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Wikiquote:Quote of the day/June

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Today is Monday, November 18, 2024; it is now 04:42 (UTC)


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This page lists quote of the day proposals specifically for dates in the month of June, and quotes proposed should ideally have some relation to the day, or persons born on it, though sometimes exceptions can be made, usually for notable quotes that relate to recent events, such as the death of prominent individuals. Developing ideas of people or works to quote on specific days can be explored through the Wikipedia page: List of historical anniversaries. The numeric section heading of each date is also a direct link to the Wikipedia list of births, deaths, and other events which occured on that date.

See also: June 2008 · 2009 · 2010 · 2011 · 2012 · 2013 · 2014 · 2015 · 2016 · 2017 · 2018 · 2019

Ranking system:

4 : Excellent - should definitely be used.
3 : Very Good - strong desire to see it used.
2 : Good - some desire to see it used.
1 : Acceptable - but with no particular desire to see it used.
0 : Not acceptable - not appropriate for use as a quote of the day.
2004
In properly organized groups no faith is required; what is required is simply a little trust and even that only for a little while, for the sooner a man begins to verify all he hears the better it is for him. ~ G. I. Gurdjieff
2005
I want to walk through life instead of being dragged through it. ~ Alanis Morissette (born 1 June 1974)
  • This was the last quotation that was selected from the Quote of the Day proposals page, prior to setting up the current system of ranking quotes to be used for each day of the year. It was first proposed on that page on 8 August 2004 by IP 24.167.93.227 ~ Kalki
2006
Surprise becomes effective when we suddenly face the enemy at one point with far more troops than he expected. This type of numerical superiority is quite distinct from numerical superiority in general: it is the most powerful medium in the art of war. ~ Carl von Clausewitz (born 1 June 1780)
2007
Strength of character does not consist solely in having powerful feelings, but in maintaining one’s balance in spite of them. Even with the violence of emotion, judgment and principle must still function like a ship’s compass, which records the slightest variations however rough the sea. ~ Carl von Clausewitz
2008
There are times when the utmost daring is the height of wisdom. ~ Carl von Clausewitz
2009
If the mind is to emerge unscathed from this relentless struggle with the unforeseen, two qualities are indispensable: first, an intellect that, even in the darkest hour, retains some glimmerings of the inner light which leads to truth; and second, the courage to follow this faint light wherever it may lead. ~ Carl von Clausewitz
2010
There is a legend about a bird that sings just once in its life, more sweetly than any other creature on the face of the earth. From the moment it leaves the nest it searches for a thorn tree and does not rest until it has found one. Then, singing among the savage branches, it impales itself upon the longest, sharpest spine. Dying, it rises above its own agony to out-carol the lark and the nightingale. One superlative song, existence the price. But the whole world stills to listen, and God in His heaven smiles. For the best is only bought at the cost of the great pain. … Or so says the legend. ~ Colleen McCullough
2011
With uncertainty in one scale, courage and self-confidence should be thrown into the other to correct the balance. The greater they are, the greater the margin that can be left for accidents. ~ Carl von Clausewitz
2012
Angels are those beings who have been on an earth like this, and have passed through the same ordeals that we are now passing through. They have kept their first estate far enough to preserve themselves in the Priesthood. They did not so violate the law of the Priesthood and condemn themselves to the sin against the Holy Ghost as to be finally lost. They are not crowned with the celestial ones. They are persons who have lived upon an earth, but did not magnify the Priesthood in that high degree that many others have done who have become Gods, even the sons of God. Human beings that pertain to this world, who do not magnify or are not capable of magnifying their high calling in the Priesthood and receive crowns of glory, immortality, and eternal lives, will also, when they again receive their bodies, become angels and will receive a glory. They are single, without families or kingdoms to reign over. All the difference between men and angels is, men are passing through the day of trial that angels have already passed through.
~ Brigham Young ~
2013
Beauty cannot be defined by abscissas and ordinates; neither are circles and ellipses created by their geometrical formulas.
~ Carl von Clausewitz ~
2014
Seize the time, Meribor. Live now. Make now always the most precious time. Now will never come again.
~ Jean-Luc Picard ~
in
Star Trek : The Next Generation
~ "The Inner Light" ~
2015
I want to decide between survival and bliss
And though I know who I'm not I still don't know who I am
But I know I won't keep on playing the victim.
~ Alanis Morissette ~
2016
Determination in a single instance is an expression of courage; if it becomes characteristic, a mental habit. But here we are referring not to physical courage but to courage to accept responsibility, courage in the face of a moral danger. This has often been called courage d'esprit, because it is created by the intellect. That, however, does not make it an act of the intellect: it is an act of temperament. Intelligence alone is not courage; we often see that the most intelligent people are irresolute. Since in the rush of events a man is governed by feelings rather than by thought, the intellect needs to arouse the quality of courage, which then supports and sustains it in action.
Looked at in this way, the role of determination is to limit the agonies of doubt and the perils of hesitation when the motives for action are inadequate.
~ Carl von Clausewitz ~
2017

There's an obvious attraction
To the path of least resistance in your life
Well there's an obvious aversion no amount of my insistence
Could make you try tonight

'Cause it's easy not to
So much easier not to
And what goes around never comes around to you
To you, to you, to you, to you, to you.

~ Alanis Morissette ~
2018
The mind is formed by the knowledge and the direction of ideas it receives and the guidance it is given. Great things alone can make a great mind, and petty things will make a petty mind unless a man rejects them as completely alien.
~ Carl von Clausewitz ~
2019
The truth is I've never fooled anyone. I've let men sometimes fool themselves. Men sometimes didn’t bother to find out who and what I was. Instead they would invent a character for me. I wouldn't argue with them. They were obviously loving somebody I wasn't. When they found this out, they would blame me for disillusioning them — and fooling them.
~ Marilyn Monroe ~
2020
The invention of gunpowder and the constant improvement of firearms are enough in themselves to show that the advance of civilization has done nothing practical to alter or deflect the impulse to destroy the enemy, which is central to the very idea of war.
~ Carl von Clausewitz ~
2021
"God is love," as Scripture says, and that means the revelation is in the relationship. "God is love" means God is known devotionally, not dogmatically. "God is love" does not clear up old mysteries; it discloses new mystery. "God is love" is not a truth we can master; it is only one to which we can surrender. Faith is being grasped by the power of love.
~ William Sloane Coffin ~
2022
War is an act of violence pushed to its utmost bounds.
~ Carl von Clausewitz ~
2023
If we do not learn to regard a war, and the separate campaigns of which it is composed, as a chain of linked engagements each leading to the next, but instead succumb to the idea that the capture of certain geographical points or the seizure of undefended provinces are of value in themselves, we are liable to regard them as windfall profits. In so doing, and in ignoring the fact that they are links in a continuous chain of events, we also ignore the possibility that their possession may later lead to definite disadvantages.
~ Carl von Clausewitz ~
2024
Rank or add further suggestions…


2004
The difference between a hooker and a ho ain't nothin' but a fee. ~ Cheryl James ("Salt" of the rap group "Salt 'N' Pepa")
  • proposed by IP 66.157.59.118
2005
I'm the guy they used to call Deep Throat. ~ W. Mark Felt (recent revelation of identity)
2006
A lover without indiscretion is no lover at all. Circumspection and devotion are a contradiction in terms. ~ Thomas Hardy (born 2 June 1840)
2007
To find themselves utterly alone at night where company is desirable and expected makes some people fearful; but a case more trying by far to the nerves is to discover some mysterious companionship when intuition, sensation, memory, analogy, testimony, probability, induction — every kind of evidence in the logician's list — have united to persuade consciousness that it is quite in isolation. ~ Thomas Hardy
2008
The capacity to produce social chaos is the last resort of desperate people. ~ Cornel West
2009

The Poet's License! — 't is the right,
Within the rule of duty,
To look on all delightful things
Throughout the world of beauty.

To gaze with rapture at the stars
That in the skies are glowing;
To see the gems of perfect dye
That in the woods are growing, —
And more than sage astronomer,
And more than learned florist,
To read the glorious homilies
Of Firmament and Forest.
~ John Godfrey Saxe ~

2010

The ancient pulse of germ and birth
Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth
Seemed fervourless as I.

At once a voice arose among
The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
Of joy illimited;
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
Upon the growing gloom.

So little cause for carolings
Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
Afar or nigh around,
That I could think there trembled through
His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
And I was unaware.
~ Thomas Hardy ~

2011

Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right
And all were in the wrong.

So oft in theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean,
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!

~ John Godfrey Saxe ~

2012
When Nature gives a gorgeous rose,
Or yields the simplest fern,
She writes this motto on the leaves, —
"To whom it may concern!"
And so it is the poet comes
And revels in her bowers,
And, — though another hold the land,
Is owner of the flowers.
~ John Godfrey Saxe ~
2013
You can't lead the people if you don't love the people. You can't save the people, if you don't serve the people.
~ Cornel West ~
2014
Though the General's feelings and my own were perfectly in unison, with respect to our predilection for private life, yet I cannot blame him, for having acted according to his ideas of duty, in obeying the voice of his country. The consciousness of having attempted to do all the good in his power, and the pleasure of finding his fellow-citizens so well satisfied with the disinterestedness of his conduct, will doubtless be some compensation for the great sacrifices, which I know he has made.
~ Martha Washington ~
2015
To find beauty in ugliness is the province of the poet.
~ Thomas Hardy ~
2016
I remind young people everywhere I go, one of the worst things the older generation did was to tell them for twenty-five years "Be successful, be successful, be successful" as opposed to "Be great, be great, be great". There's a qualititative difference.
~ Cornel West ~
2017
At last, in a world torn by the hatred and wars of men, appears a woman to whom the problems and feats of men are mere child's play. A woman whose identity is known to none, but whose sensational feats are outstanding in a fast-moving world. With a hundred times the agility and strength of our best male athletes and strongest wrestlers, she appears as though from nowhere to avenge an injustice or right a wrong! As lovely as Aphrodite — as wise as Athena — with the speed of Mercury and the strength of Hercules — She is known only as Wonder Woman, but who she is, or whence she came from, nobody knows!
~ William Moulton Marston ~
  • proposed by Kalki — a quote of the first introduction of the Wonder Woman character, in regard to the first Wonder Woman feature film, opening in the US on this date.
2018

Only a man harrowing clods
In a slow silent walk
With an old horse that stumbles and nods
Half asleep as they stalk.

Only thin smoke without flame
From the heaps of couch-grass;
Yet this will go onward the same
Though Dynasties pass.

Yonder a maid and her wight
Come whispering by:
War's annals will cloud into night
Ere their story die.

~ Thomas Hardy ~
2019
If all hearts were open and all desires known — as they would be if people showed their souls — how many gapings, sighings, clenched fists, knotted brows, broad grins, and red eyes should we see in the market-place!
~ Thomas Hardy ~
2020
To be an intellectual really means to speak a truth that allows suffering to speak. That is, it creates a vision of the world that puts into the limelight the social misery that is usually hidden or concealed by the dominant viewpoints of a society. "Intellectual" in that sense simply means those who are willing to reflect critically upon themselves as well as upon the larger society and to ascertain whether there is some possibility of amelioration and betterment.
~ Cornel West ~
2021
I am not apt to forget the feelings that have been inspired by my former society with good acquaintances, nor to be insensible to their expressions of gratitude to the President of the United States; for you know me well enough, to do me the justice to believe, that I am fond of only what comes from the heart.
~ Martha Washington ~
2022
Yes; quaint and curious war is!
You shoot a fellow down
You'd treat if met where any bar is,
Or help to half-a-crown.
~ Thomas Hardy ~
2023
Is your heart far away,
Or with mine beating?
When false things are brought low,
And swift things have grown slow,
Feigning like froth shall go,
Faith be for aye.
~ Thomas Hardy ~
2024
A man should be only partially before his time — to be completely to the vanward in aspirations is fatal to fame. Had Philip's warlike son been intellectually so far ahead as to have attempted civilization without bloodshed, he would have been twice the godlike hero that he seemed, but nobody would have heard of an Alexander.
~ Thomas Hardy ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
There is little difference in people, but that little difference makes a big difference. That little difference is attitude. The big difference is whether it is positive or negative. ~ W. Clement Stone
2005
A time is marked not so much by ideas that are argued about as by ideas that are taken for granted. The character of an era hangs upon what needs no defense. Power runs with ideas that only the crazy would draw into doubt. The "taken for granted" is the test of sanity... In these times, the hardest task for social or political activists is to find a way to get people to wonder again about what we all believe is true. The challenge is to sow doubt. ~ Lawrence Lessig (born 3 June 1961)
2006
It's a bumper sticker culture. People have to get it like that, and if they don't, if it takes three seconds to make them understand, you're off their radar screen. Three seconds to understand, or you lose. This is our problem. ~ Lawrence Lessig
2007
We are on the cusp of this time where I can say, "I speak as a citizen of the world" without others saying, "God, what a nut." ~ Lawrence Lessig
2008
When government disappears, it's not as if paradise will take its place. When governments are gone, other interests will take their place. ~ Lawrence Lessig
2009
It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do little. ~ Sydney Smith
2010
You can't incent a dead person. No matter what we do, Hawthorne will not produce any more works, no matter how much we pay him. ~ Lawrence Lessig
2011
Have the courage to be ignorant of a great number of things, in order to avoid the calamity of being ignorant of every thing. ~ Sydney Smith
2012
It might be crazy to expect a high government official to speak the truth. It might be crazy to believe that government policy will be something more than the handmaiden of the most powerful interests. It might be crazy to argue that we should preserve a tradition that has been part of our tradition for most of our history — free culture.
If this is crazy, then let there be more crazies. Soon.
~ Lawrence Lessig ~
2013
If the Internet teaches us anything, it is that great value comes from leaving core resources in a commons, where they're free for people to build upon as they see fit.
~ Lawrence Lessig ~
2014
So uncritically do we accept the idea of property in ideas that we don't even notice how monstrous it is to deny ideas to a people who are dying without them. So uncritically do we accept the idea of property in culture that we don't even question when the control of that property removes our ability, as a people, to develop our culture democratically. Blindness becomes our common sense. And the challenge for anyone who would reclaim the right to cultivate our culture is to find a way to make this common sense open its eyes.
So far, common sense sleeps. There is no revolt. Common sense does not yet see what there could be to revolt about.
~ Lawrence Lessig ~
2015
There's nothing much I can tell you about this war. It's like all wars, I suppose. The undertakers are winning it. Oh, the politicians will talk a lot about the "glory" of it, and the old men'll talk about the "need" of it — the soldiers, they just want to go home.
~ James Lee Barrett ~
in
~ Shenandoah ~
2016
Americans have been selling this view around the world: that progress comes from perfect protection of intellectual property. Notwithstanding the fact that the most innovative and progressive space we've seen — the Internet — has been the place where intellectual property has been least respected. You know, facts don't get in the way of this ideology.
~ Lawrence Lessig ~
2017
We, the most powerful democracy in the world, have developed a strong norm against talking about politics. It's fine to talk about politics with people you agree with. But it is rude to argue about politics with people you disagree with. Political discourse becomes isolated, and isolated discourse becomes more extreme. We say what our friends want to hear, and hear very little beyond what our friends say.
~ Lawrence Lessig ~
2018
The truth is, that most men want knowledge, not for itself, but for the superiority which knowledge confers; and the means they employ to secure this superiority, are as wrong as the ultimate object, for no man can ever end with being superior, who will not begin with being inferior.
~ Sydney Smith ~
2019
Let's forget today who is friend or foe,
and hold each other in caring embrace.
Let your love be the magnet
to bring the humanity to Allah's grace.

