Amiel (1821-1881) Swiss philosopher, poet, critic
Journal (7 Apr 1851) [tr. Ward (1887)]
Crazy — a nonscientific term meaning that the person to whom one applies that label has a world picture differing from the accepted one.
Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Time Enough For Love [Lazarus Long] (1973)
Theology being the work of males, original sin was traced to the female.
Barbara W. Tuchman (1912-1989) American historian and author
A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century, ch. 9 (1978)
(Source)
There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.
W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) English novelist and playwright [William Somerset Maugham]
(Attributed)
The earliest (uncited) attribution is from 1977. More discussion here.
Indolence is a delightful but distressing state; we must be doing something to be happy. Action is no less necessary than thought to the instinctive tendencies of the human frame.
William Hazlitt (1778-1830) English writer
Table Talk, “On the Pleasure of Painting” (1821-22)
Oh! be thou blest with all that Heaven can send,
Long health, long youth, long pleasure, and a friend.Alexander Pope (1688-1744) English poet
“To Mrs. M.B. on Her Birth-Day”, l. 1
We believe in only the government we need, but we insist on all the government we need. We believe in a government that is characterized by fairness and reasonableness, a reasonableness that goes beyond labels, that doesn’t distort or promise to do things that we know we can’t do. We believe in a government strong enough to use words like “love” and “compassion” and smart enough to convert our noblest aspirations into practical realities. We believe in encouraging the talented, but we believe that while survival of the fittest may be a good working description of the process of evolution, a government of humans should elevate itself to a higher order.
Mario Cuomo (1932-2015) American politician
Keynote Address, Democratic National Convention (16 Jul 1984)
(Source)
Solutions nearly always come from the direction you least expect, which means there’s no point trying to look in that direction because it won’t be coming from there.
Douglas Adams (1952-2001) English writer
The Salmon of Doubt (2002)
I also give it in charge to you to avoid all disrespect of the religion of the country, and its ceremonies. Prudence, policy, and a true Christian spirit, will lead us to look wit compassion up their errors without insulting them. While we are contending for our own liberty, we should be very cautious not to violate 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 are they answerable.
George Washington (1732-1799) American military leader, Founding Father, US President (1789-1797)
“Charge to the Northern Expeditionary Force,” letter to Benedict Arnold (14 Sep 1775)
(Source)
Regarding the invasion of (Catholic) Quebec, Canada.
When we are pleased with ourselves, we are pleased with others.
Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915) American writer, businessman, philosopher
The Philosophy of Elbert Hubbard [ed. Edward Hubbard II] (1930)
If the man doesn’t believe as we do, we say he is a crank, and that settles it. I mean it does nowadays, because now we can’t burn him.
Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
Following the Equator, ch. 53 (1897)
No one would have crossed the ocean if he could have gotten off the ship in the storm.
Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958) American inventor, engineer, researcher, businessman
In “Looking ahead with Boss Ket,” Popular Mechanics (Feb 1935)
If we do not lay out ourselves in the service of mankind whom should we serve?
Abigail Adams (1744-1818) American correspondent, First Lady (1797-1801)
Letter to John Thaxter (29 Sep 1778)
Never threaten, because a threat is a promise to pay that it isn’t always convenient to meet, but if you don’t make it good it hurts your credit. Save a threat till you’re ready to act, and then you won’t need it.
George Horace Lorimer (1867-1937) American journalist, author, magazine editor
Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son, ch. 15 (1901)
(Source)
There are some philosophers who exist to uphold the status quo, and others who exist to upset it — Marx, of course, belongs to the second lot. For my part, I should reject both those as not being the true business of a philosopher, and I should say the business of a philosopher is not to change the world but to understand it, which is the exact opposite to what Marx said.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
Interview by Woodrow Wyatt, BBC TV (1959)
Collected in Bertrand Russell's BBC Interviews (1959) [UK] and Bertrand Russell Speaks His Mind (1960) [US]. Reprinted (abridged) in The Humanist (1982-11/12), and in Russell Society News, #37 (1983-02).
We are susceptible only to those suggestions with which we are already secretly in accord.
Carl Jung (1875-1961) Swiss psychologist
Modern Man in Search of a Soul, ch. 3 [tr. Dell & Baynes (1933)]
MAL: Nothing worse than a monster who thinks he’s right with God.
