[Morrigan]

I always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific.jane wagner

The human race is faced with a cruel choice: work or daytime television. Unknown

The real hero is always a hero by mistake; he dreams of being an honest coward like everybody else.Umberto Eco

None are so busy as the fool and knave. John Dryden

To avoid criticism do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. Elbert Hubbart

Be thou the first true merit to befriend, his praise is lost who stays till all commend.Alexander Pope

Many people weigh the guilt they will feel against the pleasure of the forbidden action they want to take. Peter McWilliams

Fear does not have any special power unless you empower it by submitting to it.Less Brown

We will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.
Martin Luther King, Jr.

Better no rule than cruel rule.
Aesop

True friends stab you in the front.
Oscar Wilde


Life without love is like a tree without blossoms or fruit.
Kahil Gibran

A good garden may have some weeds.
Caffeine. The gateway drug.
Eddie Wedder

I just think that all of us in this room should have a voice in how the USA is represented. And he don't allow us our voice, that's all I'm saying.
Eddie Wedder





I love men, not for what unites them, but for what divides them, and I want to know most of all what gnaws at their hearts.
Guillaume Apollinaire

Do things repeat themselves? What in human nature is inherited versus self-determined? All of those things are so important in how you deal with the changes that happen in life - how you deal with your successes, your failures, with love, with loss.
Amy Tan



Time is what keeps the light from reaching us. There is no greater obstacle to God than time: and not only time but temporalities, not only temporal things but temporal affections, not only temporal affections but the very taint and smell of time.
Meister Eckhart



"Funny business, a woman's career: the things you drop on the way up the ladder so you can move faster. You forget you'll need them again when you get back to being a woman. It's one career all females have in common, whether we like it or not: being a woman. Sooner or later, we've got to work at it, no matter how many other careers we've had or wanted." Joseph L Mankiewichz, in All About Eve
US movie director, producer (1909 - 1993)


A man marries to have a home, but also because he doesn't want to be bothered with sex and all that sort of thing.

W. Somerset Maugham

An unfortunate thing about this world is that the good habits are much easier to give up than the bad ones.
W. Somerset Maugham

Any nation that thinks more of its ease and comfort than its freedom will soon lose its freedom; and the ironical thing about it is that it will lose its ease and comfort too.
W. Somerset Maugham

Anyone can tell the truth, but only very few of us can make epigrams.
W. Somerset Maugham

Beauty is an ecstasy; it is as simple as hunger. There is really nothing to be said about it. It is like the perfume of a rose: you can smell it and that is all.
W. Somerset Maugham

Considering how foolishly people act and how pleasantly they prattle, perhaps it would be better for the world if they talked more and did less.
W. Somerset Maugham

Death doesn't affect the living because it has not happened yet. Death doesn't concern the dead because they have ceased to exist.
W. Somerset Maugham

Death is a very dull, dreary affair, and my advice to you is to have nothing whatsoever to do with it.
W. Somerset Maugham

Every production of an artist should be the expression of an adventure of his soul.
W. Somerset Maugham

Excess on occasion is exhilarating. It prevents moderation from acquiring the deadening effect of a habit.
W. Somerset Maugham

Few misfortunes can befall a boy which bring worse consequence than to have a really affectionate mother.
W. Somerset Maugham

Habits in writing as in life are only useful if they are broken as soon as they cease to be advantageous.
W. Somerset Maugham

Have common sense and stick to the point.
W. Somerset Maugham

I do not believe they are right who say that the defects of famous men should be ignored. I think it is better that we should know them. Then, though we are conscious of having faults as glaring as theirs, we can believe that that is no hindrance to our achieving also something of their virtues.
W. Somerset Maugham

I made up my mind long ago that life was too short to do anything for myself that I could pay others to do for me.
W. Somerset Maugham

I would sooner read a time-table or a catalogue than nothing at all. They are much more entertaining than half the novels that are written.
W. Somerset Maugham

I'll give you my opinion of the human race in a nutshell... their heart's in the right place, but their head is a thoroughly inefficient organ.
W. Somerset Maugham

If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom, and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too.
W. Somerset Maugham

