Quotes, everybody loves to read 'em. What are your favorites?
A few of mine that I apply to my every day life are:
"Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong."
Ayn Rand
"I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."
Ayn Rand
"The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me."
Ayn Rand
"In theory, theory is practice. In practice it isn't."
Yogi Berra
"Be careful if you don't know where you're going because you might not get there"
Yogi Berra
"You can observe a lot by just watching."
Yogi Berra
"All pitchers are liars or crybabies."
Yogi Berra
Full Version: Quotes
Good thread, Jeff. Will post more later, but this one is definitely one of my favorites:
"The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me."
Ayn Rand
"The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me."
Ayn Rand
"You guys line up alphabetically by height. You guys pair up in groups of three, then line up in a circle."
-- Bill Peterson, a Florida State football coach
"There is but one use for law, but one excuse for government -- the preservation of liberty -- to give to each man his own, to secure to the farmer what he produces from the soil, the mechanic what he invents and makes, to the artist what he creates, to the thinker the right to express his thoughts."
--(Robert Ingersoll, "On Voltaire")
"To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason is like administering medicine to the dead."
-- Thomas Paine
"… The man
Of virtuous soul commands not, nor obeys."
-- Percy Shelley, Queen Mab
"Yet persistently a few men awaken -- men who look back at greatness, are encouraged by reflecting on it, and feel themselves blessed, as though human life were a splendid thing, as though the loveliest fruit of this bitter plant were the knowledge that before them one man lived his life with pride and strength, another profoundly, and a third with compassion and benevolence -- but all bequeathed the same lesson: the man who is ready to risk his existence lives most beautifully."
-- Nietzsche, Unmodern Observations
"Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence."
-- Albert Einstein
"She herself was a victim of that lust for books which rages in the breast like a demon, and which cannot be stilled save by the frequent and plentiful acquisition of books. This passion is more common, and more powerful, than most people suppose. Book lovers are thought by unbookish people to be gentle and unworldly, and perhaps a few of them are so. But there are others who will lie and scheme and steal to get books as wildly and unconscionably as the dope-taker in pursuit of his drug. They may not want the books to read immediately, or at all; they want them to possess, to range on their shelves, to have at command. They want books as a Turk is thought to want concubines -- not to be hastily deflowered, but to be kept at their master's call, and enjoyed more often in thought than in reality."
-- Robertson Davies, The Salterton Trilogy
"Whoever said you can't buy happiness forgot about puppies."
-- Gene Hill
"Dogs feel very strongly that they should always go with you in the car, in case the need should arise for them to bark violently at nothing right in your ear."
-- Dave Barry
"Ever consider what [dogs] must think of us? I mean, here we come back from a grocery store with the most amazing haul -- chicken, pork, half a cow. They must think we're the greatest hunters on earth!"
-- Anne Tyler
"Money will buy you a pretty good dog, but it won't buy the wag of his tail."
"He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion."
"Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence.… From the hour the Pilgrims landed, to the present day, events, occurances, and tendencies prove that to insure peace, security, and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable. Every corner of this land knows firearms, and more than 99 99/100 percent of them by their silence indicate they are in safe and sane hands. The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil interference -- they deserve a place of honor with all that's good. WHEN FIREARMS GO, ALL GOES -- we need them every hour."
-- George Washington, 2nd Session of 1st Congress
"Things that upset a terrier may pass virtually unnoticed by a Great Dane."
-- Smiley Blanton
"I will not change my horse with any that treads on four pasterns. Ca ha! He bounds from the earth, as if his entrails were hairs, le cheval volant, the Pegasus, chez les narines de feu! When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes … he is pure air and fire … the prince of palfreys; his neigh is like the bidding of a monarch and his countenance enforces homage."
-- William Shakespeare
"Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."
-- George Washington
"The most formidable weapon against errors of any kind is Reason. I have never used any other, and I trust I never shall."
-- Thomas Paine
"I have never been able to make up my mind as to what was my true calling -- that of composer, pianist, or conductor … I am constantly troubled by the misgiving that, in venturing into too many fields, I may have failed to make the best use of my life."
-- Sergei Rachmaninoff, 1933
"Truth is neither young nor old, is neither ancient nor modern, but is the same for all times and places and should be sought for with ceaseless activity, eagerly acknowledged, loved more than life, and abandoned -- never."
-- Robert Ingersoll
"What light is to the eyes -- what air is to the lungs -- what love is to the heart, liberty is to the soul of man. Without liberty, the brain is a dungeon, where the chained thoughts die with their pinions pressed against the hingeless doors."
-- Robert Ingersoll
"These things are enough to make one think that sometimes the world becomes insane and that the earth is a vast asylum without a keeper."