Brett Matthews (b. c. 1978) American television screenwriter, author
Firefly, 1×13 “Heart of Gold” (4 Aug 2003)
But finally, there is one other quality I would mention among these that I believe will fit you for difficult and important posts. This is a healthy and lively sense of humor.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Commencement Address, US Naval Academy (4 Jun 1958)
There is something wonderful in seeing a wrong-headed majority assailed by truth.
John Kenneth Galbraith (1908-2006) Canadian-American economist, diplomat, author
The Guardian (28 Jul 1989)
Praise, like gold and diamonds, owes its value only to its scarcity.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English writer, lexicographer, critic
The Rambler, #136 (6 Jul 1751)
(Source)
Some very worthy persons, who have not had great advantages for information, have objected against that clause in the constitution which provides, that no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States. They have been afraid that this clause is unfavorable to religion. But my countrymen, the sole purpose and effect of it is to exclude persecution, and to secure to you the important right of religious liberty. We are almost the only people in the world, who have a full enjoyment of this important right of human nature. In our country every man has a right to worship God in that way which is most agreeable to his conscience. If he be a good and peaceable person he is liable to no penalties or incapacities on account of his religious sentiments; or in other words, he is not subject to persecution. But in other parts of the world, it has been, and still is, far different. Systems of religious error have been adopted, in times of ignorance. It has been the interest of tyrannical kings, popes, and prelates, to maintain these errors. When the clouds of ignorance began to vanish, and the people grew more enlightened, there was no other way to keep them in error, but to prohibit their altering their religious opinions by severe persecuting laws. In this way persecution became general throughout Europe.
Oliver Ellsworth (1745-1807) American lawyer, politician, Founder, Supreme Court chief justice (1796-1800)
Essay (17 Dec 1787)
(Source)
No, I have never wanted to be a man. I have often wanted to be more effective as a woman, but I have never felt that trousers would do the trick!
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
If You Ask Me (1946)
She was beautiful, but she was beautiful in the way a forest fire was beautiful: something to be admired from a distance, not up close.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Good Omens, 3. “Wednesday” (1990) [with Neil Gaiman]
(Source)
If you don’t know what to do, sit still and listen. You may hear something.
Carl Sandburg (1878-1967) American poet, biographer
Incidentals (1900)
Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; It is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable.
Sydney J. Harris (1917-1986) Anglo-American columnist, journalist, author
Strictly Personal (1953)
May you live to be a hundred years,
With one extra year to repent.(Other Authors and Sources)
Irish proverb
We believe in a single fundamental idea that describes better than most textbooks and any speech that I could write what a proper government should be: the idea of family, mutuality, the sharing of benefits and burdens for the good of all, feeling one another’s pain, sharing one another’s blessings — reasonably, honestly, fairly, without respect to race, or sex, or geography, or political affiliation.
Mario Cuomo (1932-2015) American politician
Commencement Address, Iona College (3 Jun 1984)
It’s important to remember that the relationship between different media tends to be complementary. When new media arrive they don’t necessarily replace or eradicate previous types. Though we should perhaps observe a half second silence for the eight-track. — There that’s done. What usually happens is that older media have to shuffle about a bit to make space for the new one and its particular advantages. Radio did not kill books and television did not kill radio or movies — what television did kill was the cinema newsreel.
Douglas Adams (1952-2001) English writer
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Future (2001)
The higher paranoid scholarship is nothing if not coherent — in fact the paranoid mind is far more coherent than the real world.
Richard Hofstadter (1916-1970) American historian and intellectual
“The Paranoid Style in American Politics,” Herbert Spencer Lecture, Oxford (Nov 1963)
Reprinted in Harpers (Nov 1964).
The man who makes it his business to please the multitude is never done.
Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592) French essayist
The Autobiography of Michel de Montaigne, ch. 34 [ed. Marven Lowenthal (1935)]
The man who has no tincture of philosophy goes through life imprisoned in the prejudices derived from common sense, from the habitual beliefs of his age or his nation, and from convictions which have grown up in his mind without the co-operation or consent of his deliberate reason.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
The Problems of Philosophy, ch. 15 “The Value of Philosophy” (1912)
It is really mortifying, sir, when a woman possessed of a common share of understanding considers the difference of education between the male and female sex, even in those families where education is attended to …. Nay, why should your sex wish for such a disparity in those whom they one day intend for companions and associates. Pardon me, sir, if I cannot help sometimes suspecting that this neglect arises in some measure from an ungenerous jealousy of rivals near the throne.