If you don't change your beliefs, your life will be like this forever. Is that good news?
W. Somerset Maugham

If you want to eat well in England, eat three breakfasts.
W. Somerset Maugham

Imagination grows by exercise, and contrary to common belief, is more powerful in the mature than in the young.
W. Somerset Maugham

Impropriety is the soul of wit.
W. Somerset Maugham

In Hollywood, the women are all peaches. It makes one long for an apple occasionally.
W. Somerset Maugham

In the country the darkness of night is friendly and familiar, but in a city, with its blaze of lights, it is unnatural, hostile and menacing. It is like a monstrous vulture that hovers, biding its time.
W. Somerset Maugham

It is a funny thing about life; if you refuse to accept anything but the best you very often get it.
W. Somerset Maugham

It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it.
W. Somerset Maugham

It is not true that suffering ennobles the character; happiness does that sometimes, but suffering for the most part, makes men petty and vindictive.
W. Somerset Maugham

It is not wealth one asks for, but just enough to preserve one's dignity, to work unhampered, to be generous, frank and independent.
W. Somerset Maugham

It is salutary to train oneself to be no more affected by censure than by praise.
W. Somerset Maugham

It is unsafe to take your reader for more of a fool than he is.
W. Somerset Maugham

It seems that the creative faculty and the critical faculty cannot exist together in their highest perfection.
W. Somerset Maugham

It was such a lovely day I thought it a pity to get up.
W. Somerset Maugham

It wasn't until late in life that I discovered how easy it is to say "I don't know."
W. Somerset Maugham

It's a funny thing about life; if you refuse to accept anything but the best, you very often get it.
W. Somerset Maugham

It's no good trying to keep up old friendships. It's painful for both sides. The fact is, one grows out of people, and the only thing is to face it.
W. Somerset Maugham

It's very hard to be a gentleman and a writer.
W. Somerset Maugham

Let us develop the resources of our land, call forth its powers, build up its institutions, promote all its great interests, and see whether we also, in our day and generation, may not perform something worthy to be remembered.
W. Somerset Maugham

Like all weak men he laid an exaggerated stress on not changing one's mind.
W. Somerset Maugham

Love is only a dirty trick played on us to achieve continuation of the species.
W. Somerset Maugham

Marriage is a very good thing, but I think it's a mistake to make a habit out of it.
W. Somerset Maugham

Men have an extraordinarily erroneous opinion of their position in nature; and the error is ineradicable.
W. Somerset Maugham

Money is like a sixth sense without which you cannot make a complete use of the other five.
W. Somerset Maugham

Money is the string with which a sardonic destiny directs the motions of its puppets.
W. Somerset Maugham

My own belief is that there is hardly anyone whose sexual life, if it were broadcast, would not fill the world at large with surprise and horror.
W. Somerset Maugham

No gray hairs streak my soul, no grandfatherly fondness there! I shake the world with the might of my voice, and walk -handsome, twenty-two year old.
W. Somerset Maugham

Old age has its pleasures, which, though different, are not less than the pleasures of youth.
W. Somerset Maugham

Old age is ready to undertake tasks that youth shirked because they would take too long.
W. Somerset Maugham

Only a mediocre person is always at his best.
W. Somerset Maugham

People ask for criticism, but they only want praise.
W. Somerset Maugham

Perfection has one grave defect: it is apt to be dull.
W. Somerset Maugham

Perfection is a trifle dull. It is not the least of life's ironies that this, which we all aim at, is better not quite achieved.
W. Somerset Maugham

Sentimentality is the only sentiment that rubs you the wrong way.
W. Somerset Maugham

She had a pretty gift for quotation, which is a serviceable substitute for wit.
W. Somerset Maugham

She plunged into a sea of platitudes, and with the powerful breast stroke of a channel swimmer made her confident way towards the white cliffs of the obvious.
W. Somerset Maugham

The ability to quote is a serviceable substitute for wit.
W. Somerset Maugham

The artist produces for the liberation of his soul. It is his nature to create as it is the nature of water to run down the hill.
W. Somerset Maugham