-- Robert Ingersoll
"The higher you get in the scale of being, the grander, the nobler, and the tenderer you will become. Kindness is always an evidence of greatness. Malice is the property of small souls."
-- Robert Ingersoll
-- Bill Peterson, a Florida State football coach
"There is but one use for law, but one excuse for government -- the preservation of liberty -- to give to each man his own, to secure to the farmer what he produces from the soil, the mechanic what he invents and makes, to the artist what he creates, to the thinker the right to express his thoughts."
--(Robert Ingersoll, "On Voltaire")
"To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason is like administering medicine to the dead."
-- Thomas Paine
"… The man
Of virtuous soul commands not, nor obeys."
-- Percy Shelley, Queen Mab
"Yet persistently a few men awaken -- men who look back at greatness, are encouraged by reflecting on it, and feel themselves blessed, as though human life were a splendid thing, as though the loveliest fruit of this bitter plant were the knowledge that before them one man lived his life with pride and strength, another profoundly, and a third with compassion and benevolence -- but all bequeathed the same lesson: the man who is ready to risk his existence lives most beautifully."
-- Nietzsche, Unmodern Observations
"Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence."
-- Albert Einstein
"She herself was a victim of that lust for books which rages in the breast like a demon, and which cannot be stilled save by the frequent and plentiful acquisition of books. This passion is more common, and more powerful, than most people suppose. Book lovers are thought by unbookish people to be gentle and unworldly, and perhaps a few of them are so. But there are others who will lie and scheme and steal to get books as wildly and unconscionably as the dope-taker in pursuit of his drug. They may not want the books to read immediately, or at all; they want them to possess, to range on their shelves, to have at command. They want books as a Turk is thought to want concubines -- not to be hastily deflowered, but to be kept at their master's call, and enjoyed more often in thought than in reality."
-- Robertson Davies, The Salterton Trilogy
"Whoever said you can't buy happiness forgot about puppies."
-- Gene Hill
"Dogs feel very strongly that they should always go with you in the car, in case the need should arise for them to bark violently at nothing right in your ear."
-- Dave Barry
"Ever consider what [dogs] must think of us? I mean, here we come back from a grocery store with the most amazing haul -- chicken, pork, half a cow. They must think we're the greatest hunters on earth!"
-- Anne Tyler
"Money will buy you a pretty good dog, but it won't buy the wag of his tail."
"He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion."
"Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence.… From the hour the Pilgrims landed, to the present day, events, occurances, and tendencies prove that to insure peace, security, and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable. Every corner of this land knows firearms, and more than 99 99/100 percent of them by their silence indicate they are in safe and sane hands. The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil interference -- they deserve a place of honor with all that's good. WHEN FIREARMS GO, ALL GOES -- we need them every hour."
-- George Washington, 2nd Session of 1st Congress
"Things that upset a terrier may pass virtually unnoticed by a Great Dane."
-- Smiley Blanton
"I will not change my horse with any that treads on four pasterns. Ca ha! He bounds from the earth, as if his entrails were hairs, le cheval volant, the Pegasus, chez les narines de feu! When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes … he is pure air and fire … the prince of palfreys; his neigh is like the bidding of a monarch and his countenance enforces homage."
-- William Shakespeare
"Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."
-- George Washington
"The most formidable weapon against errors of any kind is Reason. I have never used any other, and I trust I never shall."
-- Thomas Paine
"I have never been able to make up my mind as to what was my true calling -- that of composer, pianist, or conductor … I am constantly troubled by the misgiving that, in venturing into too many fields, I may have failed to make the best use of my life."
-- Sergei Rachmaninoff, 1933
"Truth is neither young nor old, is neither ancient nor modern, but is the same for all times and places and should be sought for with ceaseless activity, eagerly acknowledged, loved more than life, and abandoned -- never."
-- Robert Ingersoll
"What light is to the eyes -- what air is to the lungs -- what love is to the heart, liberty is to the soul of man. Without liberty, the brain is a dungeon, where the chained thoughts die with their pinions pressed against the hingeless doors."
-- Robert Ingersoll
"These things are enough to make one think that sometimes the world becomes insane and that the earth is a vast asylum without a keeper."
-- Robert Ingersoll
"The higher you get in the scale of being, the grander, the nobler, and the tenderer you will become. Kindness is always an evidence of greatness. Malice is the property of small souls."
-- Robert Ingersoll
All good quotes, but this one made me crack up:
"Whoever said you can't buy happiness forgot about puppies."
-- Gene Hill
So true!
"Whoever said you can't buy happiness forgot about puppies."
-- Gene Hill
So true!
Keep your friends close but your enemies closer. Mario Puzo The Godfather I have a few more.
