Wikiquote:Quote of the Day

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QOTD : January - February - March - April - May - June - July - August - September - October - November - December

Today is Friday, December 5, 2008; it is now 13:16 (UTC)

This page lists all "Quotes of the day" that have been chosen at Wikiquote, in chronological order, with the earliest quotes at the top. This can be very useful for avoiding repetition of past selections in making proposals.

Note: In the first few months of the Wikiquote project a new "Quote of the Day" was not always selected for each day, and sometimes several days would pass before a new one was chosen.

2003 : January - February - March - April - May - June - July - August - September - October - November - December

2004 : January - February - March - April - May - June - July - August - September - October - November - December

2005 : January - February - March - April - May - June - July - August - September - October - November - December

2006 : January - February - March - April - May - June - July - August - September - October - November - December

2007 : January - February - March - April - May - June - July - August - September - October - November - December

2008 : January - February - March - April - May - June - July - August - September - October - November - December

July 2003

11. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. ~ Martin Luther King (This was the first "Quote of the Day" at Wikiquote, selected by Nanobug on 11 July 2003.)

12. It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit. ~ Harry S. Truman

14. If we knew what we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein

15. Most people would rather die than think; in fact, they do so. ~ Bertrand Russell

16. Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes. ~ Oscar Wilde

17. All animals are equal — but some animals are more equal than others. ~ Animal Farm by George Orwell

18. To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day, to the last syllable of recorded time; and all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. ~ Macbeth by William Shakespeare

20. I found one day in school a boy of medium size ill-treating a smaller boy. I expostulated, but he replied: 'The bigs hit me, so I hit the babies; that's fair.' In these words he epitomized the history of the human race. ~ Education and the Social Order by Bertrand Russell

21. The barge she sat in, like a burnishd throne, burnd on the water; the poop was beaten gold, purple the sails, and so perfumed, that the winds were love-sick with them, the oars were silver, which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made the water which they beat to follow faster, as amorous of their strokes. For her own person, it beggard all description ~ (Enobarbus, II.ii) Antony and Cleopatra by William Shakespeare

22. One can no more prevent the mind from returning to an idea than the sea from returning to a shore. In the case of the sailor, this is called a tide; in the case of the guilty, it is called remorse. ~ Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

23. I am reminded of the professor who, in his declining hours, was asked by his devoted pupils for his final counsel. He replied, 'Verify your quotations.' ~ Winston Churchill

24. This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of a hammer. ~ Will Rogers

25. The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. ~ Albert Einstein

27. I think all foreigners should stop interfering in the internal affairs of Iraq. ~ Paul Wolfowitz

29. The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the law free. ~ Henry David Thoreau

30. On two occasions I have been asked [by members of Parliament!], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question. ~ Charles Babbage

31. History would be an excellent thing if only it were true. ~ Leo Tolstoy

August 2003

1. Without friends no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods. ~ Aristotle

4. I can't die. It would ruin my image. ~ Jack La Lanne

5. Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes. ~ Edsger Dijkstra

6. When the weight of the paperwork equals the weight of the plane, the plane will fly. ~ Donald Douglas

7. It's a damn poor mind that can only think of one way to spell a word. ~ Andrew Jackson

8. A man said to the Universe: "Sir, I exist!" "However," replied the Universe, "the fact has not created in me a sense of obligation." ~ Stephen Crane

9. The battle of the sexes will never be won as long as we keep sleeping with the enemy. ~ Emo Phillips

12. A free society is one where it is safe to be unpopular. ~ Adlai Stevenson

13. As long as I am mayor of this city the great industries are secure. We hear about constitutional rights, free speech and the free press. Every time I hear these words I say to myself, 'That man is a Red, that man is a Communist.' You never hear a real American talk like that. ~ Frank Hague

14. I never met a man so stupid I could not learn something from him. ~ Galileo Galilei

15. Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have. ~ Harry Emerson Fosdick

17. I don't mind making jokes, but I don't want to look like one. ~ Marilyn Monroe

18. It's a thingy! A fiendish thingy! ~ Help by George Harrison

19. There comes a point when a man must refuse to answer to his leader if he is also to answer to his own conscience. ~ Hartley Shawcross

21. Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow. ~ Aesop

22. I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to. ~ Elvis Presley

23. The conservation movement is a breeding ground of Communists and other subversives. We intend to clean them out, even if it means rounding up every bird watcher in the country. ~ John Mitchell

