My Favorite Quotes…
LIFE
"Adults are obsolete children."
-Dr. Seuss
“The sonatas of Mozart are unique;
they are too easy for children, and too difficult for artists."
-Artur
Schnabel
“We do
not stop playing because we grow old. We
grow old because we stop playing.”
-George
Bernard Shaw
“When I see an adult on a bicycle, I
do not despair for the future of the human race.”
-H. G. Wells
"All human beings seek to locate
themselves in the stream of time."
-Carl N. Degler
“Who knows only his own generation
remains always a child.”
-Norlin
Library entrance,
"The richness of life lies in the
memories we have forgotten."
-Cesare Pavese
"We have reached an important
point when the end begins to come into view."
-William Childs Westmoreland
“Solitude is the salt of
personhood. It brings out the authentic
flavor of every experience.”
-May Sarton
"The secret of good old age is
simply an honorable pact with solitude."
-Gabriel García
Márquez
“Millions long for immorality
who don’t know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon.”
-Susan Ertz
“The unexamined life is not worth
living.”
-Socrates
"It is better to be a human being
dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a
fool satisfied."
-John Stuart Mill
“There are only two ways to live your
life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything
is a miracle.”
-Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
“A well-written life is almost as rare
as a well-spent one.”
-Thomas Carlyle
"Your net worth to the world is
usually determined by what remains after your bad habits are subtracted from
your good ones."
-Benjamin Franklin
“Some people are born on third base
and go through life thinking they hit a triple.”
-Barry Switzer
“A technical objection is the first
refuge of a scoundrel.”
-Heywood Broun
“A man is about as big as the things
that make him angry.”
-Winston Churchill
“A man’s health can be judged by which he takes two at a time – pills or stairs.”
-John Welsh
“Wine is constant proof that God loves us and
wants to see us happy.”
-Benjamin Franklin
“I’ve wrestled with reality for 35
years, doctor, and I’m happy to state that I’ve finally won out over it.”
-Jimmy Stewart, as Elwood P. Down in
“Life is a tragedy for those who feel
and a comedy for those who think.”
-from a Chinese fortune cookie!
"The trouble with life isn't that
there is no answer, it's that there are so many answers."
Ruth Benedict
"There is more to life than
increasing its speed."
-Mahatma Gandhi
PURPOSE
“All philosophy lies in two words,
sustain and abstain.”
-Epictetus
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without”
-
“He will always be a slave who does not know
how to live upon a little.”
-Horace
"Only when he has ceased to need
things can a man truly be his own master and so really exist."
-Anwar al-Sadat
“He who would travel happily must travel
light.”
-Antoine de Saint-Exupery
"Travel: Some good advice from
one who knows: Take twice the cash and half the clothes."
-Anonymous
"Why grab possessions like
thieves, or divide them like socialists, when you can ignore them like wise
men?"
-Natalie Clifford Barney
“What some people mistake for the high cost of living is really the cost of living high.”
-Doug Larson
"Things only have the value that
we give them."
-Molière
"Prosperity is only an instrument
to be used, not a deity to be worshipped."
-Calvin Coolidge
"We act as though comfort and
luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all we need to make us happy
is something to be enthusiastic about."
-Albert Einstein
“Another flaw in the human character
is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.”
-Kurt Vonnegut
“The greatest use of life is to spend
it for something that will outlast it.”
-William James
"The clearest way into the
universe is through a forest wilderness."
-John Muir
"I went into the
woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts
of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I
came to die, discover that I had not lived."
-Henry David Thoreau
"The proper function of man is to
live, not to exist. I shall not waste my
days in trying to prolong them. I shall
use my time."
-Jack London
"You do what you can for as long as you can, and when you finally can't, you do the next best thing. You back up but you don't give up."
-Chuck Yeager
"None of us can estimate what we
do when we do it from instinct."
-Luigi Pirandello
"In order to serve its purpose, a vision has to be a shared vision."
-Warren Bennis
"Planning is as natural to the
process of success as its absence is to the process of failure."
-Robin Sieger
"To succeed, you have to believe
in something with such a passion that it becomes a reality."
-Anita Roddick
“The secret of success is constancy to
purpose.”
-Benjamin Distaeli
"To
laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the
affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure
the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty, to find the best in
others; to leave the world a little better, whether by a healthy child, a
garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has
breathed easier because you have lived. This is the meaning of success!"
-Ralph
Waldo Emerson
"Success is always something that
you have to recover from."
-Marsha Norman
CONVICTION
"Ideals are like stars; you will not succeed in touching them in your hands. But like the seafaring man on the desert of waters, you choose them as your guides, and following them you will reach your destiny."
-Carl Schurz
“It is so many years before one can believe enough in what one feels even to know what that feeling is.”
-W.B. Yeats
“Talent hits a target no one else can
hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.”
-Arthur Schopenhauer
"Dreams are the most powerful
motivators of all."
-Nick Thornely
"One person with a dream is equal
to ninety-nine who only have an interest."
?
"Dream as if you'll live forever.
Live as if you'll die tomorrow."
-James Dean
“Sometimes you just have to take the
leap, and build your wings on the way down.”
-Kobi Yamada
“Do not hurry. Do not rest.”
-Goethe
WISDOM
“The beginning of wisdom is to call
things by their right names”
-Chinese Proverb
“Man’s mind, once stretched by a new
idea, never regains its original dimensions.”