The common idea that success spoils people by making them vain, egotistic and self-complacent is erroneous; on the contrary it makes them, for the most part, humble, tolerant and kind.
W. Somerset Maugham

The crown of literature is poetry.
W. Somerset Maugham

The essence of the beautiful is unity in variety.
W. Somerset Maugham

The great American novel has not only already been written, it has already been rejected.
W. Somerset Maugham

The great critic must be a philosopher, for from philosophy he will learn serenity, impartiality, and the transitoriness of human things.
W. Somerset Maugham

The love that lasts longest is the love that is never returned.
W. Somerset Maugham

The most useful thing about a principle is that it can always be sacrificed to expediency.
W. Somerset Maugham

The trouble with young writers is that they are all in their sixties.
W. Somerset Maugham

The world in general doesn't know what to make of originality; it is startled out of its comfortable habits of thought, and its first reaction is one of anger.
W. Somerset Maugham

The world is quickly bored by the recital of misfortune, and willing avoids the sight of distress.
W. Somerset Maugham

The writer is more concerned to know than to judge.
W. Somerset Maugham

The writer of prose can only step aside when the poet passes.
W. Somerset Maugham

There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.
W. Somerset Maugham

There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.
W. Somerset Maugham

There are two good things in life - freedom of thought and freedom of action.
W. Somerset Maugham

There is no explanation for evil. It must be looked upon as a necessary part of the order of the universe. To ignore it is childish, to bewail it senseless.
W. Somerset Maugham

Things were easier for the old novelists who saw people all of a piece. Speaking generally, their heroes were good through and through, their villains wholly bad.
W. Somerset Maugham

To eat well in England, you should have a breakfast three times a day.
W. Somerset Maugham

Tolerance is another word for indifference.
W. Somerset Maugham

Tradition is a guide and not a jailer.
W. Somerset Maugham

We are not the same persons this year as last; nor are those we love. It is a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person.
W. Somerset Maugham

We have long passed the Victorian Era when asterisks were followed after a certain interval by a baby.
W. Somerset Maugham

We know our friends by their defects rather than by their merits.
W. Somerset Maugham

We learn resignation not by our own suffering, but by the suffering of others.
W. Somerset Maugham

What has influenced my life more than any other single thing has been my stammer. Had I not stammered I would probably... have gone to Cambridge as my brothers did, perhaps have become a don and every now and then published a dreary book about French literature.
W. Somerset Maugham

What makes old age hard to bear is not the failing of one's faculties, mental and physical, but the burden of one's memories.
W. Somerset Maugham

When I read a book I seem to read it with my eyes only, but now and then I come across a passage, perhaps only a phrase, which has a meaning for me, and it becomes part of me.
W. Somerset Maugham

When you are young you take the kindness people show you as your right.
W. Somerset Maugham

When you choose your friends, don't be short-changed by choosing personality over character.
W. Somerset Maugham

Writing is the supreme solace.
W. Somerset Maugham

You are not angry with people when you laugh at them. Humor teaches tolerance.
W. Somerset Maugham

You can do anything in this world if you are prepares to take the consequences.
W. Somerset Maugham

You know that the Tasmanians, who never committed adultery, are now extinct.
W. Somerset Maugham

You know what the critics are. If you tell the truth they only say you're cynical and it does an author no good to get a reputation for cynicism.

W. Somerset Maugham

A bad excuse is better than none.
A bad workman blames his tools.
A barking dog never bites.
A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
A cat in gloves catches no mice.
A deaf husband and a blind wife are always a happy couple.
A dog is a man's best friend.
A man's reach should exceed his grasp.
A stumble may prevent a fall.
Actions speak louder than words.
Affectation is a greater enemy to the face than smallpox.
After dinner rest a while, after supper walk a mile.
All good things come to those who wait.
All good things must come to an end.
All that glitters is not gold.
All wealth begins in mind.
As you make your bed, so you must lie upon it.

More Quotes

[Misafir]

ProVerbs From Turkey


Even though you know a thousand things, ask the man who knows one.

A person does not seek luck; luck seeks the person

Coffee should be black as Hell, strong as death, and sweet as love

Having two ears and one tongue, we should listen twice as much as we speak.