25. What can be said at all can be said clearly. ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

26. One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other. ~ Emma by Jane Austen

27. He caught glimpses of everything, but saw nothing. ~ Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

28. Certain old men prefer to rise at dawn, taking a cold bath and a long walk with an empty stomach and otherwise mortifying the flesh. They then point with pride to these practices as the cause of their sturdy health and ripe years; the truth being that they are hearty and old, not because of their habits, but in spite of them. The reason we find only robust persons doing this thing is that it has killed all the others who have tried it. ~ The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce

29. I don't like spinach, and I'm glad I don't, because if I liked it I'd eat it, and I just hate it. ~ Clarence Darrow

31. Government is too big and too important to be left to the politicians. ~ Chester Bowles

September 2003

2. Ars longa, vita brevis. ("Art is long, life is short.") ~ Horace

3. There's nothing in the middle of the road but a yellow stripe and dead armadillos. ~ Jim Hightower

4. Every man desires to live long, but no man would be old. ~ Jonathan Swift

5. Most people today still believe, perhaps unconsciously, in the heliocentric universe ... every newspaper in the land has a section on astrology, yet few have anything at all on astronomy. ~ Hannes Alfven

8. Dare to be naïve. ~ Buckminster Fuller

9. What's another word for Thesaurus? ~ Steven Wright

10. It is now possible for a flight attendant to get a pilot pregnant. ~ Richard Ferris

11. Never burn a penny candle looking for a halfpenny. ~ Irish proverb

12. Your theory is crazy, but it's not crazy enough to be true. ~ Niels Bohr

15. Our chiefs said 'Done,' and I did not deem it;
Our seers said 'Peace,' and it was not peace;
Earth will grow worse till men redeem it,
And wars more evil, ere all wars cease.
~ "A Song of Defeat" by Gilbert Keith Chesterton ~

16. One can promise actions, but not feelings, for the latter are involuntary. He who promises to love forever or hate forever or be forever faithful to someone is promising something that is not in his power. ~ Human, All Too Human by Friedrich Nietzsche

17. It's not that I'm afraid to die, I just don't want to be there when it happens. ~ Woody Allen

18. Remember that time is money. ~ Benjamin Franklin

22. I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read. ~ Samuel Johnson

23. When smashing monuments, save the pedestals — they always come in handy. ~ Stanislaw Jerzy Lec

24. Since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

25. As for the future, your task is not to forsee it, but to enable it. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery

26. We have a firm commitment to NATO; we are a part of NATO. We have a firm commitment to Europe; we are a part of Europe. ~ Dan Quayle

27. You can build a throne with bayonets, but you can't sit on it for long. ~ Boris Yeltsin

28. If homosexuality is a disease, let's all call in queer to work. 'Hello, can't work today. Still queer.' ~ Robin Tyler

29. Outside of the killings, DC has one of the lowest crime rates in the country. ~ Marion Barry

October 2003

3. We shall not 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.
~ The Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot ~

6. That man is an Euclidian point: position without substance. ~ Ernest Rutherford

7. One of the basic tenets of Zen Buddhism is that there is no way to characterize what Zen is. No matter what verbal space you try to enclose Zen in, it resists, and spills over... ~ Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas Hofstadter

8. We've moved away from being a culture of people who think about movies to one made up of people who believe that spouting a list of preferences is the same as registering an opinion. ~ Stephanie Zacharek

10. The reason that clichés become clichés is that they are the hammers and screwdrivers in the toolbox of communication. ~ Terry Pratchett

11. We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately" - Benjamin Franklin

13. Really, I'm not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect. ~ Linus Torvalds

17. Sex is only dirty if it's done right. ~ Woody Allen

18. He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

19. I really believe that if there's any kind of God, he wouldn't be in any one of us — not you, not me, but just this space in between. If there's some magic in this world, it must be in the attempt of understanding someone else, sharing something. ~ Before Sunrise (motion picture)

November 2003

1. God is an Iron ~ Spider Robinson

7. Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born. ~ Anaïs Nin

12. The Enlightened take things Lightly. ~ Principia Discordia

14. The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs. ~ George Eliot

17. A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. This every sister of the Bene Gesserit knows. ~ Frank Herbert in Dune

19. One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes. In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And, the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility. ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

24, A coward is incapable of exhibiting love; it is the prerogative of the brave. ~ Mohandas Gandhi

27. If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, 'Thank You', that would suffice. ~ Meister Eckhart

28. Security is mostly a superstition... Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing. ~ Helen Keller

December 2003

1. For myself, I am an optimist — it does not seem to be much use being anything else. ~ Winston Churchill

3. I have never let my schooling get in the way of my education. ~ Mark Twain

4. I'm completely in favor of the separation of Church and State. My idea is that these two institutions screw us up enough on their own, so both of them together is certain death. ~ George Carlin