Remember those in perennial fast,
constantly in hunger and deprivation,
Share with the poor, orphans and the destitutes,
to make inclusive your celebration.
~ Kazi Nazrul Islam ~
2020
When you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
~ Jesus ~
as quoted in the
~ Gospel of Matthew ~
2021
Life is to be fortified by many friendships. To love, and to be loved, is the greatest happiness of existence.
~ Sydney Smith ~
2022
According to new data just released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, guns are the number one killer of children in the United States of America. The number one killer. More than car accidents. More than cancer.
Over the last two decades, more school-aged children have died from guns than on-duty police officers and active-duty military combined. Think about that: more kids than on-duty cops killed by guns, more kids than soldiers killed by guns.
For God’s sake, how much more are we willing to accept? How many more innocent American lives must be taken before we say “enough”? Enough.
~ Joe Biden ~
  • proposed by Kalki; recent remarks on recurring tragedies.
2023
Among the smaller duties of life I hardly know any one more important than that of not praising where praise is not due.
~ Sydney Smith ~
2024
Manners are the shadows of virtues; the momentary display of those qualities which our fellow creatures love, and respect.
~ Sydney Smith ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
We all have ability. The difference is how we use it. ~ Stevie Wonder
2005
I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance. ~ Socrates
2006
Nations, like stars, are entitled to eclipse. All is well, provided the light returns and the eclipse does not become endless night. Dawn and resurrection are synonymous. The reappearance of the light is the same as the survival of the soul. ~ Victor Hugo in Les Misérables
  • proposed by Kalki earliest recorded solar eclipse (disputed), in China, 4 June 780 BC.
2007
I believe that imagination is stronger than knowledge —
That myth is more potent than history.
I believe that dreams are more powerful than facts —
That hope always triumphs over experience —
That laughter is the only cure for grief.
And I believe that love is stronger than death.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2008
To insist on one's place in the scheme of things and to live up to that place.
To empower others in their reaching for some place in the scheme of things.
To do these things is to make fairy tales come true.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2009
I recall an old Sufi story of a good man who was granted one wish by God. The man said he would like to go about doing good without knowing about it. God granted his wish. And then God decided that it was such a good idea, he would grant that wish to all human beings.
And so it has been to this day. ~ Robert Fulghum
2010
Knowledge is meaningful only if it is reflected in action. The human race has found out the hard way that we are what we do, not just what we think. This is true for kids and adults — for schoolrooms and nations. ~ Robert Fulghum
2011
Be aware of wonder. And then remember the Dick and Jane books and the first word you learned — the biggest word of all — LOOK. ~ Robert Fulghum
2012
Yelling at living things does tend to kill the spirit in them. Sticks and stones may break our bones, but words will break our hearts.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2013
Love the battle between chaos and imagination.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2014
Maybe we should develop a Crayola bomb as our next secret weapon. A happiness weapon. A Beauty Bomb. And every time a crisis developed, we would launch one. It would explode high in the air — explode softly — and send thousands, millions, of little parachutes into the air. Floating down to earth — boxes of Crayolas. And we wouldn't go cheap either — not little boxes of eight. Boxes of sixty-four, with the sharpener built right in. With silver and gold and copper, magenta and peach and lime, amber and umber and all the rest. And people would smile and get a little funny look on their faces and cover the world with imagination instead of death. A child who touched one wouldn't have his hand blown off.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2015
The grass is not, in fact, always greener on the other side of the fence. Fences have nothing to do with it. The grass is greenest where it is watered. When crossing over fences, carry water with you and tend the grass wherever you may be.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2016
One of life's best coping mechanisms is to know the difference between an inconvenience and a problem. If you break your neck, if you have nothing to eat, if your house is on fire, then you've got a problem. Everything else is an inconvenience. Life is inconvenient. Life is lumpy. A lump in the oatmeal, a lump in the throat and a lump in the breast are not the same kind of lump. One needs to learn the difference.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2017
There’s another thing not everyone figures out right away: It’s almost impossible to go through life all alone. We need to find our support group — family, friends, companion, therapy gatherings, team, church or whatever. The kindergarten admonition applies as long as we live: “When you go out into the world, hold hands and stick together.” It’s dangerous out there — lonely, too. Everyone needs someone. Some assembly is always required.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2018
I don't think the thing is to be well known, but being worth knowing.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2019
If every one of those good words — liberty, equality, fraternity, democracy, human rights — has been called "bourgeois", what on earth does that leave for us?
~ Fang Lizhi ~
2020
Don't worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2021
The older I get, the more I realize the importance of exercising the various dimensions of my body, soul, mind and heart. Taken together, these aspects give me a sense of wholeness. I want to be a whole human being rather than one who limps on one leg because I don't know how to use all of my parts. Intellectual, emotional, and physical activity are not separate entities. Rather, they are dimensions of the same human being.
~ Robert Fulghum ~
2022
Exactly one hundred days ago we all woke up in a different reality. Exactly one hundred days ago, different us woke up. When Ukrainians are awakened not by the sun's rays, but by the explosions of missiles that hit our homes, then completely different Ukrainians wake up.
In 2014, Russia came to us with one word, with a new word. And this is the word "war". On February 24, Russia added another word to it, making the phrase "full-scale war."
~ Volodymyr Zelenskyy ~
2023
I know bipartisanship is hard and unity is hard, but we can never stop trying, because in moments like this one — the ones we just faced, where the American economy and the world economy is at risk of collapsing — there is no other way.
No matter how tough our politics gets, we need to see each other not as adversaries, but as fellow Americans. Treat each other with dignity and respect. To join forces as Americans to stop shouting, lower the temperature, and work together to pursue progress, secure prosperity, and keep the promise of America for everybody.
~ Joe Biden ~
2024
Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles.
Have no friends not equal to yourself.
When you have faults, do not fear to abandon them.
~ Confucius ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Honest differences are often a healthy sign of progress. ~ Mahatma Gandhi
2005
A study of the history of opinion is a necessary preliminary to the emancipation of the mind. ~ John Maynard Keynes (born 5 June 1883)
2006
Nobody knows you. No. But I sing of you.
For posterity I sing of your profile and grace.
Of the signal maturity of your understanding.
Of your appetite for death and the taste of its mouth.
Of the sadness of your once valiant gaiety.
~ Federico García Lorca (born 5 June 1898)
2007
The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds. ~ John Maynard Keynes
2008
Words ought to be a little wild for they are the assault of thoughts on the unthinking. ~ John Maynard Keynes
2009
It is better to be roughly right than precisely wrong. ~ John Maynard Keynes
2010
The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. ~ John Maynard Keynes
2011
Newton was not the first of the age of reason. He was the last of the magicians, the last of the Babylonians and Sumerians, the last great mind that looked out on the visible and intellectual world with the same eyes as those who began to build our intellectual inheritance rather less than 10000 years ago. ~ John Maynard Keynes
2012
Words ought to be a little wild, for they are the assault of thoughts on the unthinking.
~ John Maynard Keynes ~
2013
The reward for living is the living itself.
~ Charles Hartshorne ~
2014
Bullies — political bullies, economic bullies, and religious bullies — cannot be appeased; they have to be opposed with courage, clarity, and conviction. This is never easy. These true believers don't fight fair. Robert's Rules of Order is not one of their holy texts.
~ Bill Moyers ~
2015
Pure democracy or sheer equalitarianism in religious matters is not to be expected of our human nature. Some distinction between leaders or founders and followers or disciples seems to be our destiny. But there is a question of degree, or of qualification. To what extent, or under what conditions, are some individuals, or perhaps is some unique individual, worthy of trust in religious matters? It is in the answer to this question that mistakes can be made.
~ Charles Hartshorne ~
2016
Once we realize we are all members of humanity, we will want to compete in the spirit of love.
In a competition of love we would not be running against one another, but with one another. We would be trying to gain victory for all humanity. If I am a faster runner than you, you may feel bad seeing me pass you in the race, but if you know that we are both racing to make our world better, you will feel good knowing that we are racing toward a common goal, a mutual reward.
In a competition of love we'll all share in the victory, no matter who comes first.
~ Muhammad Ali ~
  • proposed by Kalki, in memoriam — recent death.
2017
Americans are apt to be unduly interested in discovering what average opinion believes average opinion to be; and this national weakness finds its nemesis in the stock market.
~ John Maynard Keynes ~
in
~ The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money ~
2018
Too often we honor swagger and bluster and wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach non-violence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them. Some look for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear: violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.
~ Robert F. Kennedy ~
  • proposed by Kalki, in regard to the 50th anniversary of his assassination.
2019
The social object of skilled investment should be to defeat the dark forces of time and ignorance which envelope our future.
~ John Maynard Keynes ~
in
~ The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money ~
2020
IN UNION THERE IS STRENGTH
I have watched this week's unfolding events, angry and appalled. The words "Equal Justice Under Law" are carved in the pediment of the United States Supreme Court. This is precisely what protesters are rightly demanding. It is a wholesome and unifying demand — one that all of us should be able to get behind. We must not be distracted by a small number of lawbreakers. The protests are defined by tens of thousands of people of conscience who are insisting that we live up to our values — our values as people and our values as a nation.
~ James Mattis ~
2021
My ultimate intuitive clue in philosophy is that "God is love" and that the idea of God is definable as that of the being worthy to be loved with all one’s heart, mind, soul, and entire being.
~ Charles Hartshorne ~
2022
Any attempts to alter the status of parts of Ukrainian territory are a clear violation of international law, the UN Charter and Ukraine’s Constitution, they further undermine sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, and will not be recognised by the European Union. Russia, its political leadership, and all those involved in violations of international law and international humanitarian law will be held accountable for these illegal actions.
The European Union remains unwavering in its support for Ukraine's independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity, and urges the Russian Federation to immediately and unconditionally withdraw all of its troops and military equipment from the entire territory of Ukraine within its internationally recognised borders.
~ European Union ~
2023
Too large a proportion of recent "mathematical" economics are mere concoctions, as imprecise as the initial assumptions they rest on, which allow the author to lose sight of the complexities and interdependencies of the real world in a maze of pretentious and unhelpful symbols.
~ John Maynard Keynes ~
in
~ The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money ~
2024
The old saying holds. Owe your banker £1000 and you are at his mercy; owe him £1 million and the position is reversed.
~ John Maynard Keynes ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Do nothing, and everything is done. ~ Laozi
  • suggested by IP 68.201.219.53
2005
Fearing no insult, asking for no crown, receive with indifference both flattery and slander, and do not argue with a fool. ~ Aleksandr Pushkin (born 6 June 1799 {26 May O.S.})
2006
Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six. ~ The Book of Revelation
  • selected by Kalki; once a century date of 06/06/06; too rare a link to this old chestnut to pass up
2007
Opinions cannot survive if one has no chance to fight for them. ~ Thomas Mann
2008
I can be forced to live without happiness, but I will never consent to live without honor. ~ Pierre Corneille
2009
Do your duty, and leave the rest to heaven. ~ Pierre Corneille
2010
I will keep faith with death in my heart, yet will remember that faith with death and the dead is only wickedness and dark voluptuousness and enmity against humankind, if it is given power over our thought and contemplation. For the sake of goodness and love, man shall let death have no sovereignty over his thoughts. And with that, I wake up. ~ Thomas Mann
2011
Time has no divisions to mark its passage, there is never a thunderstorm or blare of trumpets to announce the beginning of a new month or year. Even when a new century begins it is only we mortals who ring bells and fire off pistols. ~ Thomas Mann
2012
Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force!
You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.
Your task will not be an easy one.
~ Dwight D. Eisenhower ~
2013
The hand of the aggressor is stayed by strength — and strength alone.
~ Dwight D. Eisenhower ~
2014
The tide has turned!
The free men of the world are marching together to Victory! I have full confidence in your courage and devotion to duty and skill in battle. We will accept nothing less than full Victory! Good luck! And let us beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.
~ Dwight D. Eisenhower ~
2015
After having won a scepter, few are so generous as to disdain the pleasures of ruling.
~ Pierre Corneille ~
2016
It is a fact that a man’s dying is more the survivors’ affair than his own. Whether he realizes it or not, he illustrates the pertinence of the adage: So long as we are, death is not; and when death is present, we are not. In other words, between death and us there is no rapport; it is something with which we have nothing to do — and only incidentally the world and nature. And that is why all living creatures can contemplate it with composure, with indifference, unconcern, with egoistic irresponsibility.
~ Thomas Mann ~
2017
O Lord, give us faith. Give us faith in Thee; faith in our sons; faith in each other; faith in our united crusade. Let not the keenness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but fleeting moment — let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose.
With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy. Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogances. Lead us to the saving of our country, and with our sister nations into a world unity that will spell a sure peace — a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men. And a peace that will let all of men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil.
Thy will be done, Almighty God.
Amen.
~ Franklin D. Roosevelt ~
2018
There are two kinds of fools: one says, "This is old, therefore it is good"; the other says, "This is new, therefore it is better."
~ William Ralph Inge ~
2019
Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity.
Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith.
They will need Thy blessings. Their road will be long and hard. For the enemy is strong. He may hurl back our forces. Success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again; and we know that by Thy grace, and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph.
They will be sore tried, by night and by day, without rest — until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame. Men's souls will be shaken with the violences of war.
For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and goodwill among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home.
Some will never return. Embrace these, Father, and receive them, Thy heroic servants, into Thy kingdom.
And for us at home — fathers, mothers, children, wives, sisters, and brothers of brave men overseas, whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them — help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.
~ Franklin D. Roosevelt ~
  • proposed by Kalki, for the 75th anniversary of the Invasion of Normandy, on which date this prayer was publicly delivered by FDR, 6 June 1944.
2020
Many people have urged that I call the Nation into a single day of special prayer. But because the road is long and the desire is great, I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts.
Give us strength, too — strength in our daily tasks, to redouble the contributions we make in the physical and the material support of our armed forces.
And let our hearts be stout, to wait out the long travail, to bear sorrows that may come, to impart our courage unto our sons wheresoever they may be.
~ Franklin D. Roosevelt ~
2021
Love stands opposed to death. It is love, not reason, that is stronger than death. Only love, not reason, gives sweet thoughts. And from love and sweetness alone can form come: form and civilization, friendly, enlightened, beautiful human intercourse — always in silent recognition of the blood sacrifice.
~ Thomas Mann ~
2022
The illusion which exalts us is dearer to us than ten thousand truths.
~ Aleksandr Pushkin ~
2023
Come purge my soul, Thou Master of my days,
Of vain and empty words, of idle ways,
Of base ambition and the urge to rule;
That hidden serpent that corrupts a fool;
and grant me, Lord, to see my sins alone.
That I not call my brother to atone;
Make chaste my heart and lend me from above
Thy fortitude, humility, and love.
~ Aleksandr Pushkin ~
2024
Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force!
You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.
Your task will not be an easy one.
~ Dwight D. Eisenhower ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Man's most valuable trait is a judicious sense of what not to believe. ~ Euripides
2005
Truth-tellers are not always palatable. There is a preference for candy bars. ~ Gwendolyn Brooks (born 7 June 1917)
2006
Nature has mysterious infinities and imaginative power. It is always varying the productions it offers to us. The artist himself is one of nature's means. ~ Paul Gauguin (born 7 June 1848)
2007
Exhaust the little moment.
Soon it dies.
And be it gash or gold it will not come
Again in this identical guise.
~ Gwendolyn Brooks ~
2008
A young man who is unable to commit a folly is already an old man. ~ Paul Gauguin (born 7 June 1848)
2009
Our earth is round, and, among other things, that means that you and I can hold completely different points of view and both be right. The difference of our positions will show stars in your window I cannot even imagine. Your sky may burn with light, while mine, at the same moment, spreads beautiful to darkness. Still we must choose how we separately corner the circling universe of our experience. Once chosen, our cornering will determine the message of any star and darkness we encounter. ~ June Jordan
  • proposed by Kalki (originally suggested with an attribution of Gwendolyn Brooks, but soon after it was selected this was determined to be a long standing misattribution, and the correct attribution was made.)
2010
Art hurts. Art urges voyages — and it is easier to stay at home. ~ Gwendolyn Brooks
2011
A time will come when people will think I am a myth, or rather something the newspapers have made up. ~ Paul Gauguin
2012
Art is a refining and evocative translation of the materials of the world.
~ Gwendolyn Brooks ~
2013
The world can only be redeemed through action — movement — motion. Uncoerced, unbribed, and unbought, humanity will move toward the light.
~ Alice Moore Hubbard ~
2014
Teaching is successful only as it causes people to think for themselves. What the teacher thinks matters little; what he makes the child think matters much.
~ Alice Moore Hubbard ~
2015
As you get older, you find that often the wheat, disentangling itself from the chaff, comes out to meet you.
~ Gwendolyn Brooks ~
2016
It is brave to be involved
To be not fearful to be unresolved.
~ Gwendolyn Brooks ~
2017
we are each other's
harvest:
we are each other's
business:
we are each other's
magnitude and bond
~ Gwendolyn Brooks ~
2018
Wherever life can grow, it will.
It will sprout out,
and do the best it can.
I give you what I have.
You don’t get all your questions answered in this world.
How many answers shall be found
in the developing world of my Poem?
I don’t know. Nevertheless I put my Poem,
which is my life, into your hands, where it will do the best it can.
~ Gwendolyn Brooks ~
2019
My Poem is life, and not finished.
It shall never be finished.
My Poem is life, and can grow.
~ Gwendolyn Brooks ~
2020
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. The only way they can inherit the freedom we have known is if we fight for it, protect it, defend it, and then hand it to them with the well fought lessons of how they in their lifetime must do the same. And if you and I don't do this, then you and I may well spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it once was like in America when men were free.
~ Ronald Reagan ~
2021
Love... Thy will be done
I can no longer hide, I can no longer run
No longer can I resist Your guiding light
That gives me the power 2 keep up the fight