Happiness is like crystal -- when it shines the most, it soon cracks

[Misafir]

Proverb

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


A proverb (from the Latin proverbium) is a simple and concrete saying popularly known and repeated, which expresses a truth, based on common sense or the practical experience of humanity. They are often metaphorical. A proverb that describes a basic rule of conduct may also be known as a maxim. If a proverb is distinguished by particularly good phrasing, it may be known as an aphorism.
Proverbs are often borrowed from similar languages and cultures, and sometimes come down to the present through more than one language. Both the Bible (Book of Proverbs) and medieval Latin have played a considerable role in distributing proverbs across Europe, although almost every culture has examples of its own.


Paremiology

The study of proverbs is called paremiology (from Greek παροιμία - paroimía, "proverb") and can be dated back as far as Aristotle. Paremiography, on the other hand, is the collection of proverbs. Currently, the foremost proverb scholar in the United States is Wolfgang Mieder (a claim based on the fact that he has written or edited over 50 books on the subject, edits the journal Proverbium, has written innumerable articles on proverbs, and is very widely cited by other proverb scholars). Mieder defines the term proverb as follows:
"A proverb is a short, generally known sentence of the folk which contains wisdom, truth, morals, and traditional views in a metaphorical, fixed and memorizable form and which is handed down from generation to generation.” (Mieder 1985:119; also in Mieder 1993:24) Subgenres include proverbial comparisons (“as busy as a bee”), proverbial interrogatives (“Does a chicken have lips?”) and twin formulas (“give and take”).
Another subcategory are wellerisms, named after Sam Weller from Charles Dickens's The Pickwick Papers (1837). They are constructed in a triadic manner which consists of a statement (often a proverb), an identification of a speaker (person or animal) and a phrase that places the statement into an unexpected situation. Ex.: “Every evil is followed by some good,” as the man said when his wife died the day after he became bankrupt.
Yet another category of proverb is the "anti-proverb" (Mieder and Litovkina 2002). In such cases, people twist familiar proverbs to change the meaning. Sometimes the result is merely humorous, but the most spectacular examples result in the opposite meaning of the standard proverb. Examples include, "Nerds of a feather flock together", "Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and likely to talk about it," and "Absence makes the heart grow wander".
A similar form is proverbial expressions (“to bite the dust”). The difference is that proverbs are uncaneable sentences, while proverbial expressions permit alteretions to fit the grammar of the context.

Another close construction is an allusion to a proverb, such as "The new broom will sweep clean."
Typical stylistic features of proverbs (as Shirley Arora points out in her article, The Perception of Proverbiality (1984)) are:

• alliteration (Forgive and forget)
• parallelism (Nothing ventured, nothing gained)
• rhyme (When the cat is away, the mice will play)
• ellipsis (Once bitten, twice shy)

In some languages, assonance, the repetion of a vowel, is also exploited in forming artistic proverbs, such as the following extreme example from Oromo, of Ethiopia.

• kan mana baala, a’laa gaala (“A leaf at home, but a camel elsewhere"; somebody who has a big reputation among those who do not know him well.)

Internal features that can be found quite frequently include :

• hyperbole (All is fair in love and war)
• paradox (The longest way around is the shortest way home)
• personification (Hunger is the best cook)