-Oliver Wendell Holmes
“Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.”
?
“It is the mark of an educated mind to
be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.”
-Aristotle
"The surest way to corrupt a
youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than
those who think differently."
-Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)
“The true lover of knowledge naturally
strives for truth, and is not content with common opinion, but soars with
undimmed and unwearied passion till he grasps the essential nature of things.”
-Plato
“Two things are infinite: the universe
and human stupidity; and I’m not sure about the
universe.”
-Albert Einstein
"Keep away from
people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the
really great ones make you feel that you, too, can become great."
-Mark Twain
“A friendship founded on business is
better than a business founded on friendship.”
-John D. Rockefeller (1874-1960)
"One of the lessons of history is
that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to
say."
-Will Durant
“If I am to speak ten minutes, I need
a week for preparation; if fifteen minutes, three days; if half an hour, two
days; if an hour, I am ready now.”
-Woodrow
Wilson
“Only in quiet waters do things mirror themselves
undistorted. Only in a quiet mind is
adequate perception of the world.”
-Hans Margolius
“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”
-Leonardo da Vinci
"He is happiest of whom the world says least, good or
bad."
-Thomas Jefferson
“The higher a monkey climbs, the more you can see of its
behind.”
-Saint Bonaventure (1217-1274)
“With fame I become more and more stupid, which is of
course, a very common phenomenon.”
-Albert Einstein
“Adversity makes men, prosperity makes monsters.”
-Victor Hugo
“Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to
test a man’s character, give him power.”
-Abraham Lincoln
“It’s said that power corrupts, but actually it’s more true that power attracts the corruptible.”
-David Brin
“Men of power have not time to read; yet men who don’t read
are unfit for power.”
-Michael Foot
“I wanted to change the world. But I have found that the only thing one can
be sure of changing is oneself.”
-Aldous Huxley
“Lord, 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."
-Saint Francis of
“Nature teaches more than she
preaches. There are no sermons in
stones.”
-John Burroughs
“This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for
complicated philosophy. Our own brain,
our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.”
-Dalai Lama
"The gospel is meant to comfort
the afflicted and afflict the comfortable."
-Garrison Keillor
"Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier."
-Mother Theresa
DISCOVERY
"Science is the topography of
ignorance."
-Oliver Wendell Holmes
"The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one
that heralds new discoveries, is not
-Isaac Asimov
"A hidden connection is stronger than an obvious one."
-Heraclitus
"Solve the problem yourself or accept a fate you may not like...from this perspective, the ethic of personal responsibility gains appeal."
-Noel M. Tichy
"Don't study the idea to death
with experts and committees. Get on with it and see if it works."
-Ken Iverson
“An expert is a person who has made all the mistakes that can be made in a very narrow field.”
-Neils Bohr
"The mathematician has reached the highest rung on the ladder of human thought."
-
"If you're not part of the
solution, you're part of the precipitate."
-Steven Wright
"To make an apple pie from
scratch, you must first invent the universe."
-Carl Sagan
"A useless but amusing fact is
that if all the DNA in all the cells in a single human
being were stretched out it would reach the moon and back eight thousand
times."
-Steve Jones
"It is a mathematical fact that the casting of this pebble from my hand alters the centre of gravity of the universe."
-Thomas Carlyle
"The greater becomes the volume of our sphere of knowledge, the greater also becomes its surface of contact with the unknown."
-Jules Sageret
“He who learns and
learns and yet does not know what he knows, is one who plows and plows yet
never sows.”
-Alfred Korzybski
"What use is it that knowledge
mounts? It's knowing something good that counts."
-Friedrich von Logau
"We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done."
-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
"In the end, you're measured not by how much you undertake but by what you finally accomplish."
-Donald Trump
"I think that only daring speculation can lead us further and not accumulation of facts."
-Albert Einstein
“No pessimist ever discovered the
secret of the stars, or sailed to an uncharted land, or opened a new heaven to
the human spirit.”
-Helen Keller
“We shall never cease from
exploration.
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first
time.”
-T.S. Elliot
FLIGHT
"When once you have tasted
flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for
there you have been, and there you will always long to return."
-Leonardo da
Vinci
"Pilots are drawn to flying
because it's a perfect combination of science, romance and adventure."
-Charles Lindbergh
“I fly because it releases my mind
from the tyranny of petty things…’
-Antoine de Saint Exupery
High Flight, by John G. Magee
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 windswept 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.
In August
or September 1941, Pilot Officer Magee composed High Flight and sent a
copy to his parents. Several months later, on December 11, 1941 his Spitfire
collided with another plane over England and Magee, only 19 years of age,
crashed to his death.
“Man must rise above the Earth – to
the top of the atmosphere and beyond – for only thus will he fully understand
the world in which he lives.”
-Socrates
“…we are too feeble and sluggish to make our
way out to the upper limit of the air.
If someone could reach the summit, or put on wings and fly aloft, when
he put up his head he would see the world above, just as fishes see our world
when they put up their heads out of the sea; and if his nature were able to
bear the sight, he would recognize that that is the true heaven...”
-Plato
(from The Last Days of Socrates, 5th century, BC)
“…there may be only a brief window of
opportunity for space travel during which we will in principle have the
capability to establish colonies... If we let that opportunity pass without
taking advantage of it we will be doomed to remain on the Earth, where we will
eventually go extinct.”
- J.
Richard Gott III,