6. What we cannot speak of we must pass over in silence. ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

9. If your morals make you dreary, depend upon it, they are wrong. I do not say give them up, for they may be all you have, but conceal them like a vice lest they spoil the lives of better and simpler people. ~ Robert Louis Stevenson

11. Some mornings it just doesn't seem worth it to gnaw through the leather straps. ~ Emo Phillips

15. Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire. ~ Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

17. Men are born ignorant, not stupid. They are made stupid by education. ~ Bertrand Russell

18. That virtue we appreciate is as much ours as anothers. We see so much only as we possess. ~ Henry David Thoreau

21. We are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it. ~ Thomas Jefferson

24. Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. ~ Yeshua (Jesus Christ)

27. The time is always right to do what is right ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

30. They were nothing like the French people I had imagined. If anything, they were too kind, too generous and too knowledgable in the fields of plumbing and electricity. ~ David Sedaris

31. I cannot believe in a God who wants to be praised all the time. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

January 2004

1. Jackie Biskupski is running for a seat in the Utah Legislature, and she's attracting a lot of attention because she's a lesbian. Her Republican opponent, Dan Alderson, is a staunch Mormon, and is running a negative ad campaign calling her lifestyle abnormal and deviant. His six wives agree. ~ Rick Mercer, This Hour Has 22 Minutes (12 October 1998)

2. Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind. ~ Albert Einstein

3.Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.
~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson ~

5. Skeptical scrutiny is the means, in both science and religion, by which deep thoughts can be winnowed from deep nonsense. ~ Carl Sagan

6. All of humanity is in peril of extinction if each one of us does not dare, now and henceforth, always to tell only the truth, and all the truth, and to do so promptly — right now. ~ Buckminster Fuller

7.Truth alone will endure; all the rest will be swept away before the tide of time. ~ Mohandas Gandhi

8. True Love in this differs from gold and clay, That to divide is not to take away. Love is like understanding, that grows bright, Gazing on many truths. ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley

9 Shared pain is lessened; shared joy, increased — thus do we refute entropy. ~ Spider Robinson

12. Dignity does not come in possessing honors, but in deserving them. ~ Aristotle

13. There may be love without jealousy, but there is none without fear. ~ Miguel de Cervantes

14. Jealousy is a disease, love is a healthy condition. The immature mind often mistakes one for the other, or assumes that the greater the love, the greater the jealousy — in fact, they are almost incompatible; one emotion hardly leaves room for the other ~ Robert Heinlein in Stranger In A Strange Land

15. There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. ... There is another theory which states that this has already happened. ~ Douglas Adams

16. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong. ~ Arthur C. Clarke

19. Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic. ~ Frank Herbert in Dune

20. No man can justly censure or condemn another, because indeed no man truly knows another ~ Sir Thomas Browne

21. Men do not differ much about what things they will call evils; they differ enormously about what evils they will call excusable. ~ G. K. Chesterton

22. I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by. ~ Douglas Adams

23. All the ill that is in us comes from fear, and all the good from love. ~ Eleanor Farjeon

26. In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer. ~ Albert Camus

27. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us. ~ J. R. R. Tolkien in The Lord of the Rings : The Fellowship of the Ring

29. I expect to pass through this world but once. Any good thing, therefore, that I can do or any kindness I can show to any fellow human being let me do it now. Let me not defer nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again. ~ Stephen Grellet

February 2004

2. My years are not advancing as fast as you might think. ~ Bill Murray as "Phil" in Groundhog Day

3. The things to do are: the things that need doing, that you see need to be done, and that no one else seems to see need to be done. ~ Buckminster Fuller

4. If my poetry aims to achieve anything, it's to deliver people from the limited ways in which they see and feel. ~ Jim Morrison

5. Do what you can, with what you have, where you are ~ Theodore Roosevelt

6. To explain all nature is too difficult a task for any one man or even for any one age. 'Tis much better to do a little with certainty, and leave the rest for others that come after you, than to explain all things. ~ Isaac Newton

9. Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength. ~ Eric Hoffer

10. Misunderstandings and neglect occasion more mischief in the world than even malice and wickedness. At all events, the two latter are of less frequent occurrence. ~ Goethe in The Sorrows of Young Werther

11. Fanaticism consists in redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim. ~ George Santayana

12. If we cannot end now our differences, at least we can make the world safe for diversity. ~ John F. Kennedy

14. True love is inexhaustible; the more you give, the more you have. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery

16. I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance. ~ e. e. cummings

17. Treat a person as he is, and he will remain as he is. Treat him as he could be, and he will become what he should be. ~ Anonymous