RANDOM EXCERPTS FROM MY FILE OF QUOTATIONS:
“We live in deeds, not years: In thoughts, not breaths; In feelings, not in figures on a dial. We should count time by heartthrobs. He most lives who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.” (Aristotle)
“In the time of your life, live - so that in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite variety and mystery of it.” (William Saroyan)
“Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of Peace
Count many a year of strife well lost
And for a breath of ecstasy
Give all you have been, or could be.” (Edna St. Vincent Millay)
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.” (Williamson)
“If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.” (Henry David Thoreau
"First they came for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up, because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me." (Martin Neimoller, 1945)
"The moment a person forms a theory, his imagination sees, in every object, only the traits which favor that theory." (Thomas Jefferson)
"We are here on earth to do good for others. What the others are here for, I don't know."(W. H. Auden)
"We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever
believed in. Some of us just go one god further." (Richard Dawkins),
"With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil, that takes religion."(Steven Weinberg)
“Surely all art is the result of having been in danger, of having gone through an experience all the way to the end, to where no one can go any further.” (Rainer Maria Rilke)
“There are only three rules for writing a novel. The trouble is, no one knows what they are.” (Somerset Maugham)
Barbara
“We live in deeds, not years: In thoughts, not breaths; In feelings, not in figures on a dial. We should count time by heartthrobs. He most lives who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.” (Aristotle)
“In the time of your life, live - so that in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite variety and mystery of it.” (William Saroyan)
“Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of Peace
Count many a year of strife well lost
And for a breath of ecstasy
Give all you have been, or could be.” (Edna St. Vincent Millay)
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.” (Williamson)
“If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.” (Henry David Thoreau
"First they came for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up, because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me." (Martin Neimoller, 1945)
"The moment a person forms a theory, his imagination sees, in every object, only the traits which favor that theory." (Thomas Jefferson)
"We are here on earth to do good for others. What the others are here for, I don't know."(W. H. Auden)
"We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever
believed in. Some of us just go one god further." (Richard Dawkins),
"With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil, that takes religion."(Steven Weinberg)
“Surely all art is the result of having been in danger, of having gone through an experience all the way to the end, to where no one can go any further.” (Rainer Maria Rilke)
“There are only three rules for writing a novel. The trouble is, no one knows what they are.” (Somerset Maugham)
Barbara
QUOTE(Barbara Branden @ Dec 13 2006, 08:53 PM) 
“We live in deeds, not years: In thoughts, not breaths; In feelings, not in figures on a dial. We should count time by heartthrobs. He most lives who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.” (Aristotle)
“In the time of your life, live - so that in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite variety and mystery of it.” (William Saroyan)
“If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.” (Henry David Thoreau
“In the time of your life, live - so that in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite variety and mystery of it.” (William Saroyan)
“If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.” (Henry David Thoreau
These are beautiful quotes, Barbara! I especially dug the last one.
QUOTE(Barbara Branden @ Dec 13 2006, 08:53 PM)
"First they came for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up, because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me." (Martin Neimoller, 1945)
Thanks for reminding me of this quote! I'd read it a few years ago, but had forgotten it.
QUOTE(Barbara Branden @ Dec 13 2006, 08:53 PM)
"The moment a person forms a theory, his imagination sees, in every object, only the traits which favor that theory." (Thomas Jefferson)
Gave me a chuckle. So true.
Here are a couple of mine (sorry to crowd up every topic I enter with references to Manson, hehehe):
“When you're taught to love everyone, to love your enemies, then what value does that place on love?” - Marilyn Manson
“I never said to be like me, I say to be like you and make a difference.” - Marilyn Manson
“Is adult entertainment killing our children? or is killing our children entertaining our adults?” - Marilyn Manson
"You cannot sedate, all the things you hate
I don’t need your hate, I decide my fate" - Marilyn Manson
"I went to God just to see, and I was looking at me." - Marilyn Manson
"When we were good, you just closed your eyes. So when we are bad, we'll scar your minds." - Marilyn Manson
"Everything you do is part of a plane plummeting towards our pitiful, dying earth. But your art, what you create is stepping onto the burning wing and forgetting silly things like life and death for a moment. Just to enjoy for one second a glimpse of beauty before you are reduced to ashes." - Marilyn Manson
This passage from Atlas should be near every Objectivist teacher of philosphy; "He retired nine years ago. Isn't it odd Whan a politician or movie star retires, we read front page stories about it. But when a philosopher retires, people do note even notice it. They do eventually." Word that thrill me everytime: "Mr Gorbevach: Tear down this wall." Ronald Reagan who had to keep putting these words into his wall speech because our pussy State Department kept taking them out.
"Progress isn't always progressive. If it were not inevitable, it may be better to stop it."
