Wikiquote:Quote of the day/September 2011
If you're up against a smart opponent, make him think himself to death. ~ C. J. Cherryh ~ |
The great work of the present for every man, and every organization of men, who would improve social conditions, is the work of education — the propagation of ideas. It is only as it aids this that anything else can avail. ~ Henry George ~ |
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A degree of silence envelops Washington’s actions; he moved slowly; one might say that he felt charged with future liberty, and that he feared to compromise it. It was not his own destiny that inspired this new species of hero: it was that of his country; he did not allow himself to enjoy what did not belong to him; but from that profound humility what glory emerged! Search the woods where Washington’s sword gleamed: what do you find? Tombs? No; a world! Washington has left the United States behind for a monument on the field of battle. ~ François-René de Chateaubriand ~ |
Whether religion is a divisive or reconciling force depends on our certainty or our humility as we practice our faith in our politics. If we believe that we know God's truth and that we can embody that truth in a political agenda, we divide the realm of politics into those who are on God's side, which is our side, and those with whom we disagree, who oppose the side of God. This is neither good religion nor good politics. It is not consistent with following a Lord who reached out to a variety of people — prostitutes, tax collectors, lepers. If politics is the art of compromise, certainty is not really politics, for how can one compromise with God's own truth? Reconciliation depends on acknowledging that God's truth is greater than our own, that we cannot reduce it to any political platform we create, no matter how committed we are to that platform, and that God's truth is large enough to accommodate the opinions of all kinds of people, even those with whom we strongly disagree. ~ John Danforth ~ |
The Immortal Principle was first called water by Thales. Anaximenes called it air. The Pythagoreans called it number and were thus the first to see the Immortal Principle as something nonmaterial. Heraclitus called the Immortal Principle fire and introduced change as part of the Principle. He said the world exists as a conflict and tension of opposites. He said there is a One and there is a Many and the One is the universal law which is immanent in all things. Anaxagoras was the first to identify the One as nous, meaning "mind." ~ Robert M. Pirsig ~ |
It is a part of the poet's work to show each man what he sees but does not know he sees. ~ Edith Sitwell ~ |
Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle! ~ Peter Sellers ~ |
As soon as men live entirely in accord with the law of love natural to their hearts and now revealed to them, which excludes all resistance by violence, and therefore hold aloof from all participation in violence — as soon as this happens, not only will hundreds be unable to enslave millions, but not even millions will be able to enslave a single individual. ~ Leo Tolstoy ~ |
The idea does not belong to the soul; it is the soul that belongs to the idea. |
This enemy attacked not just our people, but all freedom-loving people everywhere in the world. The United States of America will use all our resources to conquer this enemy. We will rally the world. We will be patient, we will be focused, and we will be steadfast in our determination.… we will not allow this enemy to win the war by changing our way of life or restricting our freedoms. ~ George W. Bush ~ On September 11, 2001, in our time of grief, the American people came together. We offered our neighbors a hand, and we offered the wounded our blood. We reaffirmed our ties to each other, and our love of community and country. On that day, no matter where we came from, what God we prayed to, or what race or ethnicity we were, we were united as one American family. ~ Barack Obama ~ |
The battles that count aren't the ones for gold medals. The struggles within yourself — the invisible, inevitable battles inside all of us — that's where it's at. ~ Jesse Owens ~ |
Something there is more immortal even than the stars, ~ Walt Whitman ~ |
The difference between patriotism and nationalism is that the patriot is proud of his country for what it does, and the nationalist is proud of his country no matter what it does; the first attitude creates a feeling of responsibility, but the second a feeling of blind arrogance that leads to war. ~ Sydney J. Harris ~ |
I do not argue with obstinate men. I act in spite of them. ~ Agatha Christie ~ |
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We have come by curious ways We have found, O foolish-fond, Deep in every heart it lies ~ Alfred Noyes ~ |
It's a strange courage Shine alone in the sunrise |
It is always observable that silence propagates itself, and that the longer talk has been suspended, the more difficult it is to find any thing to say. ~ Samuel Johnson ~ |
On this hapless earth |
I have a conscience and a religious faith, and I know that our liberties were not won without suffering, and may be lost again through our cowardice. ~ Upton Sinclair ~ |
No one would have believed, in the last years of the nineteenth century, that human affairs were being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their affairs they were scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacency men went to and fro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their assurance of their empire over matter. It is possible that the infusoria under the microscope do the same. No one gave a thought to the older worlds of space as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea of life upon them as impossible or improbable. It is curious to recall some of the mental habits of those departed days. At most, terrestrial men fancied there might be other men upon Mars, perhaps inferior to themselves and ready to welcome a missionary enterprise. Yet, across the gulf of space, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us. ~ H. G. Wells ~ |
Work. Finish. Publish. ~ Michael Faraday ~ |
Agnosticism is not properly described as a "negative" creed, nor indeed as a creed of any kind, except in so far as it expresses absolute faith in the validity of a principle which is as much ethical as intellectual. This principle may be stated in various ways, but they all amount to this: that it is wrong for a man to say that he is certain of the objective truth of any proposition unless he can produce evidence which logically justifies that certainty. |
The whole secret of life is to be interested in one thing profoundly and in a thousand things well. ~ Hugh Walpole ~ |
[NOTE : This layout was initially devised with citations of the statment to Horace Walpole — but this has since been determined to be a misattribution which began as early as the 1930s. ~ ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 00:44, 13 March 2020 (UTC)]
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The artist doesn't have time to listen to the critics. The ones who want to be writers read the reviews, the ones who want to write don't have the time to read reviews. |
Quick now, here, now, always — ~ T. S. Eliot ~ |
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The superior man examines his heart, that there may be nothing wrong there, and that he may have no cause for dissatisfaction with himself. That wherein the superior man cannot be equaled is simply this — his work which other men cannot see. 孔夫子 |
At that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book. ~ Book of Daniel ~ |
~ Rumi ~ |
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