18. What a man believes may be ascertained, not from his creed, but from the assumptions on which he habitually acts. ~ George Bernard Shaw

19. Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us ~ Bill Watterson

20. There can be no Friendship where there is no Freedom. Friendship loves a free Air, and will not be penned up in streight and narrow Enclosures. It will speak freely, and act so too; and take nothing ill where no ill is meant; nay, where it is, ’twill easily forgive, and forget too, upon small Acknowledgments. ~ William Penn

21. Careful the things you say, children will listen. Guide them along the way, children will see and learn. Children may not obey, but children will look to you for which way to turn; to learn what to be! Careful before you say "Listen to Me." Children will listen. ~ Into the Woods (Sondheim/Lapine)

22. The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom. ~ Isaac Asimov

23. Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. ~ Dr. Seuss

24. Ethics and Aesthetics are one. ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

25. An amicable divorce is like a ventilated condom; it just doesn't work. ~ Rita Rudner

26. An interesting thing has happened since San Francisco started granting marriage licenses to same-sex couples: my marriage is just fine! Even though there are thousands of gay and lesbian couples affirming their love for and commitment to each other, my marriage — my affirmation of love and commitment to (my wife) — isn't threatened at all. As a matter of fact, the only people who can really "threaten" my marriage are the two of us. ~ Wil Wheaton

27. It must be so humiliating to have such a public break-up. ~ Ellen Degeneres to Justin Timberlake

28. Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. ~ Oscar Wilde

29. Just because it's old doesn't mean you have to read it. ~ Jolene Sugarbaker, the Trailer Park Queen, as portrayed by actor Jayson Saffer.

March 2004

Truth gains more even by the errors of one who, with due study and preparation, thinks for himself, than by the true opinions of those who only hold them because they do not suffer themselves to think. ~ John Stuart Mill
We may afirm absolutely that nothing great in the world has been accomplished without passion. ~ Georg Friedrich Wilhelm Hegel
It is only by preserving faith in human dreams that we may, after all, perhaps some day make them come true. ~ James Branch Cabell
The day may dawn when fair play, love for one's fellow men, respect for justice and freedom, will enable tormented generations to march forth triumphant from the hideous epoch in which we have to dwell. Meanwhile, never flinch, never weary, never despair. ~ Winston Churchill
When there is no more room in Hell, the dead will walk the Earth. ~ Dawn of the Dead (by George Romero).
The mind is its own place, and in itself, can make heaven of Hell, and a hell of Heaven. ~ John Milton
May Heaven exist, even if my place is Hell. ~ Jorge Luis Borges
An artist's only concern is to shoot for some kind of perfection, and on his own terms, not anyone else's. ~ J. D. Salinger
People often say to me, ‘I understand what you are talking about intellectually, but I don’t really feel it, I don’t realize it,' and I am apt to reply, ‘I wonder whether you do understand it intellectually, because if you did you would also feel it.' ~ Alan Watts
Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves. ~ Carl Jung
To know someone here or there with whom you can feel there is understanding in spite of distances or thoughts expressed. That can make life a garden. ~ Goethe
Believe those who are seeking the truth; doubt those who find it. ~ André Gide
The greatest friend of Truth is time, her greatest enemy is Prejudice, and her constant companion Humility. ~ Charles Caleb Colton
I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding which bringeth peace. ~ Helen Keller
I'm for truth, no matter who tells it. I'm for justice, no matter who it's for or against. ~ Malcolm X
Do not say, "I follow the one true path of the Spirit", but rather, "I have found the Spirit walking on my path", for the Spirit walks on all paths. ~ Khalil Gibran
Try to have a good day today, wherever you are, whatever you do, whoever is near, if no one is near. Try to be happy, because you may not see tomorrow. There is someone this morning, who didn't wake up, who will never see this day. Try to feel lucky that this is not you. ~ Margaret Cho
I will permit no man to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him. ~ Booker T. Washington
Education: That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding. ~ Ambrose Bierce in The Devil's Dictionary
Always, Sir, set a high value on spontaneous kindness. He whose inclination prompts him to cultivate your friendship of his own accord, will love you more than one whom you have been at pains to attach to you. ~ Samuel Johnson
Cowardice asks the question, 'Is it safe?' Expediency asks the question, 'Is it politic?' And Vanity comes along and asks the question, 'Is it popular?' But Conscience asks the question 'Is it right?' And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because Conscience tells him it is right. ~ Martin Luther King
The pursuit of truth and beauty is a sphere of activity in which we are permitted to remain children all our lives. ~ Albert Einstein
It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry. ~ Thomas Paine
A man who lies to himself, and believes his own lies, becomes unable to recognize truth, either in himself or in anyone else, and he ends up losing respect for himself and for others. When he has no respect for anyone, he can no longer love, and in him, he yields to his impulses, indulges in the lowest form of pleasure, and behaves in the end like an animal in satisfying his vices. And it all comes from lying to others and to yourself. ~ Fyodor Dostoevsky
The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human. ~ Aldous Huxley
In critical moments even the very powerful have need of the weakest. ~ Aesop
If a man would pursue Philosophy, his first task is to throw away conceit. For it is impossible for a man to begin to learn what he has a conceit that he already knows. ~ Epictetus
Love is an act of endless forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit. ~ Peter Ustinov
There's no such thing in anyone's life as an unimportant day ~ Alexander Woolcott
The meaning I picked, the one that changed my life: Overcome fear, behold wonder. ~ Æschylus