To make the respective statement more general most proverbs are based on a metaphor. Further typical features of the proverb are its shortness (average: seven words), and the fact that its author is generally unknown (otherwise it would be a quotation).
In the article “Tensions in Proverbs: More Light on International Understanding,” Joseph Raymond comments on what common Russian proverbs from the 1700s and 1800s portray: Potent antiauthoritarian proverbs reflected tensions between the Russian people and the Czar. The rollickingly malicious undertone of these folk verbalizations constitutes what might be labeled a ‘paremiological revolt.’ To avoid openly criticizing a given authority or cultural pattern, folk take recourse to proverbial expressions which voice personal tensions in a tone of generalized consent. Thus, personal involvement is linked with public opinion [2] Proverbs that speak to the political disgruntlement include: “When the Czar spits into the soup dish, it fairly bursts with pride”; “If the Czar be a rhymester, woe be to the poets”; and “The hen of the Czarina herself does not lay swan’s eggs.” While none of these proverbs state directly, “I hate the Czar and detest my situation” (which would have been incredibly dangerous), they do get their points across.
Other well known Russian proverbs include: “Every seed knows its time” (everything comes in time), “you will reap what you sow,” “a titmouse in the hand is better than a crane in the sky” (remarkably similar to “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush”), “idleness is the mother of all vices” (similarly, “idle hands are the Devil’s workshop”), “God takes care of the one who takes care of himself,” and “chickens are counted in autumn” (“don’t count your chickens until the eggs have hatched”) (cogweb.ucla.edu). These proverbs have in common the values of diligent work, patience, and gratitude—all of which peasants would teach their children.
Proverbs are found in many parts of the world, but some areas seem to have richer stores of proverbs than others (such as West Africa), while others have hardly any (North and South America) (Mieder 2004:108,109).
Proverbs are often borrowed across lines of language, religion, and even time. For example, a proverb of the approximate form “No flies enter a mouth that is shut” is currently found in Spain, Ethiopia, and many countries in between. It is embraced as a true local proverb in many places and should not be excluded in any collection of proverbs because it is shared by the neighbors. However, though it has gone through multiple languages and millenia, the proverb can be traced back to an ancient Babylonian proverb (Pritchard 1958:146).
Proverbs are used by speakers for a variety of purposes. Sometimes they are used as a way of saying something gently, in a veiled way (Obeng 1996). Other times, they are used to carry more weight in a discussion, a weak person is able to enlist the tradition of the ancestors to support his position. Proverbs can also be used to simply make a conversation/discussion more lively. In many parts of the world, the use of proverbs is a mark of being a good orator.
The study of proverbs has application in a number of fields. Clearly, those who study folklore and literature are interested in them, but scholars from a variety of fields have found ways to profitably incorporate the study proverbs. For example, they have been used to study abstract reasoning of children, acculturation of immigrants, intelligence, the differing mental processes in mental illness, cultural themes, etc. Proverbs have also been incorporated into the strategies of social workers, teachers, preachers, and even politicians. (For the deliberate use of proverbs as a propoganda tool by Nazis, see Mieder 1982.)

Sources for proverb study

For those interested in further study of proverbs, a number of sources are available. A seminal work in the field is Archer Taylor's The Proverb, later republished together with an index, by Wolfgang Mieder (1985). A good introduction to the study of proverbs is Mieder's 2004 volume, Proverbs: A Handbook. Mieder has also published a series of bibliography volumes on proverb research, as well as a large number of articles and other books in the field. For those interested in proverbs of Africa, Stan Nussbaum has edited a large collection on proverbs of Africa, published on a CD, including reprints of out-of-print collections, original collections, and works on analysis, bibliography, and application of proverbs to Christian ministry (1998). For those interested in comparing proverbs across Europe, Paczolay has published a collection of similar proverbs in 55 languages (1997). Mieder edits an academic journal of proverb study, Proverbium. A volume containing articles on a wide variety of topics touching on proverbs was edited by Mieder and Alan Dundes.

[Misafir]

British Proverbs

'Every cloud has a silver lining'
There's always something good in bad times.

'A stitch in time saves nine'
Act early and you can save a lot of time.

'Nothing ventured nothing gained'
You have to try or you won't get anything.

'Out of the frying pan into the fire'
From one problem to another.

'One man's meat is another man's poison'
People often don't like the same things.

'Don't look a gift horse in the mouth'
Don't question good luck.

'You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink'
You can give a person a chance, but you can't make him or her take it.

'The grass is always greener on the other side'
You always think that other peoples lives are better than yours.

'The best things in life are free'
We don't have to pay for the things that are really valuable, like love,
friendship, good health etc.

'Don't cross your bridges before you come to them'
Don't worry about problems before they arrive.

'It was the last straw that broke the camel's back'
There is a limit to everything. We can load the camel with lots of straw, but
finally it will be too much and the camel's back will break. And it is only a single straw that breaks its back - the last straw.
This can be applied to many things in life. People often say "That's the last straw!" when they will not accept any more of something.