Oh Lord, Love... Thy will be done
Since I have found you, my life has just begun
And I see all of Your creations as one perfect complex
No one less beautiful or more special than the next
We are all blessed and so wise 2 accept
Thy will, Love, be done.
~ Prince ~
2022
Experience isn't interesting until it begins to repeat itself — in fact, till it does that, it hardly is experience.
~ Elizabeth Bowen ~
2023
No one wants my painting because it is different from other people's — peculiar, crazy public that demands the greatest possible degree of originality on the painter's part and yet won't accept him unless his work resembles that of the others!
~ Paul Gauguin ~
2024
As we reflect on the sacrifices made on D-Day, we are reminded that freedom is not free and it has never been guaranteed. Every generation has to earn it, fight for it, and defend it in the battle between autocracy and democracy — between the greed of a few and the rights of many. Eighty years after our Nation’s brave Airmen, Coast Guardsmen, Sailors, Soldiers, and Marines embarked on D-Day — and as Americans everywhere answered the call to prayer and filled their hearts and homes with hope — may we honor the faith they kept in our Nation and their legacy by upholding the future that they died for — one grounded in freedom, democracy, opportunity, and equality for all.
~ Joe Biden ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
It is not so much what you believe in that matters, as the way in which you believe it and proceed to translate that belief into action. ~ Lin Yutang
2005
I have something to tell you today. Mac OS X has been leading a secret double life — for the past five years. ~ Steve Jobs (on the plans for Apple Computer to begin using Intel processors in its Macintosh computers)
2006
The present is the ever moving shadow that divides yesterday from tomorrow. In that lies hope. ~ Frank Lloyd Wright (born 8 June 1867)
2007
I knew that good like bad becomes a routine, that the temporary tends to endure, that what is external permeates to the inside, and that the mask, given time, comes to be the face itself. ~ Marguerite Yourcenar
2008
History does not always repeat itself. Sometimes it just yells, "Can't you remember anything I told you?" and lets fly with a club. ~ John W. Campbell (born 8 June 1910)
2009
The scientist has marched in and taken the place of the poet. But one day somebody will find the solution to the problems of the world and remember, it will be a poet, not a scientist. ~ Frank Lloyd Wright
2010
Our civil laws will never be supple enough to fit the immense and changing variety of facts. Laws change more slowly than custom, and though dangerous when they fall behind the times are more dangerous still when they presume to anticipate custom. ~ Marguerite Yourcenar
2011
Every generation of humans believed it had all the answers it needed, except for a few mysteries they assumed would be solved at any moment. And they all believed their ancestors were simplistic and deluded. What are the odds that you are the first generation of humans who will understand reality? ~ Scott Adams
2012
Nothing is slower than the true birth of a man.
~ Marguerite Yourcenar ~
2013
Remember there’s no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end.
~ Scott Adams ~
2014
The best way to solve a problem is to identify the core belief that causes the problem; then mock that belief until the people who hold it insist that you heard them wrong.
~ Scott Adams ~
2015
Human beings betray their worst failings when they marvel to find that a world ruler is neither foolishly indolent, presumptuous, nor cruel.
~ Marguerite Yourcenar ~
2016
The world isn't fair, but as long as it's tilting in my direction I find that there's a natural cap to my righteous indignation.
~ Scott Adams ~
2017
The fact that we're all connected, the fact that we've got this information space — does change the parameters. It changes the way people live and work. It changes things for good and for bad. But I think, in general, it's clear that most bad things come from misunderstanding, and communication is generally the way to resolve misunderstandings — and the Web's a form of communications — so it generally should be good. But I think, also, we have to watch whether we preserve the stability of the world … We need to look at the whole society and think, "Are we actually thinking about what we're doing as we go forward, and are we preserving the really important values that we have in society? Are we keeping it democratic, and open, and so on?"
~ Tim Berners-Lee ~
2018
Always Postpone Meetings with Time-wasting Morons
~ Scott Adams ~
2019
Anyone who has lost track of time when using a computer knows the propensity to dream, the urge to make dreams come true and the tendency to miss lunch.
~ Tim Berners-Lee ~
2020
In an extreme view, the world can be seen as only connections, nothing else. We think of a dictionary as the repository of meaning, but it defines words only in terms of other words. I liked the idea that a piece of information is really defined only by what it's related to, and how it's related. There really is little else to meaning. The structure is everything. There are billions of neurons in our brains, but what are neurons? Just cells. The brain has no knowledge until connections are made between neurons. All that we know, all that we are, comes from the way our neurons are connected.
~ Tim Berners-Lee ~
2021
The world is big … May it please the One who perchance Is to expand the human heart to life's full measure.
~ Marguerite Yourcenar ~
2022
We need to restore our family values. We need to restore our American values. And we need responsible gun ownership — responsible gun ownership. We need background checks. We need to raise the minimum age to purchase an AR-15 rifle to 21. We need a waiting period for those rifles. We need red-flag laws and consequences for those who abuse them.
These are reasonable, practical, tactical regulations to our nation, states, communities, schools, and homes.
Responsible gun owners are fed up with the Second Amendment being abused and hijacked by some deranged individuals. These regulations are not a step back; they’re a step forward for a civil society and — and the Second Amendment.
Look, is this a cure-all? Hell no.
But people are hurting — families are, parents are. And look, as — as divided as our country is, this gun responsibility issue is one that we agree on more than we don’t. It really is.
But this should be a nonpartisan issue. This should not be a partisan issue.
There is not a Democratic or Republican value in one single act of these shooters. It’s not.
But people in power have failed to act. So we’re asking you and I’m asking you, will you please ask yourselves: Can both sides rise above? Can both sides see beyond the political problem at hand and admit that we have a life preservation problem on our hands?
~ Matthew McConaughey ~
  • proposed by Kalki; recent remarks on recent tragedies.
2023
It is not difficult to nourish admirable thoughts when the stars are present.
~ Marguerite Yourcenar ~
2024
I was taught by both of my parents to work hard, to be passionate about whatever I did, and I felt that I did that and kind of got to where I am today because of hard work and passion and determination.
~ Ashley Biden ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence. ~ David Hume
2005
There are always good parts. They may not pay what you want, and they may not have as many days' work as you want, they may not have the billing that you want, they may not have a lot of things, but — the content of the role itself — I find there are many roles. ~ Anne Bancroft (recent death)
2006
When you were born in this world
Everyone laughed while you cried
Conduct not yourself in manner such
That they laugh when you are gone.
~ Kabir (à propos of recent death of terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi)
2007
What is this thing called love?
This funny thing called love?
~ Cole Porter ~
2008
Be a clown, be a clown,
All the world loves a clown.
Act the fool, play the calf,
And you'll always have the last laugh.
~ Cole Porter ~
2009
In olden days a glimpse of stocking
Was looked on as something shocking
But now, Heaven knows,
Anything goes.
~ Cole Porter ~
2010

Oh, give me land, lots of land under starry skies above.
Don't fence me in.
Let me ride through the wide open country that I love
Don't fence me in.

Let me be by myself in the evenin' breeze
And listen to the murmur of the cottonwood trees
Send me off forever but I ask you please
Don't fence me in.

~ Cole Porter ~

2011
I want to ride to the ridge where the west commences
And gaze at the moon till I lose my senses
I can't look at hobbles and I can't stand fences
Don't fence me in
~ Cole Porter ~
2012
One thing most of us agree on is that the universe exists (people who deny that usually follow some trade other than science), so if some theoretical particle interaction would lead ultimately to the nonexistence of the universe, then you can save a lot of electricity by not trying to demonstrate it.
~ Joe Haldeman ~
2013

This rule I propose,
Always have an ace in the hole.

Always try to arrive at
Having an ace some place private.

Always have an ace in the hole.

~ Cole Porter ~
2014
If it were in my power to forgive you for your reckless cruelty I would do so. I like to think I am a gentle man, but your forgiveness will have to come from someone other than me. … Let us not assassinate this lad further, Senator. You’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?
~ Joseph N. Welch ~
2015
Be the poor silly ass
And you'll always travel first class.
Give 'em quips, give 'em fun,
And they'll pay to say you're A–1.
If you become a farmer, you've the weather to buck.
If become a gambler you'll be struck with your luck.
But jack you'll never lack if you can quack like a duck.
Be a clown, be a clown, be a clown.
~ Cole Porter ~
2016
They say that spring
Means just one thing
To little lovebirds.
We're not above birds,
Let's misbehave.
~ Cole Porter ~
2017
It must be fun to be you
And play with love as you do
To treat each new romance
As merely one more dance
Or just another book to glance through
It must be fun to acquire
Whatever heart you desire,
And when you're bored with it
To tear it in two,
It must be fun to be you.
~ Cole Porter ~
2018
Travel changes you. As you move through this life and this world you change things slightly, you leave marks behind, however small. And in return, life — and travel — leaves marks on you. Most of the time, those marks — on your body or on your heart — are beautiful. Often, though, they hurt.
~ Anthony Bourdain ~
2019
I get no kick from champagne.
Mere alcohol doesn't thrill me at all,
So tell me why it should be true
That I get a kick out of you?
~ Cole Porter ~
2020
So kiss me Kate,
Thou lovely loon,
E'er we start on our honeymoon.
~ Cole Porter ~
2021
You are my fav'rite star,
My haven in heaven above,
You are ev'rything I love.
~ Cole Porter ~
2022
I really want the whole world, and Americans as well, not to get used to this war. Yes, it is far from you, it lasts long, and you can get tired of it, but please do not get used to it, because if everyone gets used to it, this war will never end. Don't get used to the pain. And when you start thinking that there may be some reason for this war, it means that you are in the zone of Russian propaganda. Be careful, hear the truth.
~ Olena Zelenska ~
2023
I have been summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday, at 3 PM. I never thought it possible that such a thing could happen to a former President of the United States, who received far more votes than any sitting President in the History of our Country, and is currently leading, by far, all Candidates, both Democrat and Republican, in Polls of the 2024 Presidential Election. I AM AN INNOCENT MAN!
~ Donald Trump ~
  • proposed by Kalki; recent remarks on a summons to appear in a federal court.
2024
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds,—and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of—wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air. ...
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew—
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
—Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
~ John Gillespie Magee Jr. ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
History teaches that wars begin when governments believe the price of aggression is cheap. ~ Ronald Reagan (recent death)
2005
A novel is balanced between a few true impressions and the multitude of false ones that make up most of what we call life. It tells us that for every human being there is a diversity of existences, that the single existence is itself an illusion in part, that these many existences signify something, tend to something, fulfill something; it promises us meaning, harmony and even justice. ~ Saul Bellow (born 10 June 1915)
2006
All that you see has appeared because of Love.
All shines from Love,
All pulses with Love,
All flows from Love —
No, once again, all is Love!
~ Fakhruddin 'Iraqi (born 10 June 1213)
2007
Goodness is achieved not in a vacuum, but in the company of other men, attended by love. ~ Saul Bellow
2008
We are drowning in information, while starving for wisdom. The world henceforth will be run by synthesizers, people able to put together the right information at the right time, think critically about it, and make important choices wisely. ~ E. O. Wilson
2009
Most joyful let the Poet be;
It is through him that all men see.
~ William Ellery Channing ~ (born June 10)
2010
Apparently the rise of consciousness is linked to certain kinds of privation. It is the bitterness of self-consciousness that we knowers know best. Critical of the illusions that sustained mankind in earlier times, this self-consciousness of ours does little to sustain us now. The question is: which is disenchanted, the world itself or the consciousness we have of it? ~ Saul Bellow
2011
Children are tough, though we tend to think of them as fragile. They have to be tough. Childhood is not easy. We sentimentalize children, but they know what's real and what's not. They understand metaphor and symbol. ~ Maurice Sendak
2012
You can’t make anything go anywhere. It just happens. ~ Thelonious Monk
2013
Love is a fire that burns unseen,
A wound that aches yet isn't felt,
An always discontent contentment,
A pain that rages without hurting,
A longing for nothing but to long,
A loneliness in the midst of people,
A never feeling pleased when pleased,
A passion that gains when lost in thought.
~ Luís de Camões ~
2014
From their earliest years children live on familiar terms with disrupting emotions, fear and anxiety are an intrinsic part of their everyday lives, they continually cope with frustrations as best they can. And it is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. It is the best means they have for taming Wild Things.
~ Maurice Sendak ~
2015
Writers are greatly respected. The intelligent public is wonderfully patient with them, continues to read them, and endures disappointment after disappointment, waiting to hear from art what it does not hear from theology, philosophy, social theory, and what it cannot hear from pure science. Out of the struggle at the center has come an immense, painful longing for a broader, more flexible, fuller, more coherent, more comprehensive account of what we human beings are, who we are, and what this life is for.
~ Saul Bellow ~
2016
He who inflicts a vile and unjust harm by using the power and the force with which he is invested, does not conquer; the true victory is to have on one's side Right naked and entire.
~ Luís de Camões ~
2017
A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep.
~ Saul Bellow ~
2018
We are all such accidents. We do not make up history and culture. We simply appear, not by our own choice. We make what we can of our condition with the means available. We must accept the mixture as we find it — the impurity of it, the tragedy of it, the hope of it.
~ Saul Bellow ~
2019
In the greatest confusion there is still an open channel to the soul. It may be difficult to find because by midlife it is overgrown, and some of the wildest thickets that surround it grow out of what we describe as our education. But the channel is always there, and it is our business to keep it open, to have access to the deepest part of ourselves.
~ Saul Bellow ~
2020
For the first time in history, the human species as a whole has gone into politics. Everyone is in the act, and there is no telling what may come of it.
~ Saul Bellow ~
2021
There is no God but Love.
~ Fakhruddin 'Iraqi ~
2022
We cannot just sweep this under the rug. We need to know why it happened, who did it, and people need to be held accountable for it. And I'm committed to make sure that happens.
~ Kevin McCarthy ~
2023
The men and women of the United States intelligence community and our armed forces dedicate their lives to protecting our nation and its people. Our laws that protect national defense information are critical to the safety and security of the United States and they must be enforced. Violations of those laws put our country at risk.
Adherence to the rule of law is a bedrock principle of the Department of Justice. And our nation’s commitment to the rule of law sets an example for the world. We have one set of laws in this country, and they apply to everyone. Applying those laws. Collecting facts. That’s what determines the outcome of an investigation. Nothing more. Nothing less.
The prosecutors in my office are among the most talented and experienced in the Department of Justice. They have investigated this case hewing to the highest ethical standards. And they will continue to do so as this case proceeds.
It’s very important for me to note that the defendants in this case must be presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law. To that end, my office will seek a speedy trial in this matter.
~ Jack Smith ~
2024
Children are willing to expose themselves to experiences. We aren't. Grownups always say they protect their children, but they're really protecting themselves. Besides, you can't protect children. They know everything.
~ Maurice Sendak ~