Abigail Adams (1744-1818) American correspondent, First Lady (1797-1801)
Letter to John Thaxter (15 Feb 1778)
I often say that research is a way of finding out what you are going to do when you can’t keep on doing what you are doing now.
Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958) American inventor, engineer, researcher, businessman
“Industrial Prospecting,” Speech, Founder Societies of Engineers (20 May 1935)
Happiness is where we find it, but very rarely where we seek it.
Jean-Antoine Petit-Senn (1792-1870) French-Swiss poet
(Attributed)
Slavery was contrary to all the moral principles advocated by Plato and Aristotle, yet neither of them saw this because to renounce slavery would have meant the collapse of the life they were living.
Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) Russian novelist and moral philosopher
The Kingdom of God Is Within You, ch. 6 (1893) [tr. Maude (1936)]
The Difficult is that which can be done immediately; the Impossible is that which takes a little longer.
George Santayana (1863-1952) Spanish-American poet and philosopher [Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruíz de Santayana y Borrás]
(Attributed)
Quoted in Reader's Digest (Nov 1939), but without citation. The sentiment has a number of antecedents (see discussion here).
ZOE: Preacher, don’t the Bible have some pretty specific things to say about killin’?
BOOK: Quite specific. It is, however, somewhat fuzzier on the subject of kneecaps.
Cheryl Cain (contemp.) American television screenwriter
Firefly, 1×10 “War Stories” (6 Dec 2002)
The hope of the world is that wisdom can arrest conflict between brothers. I believe that war is the deadly harvest of arrogant and unreasoning minds.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Speech, National Education Association, Washington, D.C. (4 Apr 1957)
Would you have a friend who talks to you the way you talk to yourself?
Carolyn Ann "Callie" Khouri (b. 1957) American screenwriter, producer, director, feminist
Commencement Address, Sweet Briar College (22 May 1994)
(Source)
There are reproaches that compliment, and compliments that disparage.
François VI, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) French epigrammatist, memoirist, noble
Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales [Maxims], #148 (1665) [tr. Kronenberger (1959)]
Now who can hear Christ declare that his kingdom is not of this world, and yet believe that this blending of church and state together can be pleasing to him?
Isaac Backus (1724-1806) American clergyman and historian
An Appeal to the Public for Religious Liberty (1773)
(Source)
I am stressing that it is the force of ideas rather than the impact of material things that made us a great nation. It is my conviction, too, that only the power of ideas, of enduring values, can keep us a great nation. For, where there is no vision the people perish.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
Tomorrow Is Now (1963)
“The female mind is certainly a devious one, my lord.”
Vetinari looked at his secretary in surprise. “Well, of course it is. It has to deal with the male one.”
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Unseen Academicals (2009)
The facts are indispensable; they are not sufficient. To solve a problem it is necessary to think.
Robert M. Hutchins (1899-1977) American educator and educational philosopher
Great Books: The Foundation of a Liberal Education (1954)
It is better to be seventy years young than forty years old!
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809-1894) American poet, essayist, scholar
(Attributed)
Reply to an invitation for the seventieth birthday of Julia Ward Howe (27 May 1889).
Most of us have achieved levels of affluence and comfort un-thought of two generations ago. We’ve never had it so good, most of us. Nor have we ever complained so bitterly about our problems. The closed circle of materialism is clear to us now — aspirations become wants, wants become needs, and self-gratification becomes a bottomless pit. All around us we have seen success in the world’s terms become ultimate and desperate failure.
Mario Cuomo (1932-2015) American politician
Commencement Address, Iona College (3 Jun 1984)
Always expecting this and expecting that. May I recommend serenity to you? A life that is burdened with expectations is a heavy life. Its fruit is sorrow and disappointment. Learn to be one with the joy of the moment.
Douglas Adams (1952-2001) English writer
The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul, ch. 4 (1988)
If you aren’t having to apologize every now and then you aren’t being interesting enough.
Robert Scoble (b. 1965) American blogger, technical journalist, author
“My Apology to Tim Cook,” Google+ (6 Oct 2011)
It is better to be a beggar than ignorant; for a beggar only wants money, but an ignorant person wants humanity.
