Quotes of the day from previous years:
- 2004
- Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. ~ Dr. Seuss
- 2005
- If you're going to be crazy, you have to get paid for it or else you're going to be locked up. ~ Hunter S. Thompson (recent death)
- 2006
- Man is always something more than what he knows of himself. He is not what he is simply once and for all, but is a process... ~ Karl Jaspers (born 23 February 1883)
- 2007
- The theory of democratic government is not that the will of the people is always right, but rather that normal human beings of average intelligence will, if given a chance, learn the right and best course by bitter experience. ~ W. E. B. Du Bois
- 2008
- There is but one coward on earth, and that is the coward that dare not know. ~ W. E. B. Du Bois
- 2009
- We cannot avoid conflict, conflict with society, other individuals and with oneself. Conflicts may be the sources of defeat, lost life and a limitation of our potentiality but they may also lead to greater depth of living and the birth of more far-reaching unities, which flourish in the tensions that engender them. ~ Karl Jaspers
- 2010
- How shall Integrity face Oppression? What shall Honesty do in the face of Deception, Decency in the face of Insult, Self-Defense before Blows? How shall Desert and Accomplishment meet Despising, Detraction, and Lies? What shall Virtue do to meet Brute Force? There are so many answers and so contradictory; and such differences for those on the one hand who meet questions similar to this once a year or once a decade, and those who face them hourly and daily. ~ W. E. B. Du Bois
- 2011
- There can be no rainbow without a cloud and a storm. ~ John Heyl Vincent
- 2012
- Man, if he is to remain man, must advance by way of consciousness. There is no road leading backward. … We can no longer veil reality from ourselves by renouncing self-consciousness without simultaneously excluding ourselves from the historical course of human existence. ~ Karl Jaspers
- 2013
| It is the search for the truth, not possession of the truth which is the way of philosophy. Its questions are more relevant than its answers, and every answer becomes a new question.
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| ~ Karl Jaspers ~
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- 2014
- 2015
- 2016
- 2017
- 2018
"What is the greatest surprise you have found about life?” a university student asked me several years ago.
"It's brevity" I replied without hesitation. … Time moves so quickly, and no matter who we are or what we have done, the time will come when our lives will be over. As Jesus said, "As long as it is day, we must do the work of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work". … Life is short, and every day is a gift from God.
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| ~ Billy Graham ~
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- 2019
- 2020
- 2021
- 2022
| There is always a certain glamour about the idea of a nation rising up to crush an evil simply because it is wrong. Unfortunately, this can seldom be realized in real life; for the very existence of the evil usually argues a moral weakness in the very place where extraordinary moral strength is called for.
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| ~ W. E. B. Du Bois ~
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- 2023
- 2024
| Today for the first time in more than a half century, the US has returned to the moon. Today, for the first time in the history of humanity, a commercial company — an American company — launched and led the voyage up there. And today is a day that shows the power and promise of NASA's commercial partnerships. … What a triumph! Odysseus has taken the moon. This feat is a giant leap forward for all of humanity.
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| ~ Bill Nelson ~
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- 2025
- 2026
- Rank or add further suggestions…
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The truth is, I do indulge myself a little the more in pleasure, knowing that this is the proper age of my life to do it; and out of my observation that most men that do thrive in the world, do forget to take pleasure during the time that they are getting their estate, but reserve that till they have got one, and then it is too late for them to enjoy it with any pleasure. ~ Samuel Pepys (born 23 February 1633)
- 3 Kalki 23:50, 22 February 2009 (UTC) with a lean toward 4.
- 1 Zarbon 05:43, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
Musique and women I cannot but give way to, whatever my business is. ~ Samuel Pepys (born 23 February 1633)
- 3 Kalki 23:50, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
- 2 Zarbon 05:43, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
To live a godly life is the best way to light up a lesson that the teacher can possibly employ. ~ John Heyl Vincent
We are pilgrims, not settlers; this earth is our inn, not our home. ~ John Heyl Vincent
In the highest class of God's school of suffering we learn not resignation nor patience, but rejoicing in tribulation. ~ John Heyl Vincent
The teacher should use illustrations for the better teaching of the lesson, and never to fill up time, to amuse the class, or to display his own genius. ~ John Heyl Vincent
He that would speak Divine things in a language which living men of to-day can comprehend, must keep up with the researches and discoveries of men who study nature, and put her words into the speech of the present. ~ John Heyl Vincent
| The 'public' is a phantom, the phantom of an opinion supposed to exist in a vast number of persons who have no effective interrelation and though the opinion is not effectively present in the units. Such an opinion is spoken of as 'public opinion,' a fiction which is appealed to by individuals and by groups as supporting their special views. It is impalpable, illusory, transient; "'tis here, 'tis there, 'tis gone"; a nullity which can nevertheless for a moment endow the multitude with power to uplift or destroy.
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| ~ Karl Jaspers ~
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The masses are our masters; and for every one who looks facts in the face his existence has become dependent on them, so that the thought of them must control his doings, his cares, and his duties.
Even an articulated mass always tends to become unspiritual and inhuman. It is life without existence, superstitions without faith. It may stamp all flat; it is disinclined to tolerate independence and greatness, but prone to constrain people to become as automatic as ants.
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| ~ Karl Jaspers ~
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| The would-be climber must be able to make himself liked ... please his superiors — avoid showing independence except in those matters wherein independence is expected of him by his chiefs... the winners in the race have qualities which disincline them to allow others to be their true selves. Hence the winners snub all those who aim at adequate self-expression, speaking of them as pretentious, eccentric, biased, unpractical, and measuring their achievements by insincere standards.
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| ~ Karl Jaspers ~
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| Imminent seems the collapse of that which for millennium has constituted man's universe. The new world which has arisen as an apparatus for supply of the necessaries of life compels everything and everyone to serve it. It annihilates whatever it has no place for person seems to be going undergoing absorption into that which is nothing more than a means to an end, into that which is devoid of purpose of significance.
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| ~ Karl Jaspers ~
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| Today war seems to have undergone a change of meaning, insofar as it is not a war of religion but a war of interests, not a war of conflicting cultures or civilizations but a war of national areas, not a war of human beings but a technical struggle of machines one against another and all against the non–combatant population.
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| ~ Karl Jaspers ~
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| The mass-man has very little spare time, does not live a life that appertains to a whole, does not want to exert himself except for some concrete aim which can be expressed in terms of utility; he will not wait patiently while things ripen; everything for him must provide some immediate gratification; and even his mental life must minister to his fleeting pleasures. That is why the essay has become the customary form of literature, why newspapers are taking the place of books... People read quickly and cursorily.
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| ~ Karl Jaspers ~
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| Reason is like an open secret that can become known to anyone at any time; it is the quiet space into which everyone can enter through his own thought.
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| ~ Karl Jaspers ~
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