2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Whatever else history may say about me when I'm gone, I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears; to your confidence rather than your doubts. My dream is that you will travel the road ahead with liberty's lamp guiding your steps and opportunity's arm steadying your way. ~ Ronald Reagan (recent death)
2005
The good writing of any age has always been the product of someone's neurosis, and we'd have a mighty dull literature if all the writers that came along were a bunch of happy chuckleheads. ~ William Styron (born 11 June 1925)
2006
In small proportions we just beauties see,
And in short measures life may perfect be.
~ Ben Jonson (born 11 June 1572)
2007
The world is wide; no two days are alike, nor even two hours; neither were there ever two leaves of a tree alike since the creation of the world; and the genuine productions of art, like those of nature, are all distinct from one another. ~ John Constable
2008
Talking and eloquence are not the same: to speak, and to speak well, are two things. A fool may talk, but a wise man speaks. ~ Ben Jonson (born 11 June 1572)
2009
There is nothing ugly; I never saw an ugly thing in my life: for let the form of an object be what it may, — light, shade, and perspective will always make it beautiful. ~ John Constable
2010
Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup
And I'll not look for wine.
~ Ben Jonson ~
2011
It is hopelessness even more than pain that crushes the soul. So the decision-making of daily life involves not, as in normal affairs, shifting from one annoying situation to another less annoying — or from discomfort to relative comfort, or from boredom to activity — but moving from pain to pain. One does not abandon, even briefly, one's bed of nails, but is attached to it wherever one goes. ~ William Styron
2012
We see nothing truly till we understand it.
~ John Constable ~
2013
The great vice of the present day is bravura, an attempt to do something beyond the truth. In endeavouring to do something better than well, they do what in reality is good for nothing. Fashion always had, & will have, its day — but truth (in all things) only will last, and can only have just claims on posterity
~ John Constable ~
2014
Surely mankind has yet to be born. Surely this is true! For only something blind and uncomprehending could exist in such a mean conjunction with its own flesh, its own kind. How else account for such faltering, clumsy, hateful cruelty? Even the possums and the skunks know better!
~ William Styron ~
2015
True happiness
Consists not in the multitude of friends,
But in the worth and choice.
~ Ben Jonson ~
2016
They say princes learn no art truly, but the art of horsemanship. The reason is, the brave beast is no flatterer. He will throw a prince as soon as his groom.
~ Ben Jonson ~
2017
Of all wild beasts preserve me from a tyrant; and of all tame, a flatterer.
~ Ben Jonson ~
2018
Depression is a disorder of mood, so mysteriously painful and elusive in the way it becomes known to the self — to the mediating intellect — as to verge close to being beyond description. It thus remains nearly incomprehensible to those who have not experienced it in its extreme mode, although the gloom, “the blues” which people go through occasionally and associate with the general hassle of everyday existence are of such prevalence that they do give many individuals a hint of the illness in its catastrophic form.
~ William Styron ~
2019
He is a narrow-minded man, that affects a triumph in any glorious study; but to triumph in a lie, and a lie themselves have forged, is frontless. Folly often goes beyond her bounds; but Impudence knows none.
~ Ben Jonson ~
2020
Thy praise or dispraise is to me alike;
One doth not stroke me, nor the other strike.
~ Ben Jonson ~
2021
This Nation was founded by men of many nations and backgrounds. It was founded on the principle that all men are created equal, and that the rights of every man are diminished when the rights of one man are threatened.
Today we are committed to a worldwide struggle to promote and protect the rights of all who wish to be free. … We are confronted primarily with a moral issue. It is as old as the scriptures and is as clear as the American Constitution.
The heart of the question is whether all Americans are to be afforded equal rights and equal opportunities, whether we are going to treat our fellow Americans as we want to be treated.
~ John F. Kennedy ~
2022
Those who invaded our Capitol and battled law enforcement for hours were motivated by what President Trump had told them — that the election was stolen, and that he was the rightful President.
President Trump summoned the mob, assembled the mob and lit the flame of this attack. You will also hear about plots to commit seditious conspiracy on January 6th, a crime defined in our laws as conspiring to overthrow, put down, or destroy by force the government of the United States, or to oppose by force the authority thereof. … On the morning of January 6th, President Donald Trump's intention was to remain President of the United States, despite the lawful outcome of the 2020 election, and in violation of his constitutional obligation to relinquish power.
Over multiple months, Donald Trump oversaw and coordinated a sophisticated seven-part plan to overturn the presidential election and prevent the transfer of presidential power.
In our hearings, you will see evidence of each element of this plan.
~ Liz Cheney ~
  • proposed by Kalki; recent remarks on notable historical events.
2023
There's reason good, that you good laws should make:
Men's manners ne'er were viler, for your sake.
~ Ben Jonson ~
2024
Art hath an enemy call'd ignorance.
~ Ben Jonson ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant. ~ Robert Louis Stevenson
2005
I don't want to have lived in vain like most people. I want to be useful or bring enjoyment to people, even those I've never met. I want to go on living even after my death! And that's why I'm grateful to God for having given me this gift, which I can use to develop and to express all that's inside me! ~ Anne Frank (born 12 June 1929)
2006
If one is but secure at the foundation, he will not be pained by departure from minor details or affairs that are contrary to expectation. But in the end, the details of a matter are important. The right and wrong of one's way of doing things are found in trivial matters. ~ Yamamoto Tsunetomo (born 12 June 1659)
2007
I don't believe that the big men, the politicians and the capitalists alone are guilty of the war. Oh, no, the little man is just as keen, otherwise the people of the world would have risen in revolt long ago! There is an urge and rage in people to destroy, to kill, to murder, and until all mankind, without exception, undergoes a great change, wars will be waged, everything that has been built up, cultivated and grown, will be destroyed and disfigured, after which mankind will have to begin all over again. ~ Anne Frank
2008
We are adhering to life now with our last muscle — the heart. ~ Djuna Barnes
2009
My knowledge of pain, learned with the sabre, taught me not to be afraid. And just as in dueling when you must concentrate on your enemy's cheek, so, too, in war. You cannot waste time on feinting and sidestepping. You must decide on your target and go in. ~ Otto Skorzeny (born 12 June 1908)
2010
Everyone's got the same insecurities as you
Believe me it is true
Do not be afraid
To show people the real you. ~ Justin Heazlewood
2011
I am not a critic; to me criticism is so often nothing more than the eye garrulously denouncing the shape of the peephole that gives access to hidden treasure. ~ Djuna Barnes
2012
Destiny and history are untidy.
~ Djuna Barnes ~
2013
Life is not to be told, call it as loud as you like, it will not tell itself.
~ Djuna Barnes ~
2014
I do not mistrust the future; I do not fear what is ahead. For our problems are large, but our heart is larger. Our challenges are great, but our will is greater. And if our flaws are endless, God's love is truly boundless.
~ George H. W. Bush ~
2015
A true friend is someone who is there for you when he'd rather be anywhere else.
~ Len Wein ~
2016
I have often been downcast, but never in despair; I regard our hiding as a dangerous adventure, romantic and interesting at the same time. In my diary I treat all the privations as amusing. I have made up my mind now to lead a different life from other girls and, later on, different from ordinary housewives. My start has been so very full of interest, and that is the sole reason why I have to laugh at the humorous side of the most dangerous moments.
~ Anne Frank ~
2017
We all know that a good example is more effective than advice. So set a good example, and it won't take long for others to follow.
~ Anne Frank ~
2018
We're all alive, but we don't know why or what for; we're all searching for happiness; we're all leading lives that are different and yet the same.
~ Anne Frank ~
2019
There is surely nothing other than the single purpose of the present moment. A man's whole life is a succession of moment after moment. There will be nothing else to do, and nothing else to pursue. Live being true to the single purpose of the moment.
~ Yamamoto Tsunetomo ~
2020
Now, those who were killed and injured here were gunned down by a single killer with a powerful assault weapon. The motives of this killer may have been different than the mass shooters in Aurora or Newtown. But the instruments of death were so similar. And now another 49 innocent people are dead; another 53 are injured; some are still fighting for their lives; some will have wounds that will last a lifetime. We can’t anticipate or catch every single deranged person that may wish to do harm to his neighbors or his friends or his coworkers or strangers. But we can do something about the amount of damage that they do. Unfortunately, our politics have conspired to make it as easy as possible for a terrorist or just a disturbed individual like those in Aurora and Newtown to buy extraordinarily powerful weapons, and they can do so legally.
~ Barack Obama ~
2021
The heart of a virtuous person has settled down and he does not rush about at things. A person of little merit is not at peace but walks about making trouble and is in conflict with all.
~ Yamamoto Tsunetomo ~
2022
Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person's character lies in their own hands.
~ Anne Frank ~
2023
I've learned one thing: you only really get to know a person after a fight. Only then can you judge their true character!
~ Anne Frank ~
2024
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization, and at present very few people have reached this level. ~ Bertrand Russell
2005
Talent perceives differences, Genius unity. ~ William Butler Yeats (born 13 June 1865)
2006
It is difficult to know yourself if you do not know others. To all Ways there are side-tracks. If you study a Way daily, and your spirit diverges, you may think you are obeying a good way, but objectively it is not the true Way. If you are following the true Way and diverge a little, this will later become a large divergence. You must realise this. ~ Miyamoto Musashi (died 13 June 1645)
2007
Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with the golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams beneath your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
2008
So long as all is ordered for attack, and that alone, leaders will instinctively increase the number of enemies that they may give their followers something to do. ~ William Butler Yeats
2009
A line will take us hours maybe;
Yet if it does not seem a moment’s thought,
Our stitching and unstitching has been naught.
Better go down upon your marrow-bones
And scrub a kitchen pavement, or break stones
Like an old pauper, in all kinds of weather;
For to articulate sweet sounds together
Is to work harder than all these, and yet
Be thought an idler by the noisy set
Of bankers, schoolmasters, and clergymen
The martyrs call the world.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
2010
I am content to follow to its source
Every event in action or in thought;
Measure the lot; forgive myself the lot!
When such as I cast out remorse
So great a sweetness flows into the breast
We must laugh and we must sing,
We are blest by everything,
Everything we look upon is blest.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
2011
All hatred driven hence,
The soul recovers radical innocence
And learns at last that it is self-delighting,
Self-appeasing, self-affrighting,
And that its own sweet will is Heaven’s will;
She can, though every face should scowl
And every windy quarter howl
Or every bellows burst, be happy still.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
2012
Gradually I began to intellectually reject some of the delusionally influenced lines of thinking which had been characteristic of my orientation. This began, most recognizably, with the rejection of politically-oriented thinking as essentially a hopeless waste of intellectual effort.
~ John Forbes Nash ~
2013
Man can embody truth but he cannot know it.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
2014
Be plural, like the universe!
~ Fernando Pessoa ~
2015
Trouble shared is trouble halved.
~ Dorothy L. Sayers ~
2016
God wills, man dreams, the work is born.
~ Fernando Pessoa ~
2017
A lofty morality should be tolerant, for none declare its laws but those worn out with its warfare, and they must pity sinners.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
in
~ The Autobiography of William Butler Yeats ~
2018
I'm nothing,
I'll always be nothing.
I can't even wish to be something.
Aside from that, I've got all the world's dreams inside me.
~ Fernando Pessoa ~
2019
The worst sin — perhaps the only sin — passion can commit, is to be joyless.
~ Dorothy L. Sayers ~
2020
A powerful class by terror, rhetoric, and organised sentimentality, may drive their people to war but the day draws near when they cannot keep them there.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
in
~ The Autobiography of William Butler Yeats ~
2021
Let's be simple and calm,
Like the trees and streams,
And God will love us, making us
Us, even as the trees are trees
And the streams are streams,
And will give us greenness in the spring, which is its season,
And a river to go to when we end...
And he'll give us nothing more, since to give us more would make us less us.
~ Fernando Pessoa ~
2022
Words are always getting conventionalized to some secondary meaning. It is one of the works of poetry to take the truants in custody and bring them back to their right senses.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
2023
We may find illustrations of the highest doctrines of science in games and gymnastics, in travelling by land and by water, in storms of the air and of the sea, and wherever there is matter in motion.
~ James Clerk Maxwell ~
2024
We can make our minds so like still water that beings gather about us that they may see, it may be, their own images, and so live for a moment with a clearer, perhaps even with a fiercer life because of our quiet.
~ William Butler Yeats ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Apathy can be overcome by enthusiasm, and enthusiasm can only be aroused by two things: first, an ideal, with takes the imagination by storm, and second, a definite intelligible plan for carrying that ideal into practice. ~ Arnold J. Toynbee
2005
At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality... We must strive every day so that this love of living humanity will be transformed into actual deeds, into acts that serve as examples, as a moving force. ~ Che Guevara (14 June 1928 is his official date of birth, though it is disputed)
2006
The longest day must have its close — the gloomiest night will wear on to a morning. An eternal, inexorable lapse of moments is ever hurrying the day of the evil to an eternal night, and the night of the just to an eternal day. ~ Harriet Beecher Stowe (born 14 June 1811)
2007
That play of black upon white, white upon black, has the intent and takes the form of creative art. It has in it a flow of the spirit and a harmony of music. Everything is lost when suddenly a false note is struck, or one party in a duet suddenly launches forth on an eccentric flight of his own. A masterpiece of a game can be ruined by insensitivity to the feelings of an adversary. ~ Yasunari Kawabata (born 14 June 1899)
2008
True love ennobles and dignifies the material labors of life; and homely services rendered for love's sake have in them a poetry that is immortal. ~ Harriet Beecher Stowe
2009
The Zen disciple sits for long hours silent and motionless, with his eyes closed. Presently he enters a state of impassivity, free from all ideas and all thoughts. He departs from the self and enters the realm of nothingness. This is not the nothingness or the emptiness of the West. It is rather the reverse, a universe of the spirit in which everything communicates freely with everything, transcending bounds, limitless. … The disciple must, however, always be lord of his own thoughts, and must attain enlightenment through his own efforts. And the emphasis is less upon reason and argument than upon intuition, immediate feeling. Enlightenment comes not from teaching but through the eye awakened inwardly. Truth is in "the discarding of words", it lies "outside words". ~ Yasunari Kawabata ~
2010
Fiction has to be plausible. All history has to do is happen. ~ Harry Turtledove
2011
In moments of great peril it is easy to muster a powerful response to moral stimuli; but for them to retain their effect requires the development of a consciousness in which there is a new priority of values. ~ Che Guevara
2012
By what strange law of mind is it that an idea long overlooked, and trodden under foot as a useless stone, suddenly sparkles out in new light, as a discovered diamond?
~ Harriet Beecher Stowe ~
2013
Each time I think I've made a connection with someone... once they find out what I can do, whether it's hours or days later, everything changes. Invariably they freak. They get retroactively paranoid, wondering what else Clark Kent is hiding from them.
~ Mark Waid ~
in
~ Superman: Birthright ~
2014
Because you cannot see him, God is everywhere.
~ Yasunari Kawabata ~
2015
What makes saintliness in my view, as distinguished from ordinary goodness, is a certain quality of magnanimity and greatness of soul that brings life within the circle of the heroic.
~ Harriet Beecher Stowe ~
2016
In the end, you're measured not by how much you undertake but by what you finally accomplish.
~ Donald Trump ~
2017
I think the big problem this country has is being politically correct.
~ Donald Trump ~
2018
Our country is a mess right now and we don't have time to pretend otherwise. We don't have time to waste on being politically correct.
~ Donald Trump ~
2019
The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy.
~ Donald Trump ~
2020
I think I’ve done more for the black community than any other President — and let’s take a pass on Abraham Lincoln, because he did good — but although it’s always questionable — you know, in other words, the end result.
~ Donald Trump ~
2021
When we see the beauty of the snow, when we see the beauty of the full moon, when we see the beauty of the cherries in bloom, when in short we brush against and are awakened by the beauty of the four seasons, it is then that we think most of those close to us, and want them to share the pleasure. The excitement of beauty calls forth strong fellow feelings, yearnings for companionship, and the word "comrade" can be taken to mean "human being".
~ Yasunari Kawabata ~
2022
When the students poured into Tiananmen Square, the Chinese government almost blew it. Then they were vicious, they were horrible, but they put it down with strength. That shows you the power of strength.
~ Donald Trump ~
2023
In my administration, I'm going to enforce all laws concerning the protection of classified information. No one will be above the law.
~ Donald Trump ~
2024
I made America great again, and I may have to do it again.
~ Donald Trump ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Seek always to do some good, somewhere. Every man has to seek in his own way to realize his true worth. You must give some time to your fellow man. Even if it's a little thing, do something for those who need help, something for which you get no pay but the privilege of doing it. ~ Albert Schweitzer
2005
If fate means you to lose, give him a good fight anyhow. ~ William McFee (born 15 June 1881)
2006
Responsibility's like a string we can only see the middle of. Both ends are out of sight. ~ William McFee (born 15 June 1881)
2007
All that you know is at an end. ~ The "Silver Surfer" in Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
2008
I protect my right to be a Catholic by preserving your right to believe as a Jew, a Protestant, or non-believer, or as anything else you choose. We know that the price of seeking to force our beliefs on others is that they might some day force theirs on us. ~ Mario Cuomo
2009
The world belongs to the Enthusiast who keeps cool. ~ William McFee (born 15 June 1881)
2010
There are some men whom a staggering emotional shock, so far from making them mental invalids for life, seems, on the other hand, to awaken, to galvanize, to arouse into an almost incredible activity of soul. ~ William McFee
2011
When established identities become outworn or unfinished ones threaten to remain incomplete, special crises compel men to wage holy wars, by the crudest means, against those who seem to question or threaten their unsafe ideological bases. ~ Erik Erikson
2012
People don't ever seem to realise that doing what's right's no guarantee against misfortune.
~ William McFee ~
2013
Someday, maybe, there will exist a well-informed, well considered and yet fervent public conviction that the most deadly of all possible sins is the mutilation of a child’s spirit; for such mutilation undercuts the life principle of trust, without which every human act, may it feel ever so good and seem ever so right is prone to perversion by destructive forms of conscientiousness.
~ Erik Erikson ~
2014
All world-images are apt to become corrupt when left to ecclesiastic bureaucracies. But this does not make the formation of world-images expendable. And I can only repeat that we deny the remnants of old-world images at our own risk, because we do not overcome them by declaring them — with all the righteousness of skepticism — something of a secret sin. They are not less powerful for being denied.
~ Erik Erikson ~
2015
It is our will, and we firmly enjoin, that the English Church be free, and that the men in our kingdom have and hold all the aforesaid liberties, rights, and concessions, well and peaceably, freely and quietly, fully and wholly, for themselves and their heirs, of us and our heirs, in all respects and in all places for ever, as is aforesaid. An oath, moreover, has been taken, as well on our part as on the part of the barons, that all these conditions aforesaid shall be kept in good faith and without evil intent. Given under our hand — the abovenamed and many others being witnesses — in the meadow which is called Runnymede, between Windsor and Staines, on the fifteenth day of June, in the seventeenth year of our reign.
~ Magna Carta ~
2016
We must get the American public to look past the glitter, beyond the showmanship, to the reality, the hard substance of things. And we'll do it not so much with speeches that sound good as with speeches that are good and sound; not so much with speeches that will bring people to their feet as with speeches that will bring people to their senses.
~ Mario Cuomo ~
2017
I think it's already apparent that a good part of this Nation understands — if only instinctively — that anything which seems to suggest that God favors a political party or the establishment of a state church, is wrong and dangerous.
Way down deep the American people are afraid of an entangling relationship between formal religions — or whole bodies of religious belief — and government. Apart from constitutional law and religious doctrine, there is a sense that tells us it's wrong to presume to speak for God or to claim God's sanction of our particular legislation and His rejection of all other positions. Most of us are offended when we see religion being trivialized by its appearance in political throw-away pamphlets.
The American people need no course in philosophy or political science or church history to know that God should not be made into a celestial party chairman.
~ Mario Cuomo ~
2018
I protect my right to be a Catholic by preserving your right to believe as a Jew, a Protestant, or non-believer, or as anything else you choose.
We know that the price of seeking to force our beliefs on others is that they might some day force theirs on us.
This freedom is the fundamental strength of our unique experiment in government. In the complex interplay of forces and considerations that go into the making of our laws and policies, its preservation must be a pervasive and dominant concern.
~ Mario Cuomo ~
  • proposed by Kalki, for Coumo's birthdate — but also selected in regard to Eid al-Fitr of this year.
2019
There is nothing like an odor to stir memories.
~ William McFee ~
2020
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 ~
2021
London is always beautiful to those who love and understand that extraordinary microcosm; but at five of a summer morning there is about her an exquisite quality of youthful fragrance and debonair freshness which goes to the heart.
~ William McFee ~
2022
Many dreams have been brought to your doorstep
They just lie there, and they die there
Are you warm? Are you real, Mona Lisa?
Or just a cold and lonely, lovely work of art?
~ Ray Evans ~
2023
Drovers were racing brokenly across the milling hogs like wind through grass until a whole echelon of them careering up the outer flank forsook the land and faired into space with torn cries. Now the entire herd had begun to wheel wider and faster along the bluff and the outermost ranks swung centrifugally over the escarpment row on row wailing and squealing and above this the howls and curses of the drovers that now upreared in the moil of flesh they tended and swept with dust had begun to assume satanic looks with their staves and wild eyes as if they were no true swineherds but disciples of darkness got among these charges to herd them to their doom.
~ Cormac McCarthy ~
  • proposed by Kalki; in regard of his recent death.
2024
I have a mistress, for perfections rare
In every eye, but in my thoughts most fair.
Like tapers on the altar shine her eyes;
Her breath is the perfume of sacrifice;
And wheresoe’er my fancy would begin,
Still her perfection lets religion in.
We sit and talk, and kiss away the hours
As chastely as the morning dews kiss flowers:
I touch her, like my beads, with devout care,
And come unto my courtship as my prayer.
~ Thomas Randolph ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Happiness is the only good. The place to be happy is here. The time to be happy is now. The way to be happy is to make others so. ~ Robert G. Ingersoll
2005
I cannot think we are useless or Usen would not have created us. He created all tribes of men and certainly had a righteous purpose in creating each. ~ Geronimo (born 16 June 1829)
2006
If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it. ~ Abraham Lincoln's "House Divided" speech, 16 June 1858)
2007
It's no use, says he. Force, hatred, history, all that. That's not life for men and women, insult and hatred. And everybody knows that it's the very opposite of that that is really life. ~ James Joyce in Ulysses
2008
When you're 50 you start thinking about things you haven’t thought about before. I used to think getting old was about vanity — but actually it's about losing people you love. Getting wrinkles is trivial. ~ Joyce Carol Oates
2009
A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are the portals to discovery. ~ James Joyce in Ulysses
2010
It is as painful perhaps to be awakened from a vision as to be born. ~ James Joyce in Ulysses
2011
The mocker is never taken seriously when he is most serious. ~ James Joyce in Ulysses
2012
If others have their will Ann hath a way.
~ James Joyce ~
in
~ Ulysses ~
2013
Values exist in a transcendental realm, beyond space and time. They can neither be fought for, nor destroyed.
~ Enoch Powell ~
2014
I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.
~ James Joyce ~
in
~ Ulysses ~
2015
As we, or mother Dana, weave and unweave our bodies, Stephen said, from day to day, their molecules shuttled to and fro, so does the artist weave and unweave his image.
~ James Joyce ~
in
~ Ulysses ~
2016
Secrets, silent, stony
sit in the dark palaces of both our hearts: secrets weary of their
tyranny: tyrants, willing to be dethroned.
~ James Joyce ~
in
~ Ulysses ~
2017
Homo sapiens is the species that invents symbols in which to invest passion and authority, then forgets that symbols are inventions.
~ Joyce Carol Oates ~
2018
Nothing is accidental in the universe — this is one of my Laws of Physics — except the entire universe itself, which is Pure Accident, pure divinity.
~ Joyce Carol Oates ~
2019
If you are a writer you locate yourself behind a wall of silence and no matter what you are doing, driving a car or walking or doing housework — you can still be writing, because you have that space.
~ Joyce Carol Oates ~
2020
"A house divided against itself cannot stand."
I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.
I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided.
It will become all one thing or all the other.
Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become lawful in all the States, old as well as new — North as well as South.
~ Abraham Lincoln ~
  • proposed by Kalki, as the date of Lincoln's delivery of this "House Divided" speech, in 1858.
2021
my God after that long kiss I near lost my breath yes he said I was a flower of the mountain yes so we are flowers all a womans body yes that was one true thing he said in his life and the sun shines for you today yes that was why I liked him because I saw he understood or felt what a woman is and I knew I could always get round him and I gave him all the pleasure I could leading him on till he asked me to say yes and I wouldnt answer first only looked out over the sea and the sky I was thinking of so many things he didnt know
~ James Joyce ~
in
~ Ulysses ~