April 2004

Years ago my mother used to say to me... 'In this world, Elwood, you must be Oh-so-smart, or Oh-so-pleasant.' Well, for years I was smart — I recommend pleasant. You may quote me. ~ Jimmy Stewart as Elwood P. Dowd in the film Harvey
In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life — It goes on. ~ Robert Frost
Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps, for he is the only animal that is struck with the difference between what things are, and what they might have been. ~ William Hazlitt
Where there is great love there are always miracles. ~ Willa Cather
Life is too deep for words, so don't try to describe it, just live it. ~ C.S. Lewis
There is no sincerer love than the love of food. ~ George Bernard Shaw
The danger already exists that mathematicians have made a covenant with the devil to darken the spirit and confine man in the bonds of hell. ~ Saint Augustine
Great wisdom is generous; petty wisdom is contentious. Great speech is impassioned, small speech cantankerous. ~ Zhuang Zi
The soul would have no rainbow had the eyes no tears. ~ John Vance Cheney
Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind. ~ Henry James
A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. ~ Yeshua of Galilee (Jesus Christ)
Living next to [the US] is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant. No matter how friendly and even-tempered the beast, one is affected by every twitch and grunt. ~ Pierre Trudeau
Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche
We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. ~ Kurt Vonnegut
The income tax has made more liars out of the American people than golf has. Even when you make a tax form out on the level, you don't know when it's through if you are a crook or a martyr. ~ Will Rogers
Curse on all laws but those which love has made! ~ Alexander Pope
The real question is not whether machines think but whether men do. ~ B. F. Skinner
The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love, instead, see all of us as one. ~ Bill Hicks
Materialists and madmen never have doubts. ~ G. K. Chesterton
Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped. ~ Elbert Hubbard
It is not only for what we do that we are held responsible, but also for what we do not do. ~ Molière
I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart. ~ Anne Frank
The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions, and not on our circumstances. We carry the seeds of the one or the other about with us in our minds wherever we go. ~ Martha Washington
In war, you win or lose, live or die — and the difference is just an eyelash. ~ Douglas MacArthur
Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared. ~ Gautama Buddha
Nothing is better than the unintended humor of reality. ~ Steve Allen
When a thing has been said, and said well, have no scruple. Take it and copy it. ~ Anatole France
The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches, but to reveal to him his own. ~ Benjamin Disraeli
Prejudice comes from being in the dark; sunlight disinfects it. ~ Muhammad Ali
Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity. ~ Robert J. Hanlon