Aristippus of Cyrene (c. 435 – c. 356 BC) Cyrenaic philosopher, Hedonist
(Attributed)
The point is that we are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right.
George Orwell (1903-1950) English writer [pseud. of Eric Arthur Blair]
“In Front of Your Nose” Tribune (22 Mar 1946)
If you complain of neglect of Education in sons, what shall I say with regard to daughters, who every day experience the want of it?
Abigail Adams (1744-1818) American correspondent, First Lady (1797-1801)
Letter to John Adams (14 Aug 1776)
Every great improvement has come after repeated failures. Virtually nothing comes out right the first time. Failures, repeated failures, are finger posts on the road to achievement. One fails forward toward success.
Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958) American inventor, engineer, researcher, businessman
(Attributed)
(Source)
The man who sticks to his plan will become what he used to want to be.
James Richardson (b. 1950) American poet
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays, #349 (2001)
Those who are destitute of philosophy may be compared to prisoners in a cave, who are only able to look in one direction because they are bound, and who have a fire behind them and a wall in front. Between them and the wall there is nothing; all that they see are shadows of themselves, and of objects behind them, cast on the wall by the light of the fire. Inevitably they regard these shadows as real, and have no notion of the objects to which they are due. At last, some man succeeds in escaping from the cave to the light of the sun; for the first time he sees real things, and becomes aware that he had hitherto been deceived by shadows. If he is the sort of philosopher who is fit to become a guardian, he will feel it is his duty to those who were formerly his fellow prisoners to go down again into the cave, instruct them as to the truth, and show them the way up. But he will have difficulty in persuading them, because, coming out of the sunlight, he will see shadows less clearly than they do, and will seem to them stupider than before his escape.
Plato (c.428-347 BC) Greek philosopher
The Republic, 7.514
Summ. Bertrand Russell, A History of Western Philosophy, ch. 15 (1946)
The world is divided into people who do things and people who get the credit. Try, if you can, to belong to the first class. There’s far less competition.
Dwight Morrow (1873-1931) American businessman, diplomat, politician
(Attributed)
Quoted in Mary Margaret McBride, The Story of Dwight W. Morrow (1930).
SIMON: I swear — when it’s appropriate.
KAYLEE: Simon, the whole point of swearing is that it ain’t appropriate.
Ben Edlund (b. 1968) American cartoonist, writer, producer
Firefly, 1×07 “Jaynestown” (18 Oct 2002)
The world moves, and ideas that were good once are not always good.
Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
News conference (31 Aug 1956)
Judaism holds that man can most genuinely worship God by imitating those qualities that are godly: As God is merciful, so must we be compassionate; as God is just, so must we deal justly with our neighbor; as God is slow to anger, so must we be tolerant.
Morris N. Kertzer (1910-1983) American rabbi, writer
“What is a Jew?” Look Magazine (1954)
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,
And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer;
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,
Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike.
A man of abilities and character, of any sect whatever, may be admitted to any office or public trust under the United States. I am a friend to a variety of sects, because they keep one another in order. How many different sects are we composed of throughout the United States? How many different sects will be in congress? We cannot enumerate the sects that may be in congress. And there are so many now in the United States that they will prevent the establishment of any one sect in prejudice to the rest, and will forever oppose all attempts to infringe religious liberty. If such an attempt be made, will not the alarm be sounded throughout America? If congress be as wicked as we are foretold they will, they would not run the risk of exciting the resentment of all, or most of the religious sects in America.
Edmund Randolph (1753-1813) American attorney, politician
Speech, Virginia Ratifying Committee (10 Jun 1788)
I doubt that anyone does not really believe in God. People may think they don’t have any belief, but you will usually find that there is a belief in something beyond himself. In any case, I would not judge a man’s character by his belief or unbelief. I would judge his character by his deeds; and no matter what he said about his beliefs, his behavior would soon show whether he was a man of good character or bad.
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
“The Wisdom of Eleanor Roosevelt” (1963)
“I can see we’re going to get along like a house on fire,” said Miss Tick. “There may be no survivors.”
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
The Wee Free Men (2003)
For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others
Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) South African revolutionary, politician, statesman
A Long Walk to Freedom, ch. 114 (1994)
(Source)
ORLANDO: But, O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man’s eyes!
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
As You Like It, Act 5, sc. 2, l. 45ff (5.2.45) (1599)
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