2022
I love flowers Id love to have the whole place swimming in roses God of heaven theres nothing like nature the wild mountains then the sea and the waves rushing then the beautiful country with the fields of oats and wheat and all kinds of things
~ James Joyce ~
in
~ Ulysses ~
2023
It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity, but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities, but of their advantages. Nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his fellow-citizens. Even a beggar does not depend upon it entirely.
~ Adam Smith ~
2024
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Love loves to love love. ~ James Joyce in Ulysses
  • selected by Kalki (selected on the 100th "anniversary" of Bloomsday, but a day late to mark the "centennial" celebrations themselves...)
2005
I observed, "Love is the fulfilling of the law, the end of the commandment." It is not only "the first and great" command, but all the commandments in one. "Whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise," they are all comprised in this one word, love. ~ John Wesley (born 17 June 1703 — but this was in Old Style reckonings, actually 28 June by the modern Gregorian calendar)
2006
Some would say that it is too idealistic to believe in a society based on tolerance and the sanctity of human life, where borders, nationalities and ideologies are of marginal importance. To those I say, this is not idealism, but rather realism, because history has taught us that war rarely resolves our differences. Force does not heal old wounds; it opens new ones. ~ Mohamed ElBaradei (born 17 June 1942)
2007
Nothing you do, however many of us you kill, will stop that flight to our cities where freedom is strong and where people can live in harmony with one another. Whatever you do, however many you kill, you will fail. ~ Ken Livingstone (born 17 June 1945)
2008
Our security strategies have not yet caught up with the risks we are facing. The globalization that has swept away the barriers to the movement of goods, ideas and people has also swept with it barriers that confined and localized security threats. ~ Mohamed ElBaradei
2009
Whether one believes in evolution, intelligent design, or Divine Creation, one thing is certain. Since the beginning of history, human beings have been at war with each other, under the pretext of religion, ideology, ethnicity and other reasons. And no civilization has ever willingly given up its most powerful weapons. We seem to agree today that we can share modern technology, but we still refuse to acknowledge that our values — at their very core — are shared values. ~ Mohamed ElBaradei
2010
The result of the struggle between the thought and the ability to express it, between dream and reality, is seldom more than a compromise or an approximation. ~ M. C. Escher
2011
In brightest day, in blackest night,
No evil shall escape my sight
Let those who worship evil's might,
Beware my power...
Green Lantern's light!
~ Green Lantern ~
2012
My work is a game, a very serious game.
~ M. C. Escher ~
2013
The global community has become irreversibly interdependent, with the constant movement of people, ideas, goods and resources. In such a world, we must combat terrorism with an infectious security culture that crosses borders — an inclusive approach to security based on solidarity and the value of human life. In such a world, weapons of mass destruction have no place.
~ Mohamed ElBaradei ~
2014
We must abandon the unworkable notion that it is morally reprehensible for some countries to pursue weapons of mass destruction, yet morally acceptable for others to rely on them for security — and indeed to continue to refine their capacities and postulate plans for their use.
~ Mohamed ElBaradei ~
2015
Coercion never produces harmony. How harmonious are people who are being forced to act against their will? Most likely, those who are coerced will resent those who benefit from the coercion. This sets group against group; it doesn't bring them together.
~ Harry Browne ~
2016
We live in a beautiful and orderly world, not in a chaos without norms, as we sometimes seem to.
~ M. C. Escher ~
2017
We have severely underestimated the Russians, the extent of the country and the treachery of the climate. This is the revenge of reality.
~ Heinz Guderian ~
2018
Most men are difficult to buy presents for. Last year I gave up and handed my father a hundred dollars and said, "Just buy yourself something that will make your life easier." He went out and bought a gift for my mother.
~ Rita Rudner ~
2019
It has been deduced from Hitler’s great power over the masses that the Germans are an unusually suggestible race. But in all countries and at all times men have succumbed to the suggestive powers of unusual personalities, even if the wielders of those powers were not always good men in the Christian sense.
~ Heinz Guderian ~
2020
The politicians' stirring phrases are meant to keep our eyes averted from the reality of war — to make us imagine heroic young men marching in parades, winning glorious battles, and bringing peace and democracy to the world.
But war is something quite different from that.
It is your children or your grandchildren dying before they're even fully adults, or being maimed or mentally scarred for life. It is your brothers and sisters being taught to kill other people — and to hate people who are just like themselves and who don't want to kill anyone either. It is your children seeing their buddies' limbs blown off their bodies.
It is hundreds of thousands of human beings dying years before their time. It is millions of people separated forever from the ones they love.
It is the destruction of homes for which people worked for decades. It is the end of careers that meant as much to others as your career means to you.
It is the imposition of heavy taxes on you and on other Americans and on people in other countries — taxes that remain long after the war is over. It is the suppression of free speech and the jailing of people who criticize the government.
It is the imposition of slavery by forcing young men to serve in the military.
It is goading the public to hate foreign people and races — whether Arabs or Japanese or Cubans or Serbs. It is numbing our sensibilities to cruelties inflicted on foreigners.
It is cheering at the news of enemy pilots killed in their planes, of young men blown to bits while trapped inside tanks, of sailors drowned at sea.
Other tragedies inevitably trail in the wake of war. Politicians lie even more than usual. Secrecy and cover-ups become the rule rather than the exception. The press becomes even less reliable.
War is genocide, torture, cruelty, propaganda, and slavery.
War is the worst cruelty government can inflict upon its subjects. It makes every other political crime — corruption, bribery, favoritism, vote-buying, graft, dishonesty — seem petty.
~ Harry Browne ~
2021
You share in all the love there is. The goddess awakens in infinite forms and a thousand disguises. She is found where she is least expected, appears out of nowhere and everywhere to illumine the open heart. She is singing, crying, moaning, wailing, shrieking, crooning to us, to be awake, to commit ourselves to life, to be a lover in the world and of the world, to join our voices in the single song of constant change and creation. For her law is to love all beings, and she is the cup of the drink of life. The circle is ever open, ever unbroken.
~ Starhawk ~
2022
False claims that our elections have been stolen from us corrupt our democracy, as they corrupt us. To continue to insist and persist in the false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen is itself an affront to our democracy and to the Constitution of the United States — an affront without precedent.
Those who think that because America is a republic, theft and corruption of our national elections and electoral process are not theft and corruption of our democracy are sorely mistaken. America is both a republic and a representative democracy, and therefore a sustained attack on our national elections is a fortiori an attack on our democracy, any political theory otherwise notwithstanding.
~ J. Michael Luttig ~
2023
To imitate the ostrich in political matters has never been a satisfactory method of avoiding danger; yet this is what Hitler, as well as his more important political, economic and even military advisers, chose to do over and over again. The consequences of this deliberate blindness in the face of hard facts were devastating; and it was we who now had to bear them.
~ Heinz Guderian ~
2024
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
There is a great man who makes every man feel small. But the real great man is the man who makes every man feel great. ~ G. K. Chesterton
2005
In the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make. ~ Paul McCartney (born 18 June 1942)
2006
Will you still need me,
will you still feed me,
when I'm sixty-four?
~ Paul McCartney, "When I'm Sixty-Four" (McCartney turned 64 on 18 June 2006)
2007
The day after Columbine, I was interviewed... The reporter had been assigned a theory and was seeking sound bites to support it. "Wouldn't you say," she asked, "that killings like this are influenced by violent movies?" No, I said, I wouldn't say that... The reporter looked disappointed, so I offered her my theory. "Events like this," I said, "if they are influenced by anything, are influenced by news programs like your own. When an unbalanced kid walks into a school and starts shooting, it becomes a major media event. Cable news drops ordinary programming and goes around the clock with it. The story is assigned a logo and a theme song … The message is clear to other disturbed kids around the country: If I shoot up my school, I can be famous..." ~ Roger Ebert
2008
Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won. ~ Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, on the Battle of Waterloo (18 June 1815)
2009
The history of a battle, is not unlike the history of a ball. Some individuals may recollect all the little events of which the great result is the battle won or lost, but no individual can recollect the order in which, or the exact moment at which, they occurred, which makes all the difference as to their value or importance. ~ Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington
2010
It is an interesting law of romance that a truly strong woman will choose a strong man who disagrees with her over a weak one who goes along. Strength demands intelligence, intelligence demands stimulation, and weakness is boring. It is better to find a partner you can contend with for a lifetime than one who accommodates you because he doesn't really care. ~ Roger Ebert
2011
Waterloo will wipe out the memory of my forty victories; but that which nothing can wipe out is my Civil Code. That will live forever. ~ Napoleon I of France
2012
I believe we are born with our minds open to wonderful experiences, and only slowly learn to limit ourselves to narrow tastes. We are taught to lose our curiosity by the bludgeon-blows of mass marketing, which brainwash us to see "hits," and discourage exploration.
~ Roger Ebert ~
2013
A plot is about things that happen. A story is about people who behave. To admire a story you must be willing to listen to the people and observe them.
~ Roger Ebert ~
2014
The ability of so many people to live comfortably with the idea of capital punishment is perhaps a clue to how so many Europeans were able to live with the idea of the Holocaust: Once you accept the notion that the state has the right to kill someone and the right to define what is a capital crime, aren't you halfway there?
~ Roger Ebert ~
2015
"Kindness" covers all of my political beliefs. No need to spell them out. I believe that if, at the end, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do. To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts. We must try to contribute joy to the world. That is true no matter what our problems, our health, our circumstances. We must try. I didn't always know this and am happy I lived long enough to find it out.
~ Roger Ebert ~
2016
Quantum theory is now discussing instantaneous connections between two entangled quantum objects such as electrons. This phenomenon has been observed in laboratory experiments and scientists believe they have proven it takes place. They’re not talking about faster than the speed of light. Speed has nothing to do with it. The entangled objects somehow communicate instantaneously at a distance. If that is true, distance has no meaning. Light-years have no meaning. Space has no meaning. In a sense, the entangled objects are not even communicating. They are the same thing. At the “quantum level” (and I don’t know what that means), everything may be actually or theoretically linked. All is one. Sun, moon, stars, rain, you, me, everything. All one.
~ Roger Ebert ~
2017
We are connected with some people and never meet others, but it could easily have happened otherwise. Looking back over a lifetime, we describe what happened as if it had a plan. To fully understand how accidental and random life is — how vast the odds are against any single event taking place — would be humbling.
~ Roger Ebert ~
2018
Raised as a Roman Catholic, I internalized the social values of that faith and still hold most of them, even though its theology no longer persuades me. I have no quarrel with what anyone else subscribes to; everyone deals with these things in his own way, and I have no truths to impart. All I require of a religion is that it be tolerant of those who do not agree with it. I know a priest whose eyes twinkle when he says, “You go about God’s work in your way, and I’ll go about it in His.”
~ Roger Ebert ~
2019
We observe that nothing creates fascists like the threat of freedom.
Pleasantville is the kind of parable that encourages us to re-evaluate the good old days and take a fresh look at the new world we so easily dismiss as decadent. Yes, we have more problems. But also more solutions, more opportunities and more freedom. I grew up in the '50s. It was a lot more like the world of Pleasantville than you might imagine. Yes, my house had a picket fence, and dinner was always on the table at a quarter to six, but things were wrong that I didn't even know the words for.
~ Roger Ebert ~
2020
Hey Jude, don't make it bad
Take a sad song and make it better.
Remember to let her into your heart
Then you can start to make it better.
~ Paul McCartney ~
2021
Some people want to fill the world with silly love songs
And what's wrong with that?
I'd like to know
'Cause here I go again...
I love you.
~ Paul McCartney ~
2022
The long and winding road that leads to your door
Will never disappear,
I've seen that road before — it always leads me here,
Leads me to your door.
~ Paul McCartney ~
2023
Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away
Now it looks as though they're here to stay.
Oh, I believe in yesterday.
~ Paul McCartney ~
2024
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
I'm not a prettier everywoman. I am an everywoman that they clean up awfully well for TV. ~ Kelly Ripa
  • suggested by IP 66.157.63.6
2005
True eloquence makes light of eloquence, true morality makes light of morality... To make light of philosophy is to be a true philosopher. ~ Blaise Pascal (born 19 June 1623)
2006
It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it. ~ Aung San Suu Kyi (born 19 June 1945)
2007
We are gradually being conditioned to accept violence as a sensual pleasure. The directors used to say they were showing us its real face and how ugly it was in order to sensitize us to its horrors. You don't have to be very keen to see that they are now in fact desensitizing us. They are saying that everyone is brutal, and the heroes must be as brutal as the villains or they turn into fools. There seems to be an assumption that if you're offended by movie brutality, you are somehow playing into the hands of the people who want censorship... Yet surely, when night after night atrocities are served up to us as entertainment, it's worth some anxiety. … How can people go on talking about the dazzling brilliance of movies and not notice that the directors are sucking up to the thugs in the audience? ~ Pauline Kael
2008
The only real prison is fear, and the only real freedom is freedom from fear. ~ Aung San Suu Kyi
2009
The wellspring of courage and endurance in the face of unbridled power is generally a firm belief in the sanctity of ethical principles combined with a historical sense that despite all setbacks the condition of man is set on an ultimate course for both spiritual and material advancement. At the root of human responsibility is the concept of perfection, the urge to achieve it, the intelligence to find a path towards it, and the will to follow that path if not to the end at least the distance needed to rise above individual limitations and environmental impediments. It is man's vision of a world fit for rational, civilized humanity which leads him to dare and to suffer to build societies free from want and fear. Concepts such as truth, justice and compassion cannot be dismissed as trite when these are often the only bulwarks which stand against ruthless power. ~ Aung San Suu Kyi
2010
The quintessential revolution is that of the spirit, born of an intellectual conviction of the need for change in those mental attitudes and values which shape the course of a nation's development. A revolution which aims merely at changing official policies and institutions with a view to an improvement in material conditions has little chance of genuine success. Without a revolution of the spirit, the forces which produced the iniquities of the old order would continue to be operative, posing a constant threat to the process of reform and regeneration. It is not enough merely to call for freedom, democracy and human rights. There has to be a united determination to persevere in the struggle, to make sacrifices in the name of enduring truths, to resist the corrupting influences of desire, ill will, ignorance and fear. ~ Aung San Suu Kyi
2011
Who what am I? My answer: I am the sum total of everything that went before me, of all I have been seen done, of everything done-to-me. I am everyone everything whose being-in-the-world affected was affected by mine. I am anything that happens after I've gone which would not have happened if I had not come. Nor am I particularly exceptional in this matter; each "I", everyone of the now-six-hundred-million-plus of us, contains a similar multitude. I repeat for the last time: to understand me, you'll have to swallow a world. ~ Salman Rushdie
2012
The only people who see the whole picture are the ones who step outside the frame.
~ Salman Rushdie ~
2013
Is it not proven beyond all dispute that there is no limit to the enormities which men will commit when they are once persuaded that they are keepers of other men's consciences? To spread religion by any means, and to crush heresy by all means is the practical inference from the doctrine that one man may control another's religion. Given the duty of a state to foster some one form of faith, and by the sure inductions of our nature slowly but certainly persecution will occur. To prevent for ever the possibility of Papists roasting Protestants, Anglicans hanging Romish priests, and Puritans flogging Quakers, let every form of state-churchism be utterly abolished, and the remembrance of the long curse which it has cast upon the world be blotted out for ever.
~ Charles Spurgeon ~
2014
I do not envy people who think they have a complete explanation of the world, for the simple reason that they are obviously wrong.
~ Salman Rushdie ~
2015
It is a strong argument for democracy that governments regulated by principles of accountability, respect for public opinion and the supremacy of just laws are more likely than an all-powerful ruler or ruling class, uninhibited by the need to honour the will of the people, to observe the traditional duties of Buddhist kingship. Traditional values serve both to justify and to decipher popular expectations of democratic government.
~ Aung San Suu Kyi ~
2016
The unhappy legacies of authoritarianism can be removed only if the concept of absolute power as the basis of government is replaced by the concept of confidence as the mainspring of political authority: the confidence of the people in their right and ability to decide the destiny of their nation, mutual confidence between the people and their leaders and, most important of all, confidence in the principles of justice, liberty and human rights.
~ Aung San Suu Kyi ~
2017
Weak logic, inconsistencies and alienation from the people are common features of authoritarianism. The relentless attempts of totalitarian regimes to prevent free thought and new ideas and the persistent assertion of their own lightness bring on them an intellectual stasis which they project on to the nation at large. Intimidation and propaganda work in a duet of oppression, while the people, lapped in fear and distrust, learn to dissemble and to keep silent. And all the time the desire grows for a system which will lift them from the position of "rice-eating robots" to the status of human beings who can think and speak freely and hold their heads high in the security of their rights.
~ Aung San Suu Kyi ~
2018
People almost invariably arrive at their beliefs not on the basis of proof but on the basis of what they find attractive.
~ Blaise Pascal ~
2019
A mere trifle consoles us, for a mere trifle distresses us.
~ Blaise Pascal ~
in
~ Pensées ~
2020
Hope remains even in the most difficult of times … I hope today serves as a reminder that however hard things get, we will meet again.
~ Vera Lynn ~
  • proposed by Kalki, in regard of her recent death.
2021
The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor.
~ Gordon Granger ~
  • proposed by Kalki, in regard to the first "Juneteenth" celebrated as a US federal holiday.
2022
Our reason is always disappointed by the inconstancy of appearances.
~ Blaise Pascal ~
2023
Juneteenth marks both the long, hard night of slavery and subjugation, and a promise of a brighter morning to come. This is a day of profound — in my view — profound weight and profound power. A day in which we remember the moral stain, the terrible toll that slavery took on the country and continues to take — what I’ve long called “America’s original sin.” At the same time, I also remember the extraordinary capacity to heal, and to hope, and to emerge from the most painful moments and a bitter, bitter version of ourselves, but to make a better version of ourselves.
~ Joe Biden ~
2024
Irresponsibility is part of the pleasure of all art; it is the part the schools cannot recognize.
~ Pauline Kael ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Vanity is so anchored in the heart of man that a soldier, a soldier's servant, a cook, a porter brags and wishes to have his admirers. Even philosophers wish for them. Those who write against it want to have the glory of having written well; and those who read it desire the glory of having read it. I who write this have perhaps this desire, and perhaps those who will read it... ~ Blaise Pascal
2005
I cannot and will not cut my conscience to fit this year's fashions. ~ Lillian Hellman (born 20 June 1905)
2006
We wanted to bring some love to the world. I thought we were good at doing that. Bringin' love to the world. ~ Brian Wilson (born 20 June 1942)
2007
If there's not love present, it's much, much harder to function. When there's love present, it's easier to deal with life. ~ Brian Wilson
2008
For every man who lives without freedom, the rest of us must face the guilt. ~ Lillian Hellman
2009
Humor — it helps to make the vibe better — it loosens up the vibrations. ~ Brian Wilson
2010
The Tennessee stud was long and lean
The color of the sun and his eyes were green.
He had the nerve and he had the blood
And there never was a hoss like the Tennessee stud.
~ Jimmy Driftwood
2011