---anonymous
---anonymous
In C S Lewis Narnian Chronicles the book The Voyage of Dawn Treader there is this exchange: "But that would be putting the clock back; Have you no idea of progress, of development?" " I have see them both in an egg." "We call it going bad."
QUOTE(Chris Grieb @ Mar 7 2007, 06:20 PM)
In C S Lewis Narnian Chronicles the book The Voyage of Dawn Treader there is this exchange: "But that would be putting the clock back; Have you no idea of progress, of development?" " I have see them both in an egg." "We call it going bad."
In writing Sinfonia Antartica, Ralph Vaughan Williams appended 5 quotes before the commencement of each movement. They differ widely in source, but were obviously integral to his intended impact of the work, a lot of which started out as film music.
As a (then) late teenager this one particularly struck me....
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime, nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
John Donne
PS.
Check out the others.....Shelley, Psalm 104, Coleridge and RF Scott himself.....before you ever listen to the work
As a (then) late teenager this one particularly struck me....
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime, nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
John Donne
PS.
Check out the others.....Shelley, Psalm 104, Coleridge and RF Scott himself.....before you ever listen to the work
QUOTE(Peter @ Mar 8 2007, 06:24 AM)
In writing Sinfonia Antartica, Ralph Vaughan Williams appended 5 quotes before the commencement of each movement. They differ widely in source, but were obviously integral to his intended impact of the work, a lot of which started out as film music.
As a (then) late teenager this one particularly struck me....
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime, nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
John Donne
PS.
Check out the others.....Shelley, Psalm 104, Coleridge and RF Scott himself.....before you ever listen to the work
As a (then) late teenager this one particularly struck me....
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime, nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
John Donne
PS.
Check out the others.....Shelley, Psalm 104, Coleridge and RF Scott himself.....before you ever listen to the work
Oooh! Another Vaughan Williams lover!
I played that piece constantly for years! It actually motivated me to visit Antarctica!
To suffer woes which hope thinks infinite:
To forgive wrongs darker than death or night;
To defy Power which seems omnipotent ...
Neither to change, nor falter, nor repent,
This ... is to be
Good, great and joyous, beautiful and free;
This alone is Life, Joy, Empire, and Victory.
taken from Shelley, "Prometheus Unbound"
And then, of course, there's the last line from Tennyson's "Ulysses", engraved on the monument to Scott and his men who died in Antarctica:
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Judith; I have seen the quote but did not know the source. I did not know about the monument to Scott and his men. Thank you for the great information.
Thanks Judith - the line seems far more appropriate to that fateful expedition, strangely, than in the context of Tennyson's own work.
Whilst doing another post I came across a quote by Mozart after meeting 16yr old Beethoven......"Keep your eyes on him; some day he will give the world something to talk about."
Whilst doing another post I came across a quote by Mozart after meeting 16yr old Beethoven......"Keep your eyes on him; some day he will give the world something to talk about."
I've done a huge amount of research on the Scott expedition; I've got a small library of books on it. Fascinating period, fascinating people.
Judith
Judith
QUOTE
America... just a nation of two hundred million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns and no qualms about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable.
- Hunter S. ThompsonQUOTE
A long and wicked life followed by five minutes of perfect grace gets you into Heaven. An equally long life of decent living and good works followed by one outburst of taking the name of the Lord in vain - then have a heart attack at that moment and be damned for eternity. Is that the system?
-Robert A. HeinlienQUOTE
A society that gets rid of all its troublemakers goes downhill.
- Robert A. HeinleinQUOTE
Trust, but verify.
- Henry KissingerQUOTE
Fuck art, let's dance.
The Adults (band)
"It is the little 'misfits' that have the best chance to recover...The children who did not conform, the children who endure years of agonizing misery, loneliness, confusion, abuse by the teachers and by their 'peers'.... but remain aloof and withdrawn, unable to give in, unable to fake, armed with nothing but the knowlege that there is something wrong with that nursery school"
"The nonconformists are heroic little martyrs who are given no credit by no one....not even by themselves, since they cannot identify the nature of their battle. They do not have the conceptual knowlege nor the introspective skill to grasp that they are unable and unwilling to accept anything without understanding it, and that they are holding to the sovereignty of their own judgement against the terrifying pressure of everyone around him."
"A thinking child cannot conform: thought does not bow to authority. The resentment of the pack towards independence and intelligence is older than progressive education; it is an ancient evil."
(About trying to conform) "He never succeeds and is left wondering helplessly: "What is wrong with me?" "What do I lack?" "What do they want?""