May 2004

The month of May was come, when every lusty heart beginneth to blossom, and to bring forth fruit; for like as herbs and trees bring forth fruit and flourish in May, in likewise every lusty heart that is in any manner a lover, springeth and flourisheth in lusty deeds. For it giveth unto all lovers courage, that lusty month of May. ~ Sir Thomas Malory
I would rather live in a world where my life is surrounded by mystery than live in a world so small that my mind could comprehend it. ~ Harry Emerson Fosdick
In nature's infinite book of secrecy a little I can read. ~ William Shakespeare in Antony and Cleopatra
The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return. ~ eden ahbez
Everything in the universe relates to the number 5, one way or another, given enough ingenuity on the part of the interpreter. ~ Principia Discordia, The Law of Fives
That best portion of a good man's life, — His little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love. ~ William Wordsworth
If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain; If I can ease one life the aching, Or cool one pain, Or help one fainting robin Unto his nest again, I shall not live in vain. ~ Emily Dickinson
There are very few human beings who receive the truth , complete and staggering, by instant illumination. Most of them acquire it fragment by fragment, on a small scale, by successive developments, cellularly, like a laborious mosaic. ~ Anaïs Nin
All I am I owe to my mother. I attribute all my success in life to the moral, intellectual and physical education I received from her. ~ George Washington
There are worlds beyond worlds and times beyond times, all of them true, all of them real, and all of them (as children know) penetrating each other. ~ P. L. Travers
The integral vision embodies an attempt to take the best of both worlds, ancient and modern. But that demands a critical stance willing to reject unflinchingly the worst of both as well. ~ Ken Wilber
It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people. ~ Good Omens (by Gaiman & Pratchett)
I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. ~ William Faulkner
In the end it is how you fight, as much as why you fight, that makes your cause good or bad. ~ Freeman Dyson
In the fields of observation chance favors only the prepared mind. ~ Louis Pasteur
If we begin with certainties, we shall end in doubts; if we begin with doubts, and are patient, we shall end in certainties. ~ Marcus Aurelius
Explanations exist; they have existed for all times, for there is always an easy solution to every human problems — neat, plausible, and wrong. ~ H. L. Mencken
Love me for love's sake, that evermore thou may'st love on, through love's eternity. ~ Elizabeth Barrett Browning
It is love alone that gives worth to all things. ~ St. Teresa of Avila (Teresa de Jesús)
No theory, no ready-made system, no book that has ever been written will save the world. I cleave to no system. I am a true seeker. ~ Mikhail Bakunin
The road to wisdom? — Well, it's plain and simple to express: Err and err and err again but less and less and less. ~ Piet Hein
The way I see it, if you want the rainbow you gotta be willing to put up with the rain. ~ Dolly Parton
I try to make everyone's day a little more surreal. ~ Bill Watterson
The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct acting from inner necessity. The creative mind plays with the objects it loves. ~ Carl Jung
I got some new underwear the other day. Well, new to me. ~ Emo Philips
Everything that is new or uncommon raises a pleasure in the imagination, because it fills the soul with an agreeable surprise, gratifies its curiosity, and gives it an idea of which it was not before possessed. ~ Joseph Addison
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
Transport of the mails, transport of the human voice, transport of flickering pictures — in this century, as in others, our highest accomplishments still have the single aim of bringing men together. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery
A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking. ~ Steven Wright
All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream. ~ Edgar Allan Poe
There is nothing so pitiful as a young cynic because he has gone from knowing nothing to believing nothing. ~ Maya Angelou

June 2004

In properly organized groups no faith is required; what is required is simply a little trust and even that only for a little while, for the sooner a man begins to verify all he hears the better it is for him. ~ G. I. Gurdjieff
The difference between a hooker and a ho ain't nothin' but a fee. ~ Cheryl James ("Salt" of the rap group "Salt 'N' Pepa")
There is little difference in people, but that little difference makes a big difference. That little difference is attitude. The big difference is whether it is positive or negative. ~ W. Clement Stone
We all have ability. The difference is how we use it. ~ Stevie Wonder
Honest differences are often a healthy sign of progress. ~ Mahatma Gandhi
Do nothing, and everything is done. ~ Lao Zi; Variant: When nothing is done, nothing is left undone.
Man's most valuable trait is a judicious sense of what not to believe. ~ Euripides
It is not so much what you believe in that matters, as the way in which you believe it and proceed to translate that belief into action. ~ Lin Yutang
A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence. ~ David Hume
History teaches that wars begin when governments believe the price of aggression is cheap. ~ Ronald Reagan
Whatever else history may say about me when I’m gone, I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears; to your confidence rather than your doubts. My dream is that you will travel the road ahead with liberty’s lamp guiding your steps and opportunity’s arm steadying your way. ~ Ronald Reagan
Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant. ~ Robert Louis Stevenson
To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization, and at present very few people have reached this level. ~ Bertrand Russell
Apathy can be overcome by enthusiasm, and enthusiasm can only be aroused by two things: first, an ideal, with takes the imagination by storm, and second, a definite intelligible plan for carrying that ideal into practice. ~ Arnold J. Toynbee
Seek always to do some good, somewhere. Every man has to seek in his own way to realize his true worth. You must give some time to your fellow man. Even if it's a little thing, do something for those who need help, something for which you get no pay but the privilege of doing it. ~ Albert Schweitzer
Happiness is the only good. The place to be happy is here. The time to be happy is now. The way to be happy is to make others so. ~ Robert G. Ingersoll
Love loves to love love. ~ James Joyce in Ulysses
There is a great man who makes every man feel small. But the real great man is the man who makes every man feel great. ~ G. K. Chesterton
I'm not a prettier everywoman. I am an everywoman that they clean up awfully well for TV. ~ Kelly Ripa
Vanity is so anchored in the heart of man that a soldier, a soldier's servant, a cook, a porter brags and wishes to have his admirers. Even philosophers wish for them. Those who write against it want to have the glory of having written well; and those who read it desire the glory of having read it. I who write this have perhaps this desire, and perhaps those who will read it... ~ Blaise Pascal
With most men, unbelief in one thing springs from blind belief in another. ~ Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
How wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progress. ~ Niels Bohr
Every man should be capable of all ideas. ~ Jorge Luis Borges
Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. ~ Alfred Whitney Griswold
Play the man, Master Ridley; we shall this day light such a candle, by God's grace, in England, as I trust shall never be put out. ~ Hugh Latimer
It is circumstances which show what men are. ~ Epictetus
Faith and doubt both are needed — not as antagonists, but working side by side to take us around the unknown curve. ~ Lillian Smith
They serve so that we don't have to. They offer to give up their lives so that we can be free. It is, remarkably, their gift to us. And all they ask for in return is that we never send them into harm's way unless it is absolutely necessary. Will they ever trust us again? ~ Michael Moore
How is the world ruled and how do wars start? Diplomats tell lies to journalists and then believe what they read. ~ Karl Kraus
Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral laws are written on the tablets of eternity. ~ James Anthony Froude (long misattributed to Lord Acton)