Ole Hickory said we could take 'em by surprise,
If we didn't fire our muskets 'til we looked 'em in the eyes.
We held our fire 'til we seed their faces well,
Then we opened up our squirrel guns an' really gave 'em ...well!

Yeah, they ran through the briars an' they ran through the brambles
An' they ran through the bushes where the rabbits couldn't go.
They ran so fast that the hounds couldn't catch 'em
Down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico.
~ Jimmy Driftwood ~

2012
The well taught philosophic mind
To all compassion gives;
Casts round the world an equal eye,
And feels for all that lives.
~ Anna Letitia Barbauld ~
2013
It's time to start believing — Oh yes
Believing who you are:
You are a shining star.
~ Lionel Richie ~
2014
Nothing is wholly obvious without becoming enigmatic. Reality itself is too obvious to be true.
~ Jean Baudrillard ~
2015
I may not always love you
But long as there are stars above you
You never need to doubt it
I'll make you so sure about it
God only knows what I'd be without you…
~ Brian Wilson ~
2016
All of us have the privilege of making music that helps and heals — to make music that makes people happier, stronger and kinder. Don't forget: music is God's voice.
~ Brian Wilson ~
2017
Lives were being ruined and few hands were raised in help. Since when do you have to agree with people to defend them from injustice?
~ Lillian Hellman ~
2018
Nobody outside of a baby carriage or a Judge's chamber can believe in an unprejudiced point of view.
~ Lillian Hellman ~
2019
There are people who eat Earth and eat all the people on it like in the Bible with the locusts. Then there are people who stand around and watch them eat it. … Sometimes I think it ain't right to stand and watch them do it.
~ Lillian Hellman ~
2020
The colours of the pales are those used in the flag of the United States of America; White signifies purity and innocence, Red, hardiness & valor, and Blue, the colour of the Chief signifies vigilance, perseverance & justice. The Olive branch and arrows denote the power of peace & war which is exclusively vested in Congress. The Constellation denotes a new State taking its place and rank among other sovereign powers. The Escutcheon is born on the breast of an American Eagle without any other supporters to denote that the United States of America ought to rely on their own Virtue.
~ Charles Thomson ~
2021
Two hearts,
Two hearts that beat as one
Our lives have just begun.
~ Lionel Richie ~
2022
The chearful light, the vital air,
Are blessings widely given;
Let nature's commoners enjoy
The common gifts of heaven.
~ Anna Letitia Barbauld ~
2023
Nothing, of course, begins at the time you think it did.
~ Lillian Hellman ~
2024
June with her glancing grasses,
  June with a smiling sky,
June, brown as the country lasses
  Or wings of the dragon-fly!
The mown hay lies like sedges
  Or weed of the seashore strewn;
Abrim with corn to the hedges
  The fields are filled in June.
~ Walter Headlam ~
2004
With most men, unbelief in one thing springs from blind belief in another. ~ Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
2005
Life has no meaning a priori...It is up to you to give it a meaning, and value is nothing but the meaning that you choose. ~ Jean-Paul Sartre (born 21 June 1905)
2006
Liberty, as it is conceived by current opinion, has nothing inherent about it; it is a sort of gift or trust bestowed on the individual by the state pending good behavior. ~ Mary McCarthy (born 21 June 1912)
2007
Give me the splendid silent sun with all his beams full-dazzling… ~ Walt Whitman in Leaves of Grass (Solstice date 2007)
2008
Every natural fact is a symbol of some spiritual fact. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
2009
God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~ (born 21 June 1892)
2010
There is a property in the horizon which no man has but he whose eye can integrate all the parts, that is, the poet. … To speak truly, few adult persons can see nature. Most persons do not see the sun. At least they have a very superficial seeing. The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child. The lover of nature is he whose inward and outward senses are still truly adjusted to each other; who has retained the spirit of infancy even into the era of manhood. His intercourse with heaven and earth, becomes part of his daily food. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
2011
Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime; therefore, we are saved by hope. Nothing true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore, we are saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore, we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as from our own; therefore, we are saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness. ~ Reinhold Niebuhr
2012
Man's capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man's inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~
2013
Cause, Principle, and One eternal
From whom being, life, and movement are suspended,
And which extends itself in length, breadth, and depth,
To whatever is in Heaven, on Earth, and Hell;
With sense, with reason, with mind, I discern,
That there is no act, measure, nor calculation, which can comprehend
That force, that vastness and that number,
Which exceeds whatever is inferior, middle, and highest;
Blind error, avaricious time, adverse fortune,
Deaf envy, vile madness, jealous iniquity,
Crude heart, perverse spirit, insane audacity,
Will not be sufficient to obscure the air for me,
Will not place the veil before my eyes,
Will never bring it about that I shall not
Contemplate my beautiful Sun.
~ Giordano Bruno ~
2014
Aion is a child at play, gambling; a child’s is the kingship. Telesphorus traverses the dark places of the world, like a star flashing from the deep, leading the way to the gates of the sun and the land of dreams.
~ Bollingen Tower inscription ~
by Carl Jung, quoting
~ Heraclitus & Homer ~
2015
One of the fundamental points about religious humility is you say you don't know about the ultimate judgment. It's beyond your judgment. And if you equate God's judgment with your judgment, you have a wrong religion.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~
2016
Human existence is obviously distinguished from animal life by its qualified participation in creation. Within limits it breaks the forms of nature and creates new configurations of vitality. Its transcendence over natural process offers it the opportunity of interfering with the established forms and unities of vitality as nature knows them.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~
2017
Calling someone a monster does not make him more guilty; it makes him less so by classing him with beasts and devils.
~ Mary McCarthy ~
2018
My personal attitude toward atheists is the same attitude that I have toward Christians, and would be governed by a very orthodox text: "By their fruits shall ye know them." I wouldn't judge a man by the presuppositions of his life, but only by the fruits of his life. And the fruits — the relevant fruits — are, I'd say, a sense of charity, a sense of proportion, a sense of justice. And whether the man is an atheist or a Christian, I would judge him by his fruits, and I have therefore many agnostic friends.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~
2019
Our dreams of bringing the whole of human history under the control of the human will are ironically refuted by the fact that no group of idealists can easily move the pattern of history toward the desired goal of peace and justice. The recalcitrant forces in the historical drama have a power and persistence beyond our reckoning.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~
2020
Reason is not the sole basis of moral virtue in man. His social impulses are more deeply rooted than his rational life. Reason may extend and stabilise, but it does not create, the capacity to affirm other life than his own.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~
2021
Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~
2022
O great wide beautiful wonderful World
With the wonderful waters around you curled
And the beautiful grass upon your breast
O World you are beautifully dressed.
~ John Crowley ~
2023
As individuals, men believe they ought to love and serve each other and establish justice between each other. As racial, economic and national groups they take for themselves, whatever their power can command.
~ Reinhold Niebuhr ~
2024
I wasn't the best hitter, Ted Williams was. I wasn't the best fielder, Roberto Clemente was. I wasn't the best base stealer, Maury Wills was. But I was among the best in everything.
~ Willie Mays ~
  • proposed by Kalki; in regard of his recent death.
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
How wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progress. ~ Niels Bohr
2005
The sea does not reward those who are too anxious, too greedy, or too impatient... Patience, patience, patience, is what the sea teaches. Patience and faith. One should lie empty, open, choiceless as a beach — waiting for a gift from the sea. ~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh (born 22 June 1906)
2006
The intellectual is constantly betrayed by his vanity. Godlike he blandly assumes that he can express everything in words; whereas the things one loves, lives, and dies for are not, in the last analysis completely expressible in words. ~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh
2007
Only in growth, reform, and change, paradoxically enough, is true security to be found. ~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh
2008
If we glance at the most important revolutions in history, we are at no loss to perceive that the greatest number of these originated in the periodical revolutions of the human mind. ~ Wilhelm von Humboldt
2009
This earth is one of the rare spots in the cosmos where mind has flowered. Man is a product of nearly three billion years of evolution, in whose person the evolutionary process has at last become conscious of itself and its possibilities. Whether he likes it or not, he is responsible for the whole further evolution of our planet. ~ Julian Huxley
2010
In tradition and in books an integral part of the individual persists, for it can influence the minds and actions of other people in different places and at different times: a row of black marks on a page can move a man to tears, though the bones of him that wrote it are long ago crumbled to dust. In truth, the whole progress of civilization is based upon this power. ~ Julian Huxley
2011
That government is best which makes itself unnecessary. ~ Wilhelm von Humboldt
2012
We see what we are told that we see.
Repetition and pride are the keys to this.
To hear and to see
Even an obvious lie
Again
And again and again
May be to say it,
Almost by reflex
Then to defend it
Because we have said it
And at last to embrace it
Because we've defended it.
~ Octavia Butler ~
2013
One cannot collect all the beautiful shells on the beach. One can collect only a few, and they are more beautiful if they are few.
~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh ~
2014
I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness and the willingness to remain vulnerable. All these and other factors combined, if the circumstances are right, can teach and can lead to rebirth.
~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh ~
2015
The entire cosmos is made out of one and the same world-stuff, operated by the same energy as we ourselves. "Mind" and "matter" appears as two aspects of our unitary mind-bodies. There is no separate supernatural realm: all phenomena are part of one natural process of evolution. There is no basic cleavage between science and religion; they are both organs of evolving humanity.
~ Julian Huxley ~
2016
The true end of Man, or that which is prescribed by the eternal and immutable dictates of reason, and not suggested by vague and transient desires, is the highest and most harmonious development of his powers to a complete and consistent whole.
~ Wilhelm von Humboldt ~
2017
I find I am shedding hypocrisy in human relationships. What a rest that will be! The most exhausting thing in life, I have discovered, is being insincere. That is why so much of social life is exhausting; one is wearing a mask. I have shed my mask.
~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh ~
2018
One sole God;
One sole ruler, — his Law;
One sole interpreter of that law — Humanity.
~ Giuseppe Mazzini ~
2019
Every mission constitutes a pledge of duty. Every man is bound to consecrate his every faculty to its fulfilment. He will derive his rule of action from the profound conviction of that duty.
~ Giuseppe Mazzini ~


2020
Art does not imitate, but interpret. It searches out the idea lying dormant in the symbol, in order to present the symbol to men in such form as to enable them to penetrate through it to the idea. Were it otherwise, what would be the use or value of art?
~ Giuseppe Mazzini ~
2021
Forgotten the strife;
Now the need to kill
Has died like fire,
And the need to love
Has replaced desire
~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh ~
2022
I would urge all of those watching today to focus on the evidence the committee will present. Don't be distracted by politics. This is serious. We cannot let America become a nation of conspiracy theories and thug violence.
~ Liz Cheney ~
  • proposed by Kalki; recent remarks on major events.
2023
Nature is for art the garb of the Eternal. The real is the finite expression and representation of the true; forms are the limits affixed by time and space to the power of life. Nature, reality, and form, should, all of them, be so rendered and expressed by art, as to reveal to mankind some ray of the truth — a vaster and profounder sentiment of life.
~ Giuseppe Mazzini ~
2024
I’m really hoping that in some movie I’m doing, I die — but I die, me, Donald — and they’re able to use my funeral and the coffin … That would be absolutely ideal. I would love that.
~ Donald Sutherland ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Every man should be capable of all ideas. ~ Jorge Luis Borges
2005
Science is a differential equation. Religion is a boundary condition. ~ Alan Turing (born 23 June 1912)
2006
We thought: we're poor, we have nothing, but when we started losing one after the other so each day became remembrance day, we started composing poems about God's great generosity and — our former riches. ~ Anna Akhmatova (born 23 June 1889)
2007
I grew up knowing I could have had a million different lives. It makes your life mysterious and your imagination go wild. ~ KT Tunstall (born 23 June 1975)
2008
We can only see a short distance ahead, but we can see plenty there that needs to be done. ~ Alan Turing
2009
I've woven them a garment that's prepared
out of poor words, those that I overheard,
and will hold fast to every word and glance
all of my days, even in new mischance,
and if a gag should bind my tortured mouth,
through which a hundred million people shout,
then let them pray for me, as I do pray
for them, this eve of my remembrance day.
~ Anna Akhmatova ~
2010

As a white stone in the well's cool deepness,
There lays in me one wonderful remembrance.
I am not able and don't want to miss this:
It is my torture and my utter gladness.