-The Comprachicos
"From the first catch-prases flung at a child to the last, it is like a series of shocks to freeze his motor, to undercut the power of his consciousness. "Dont ask so many questions-children should be seen and not heard!"-"Who are you to think? Its so because I say its so!"-"Dont argue, obey!"-"Dont try to understand, believe!"-"Dont rebel, adjust!"-"Dont stand out, belong!"-"Dont struggle, compromise!"-"Your heart is more important than your head!"-"Who are you to know? Your parents know best!"- "Who are you to know? Society knows whats best!"-"Who are you to know? The bureaucrats know whats best!"-"Who are you to object? All values are relative!"-"Who are you to want to escape a thug's bullet? Thats just a personal prejudice!"
-Atlas Shrugged
"The nonconformists are heroic little martyrs who are given no credit by no one....not even by themselves, since they cannot identify the nature of their battle. They do not have the conceptual knowlege nor the introspective skill to grasp that they are unable and unwilling to accept anything without understanding it, and that they are holding to the sovereignty of their own judgement against the terrifying pressure of everyone around him."
"A thinking child cannot conform: thought does not bow to authority. The resentment of the pack towards independence and intelligence is older than progressive education; it is an ancient evil."
(About trying to conform) "He never succeeds and is left wondering helplessly: "What is wrong with me?" "What do I lack?" "What do they want?""
-The Comprachicos
"From the first catch-prases flung at a child to the last, it is like a series of shocks to freeze his motor, to undercut the power of his consciousness. "Dont ask so many questions-children should be seen and not heard!"-"Who are you to think? Its so because I say its so!"-"Dont argue, obey!"-"Dont try to understand, believe!"-"Dont rebel, adjust!"-"Dont stand out, belong!"-"Dont struggle, compromise!"-"Your heart is more important than your head!"-"Who are you to know? Your parents know best!"- "Who are you to know? Society knows whats best!"-"Who are you to know? The bureaucrats know whats best!"-"Who are you to object? All values are relative!"-"Who are you to want to escape a thug's bullet? Thats just a personal prejudice!"
-Atlas Shrugged
I could have used that "The Three Comprachicos" essay (or a simplified variance of it) in k-8th grade.
QUOTE(Jeff Kremer @ Mar 12 2007, 02:51 AM)
I could have used that "The Three Comprachicos" essay (or a simplified variance of it) in k-8th grade.
Yeah, couldn't we all!
I used to think I had Asperger's Syndrome. It was kinda funny because it seemed to fit perfectly. Turns out that it's everyone else that has the problem. Silly me.
QUOTE(Jeff Kremer @ Dec 13 2006, 04:11 PM)
Quotes, everybody loves to read 'em. What are your favorites?
A few of mine that I apply to my every day life are:
"Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong."
Ayn Rand
"I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."
Ayn Rand
"The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me."
Ayn Rand
"In theory, theory is practice. In practice it isn't."
Yogi Berra
"Be careful if you don't know where you're going because you might not get there"
Yogi Berra
"You can observe a lot by just watching."
Yogi Berra
"All pitchers are liars or crybabies."
Yogi Berra
A few of mine that I apply to my every day life are:
"Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong."
Ayn Rand
"I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."
Ayn Rand
"The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me."
Ayn Rand
"In theory, theory is practice. In practice it isn't."
Yogi Berra
"Be careful if you don't know where you're going because you might not get there"
Yogi Berra
"You can observe a lot by just watching."
Yogi Berra
"All pitchers are liars or crybabies."
Yogi Berra
Here are few I use:
When we run over libraries, persuaded of these principles, what havoc must we make? If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames: For it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.
David Hume
Mongol General: Conan! What is best in life?
Mongol Soldier: Swift horse, the wind in the face, the falcon upon the hand!
Mongol General: Wrong. Conan! What is best?
Conan: To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women.
Mongol General: Yes. That is best.
From the mouth of Conan the Barbarian as played by the Governator -- Arnoldt Schwartzernegger
Persian to Spartans: Lay down your weapons?
Spartan to Persian: Μολών Λαβέ (Come and get them!).
Ba'al Chatzaf
QUOTE(Jeff Kremer @ Dec 13 2006, 04:11 PM)
Quotes, everybody loves to read 'em. What are your favorites?
A few of mine that I apply to my every day life are:
"Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong."
Ayn Rand
A few of mine that I apply to my every day life are:
"Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong."
Ayn Rand
Here is a beauty spoken by our Rabbi at the last Purim Service: (Purim commemorates a failed genocide attempt in Persia 2300 years ago).
They tried to kill us
The failed
Let's eat.
Ba'al Chatzaf
Hume wanted to burn books?
Dayaamm!
I think Hume must be given more serious attention by Objectivists, but with comments like that, all he did was add gasoline to the flames of the Hume/Kant burners.
Michael
Dayaamm!
I think Hume must be given more serious attention by Objectivists, but with comments like that, all he did was add gasoline to the flames of the Hume/Kant burners.