'Where there's a will there's a way'
If we have the determination to do something, we can always find the path or method to do it.

'Marry in haste, and repent at leisure'
If we get married quickly, without thinking carefully, we may be sorry later. And we will have plenty of time to be sorry.

'The best advice is found on the pillow'
If we have a problem, we may find the answer after a good night's sleep.
People also say: "I'll sleep on it."

'You can't judge a book by its cover'
We need to read a book to know if it's good or bad. We cannot know what it's like just by looking at the front or back cover. This proverb is applied to everything, not only books.

'Bad news travels fast'
'Bad news' means news about 'bad' things like accidents, death, illness etc. People tend to tell this type of news quickly. But 'good news' (passing an exam, winning some money, getting a job etc) travels more slowly.

'Birds of a feather flock together'
Birds of a feather means birds of the same type. The whole proverb means that people of the same type or sort stay together. They don't mix with people of another type

'Live and let live'
This proverb suggest that we should not interfere in other people's business. We should live our own lives and let others live their lives.

'The way to a man's heart is through his stomach'
Many women have won a man's love by cooking delicious meals for him. They fed his stomach and found love in his heart.

'Better untaught than ill taught.'
This proverb drops the verb "to be". But we understand: "It is better not to be taught at all than to be taught badly." It's better not to learn something than to learn it badly.

'Soon learnt, soon forgotten'
Something that is easy to learn is easy to forget.

[Misafir]

"Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo." - H. G. Wells (1866-1946)

"Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever." - Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821)

"Victory goes to the player who makes the next-to-last mistake." - Chessmaster Savielly Grigorievitch Tartakower (1887-1956)

"Don't be so humble - you are not that great." - Golda Meir (1898-1978) to a visiting diplomat

"His ignorance is encyclopedic" - Abba Eban (1915-2002)

"If a man does his best, what else is there?" - General George S. Patton (1885-1945)

"Political correctness is tyranny with manners." - Charlton Heston (1924-)

"I can write better than anybody who can write faster, and I can write faster than anybody who can write better." - A. J. Liebling (1904-1963)

"People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of thought which they avoid." - Soren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813-1855)

"Give me chastity and continence, but not yet." - Saint Augustine (354-430)

"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." - Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." - Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on." - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

"I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use." - Galileo Galilei

"The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work." - Emile Zola (1840-1902)

"This book fills a much-needed gap." - Moses Hadas (1900-1966) in a review

"The full use of your powers along lines of excellence." - definition of "happiness" by John F. Kennedy (1917-1963)

"I'm living so far beyond my income that we may almost be said to be living apart." - e e cummings (1894-1962)

"Give me a museum and I'll fill it." - Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)

"Assassins!" - Arturo Toscanini (1867-1957) to his orchestra

"I'll moider da bum." - Heavyweight boxer Tony Galento, when asked what he thought of William Shakespeare

"In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But in practice, there is." - Yogi Berra

"I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have." - Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

"Each problem that I solved became a rule which served afterwards to solve other problems." - Ren
Descartes (1596-1650), "Discours de la Methode"

"In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends." - Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968)

"Whether you think that you can, or that you can't, you are usually right." - Henry Ford (1863-1947)

"Do, or do not. There is no 'try'." - Yoda ('The Empire Strikes Back')

"The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it." - Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) "Don't stay in bed, unless you can make money in bed." - George Burns (1896-1996)

"I don't know why we are here, but I'm pretty sure that it is not in order to enjoy ourselves." - Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951)

"There are no facts, only interpretations." - Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)

"Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." - Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968)

"The use of COBOL cripples the mind; its teaching should, therefore, be regarded as a criminal offense." - Edsgar Dijkstra (1930-2002)

"C makes it easy to shoot yourself in the foot; C++ makes it harder, but when you do, it blows away your whole leg." - Bjarne Stroustrup

"A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems." - Paul Erdos (1913-1996)

"Problems worthy of attack prove their worth by fighting back." - Paul Erdos (1913-1996)

"Try to learn something about everything and everything about something." - Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895)

"Dancing is silent poetry." - Simonides (556-468bc)

"The only difference between me and a madman is that I'm not mad." - Salvador Dali (1904-1989)

"If you can't get rid of the skeleton in your closet, you'd best teach it to dance." - George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950)

"But at my back I always hear Time's winged chariot hurrying near." - Andrew Marvell (1621-1678)

"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws." - Plato (427-347 B.C.)