I think, that he whose look will be directed
Into my eyes, at once will see it whole.

~ Anna Akhmatova ~

2011
You will hear thunder and remember me,
And think: she wanted storms. The rim
Of the sky will be the colour of hard crimson,
And your heart, as it was then, will be on fire.
~ Anna Akhmatova ~
2012
Suddenly I see (Suddenly I see)
This is what I wanna be
Suddenly I see (Suddenly I see)
Why the hell it means so much to me.
~ KT Tunstall ~
2013
All worthy work is open to interpretations the author did not intend. Art isn't your pet — it's your kid. It grows up and talks back to you.
~ Joss Whedon ~
2014
I believe the only reality is how we treat each other. The morality comes from the absence of any grander scheme, not from the presence of any grander scheme.
~ Joss Whedon ~
2015
We have to act now … and not one of us can do it without the other.
Maybe I am a monster … I don't think I would know if I were one. I'm not what you are, and not what you intended. So there may be no way to make you trust me. … But we need to go.
~ Joss Whedon ~
in
~ Avengers: Age of Ultron ~
2016
Very occasionally, if you really pay attention, life doesn’t suck.
~ Joss Whedon ~
2017
I don't actually have anything against anybody, unless their belief precludes everybody else's. … I am an atheist and an absurdist and I have been for many years. I've actually taken a huge amount of flack for that.
~ Joss Whedon ~
2018
I believe that the pursuit of truth and right ideas through honest debate and rigorous argument is a noble undertaking. I am grateful to have played a small role in the conversations that have helped guide this extraordinary nation’s destiny.
I leave this life with no regrets. It was a wonderful life — full and complete with the great loves and great endeavors that make it worth living. I am sad to leave, but I leave with the knowledge that I lived the life that I intended.
~ Charles Krauthammer ~
  • proposed by Kalki in regard to his recent death.
2019
People with real power never fear of losing it. People with control think of little else.
~ Joss Whedon ~
2020
The greatest expression of rebellion is joy.
~ Joss Whedon ~
2021
Well my heart knows me better than I know myself
So I'm gonna let it do all the talking.
~ KT Tunstall ~
2022
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
~ Martin Rees ~
2023
Over the sea and far away
She's waiting like an iceberg
Waiting to change
But she's cold inside
She wants to be like the water.

All the muscles tighten in her face
Buries her soul in one embrace
They're one and the same
Just like water.

Then the fire fades away
And most of everyday
Is full of tired excuses
But it's too hard to say
I wish it were simple
But we give up easily
You're close enough to see that
You're the other side of the world to me.

~ KT Tunstall ~
2024
I go forth to seek —
To seek and claim the lovely magic garden
Where grasses softly sigh and Muses speak.
~ Anna Akhmatova ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. ~ Alfred Whitney Griswold
2005
Conservative, n. A statesman enamored of existing evils, as opposed to a Liberal, who wants to replace them with new ones. ~ Ambrose Bierce (born 24 June 1842)
2006
There is nothing better or more necessary than love. ~ John of the Cross (born 24 June 1542)
2007
Absurdity, n. A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion. ~ Ambrose Bierce
2008
All I do is done in love; all I suffer, I suffer in the sweetness of love. ~ John of the Cross (born this day)
2009
Guilt, n. The condition of one who is known to have committed an indiscretion, as distinguished from the state of him who has covered his tracks. ~ Ambrose Bierce, born that day.
2010
Acquaintance, n. A person whom we know well enough to borrow from, but not well enough to lend to. ~ Ambrose Bierce
2011
A thousand graces diffusing
He passed through the groves in haste,
And merely regarding them
As He passed
Clothed them with His beauty.
~ John of the Cross ~
2012
The very pure spirit does not bother about the regard of others or human respect, but communes inwardly with God, alone and in solitude as to all forms, and with delightful tranquility, for the knowledge of God is received in divine silence.
~ John of the Cross ~
2013
I have said that God is pleased with nothing but love; but before I explain this, it will be as well to set forth the grounds on which the assertion rests. All our works, and all our labours, how grand soever they may be, are nothing in the sight of God, for we can give Him nothing, neither can we by them fulfil His desire, which is the growth of our soul. As to Himself He desires nothing of this, for He has need of nothing, and so, if He is pleased with anything it is with the growth of the soul; and as there is no way in which the soul can grow but in becoming in a manner equal to Him, for this reason only is He pleased with our love.
~ John of the Cross ~
2014
The soul may always say, whether occupied with temporal or spiritual things, "My sole occupation is love." Happy life! happy state! and happy the soul which has attained to it!
~ John of the Cross‎‎ ~
2015
Any law that takes hold of a man’s daily life cannot prevail in a community, unless the vast majority of the community are actively in favor of it. The laws that are the most operative are the laws which protect life.
~ Henry Ward Beecher ~
2016
Humor is … nearer right than any emotion we have. Humor is the atmosphere in which grace most flourishes.
~ Henry Ward Beecher ~
2017
The cynic is one who never sees a good quality in a man and never fails to see a bad one. He is the human owl, vigilant in darkness and blind to light, mousing for vermin, and never seeing noble game. The cynic puts all human actions into two classes — openly bad and secretly bad.
~ Henry Ward Beecher ~
2018
When, O crowned Jesus; when, O loving Saviour; when, O patient and just Judge — when wilt Thou come forth from Thy hiding, and change tears to smiles, and groans to joys? When shall that choral song burst forth, sweeping through the air, and circling about Thy throne, which shall proclaim the redemption of the world to the Lord God?
~ Henry Ward Beecher ~
2019
Idiot, n. A member of a large and powerful tribe whose influence in human affairs has always been dominant and controlling. The Idiot's activity is not confined to any special field of thought or action, but "pervades and regulates the whole." He has the last word in everything; his decision is unappealable. He sets the fashions and opinion of taste, dictates the limitations of speech and circumscribes conduct with a dead-line.
~ Ambrose Bierce ~
2020
Let us rejoice, O my Beloved!
Let us go forth to see ourselves in Thy beauty,
To the mountain and the hill,
Where the pure water flows:
Let us enter into the heart of the thicket.
~ John of the Cross ~
2021
Well, I play purely from the heart, y'know, and so if it doesn't work the first couple of hours, forget it. Unless we feel like we're somehow on the right track then I'll keep on going. That's it, really; I don't have any magic where I just press a button and it happens. It'll either happen or it won't.
~ Jeff Beck ~
2022
Insurrection, n. An unsuccessful revolution. Disaffection's failure to substitute misrule for bad government.
~ Ambrose Bierce ~
2023
Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility.
~ Ambrose Bierce ~
2024
Past, n. That part of Eternity with some small fraction of which we have a slight and regrettable acquaintance. A moving line called the Present parts it from an imaginary period known as the Future. These two grand divisions of Eternity, of which the one is continually effacing the other, are entirely unlike. The one is dark with sorrow and disappointment, the other bright with prosperity and joy. The Past is the region of sobs, the Future is the realm of song. In the one crouches Memory, clad in sackcloth and ashes, mumbling penitential prayer; in the sunshine of the other Hope flies with a free wing, beckoning to temples of success and bowers of ease. Yet the Past is the Future of yesterday, the Future is the Past of to-morrow. They are one — the knowledge and the dream.
~ Ambrose Bierce ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Play the man, Master Ridley; we shall this day light such a candle, by God's grace, in England, as I trust shall never be put out. ~ Hugh Latimer
2005
Political language — and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists — is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind. ~ George Orwell (born 25 June 1903)
2006
The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them. ~ George Orwell (born 25 June 1903)
2007
I always disagree … when people end up saying that we can only combat Communism, Fascism or what not if we develop an equal fanaticism. It appears to me that one defeats the fanatic precisely by not being a fanatic oneself, but on the contrary by using one's intelligence. In the same way, a man can kill a tiger because he is not like a tiger and uses his brain to invent the rifle, which no tiger could ever do. ~ George Orwell
2008
By "nationalism" I mean first of all the habit of assuming that human beings can be classified like insects and that whole blocks of millions or tens of millions of people can be confidently labelled "good" or "bad." … By "patriotism" I mean devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force on other people. Patriotism is of its nature defensive, both militarily and culturally. Nationalism, on the other hand, is inseperable from the desire for power. ~ George Orwell
2009
If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear. ~ George Orwell
2010
We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men. … Bully-worship, under various disguises, has become a universal religion, and such truisms as that a machine-gun is still a machine-gun even when a "good" man is squeezing the trigger … have turned into heresies which it is actually becoming dangerous to utter. ~ George Orwell
2011
Properly speaking, there is no such thing as revenge. Revenge is an act which you want to commit when you are powerless and because you are powerless: as soon as the sense of impotence is removed, the desire evaporates also. ~ George Orwell
2012
Each generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it.
~ George Orwell ~
2013
The relative freedom which we enjoy depends of public opinion. The law is no protection. Governments make laws, but whether they are carried out, and how the police behave, depends on the general temper in the country. If large numbers of people are interested in freedom of speech, there will be freedom of speech, even if the law forbids it; if public opinion is sluggish, inconvenient minorities will be persecuted, even if laws exist to protect them.
~ George Orwell ~
2014
If you turn the other cheek, you will get a harder blow on it than you got on the first one. This does not always happen, but it is to be expected, and you ought not to complain if it does happen.
~ George Orwell ~
2015
I applied my reason at every moment. Reason is excellent for getting food, clothing and shelter. Reason is the very best tool kit. Nothing beats reason for keeping tigers away. But be excessively reasonable and you risk throwing out the universe with the bathwater.
~ Yann Martel ~
2016
All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia.
~ George Orwell ~
2017
Forgive him who wrongs you;
join him who cuts you off;
do good to him who does evil to you;
and speak the truth
even if it be against yourself.
~ Inscription on the Sword of Muhammad ~
2018
It seems that the more places I see and experience, the bigger I realize the world to be. The more I become aware of, the more I realize how relatively little I know of it, how many places I have still to go, how much more there is to learn. Maybe that's enlightenment enough — to know that there is no final resting place of the mind, no moment of smug clarity. Perhaps wisdom, at least for me, means realizing how small I am, and unwise, and how far I have yet to go.
~ Anthony Bourdain ~
2019
In a Society in which there is no law, and in theory no compulsion, the only arbiter of behaviour is public opinion. But public opinion, because of the tremendous urge to conformity in gregarious animals, is less tolerant than any system of law. When human beings are governed by "thou shalt not", the individual can practise a certain amount of eccentricity: when they are supposedly governed by "love" or "reason", he is under continuous pressure to make him behave and think in exactly the same way as everyone else.
~ George Orwell ~
2020
Certainly we ought to be discontented, we ought not simply to find out ways of making the best of a bad job, and yet if we kill all pleasure in the actual process of life, what sort of future are we preparing for ourselves? If a man cannot enjoy the return of spring, why should he be happy in a labour-saving Utopia? What will he do with the leisure that the machine will give him?
~ George Orwell ~
2021
The essence of being human is that one does not seek perfection, that one is sometimes willing to commit sins for the sake of loyalty, that one does not push asceticism to the point where it makes friendly intercourse impossible, and that one is prepared in the end to be defeated and broken up by life, which is the inevitable price of fastening one's love upon other human individuals.
~ George Orwell ~
2022
Today, the Supreme Court of the United States expressly took away a constitutional right from the American people that it had already recognized.
They didn’t limit it. They simply took it away. That’s never been done to a right so important to so many Americans.
But they did it. And it’s a sad day for the Court and for the country.
~ Joe Biden ~
  • proposed by Kalki; recent remarks on recent events.
2023
It is a mysterious thing, the loss of faith — as mysterious as faith itself. Like faith, it is ultimately not rooted in logic; it is a change in the climate of the mind.
~ George Orwell ~
2024
The past is a curious thing. It's with you all the time. I suppose an hour never passes without your thinking of things that happened ten or twenty years ago, and yet most of the time it's got no reality, it's just a set of facts that you've learned, like a lot of stuff in a history book. Then some chance sight or sound or smell, especially smell, sets you going, and the past doesn't merely come back to you, you're actually in the past.
~ George Orwell ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
It is circumstances which show what men are. ~ Epictetus
2005
The sons of torture victims make good terrorists. ~ André Malraux
2006
For the future, let all people live in harmony … Men should be taught and won over by reason, not by blows, insults, and corporal punishments. ~ Julian (died 26 June 363)
2007
A knowledge of history as detailed as possible is essential if we are to comprehend the present and be prepared for the future. Fate … is not the blind superstition or helplessness that waits stupidly for what may happen. Fate is unalterable only in the sense that given a cause, a certain result must follow, but no cause is inevitable in itself, and man can shape his world if he does not resign himself to ignorance. ~ Pearl S. Buck (born 26 June 1892)
2008
Every event has had its cause, and nothing, not the least wind that blows, is accident or causeless. ~ Pearl S. Buck
2009
Heal the world, make it a better place,
For you and for me and the entire human race,
There are people dying, but if you care enough for the living,
Make a better place for you and for me.
~ Michael Jackson ~ (recent death)
2010
An intelligent, energetic, educated woman cannot be kept in four walls — even satin-lined, diamond-studded walls — without discovering sooner or later that they are still a prison cell. ~ Pearl S. Buck
2011
All of us, without being taught, have attained to a belief in some sort of divinity, though it is not easy for all men to know the precise truth about it, nor is it possible for those who do know it to tell it to all men. ~ Julian
2012
The young do not know enough to be prudent, and so they attempt the impossible, and achieve it, generation after generation.
~ Pearl S. Buck ~
2013
So long as you are a slave to the opinions of the many you have not yet approached freedom or tasted its nectar … But I do not mean by this that we ought to be shameless before all men and to do what we ought not; but all that we refrain from and all that we do, let us not do or refrain from merely because it seems to the multitude somehow honorable or base, but because it is forbidden by reason and the god within us.
~ Julian ~
2014
Choose your friends, then treat them as friends; do not regard them like slaves or servants, but associate with them frankly and simply and generously; not saying one thing of them and thinking something else.
~ Julian ~
2015
To live among friends is the primary essential of happiness.
~ Lord Kelvin ~
  • proposed by N6n
2016
Ah well, perhaps one has to be very old before one learns how to be amused rather than shocked.
~ Pearl S. Buck ~
2017
Nature loves to hide her secrets, and she does not suffer the hidden truth about the essential nature of the gods to be flung in naked words to the ears of the profane.
~ Julian ~
2018
Religion, mysticism and magic all spring from the same basic "feeling" about the universe: a sudden feeling of meaning, which human beings sometimes "pick up" accidentally, as your radio might pick up some unknown station. Poets feel that we are cut off from meaning by a thick, lead wall, and that sometimes for no reason we can understand the wall seems to vanish and we are suddenly overwhelmed with a sense of the infinite interestingness of things.
~ Colin Wilson ~
2019
We've been looking for the enemy for some time now. We've finally found him. We're surrounded. That simplifies things.
~ Chesty Puller ~
2020
Most extremely healthy people frequently experience of intense affirmation and certainty; Maslow called these "peak experiences." No one had made this discovery before because it had never struck anyone that a science calling itself "psychology" and professing to be a science of the human mind (not merely the sick mind), ought to form its estimate of human beings by taking into account healthy minds as well as sick ones. A sick man talks obsessively about his illness; a healthy man never talks about his health; for as Pirandello points out, we take happiness for granted, and only begin to question life when we are unhappy.
~ Colin Wilson ~
2021
No art can be judged by purely aesthetic standards, although a painting or a piece of music may appear to give a purely aesthetic pleasure. Aesthetic enjoyment is an intensification of the vital response, and this response forms the basis of all value judgements. The existentialist contends that all values are connected with the problems of human existence, the stature of man, the purpose of life. These values are inherent in all works of art, in addition to their aesthetic values, and are closely connected with them.
~ Colin Wilson ~
2022
The real importance of Swedenborg lies in the doctrines he taught, which are the reverse of the gloom and hell-fire of other breakaway sects. He rejects the notion that Jesus died on the cross to atone for the sin of Adam, declaring that God is neither vindictive nor petty-minded, and that since he is God, he doesn't need atonement. It is remarkable that this common-sense view had never struck earlier theologians. God is Divine Goodness, and Jesus is Divine Wisdom, and Goodness has to be approached through Wisdom. Whatever one thinks about the extraordinary claims of its founder, it must be acknowledged that there is something very beautiful and healthy about the Swedenborgian religion. Its founder may have not been a great occultist, but he was a great man.
~ Colin Wilson ~
2023
Another name for the sense of values is intelligence. A stupid person is a person whose values are narrow.
~ Colin Wilson ~
2024
Man should possess an infinite appetite for life. It should be self-evident to him, all the time, that life is superb, glorious, endlessly rich, infinitely desirable. At present, because he is in a midway position between the brute and the truly human, he is always getting bored, depressed, weary of life. He has become so top-heavy with civilisation that he cannot contact the springs of pure vitality.
~ Colin Wilson ~
2025
Rank or add further suggestions…
2004
Faith and doubt both are needed — not as antagonists, but working side by side to take us around the unknown curve. ~ Lillian Smith
2005
There are … some potentates I would kill by any and all means at my disposal. They are Ignorance, Superstition, and Bigotry — the most sinister and tyrannical rulers on earth. ~ Emma Goldman (born 27 June 1869)
2006
The highest result of education is tolerance. Long ago men fought and died for their faith; but it took ages to teach them the other kind of courage, — the courage to recognize the faiths of their brethren and their rights of conscience. Tolerance is the first principal of community; it is the spirit which conserves the best that all men think. ~ Helen Keller (born 27 June 1880)
2007
A happy life consists not in the absence, but in the mastery of hardships. ~ Helen Keller (born June 27 1880)
2008
We differ, blind and seeing, one from another, not in our senses, but in the use we make of them, in the imagination and courage with which we seek wisdom beyond the senses. ~ Helen Keller
2009
Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement; nothing can be done without hope. ~ Helen Keller
2010
The bulk of the world’s knowledge is an imaginary construction. ~ Helen Keller (born 27 June 1880)
2011
The lunatics end up in charge of everything. Sane, normal people don't need power trips. ~ James P. Hogan
2012
God loved the birds and invented trees. Man loved the birds and invented cages.
~ Jacques Deval ~
2013
Man is a creation of desire, not a creation of need.
~ Gaston Bachelard ~
2014
Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it. My optimism, then, does not rest on the absence of evil, but on a glad belief in the preponderance of good and a willing effort always to cooperate with the good, that it may prevail. I try to increase the power God has given me to see the best in everything and every one, and make that Best a part of my life.
~ Helen Keller ~
2015
I believe it is a sacred duty to encourage ourselves and others; to hold the tongue from any unhappy word against God's world, because no man has any right to complain of a universe which God made good, and which thousands of men have striven to keep good. I believe we should so act that we may draw nearer and more near the age when no man shall live at his ease while another suffers. These are the articles of my faith, and there is yet another on which all depends — to bear this faith above every tempest which overfloods it, and to make it a principal in disaster and through affliction. Optimism is the harmony between man's spirit and of God pronouncing His works good.
~ Helen Keller ~
2016
Every optimist moves along with progress and hastens it, while every pessimist would keep the world at a standstill. The consequence of pessimism in the life of a nation is the same as in the life of the individual. Pessimism kills the instinct that urges men to struggle against poverty, ignorance and crime, and dries up all the fountains of joy in the world.
~ Helen Keller ~
2017
If there is anything worthwhile doing for the sake of culture, then it is touching on subject matters and situations which link people, and not those that divide people. There are too many things in the world which divide people, such as religion, politics, history, and nationalism. If culture is capable of anything, then it is finding that which unites us all. And there are so many things which unite people. It doesn't matter who you are or who I am, if your tooth aches or mine, it's still the same pain. Feelings are what link people together, because the word "love" has the same meaning for everybody. Or "fear", or "suffering". We all fear the same way and the same things. And we all love in the same way. That's why I tell about these things, because in all other things I immediately find division.
~ Krzysztof Kieślowski ~
2018
There is no greater fallacy than the belief that aims and purposes are one thing, while methods and tactics are another, This conception is a potent menace to social regeneration. All human experience teaches that methods and means cannot be separated from the ultimate aim. The means employed become, through individual habit and social practice, part and parcel of the final purpose; they influence it, modify it, and presently the aims and means become identical.
~ Emma Goldman ~
2019
The test of all beliefs is their practical effect in life. If it be true that optimism compels the world forward, and pessimism retards it, then it is dangerous to propagate a pessimistic philosophy.
~ Helen Keller ~
2020
To know the history of philosophy is to know that the highest thinkers of the ages, the seers of the tribes and the nations, have been optimists. The growth of philosophy is the story of man's spiritual life.
~ Helen Keller ~
2021
If love does not know how to give and take without restrictions, it is not love, but a transaction that never fails to lay stress on a plus and a minus.
~ Emma Goldman ~
2022
If I regarded my life from the point of view of the pessimist, I should be undone. I should seek in vain for the light that does not visit my eyes and the music that does not ring in my ears. I should beg night and day and never be satisfied. I should sit apart in awful solitude, a prey to fear and despair. But since I consider it a duty to myself and to others to be happy, I escape a misery worse than any physical deprivation.
~ Helen Keller ~
2023
The free expression of the hopes and aspirations of a people is the greatest and only safety in a sane society.
~ Emma Goldman ~
2024
To-day is the parent of to-morrow. The present casts its shadow far into the future. That is the law of life, individual and social. Revolution that divests itself of ethical values thereby lays the foundation of injustice, deceit, and oppression for the future society. The means used to prepare the future become its cornerstone.
~ Emma Goldman ~
2025
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2004
They serve so that we don't have to. They offer to give up their lives so that we can be free. It is, remarkably, their gift to us. And all they ask for in return is that we never send them into harm's way unless it is absolutely necessary. Will they ever trust us again? ~ Michael Moore
2005
Now you see, Lone Starr, that evil will always triumph, because good is dumb. ~ Rick Moranis as "Dark Helmet" in Spaceballs by Mel Brooks (born 28 June 1926)
2006
Hatred, as well as love, renders its votaries credulous. ~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau (born 28 June 1712)
2007
To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man, to surrender the rights of humanity and even its duties. For him who renounces everything no indemnity is possible. Such a renunciation is incompatible with man's nature; to remove all liberty from his will is to remove all morality from his acts. ~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau
2008
Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. ~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau
2009
Never dream of forcing men into the ways of God. Think yourself, and let think. Use no constraint in matters of religion. Even those who are farthest out of the way never compel to come in by any other means than reason, truth, and love. ~ John Wesley
2010
Good laws lead to the making of better ones; bad ones bring about worse. ~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau
2011
Think not the bigotry of another is any excuse for your own. ~ John Wesley born on 28 June 1703
2012
Nature never deceives us; it is we who deceive ourselves.
~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau ~
2013
The longer I live, the larger allowances I make for human infirmities.
~ John Wesley ~
2014
I observed, "Love is the fulfilling of the law, the end of the commandment." It is not only "the first and great" command, but all the commandments in one. "Whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise," they are all comprised in this one word, love.
~ John Wesley ~
2015
A country cannot subsist well without liberty, nor liberty without virtue.
~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau ~
2016
I deny that villany is ever necessary. It is impossible that it should ever be necessary for any reasonable creature to violate all the laws of justice, mercy, and truth. No circumstances can make it necessary for a man to burst in sunder all the ties of humanity. It can never be necessary for a rational being to sink himself below a brute.
~ John Wesley ~
2017
All that time is lost which might be better employed.
~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau ~
2018
Hatred, as well as love, renders its votaries credulous.
~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau ~
2019
Let's not be dazzled by the sententious glitter with which error and lying often cover themselves. Society is not created by the crowd, and bodies come together in vain when hearts reject each other. The truly sociable man is more difficult in his relationships than others; those which consist only in false appearances cannot suit him. He prefers to live far from wicked men without thinking about them, than to see them and hate them. He prefers to flee his enemy rather than seek him out to harm him. A person who knows no other society than that of the heart will not seek his society in your circles.
~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau ~
2020
Whenever the last trumpet shall sound, I will present myself before the sovereign judge with this book in my hand, and loudly proclaim, thus have I acted; these were my thoughts; such was I. With equal freedom and veracity have I related what was laudable or wicked, I have concealed no crimes, added no virtues; and if I have sometimes introduced superfluous ornament, it was merely to occupy a void occasioned by defect of memory: I may have supposed that certain, which I only knew to be probable, but have never asserted as truth, a conscious falsehood.
~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau ~
in
~ Confessions ~
2021
Though we cannot think alike, may we not love alike? May we not be of one heart, though we are not of one opinion? Without all doubt, we may. Herein all the children of God may unite, notwithstanding these smaller differences.
~ John Wesley ~
2022
Hope for the best. Expect the worst.
The world's a stage. We're unrehearsed.
No way of knowing which way it's going.
Take your chances, there are no answers.
Hope for the best. Expect the worst.
~ Mel Brooks ~
2023
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2004
How is the world ruled and how do wars start? Diplomats tell lies to journalists and then believe what they read. ~ Karl Kraus
2005
Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (born 29 June 1900)
2006
Grown-ups never understand anything for themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
2007
"Men have forgotten this truth," said the fox. "But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed." ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
2008
Here is my secret. It is very simple. It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; What is essential is invisible to the eye. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
2009
What makes the desert beautiful … is that somewhere it hides a well. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in The Little Prince
2010