Michael
'Yodah says: Do not your breath hold, Young GaltGulch, until made is movie of -Atlas Shrugged- else blue turn you will.'
"No man's need constitutes an obligation on the part of another man to fulfill that need!"
anonymous Objectivist
"No man's need constitutes an obligation on the part of another man to fulfill that need!"
anonymous Objectivist
QUOTE(Michael Stuart Kelly @ Apr 15 2007, 07:15 PM)
Hume wanted to burn books?
Dayaamm!
I think Hume must be given more serious attention by Objectivists, but with comments like that, all he did was add gasoline to the flames of the Hume/Kant burners.
Michael
Dayaamm!
I think Hume must be given more serious attention by Objectivists, but with comments like that, all he did was add gasoline to the flames of the Hume/Kant burners.
Michael
Hume was simply being rhetorical. In fact he was a librarian at some period in his life, and he wrote -the- definitive book on English history (at that time). It was the first fully documented history of England. Our own Ben Franklin made arrangement to buy a set and to help fund Hume's historical efforts. So I seriously doubt that Hume was a genuine book burner.
He considered only two classes of statement philosophically meaningful:
1. Statements about the relationships of ideas
2. Statements about fact and quantity (empirical statements).
Anything else, he considered as nonsense, hence his rather rhetorically excessive quip.
Whether you agree with Hume or not, just compare the clarity of his writing with the obscurity of Kant's writings. Hume wrote in order to be read with understanding.
Ba'al Chafatz (Lord of Chutpah)
I wanted to add one here, but I couldn't, because as we all know
QUOTE
It's the hardest thing in the world -- to do what you want.
QUOTE(Steve Gagne @ Apr 30 2007, 09:54 AM)
I wanted to add one here, but I couldn't, because as we all know
QUOTE
It's the hardest thing in the world -- to do what you want.
Nice quote, but it's truth depends on any individual. For me, the hardest thing (in this context) is doing what I need to do (long term) as opposed to what I might want NOW, if there's a conflict.
Taken literally, the statement is, of course, false. Try doing anything you don't want to do, like kicking your dog. Won't work. You won't get to first base. You won't even seriously consider it and complain that I suggested such a bad and stupid thing. Now, kicking your mother-in-law ...
I don't know who you're quoting, Rand, Peikoff, Branden--? But it's only Objectivist rhetoric of no value except to make you think, which it does.
Speaking of Peikoff, he said, "To save the world is the simplest thing in the world. All one has to do is think." A statement that could hardly be less true in its incompleteness or more dubious in its premises.
--Brant
If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw
"The solution to every problem is to kick it square in the nuts."
- Eric Cartman
- Eric Cartman
QUOTE(Brant Gaede @ Apr 30 2007, 11:15 AM)
QUOTE(Steve Gagne @ Apr 30 2007, 09:54 AM)
I wanted to add one here, but I couldn't, because as we all know
QUOTE
It's the hardest thing in the world -- to do what you want.
Nice quote, but it's truth depends on any individual. For me, the hardest thing (in this context) is doing what I need to do (long term) as opposed to what I might want NOW, if there's a conflict.
Taken literally, the statement is, of course, false. Try doing anything you don't want to do, like kicking your dog. Won't work. You won't get to first base. You won't even seriously consider it and complain that I suggested such a bad and stupid thing. Now, kicking your mother-in-law ...
I don't know who you're quoting, Rand, Peikoff, Branden--? But it's only Objectivist rhetoric of no value except to make you think, which it does.
Speaking of Peikoff, he said, "To save the world is the simplest thing in the world. All one has to do is think." A statement that could hardly be less true in its incompleteness or more dubious in its premises.
--Brant
Brant, you're absolutely right. If the Peikoff quote were true, Mensa members would have saved the world by now. Thought without action gets you nowhere. As to the first quote, I think the hardest thing in the world might be to know what you want. At least, that's my problem.
QUOTE(Michael Stuart Kelly @ Apr 15 2007, 07:15 PM)
Hume wanted to burn books?
Only the books on Scholastic Metaphysics. They are filled with nonsense anyway.
Ba'al Chatzaf
QUOTE(Ciro @ Apr 30 2007, 08:44 PM)
If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw
That's a great one!
QUOTE(Bob_Mac @ May 1 2007, 07:56 AM)
"The solution to every problem is to kick it square in the nuts."
- Eric Cartman
- Eric Cartman
Eric Cartman is amazing.
