WIST Quotations

Billings, Josh -- Josh Billings’ Farmer’s Allminax, 1876-08 (1876 ed.)

Dave — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 20:26:05 +0000

He who aims at perfekshun will probably miss the mark, but he who aims at nothing, iz sure to hit it every time.

[He who aims at perfection will probably miss the mark, but he who aims at nothing, is sure to hit it every time.]

Josh Billings (1818–1885) American humorist, aphorist [pseud. of Henry Wheeler Shaw]
Josh Billings’ Farmer’s Allminax, 1876-08 (1876 ed.)

See also Aristotle, Thoreau (1854), Lowell (1869).

McLaughlin, Mignon -- The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)

Dave — Mon, 06 Oct 2025 21:44:52 +0000

Life’s most painful condition: to be almost a celebrity.

Mignon McLaughlin (1913–1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk”

Dave — Fri, 25 Jun 2021 14:18:47 +0000

Every man is in some sort a failure to himself. No one ever reaches the heights to which he aspires.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882) American poet
“Table-Talk”

Broun, Heywood -- “Sport for Art’s Sake,” Vanity Fair (Sep 1921)

Dave — Wed, 31 May 2017 17:50:17 +0000

The tragedy of life is not that man loses, but that he almost wins.

Heywood Broun (1888–1939) American journalist, author
“Sport for Art’s Sake,” Vanity Fair (Sep 1921)

Reprinted in Pieces of Hate, and Other Enthusiasms (1922).