What though our eyes with tears be wet?
The sunrise never failed us yet.

The blush of dawn may yet restore
Our light and hope and joy once more.
Sad soul, take comfort, nor forget
That sunrise never failed us yet!

~ Celia Thaxter ~

2011

The heart of God through his creation stirs,
We thrill to feel it, trembling as the flowers
That die to live again, — his messengers,
To keep faith firm in these sad souls of ours.

The waves of Time may devastate our lives,
The frosts of age may check our failing breath,
They shall not touch the spirit that survives
Triumphant over doubt and pain and death.

~ Celia Thaxter ~

2012
It is another of the miraculous things about mankind that there is no pain nor passion that does not radiate to the ends of the earth. Let a man in a garret but burn with enough intensity and he will set fire to the world.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2013
To be a man is to be responsible: to be ashamed of miseries you did not cause; to be proud of your comrades' victories; to be aware, when setting one stone, that you are building a world.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2014
To love is not to look at one another: it is to look, together, in the same direction.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2015
Confuse not love with the raptures of possession, which bring the cruelest of sufferings. For, notwithstanding the general opinion, love does not cause suffering: what causes it is the sense of ownership, which is love's opposite.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2016
The machine does not isolate us from the great problems of nature but plunges us more deeply into them.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2017
Each man must look to himself to teach him the meaning of life. It is not something discovered: it is something molded. These prison walls that this age of trade has built up round us, we can break down. We can still run free, call to our comrades, and marvel to hear once more, in response to our call, the impassioned chant of the human voice.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2018
To be a man is, precisely, to be responsible. It is to feel shame at the sight of what seems to be unmerited misery. It is to take pride in a victory won by one's comrades. It is to feel, when setting one's stone, that one is contributing to the building of the world.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2019
A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2020
Thou great Creator! Pardon us who reach
For other heaven beyond this world of thine,
This matchless world, where thy least touch doth teach
Thy solemn lessons clearly, line on line.

And help us to be grateful, we who live
Such sordid, fretful lives of discontent,
Nor see the sunshine nor the flower, nor strive
To find the love thy bitter chastening meant.
~ Celia Thaxter ~
2021
No man can draw a free breath who does not share with other men a common and disinterested ideal. Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction. There is no comradeship except through union in the same high effort.
~ Antoine de Saint Exupéry ~
2022
Our nation is preserved by those who abide by their oaths to our Constitution. Our nation is preserved by those who know the fundamental difference between right and wrong.
~ Liz Cheney ~
2023
Already the dandelions
Are changed into vanishing ghosts.
~ Celia Thaxter ~
2024
Bad debate nights happen. Trust me, I know. But this election is still a choice between someone who has fought for ordinary folks his entire life and someone who only cares about himself. Between someone who tells the truth; who knows right from wrong and will give it to the American people straight — and someone who lies through his teeth for his own benefit. Last night didn’t change that, and it’s why so much is at stake in November.
~ Barack Obama ~
2025
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2004
Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral laws are written on the tablets of eternity. ~ James Anthony Froude
  • selected by Kalki, originally crediting it to Lord Acton who quoted Froude in an address "The Study Of History" (11 June 1895); an early published version of this did not include quote marks around Froude's statement which led to this long being widely attributed to Acton. The phrase has also sometimes been misquoted as: Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral laws are written on the table of eternity.
2005
It followed from the special theory of relativity that mass and energy are both but different manifestations of the same thing — a somewhat unfamilar conception for the average mind. Furthermore, the equation E = mc², in which energy is put equal to mass, multiplied by the square of the velocity of light, showed that very small amounts of mass may be converted into a very large amount of energy and vice versa. ~ Albert Einstein
2006
Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding the man who refuses to bow blindly to conventional prejudices and chooses instead to express his opinions courageously and honestly. ~ Albert Einstein
2007
Love means to look at yourself
The way one looks at distant things
For you are only one thing among many.
And whoever sees that way heals his heart,
Without knowing it, from various ills —
A bird and a tree say to him: Friend.
~ Czesław Miłosz ~ (born 30 June 1911)
2008
Life is a jest, and all things show it,
I thought so once, and now I know it.
~ John Gay ~ (born 30 June 1685)
2009
I think that I am here, on this earth,
To present a report on it, but to whom I don't know.
As if I were sent so that whatever takes place
Has meaning because it changes into memory.
~ Czesław Miłosz
2010
They waited, ready, for all those who would call themselves mortals,
So that they might praise, as I do, life, that is, happiness.
~ Czesław Miłosz ~
2011
And space, what it is like? Is it mechanical,
Newtonian? A frozen prison?
Or the lofty space of Einstein, the relation
Between movement and movement? No reason to pretend
I know. I don't know, and if I did,
Still my imagination is a thousand years old.
~ Czesław Miłosz ~
2012
I see myself as a huge fiery comet, a shooting star. Everyone stops, points up and gasps "Oh look at that!" Then — whoosh, and I'm gone... and they'll never see anything like it ever again... and they won't be able to forget me — ever.
~ Jim Morrison ~
2013

All was taken away from you: white dresses,
wings, even existence.
Yet I believe you,
messengers.

There, where the world is turned inside out,
a heavy fabric embroidered with stars and beasts,
you stroll, inspecting the trustworthy seams.

~ Czesław Miłosz ~
2014
I have heard that voice many a time when asleep
and, what is strange, I understood more or less
an order or an appeal in an unearthly tongue:
day draws near
another one
do what you can.
~ Czesław Miłosz ~
2015
Evil grows and bears fruit, which is understandable, because it has logic and probability on its side and also, of course, strength. The resistance of tiny kernels of good, to which no one grants the power of causing far-reaching consequences, is entirely mysterious, however. Such seeming nothingness not only lasts but contains within itself enormous energy which is revealed gradually.
~ Czesław Miłosz ~
2016

There was a time when only wise books were read
helping us to bear our pain and misery.
This, after all, is not quite the same
as leafing through a thousand works fresh from psychiatric clinics.

And yet the world is different from what it seems to be
and we are other than how we see ourselves in our ravings.

~ Czesław Miłosz ~
2017
Through all the Employments of Life
Each Neighbour abuses his Brother;
Whore and Rogue they call Husband and Wife:
All Professions be-rogue one another:
The Priest calls the Lawyer a Cheat,
The Lawyer be-knaves the Divine:
And the Statesman, because he's so great,
Thinks his Trade as honest as mine.
~ John Gay ~
2018

Someone will read as moral
That the people of Rome or Warsaw
Haggle, laugh, make love
As they pass by martyrs' pyres.
Someone else will read
Of the passing of things human,
Of the oblivion
Born before the flames have died.

But that day I thought only
Of the loneliness of the dying,
Of how, when Giordano
Climbed to his burning
There were no words
In any human tongue
To be left for mankind,
Mankind who live on.

~ Czesław Miłosz ~
2019
What I'm saying here is not, I agree, poetry,
as poems should be written rarely and reluctantly,
under unbearable duress and only with the hope
that good spirits, not evil ones, choose us for their instrument.
~ Czesław Miłosz ~
2020
Leaves glowing in the sun, zealous hum of bumblebees,
From afar, from somewhere beyond the river, echoes of lingering voices
And the unhurried sounds of a hammer gave joy not only to me.
Before the five senses were opened, and earlier than any beginning
They waited, ready, for all those who would call themselves mortals,
So that they might praise, as I do, life, that is, happiness.
~ Czesław Miłosz ~
  • proposed by Kalki in 2013 (earlier proposed by InvisibleSun in 2007, but only partially used in 2010).
2021
Love, then, hath every bliss in store;
'Tis friendship, and 'tis something more.
Each other every wish they give;
Not to know love is not to live.
~ John Gay ~
2022
We, the Heads of State and Government of the North Atlantic Alliance, have gathered in Madrid as war has returned to the European continent. We face a critical time for our security and international peace and stability. We stand together in unity and solidarity and reaffirm the enduring transatlantic bond between our nations. NATO is a defensive Alliance and poses no threat to any country. … We are united in our commitment to democracy, individual liberty, human rights, and the rule of law. We adhere to international law and to the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations. … We condemn Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine in the strongest possible terms. Russia bears full responsibility for this humanitarian catastrophe. … We will continue and further step up political and practical support to our close partner Ukraine as it continues to defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity against Russian aggression. … Today, we have decided to invite Finland and Sweden to become members of NATO, and agreed to sign the Accession Protocols. In any accession to the Alliance, it is of vital importance that the legitimate security concerns of all Allies are properly addressed. … The accession of Finland and Sweden will make them safer, NATO stronger, and the Euro-Atlantic area more secure.
~ NATO ~
  • proposed by Kalki; recent remarks on globally significant circumstances.
2023
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