Here are some more of mine:
"Don't imagine a tragic end to the book when there's not, you gotta try to rewrite in spite of how crooked the plot." - Tonedeff
"And by came an angel who had a bright key,
And he opened the coffins and set them all free;
Then down a green plain leaping, laughing, they run,
And wash in a river, and shine in the sun." - William Blake's "The Chimney Sweeper"
"For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils." - William Wordworth's "I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud"
"...and she had never forgotten that, if you drink much from a bottle marked 'poison,' it is almost certain to disagree with you, sooner or later." - Lewis Carroll "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
"I just remembered that I'm absent minded. Wait...I mean I've lost my mind...I can't find it." - Eminem
"I was born grown and grew down." - Eminem
QUOTE(Chris Grieb @ Dec 13 2006, 08:14 PM)
Keep your friends close but your enemies closer. Mario Puzo The Godfather I have a few more.
Machiavelli said it first.
Ba'al Chatzaf
QUOTE(Judith @ Mar 8 2007, 04:36 PM)
And then, of course, there's the last line from Tennyson's "Ulysses", engraved on the monument to Scott and his men who died in Antarctica:
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Amundsen lived because he paid attention to the details. Scott failed heroically. He was too much the English gentlemen to learn how to survive in the cold from the Inuit (as Amundsen did). Scott was a jackass and his stupidity not only cost him his life, but that of several of his men.
Ba'al Chatzaf
QUOTE(BaalChatzaf @ Jun 13 2007, 08:37 PM)
QUOTE(Judith @ Mar 8 2007, 04:36 PM)
And then, of course, there's the last line from Tennyson's "Ulysses", engraved on the monument to Scott and his men who died in Antarctica:
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Amundsen lived because he paid attention to the details. Scott failed heroically. He was too much the English gentlemen to learn how to survive in the cold from the Inuit (as Amundsen did). Scott was a jackass and his stupidity not only cost him his life, but that of several of his men.
Believe it or not, I already knew all that, plus a lot more about the early Antarctic expeditions. I have a small library on the subject. I still like the quote.
Judith
Judith;
In the Objectiist Forum had a book review about the Scot and Admunsen expeditions that showed that Admunsen was much more rational.
The book is I think called The Loneliest Place on Earth. Scot has always been presented as much more heroic person but my memory of the book and the review was that Admunsen was much smarter and rational.
QUOTE(Chris Grieb @ Jun 14 2007, 04:24 PM)
Judith;
In the Objectiist Forum had a book review about the Scot and Admunsen expeditions that showed that Admunsen was much more rational.
The book is I think called The Loneliest Place on Earth. Scot has always been presented as much more heroic person but my memory of the book and the review was that Admunsen was much smarter and rational.
You can get the DVD of the Alstaire Cook series on Scott and Amundsen.
See
http://www.amazon.com/Last-Place-Earth-Mar...w/dp/B00005J74R
Ba'al Chatzaf
Bob; Thanks! When I finally get a DVD player I will see about getting the film.
There is left but this single path to tell thee of: namely, that being is. And on this path there are many proofs that being is without beginning and indestructible; it is universal, existing alone, immovable and without end; nor ever was it nor will it be, since it now is, all together, one, and continuous. For what generating of it wilt thou seek out? From what did it grow, and how? I will not permit thee to say or to think that it came from not-being; for it is impossible to think or to say that not-being is. What thine would then have stirred it into activity that it should arise from not-being later rather than earlier? So it is necessary that being either is absolutely or is not. Nor will the force of the argument permit that anything spring from being except being itself. Therefore justice does not slacken her fetters to permit generation or destruction, but holds being firm.
Parmenides, Arthur Fairbanks trans.
[T]he most certain principle of all is that regarding which it is impossible to be mistaken.... For a principle which every one must have who understands anything that is, is not a hypothesis; and that which every one must know who knows anything, he must already have when he comes to a special study. Evidently then such a principle is the most certain of all; which principle this is, let us proceed to say. It is, that the same attribute cannot at the same time belong and not belong to the same subject and in the same respect....
Aristotle, Metaphysics, W.D. Ross trans., book 4, chapter 3.
Do what thy manhood bids thee do, from none but self expect applause;
He noblest lives and noblest dies who makes and keeps his self-made laws.
Richard Francis Burton
A fact never went into partnership with a miracle. Truth scorns the assistance of wonders. A fact will fit every other fact in the universe, and that is how you can tell whether it is or is not a fact. A lie will not fit anything except another lie.
Robert G. Ingersoll
Every man dies, not every man really lives.
Randall Wallace, "Braveheart" screenplay
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
Edmund Burke
But grant me from time to time — if there are divine goddesses in the realm beyond good and evil — grant me the sight, but one glance of something perfect, wholly achieved, happy, mighty, triumphant....! Of a man who justifies man...for the sake of which one may still believe in man!
Nietzsche
He that has light within his own clear breast
May sit i' th' centre and enjoy bright day;
But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts
Benighted walks under the midday sun.
John Milton
For truth is truth, though never so old, and time cannot make that false which was once true.