July 2004

A mature person is one who does not think only in absolutes, who is able to be objective even when deeply stirred emotionally, who has learned that there is both good and bad in all people and all things, and who walks humbly and deals charitably with the circumstances of life, knowing that in this world no one is all-knowing and therefore all of us need both love and charity. ~ Eleanor Roosevelt
With great power comes great responsibility. ~ Stan Lee
You don't understand. I could'a had class. I could'a been a contender. ~ Marlon Brando as "Terry Malloy" in On the Waterfront
...for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the Protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor. ~ closing lines of The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States Of America written primarily by Thomas Jefferson, and approved as an official document of united will and determination, July 4, 1776.
We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all men are created equal & independent, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness. ~ Thomas Jefferson in an early draft of The Declaration of Independence.
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. ~ Opening statement of The Declaration of Independence of The United States of America, composed primarily by Thomas Jefferson
Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards. ~ Søren Kierkegaard
Why is all around us here as if some lesser god had made the world, but had not force to shape it as he would, till the High God behold it from beyond, and enter it, and make it beautiful? Or else as if the world were wholly fair, but that these eyes of men are dense and dim, and have not power to see it as it is: perchance, because we see not to the close... ~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson in Idylls of the King
Why can't you harness Might so that it works for Right? I know it sounds nonsense, but, I mean, you can't just say there is no such thing. The Might is there, in the bad half of people, and you can't neglect it. You can't cut it out but you might be able to direct it, if you see what I mean, so that it was useful instead of bad. ~ T. H. White in The Once and Future King
You can't expect to wield supreme executive power just 'cause some watery tart threw a sword at you! ~ Michael Palin as "Dennis" in Monty Python and the Holy Grail
The old order changeth, yielding place to new, and God fulfils himself in many ways lest one good custom should corrupt the world. ~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson in Idylls of the King
What kind of peace do we seek? Not a Pax Americana enforced on the world by American weapons of war. Not the peace of the grave or the security of the slave. I am talking about genuine peace, the kind of peace that makes life on earth worth living, the kind that enables men and nations to grow and to hope and to build a better life for their children — not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women — not merely peace in our time but peace for all time. ~ John F. Kennedy
Moderate strength is shown in violence, supreme strength is shown in levity. ~ G. K. Chesterton
Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone.
For this brave old earth must borrow its mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.
~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox ~
Thar’s only two possibilities: Thar is life out there in the universe which is smarter than we are, or we’re the most intelligent life in the universe. Either way, it’s a mighty sobering thought. ~ Walt Kelly
When we wish to correct with advantage and to show another that he errs, we must notice from what side he views the matter, for on that side it is usually true, and admit that truth to him, but reveal to him the side on which it is false. He is satisfied with that, for he sees that he was not mistaken and that he only failed to see all sides. ~ Blaise Pascal
Of all the creatures that creep, swim or fly,
Peopling the earth, waters and the sky,
From Rome to Iceland, Paris to Japan,
I really think, the greatest fool is man.
~ Nicholas Boileau-Despreaux ~
Wisdom is the right use of knowledge. To know is not to be wise. Many men know a great deal, and are all the greater fools for it. There is no fool so great a fool as a knowing fool. But to know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom. ~ Charles H. Spurgeon
It is unwise to be too sure of one's own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err. ~ Mahatma Gandhi
We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility. ~ Rabindranath Tagore
Every man is a damn fool for at least five minutes every day; wisdom consists in not exceeding the limit. ~ Elbert Hubbard
What a folly to dread the thought of throwing away life at once, and yet have no regard to throwing it away by parcels and piecemeal. ~ John Howe
I'll tell you this — No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn. ~ Jim Morrison
Had we but world enough, and time, this coyness, Lady, were no crime. ~ Andrew Marvell
If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is: Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern. ~ William Blake
Science is the tool of the Western mind and with it more doors can be opened than with bare hands. It is part and parcel of our knowledge and obscures our insight only when it holds that the understanding given by it is the only kind there is. ~ Carl Jung
When I was a kid my parents used to tell me: "Don't go near the cellar door, Emo!" One day when they were away, I went to the door and opened it... and I saw birds and trees... ~ Emo Philips
Lots of people want to ride with you in the limo, but what you want is someone who will take the bus with you when the limo breaks down. ~ Oprah Winfrey
In all people I see myself, none more and not one a barley-corn less, and the good or bad I say of myself I say of them. ~ Walt Whitman in Leaves of Grass
I just know that something good is going to happen. I don't know when — but just saying it could even make it happen. ~ Kate Bush
Blue Moon, now I'm no longer alone, without a dream in my heart, without a love of my own. ~ Lorenz Hart