"The power of accurate observation is frequently called cynicism by those who don't have it." - George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950)

"Whenever I climb I am followed by a dog called 'Ego'." - Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)

"Everybody pities the weak; jealousy you have to earn." - Arnold Schwarzenegger (1947-)

"Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain." - Friedrich von Schiller (1759-1805)

"We have art to save ourselves from the truth." - Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)


"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake." - Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821)
"I think 'Hail to the Chief' has a nice ring to it." - John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) when asked what is his favorite song

"I have nothing to declare except my genius." - Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) upon arriving at U.S. customs 1882

"Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe." - H. G. Wells (1866-1946)

"Talent does what it can; genius does what it must." - Edward George Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873)

"The difference between 'involvement' and 'commitment' is like an eggs-and-ham breakfast: the chicken was 'involved' - the pig was 'committed'." - unknown

"Women might be able to fake orgasms. But men can fake a whole relationship." - Sharon Stone
"If you are going through hell, keep going." - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

"He who has a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any 'how'." - Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)

"Many wealthy people are little more than janitors of their possessions." - Frank Lloyd Wright (1868-1959)

"I'm all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with typewriters." - Frank Lloyd Wright (1868-1959)

"Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go." - Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)

"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh." - Voltaire (1694-1778)

"He is one of those people who would be enormously improved by death." - H. H. Munro (Saki) (1870-1916)

"I am ready to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter." - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

"I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them." - Ian L. Fleming (1908-1964)

"If you can count your money, you don't have a billion dollars." - J. Paul Getty (1892-1976)

"Facts are the enemy of truth." - Don Quixote - "Man of La Mancha"

"When you do the common things in life in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world." - George Washington Carver (1864-1943)

"How wrong it is for a woman to expect the man to build the world she wants, rather than to create it herself." - Anais Nin (1903-1977)

"I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work." - Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931)

"I begin by taking. I shall find scholars later to demonstrate my perfect right." - Frederick (II) the Great

"Maybe this world is another planet's Hell." - Aldous Huxley (1894-1963)

"Blessed is the man, who having nothing to say, abstains from giving wordy evidence of the fact." - George Eliot (1819-1880)

"Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth." - Sherlock Holmes (by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1859-1930)

"Black holes are where God divided by zero." - Steven Wright

"I've had a wonderful time, but this wasn't it." - Groucho Marx (1895-1977)

"It's kind of fun to do the impossible." - Walt Disney (1901-1966)

"We didn't lose the game; we just ran out of time." - Vince Lombardi

"The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds, and the pessimist fears this is true." - James Branch Cabell

"A friendship founded on business is better than a business founded on friendship." - John D. Rockefeller (1874-1960)

"All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusion is called a philosopher." - Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914)

"You can only find truth with logic if you have already found truth without it." - Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936)

"An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered; an adventure is an inconvenience rightly considered." - Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936)

"I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth." - Umberto Eco

"Be nice to people on your way up because you meet them on your way down." - Jimmy Durante

"The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good." - Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)

"A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both." - Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969), Inaugural Address, January 20, 1953

"The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them." - Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"Basically, I no longer work for anything but the sensation I have while working." - Albert Giacometti (sculptor)

"There's a limit to how many times you can read how great you are and what an inspiration you are, but I'm not there yet." - Randy Pausch (1960-)

"It is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring." - Carl Sagan (1934-1996)

"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident." - Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)

"Many a man's reputation would not know his character if they met on the street." - Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915)

"There is more stupidity than hydrogen in the universe, and it has a longer shelf life." - Frank Zappa

"Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away." - Antoine de Saint Exupery

"Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It's the transition that's troublesome." - Isaac Asimov

"If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe." - Carl Sagan (1934-1996)

"It is much more comfortable to be mad and know it, than to be sane and have one's doubts." - G. B. Burgin

"Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action." - Auric Goldfinger, in "Goldfinger" by Ian L. Fleming (1908-1964)

"To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance" - Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)

"Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens." - Jimi Hendrix

"A clever man commits no minor blunders." - Goethe (1749-1832)

"Argue for your limitations, and sure enough they're yours." - Richard Bach

"A witty saying proves nothing." - Voltaire (1694-1778)

"Sleep is an excellent way of listening to an opera." - James Stephens (1882-1950)

"The nice thing about being a celebrity is that if you bore people they think it's their fault." - Henry Kissinger (1923-)

"Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance." - Will Durant

"I have often regretted my speech, never my silence." - Xenocrates (396-314 B.C.)

"It was the experience of mystery -- even if mixed with fear -- that engendered religion." - Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough." - Mario Andretti

"I do not consider it an insult, but rather a compliment to be called an agnostic. I do not pretend to know where many ignorant men are sure -- that is all that agnosticism means." - Clarence Darrow, Scopes trial, 1925.

"Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal." - Henry Ford (1863-1947)

"I'll sleep when I'm dead." - Warren Zevon (1947-2003)

"There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread." - Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948)

"When you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)

"The instinct of nearly all societies is to lock up anybody who is truly free. First, society begins by trying to beat you up. If this fails, they try to poison you. If this fails too, they finish by loading honors on your head." - Jean Cocteau (1889-1963)

"Everyone is a genius at least once a year; a real genius has his original ideas closer together." - Georg Lichtenberg (1742-1799)

"Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it" - Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)

"While we are postponing, life speeds by." - Seneca (3BC - 65AD)

"Where are we going, and why am I in this handbasket?" - Bumper Sticker

"God, please save me from your followers!" - Bumper Sticker

"Fill what's empty, empty what's full, and scratch where it itches." - the Duchess of Windsor, when asked what is the secret of a long and happy life

"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." - Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948)

"Luck is the residue of design." - Branch Rickey - former owner of the Brooklyn Dodger Baseball Team

"Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die." - Mel Brooks

"Most people would sooner die than think; in fact, they do so." - Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)

"Wit is educated insolence." - Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)

"My advice to you is get married: if you find a good wife you'll be happy; if not, you'll become a philosopher." - Socrates (470-399 B.C.)

"Egotist: a person more interested in himself than in me." - Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914)

"A narcissist is someone better looking than you are." - Gore Vidal

"Wise men make proverbs, but fools repeat them." - Samuel Palmer (1805-80)

"It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity." - Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"The secret of success is to know something nobody else knows." - Aristotle Onassis (1906-1975)

"Sometimes when reading Goethe I have the paralyzing suspicion that he is trying to be funny." - Guy Davenport

"When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite." - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

"Any man who is under 30, and is not a liberal, has not heart; and any man who is over 30, and is not a conservative, has no brains." - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

"The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. The opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth." - Niels Bohr (1885-1962)

"We all agree that your theory is crazy, but is it crazy enough?" - Niels Bohr (1885-1962)

"When I am working on a problem I never think about beauty. I only think about how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." - Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983)

"In science one tries to tell people, in such a way as to be understood by everyone, something that no one ever knew before. But in poetry, it's the exact opposite." - Paul Dirac (1902-1984)

"I would have made a good Pope." - Richard M. Nixon (1913-1994)

"In any contest between power and patience, bet on patience." - W.B. Prescott

"Anyone who considers arithmetical methods of producing random digits is, of course, in a state of sin." - John von Neumann (1903-1957)

"The mistakes are all waiting to be made." - chessmaster Savielly Grigorievitch Tartakower (1887-1956) on the game's opening position

"It is unbecoming for young men to utter maxims." - Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)

"Grove giveth and Gates taketh away." - Bob Metcalfe (inventor of Ethernet) on the trend of hardware speedups not being able to keep up with software demands

"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." - Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work is terribly important." - Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)

"A little inaccuracy sometimes saves a ton of explanation." - H. H. Munro (Saki) (1870-1916)

"There are two ways of constructing a software design; one way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C. A. R. Hoare

"Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler." - Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"What do you take me for, an idiot?" - General Charles de Gaulle (1890-1970), when a journalist asked him if he was happy