Edward de Vere
Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!
Patrick Henry
It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.
Giordano Bruno
It is your mind that matters economically, as much or more than your mouth or hands. In the long run, the most important economic effect of population size and growth is the contribution of additional people to our stock of useful knowledge. And this contribution is large enough in the long run to overcome all the costs of population growth.
Because we can expect future generations to be richer than we are, no matter what we do about resources, asking us to refrain from using resources now so that future generations can have them later is like asking the poor to make gifts to the rich.
Julian Simon
There are many other at my site's quote page, http://johnrearden.com/quotes.htm.
Parmenides, Arthur Fairbanks trans.
[T]he most certain principle of all is that regarding which it is impossible to be mistaken.... For a principle which every one must have who understands anything that is, is not a hypothesis; and that which every one must know who knows anything, he must already have when he comes to a special study. Evidently then such a principle is the most certain of all; which principle this is, let us proceed to say. It is, that the same attribute cannot at the same time belong and not belong to the same subject and in the same respect....
Aristotle, Metaphysics, W.D. Ross trans., book 4, chapter 3.
Do what thy manhood bids thee do, from none but self expect applause;
He noblest lives and noblest dies who makes and keeps his self-made laws.
Richard Francis Burton
A fact never went into partnership with a miracle. Truth scorns the assistance of wonders. A fact will fit every other fact in the universe, and that is how you can tell whether it is or is not a fact. A lie will not fit anything except another lie.
Robert G. Ingersoll
Every man dies, not every man really lives.
Randall Wallace, "Braveheart" screenplay
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
Edmund Burke
But grant me from time to time — if there are divine goddesses in the realm beyond good and evil — grant me the sight, but one glance of something perfect, wholly achieved, happy, mighty, triumphant....! Of a man who justifies man...for the sake of which one may still believe in man!
Nietzsche
He that has light within his own clear breast
May sit i' th' centre and enjoy bright day;
But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts
Benighted walks under the midday sun.
John Milton
For truth is truth, though never so old, and time cannot make that false which was once true.
Edward de Vere
Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!
Patrick Henry
It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.
Giordano Bruno
It is your mind that matters economically, as much or more than your mouth or hands. In the long run, the most important economic effect of population size and growth is the contribution of additional people to our stock of useful knowledge. And this contribution is large enough in the long run to overcome all the costs of population growth.
Because we can expect future generations to be richer than we are, no matter what we do about resources, asking us to refrain from using resources now so that future generations can have them later is like asking the poor to make gifts to the rich.
Julian Simon
There are many other at my site's quote page, http://johnrearden.com/quotes.htm.
John;
Has I said before you are a great addition to Objectivist Living.
Can you give me a source on the Edmund Burke quote. I have never seen a specific speech cited.
One of my favorites is "Get the hell out of my way!" But I can't remember whether it was John Galt, or Francisco, or who...?
I also like "Life is an end in itself -- a dead end!" That is by Brother Hugh Astfurrit, from his wonderful book, Polish Objectivism. :-)
REB
I also like "Life is an end in itself -- a dead end!" That is by Brother Hugh Astfurrit, from his wonderful book, Polish Objectivism. :-)
REB
Roger; Is Polish Objectivism a real book? How can I get it.
QUOTE(Chris Grieb @ Jun 27 2007, 01:01 PM)
Roger; Is Polish Objectivism a real book? How can I get it.
It only exists in "manuscript" form in my brain. :-)
But because I like you, and I know you thirst for more of the Good Brother's wisdom, here is another of his pithy aphorisms:
"Existence exists -- in a certain sense."
OK, another:
"Nature, to be commanded, must be taken by force."
REB
Roger;
The quote is from Galt. The page number is 1125.
Thank you for those other quotes. They have a perverse inspiration.
QUOTE(Roger Bissell @ Jun 27 2007, 12:29 PM)
"Get the hell out of my way!"
None of those fellows...it was ME. I say it on a daily basis. Sometimes I like to spice things up and throw an F bomb in there instead.
Here are some good ones:
"I'm afraid sometimes
you'll play lonely games too,
games you can't win
because you'll play against you." - Dr. Seuss (Also, the other quotes in my sig)
"He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying." - Nietzsche
"...But when nothing happens you wince, and the impact makes you glad you exist,
Sadness desists and you miss your family/friends.
As you reexamine your presence, the apathy lifts,
Knowing that in the face of death, you found passion to live.
There's an equal amount of life within a last gasp and a first breath.
No matter how hard it gets, no one truly prefers death,
And if the hurt ends, you're sure blessed.
Remember the determination of your first step
And keep walking." - Tonedeff
"...Amazing how pricks can miss your skin, yet pierce your soul." - Tonedeff
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