August 2004

Called or uncalled, God is there. ~ Ancient proverb, said to be Spartan, popularized by Carl Jung
This is a translation of the Latin phrase Vocatus atque non vocatus, Deus aderit. which Jung used as an inscription on his house, and also on his tomb. It is also commonly translated as " Called or uncalled, God is present." or sometimes "Invoked or not invoked...", "Bidden or unbidden", or "Summoned or not summoned..." God is present.
All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts... ~ William Shakespeare in As You Like It
Keep me away from the wisdom which does not cry, the philosophy which does not laugh, and the greatness which does not bow before children. ~ Khalil Gibran
We are defined by how we use our power. ~ Gerry Spence
Your strength is but an accident arising from the weakness of others. ~ Joseph Conrad in Heart of Darkness
Character does count. For too long we have gotten by in a society that says the only thing right is to get by and the only thing wrong is to get caught. Character is doing what's right when nobody is looking... ~ J. C. Watts
A man should be upright, not kept upright. ~ Marcus Aurelius
It is certainly no part of religion to compel religion. ~ Tertullian
Long live freedom and damn the ideologies. ~ Robinson Jeffers
Nobody can be said to have attained the pinnacle of Truth until a thousand sincere people have denounced him for blasphemy. ~ Anthony de Mello
The only kind of dignity which is genuine is that which is not diminished by the indifference of others. ~ Dag Hammarskjöld
There is a healthful hardiness about real dignity that never dreads contact and communion with others, however humble. ~ Washington Irving
Humour is an affirmation of dignity, a declaration of man's superiority to all that befalls him. ~ Romain Gary
Life itself is the proper binge. ~ Julia Child
Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?
~ T. S. Eliot ~
Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke
Life is a mystery to be lived, not a problem to be solved. ~ Søren Kierkegaard
The best mind-altering drug is the truth. ~ Lily Tomlin
Comedy is simply a funny way of being serious. ~ Peter Ustinov
One horse-laugh is worth ten thousand syllogisms. It is not only more effective; it is also vastly more intelligent. ~ H. L. Mencken
No man who has once heartily and wholly laughed can be altogether irreclaimably bad. ~ Thomas Carlyle
The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. ~ Mahatma Gandhi
As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular. ~ Oscar Wilde
Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain. ~ Friedrich Schiller
It’s no use crying over spilt evils. It’s better to mop them up laughing. ~ Eleanor Farjeon
The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity and an understanding of life that fills them with compassions, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen. ~ Elisabeth Kübler-Ross
Because I remember, I despair. Because I remember, I have the duty to reject despair. ~ Elie Wiesel
It is better for a leader to make a mistake in forgiving than to make a mistake in punishing. ~ Muhammad
God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform; He plants his footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the storm. ~ William Cowper
There lives more faith in honest doubt, believe me, than in half the creeds. ~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Know Thyself ~ Ancient proverb that was inscribed upon the temple of the Oracle of Delphi.

September 2004

There is no sudden entrance into Heaven. Slow is the ascent by the path of Love. ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. ~ George Bernard Shaw
I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff — I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be. I know it's crazy. ~ J. D. Salinger in The Catcher in the Rye
The silence often of pure innocence persuades when speaking fails. ~ William Shakespeare in The Winter's Tale
Be silent as to services you have rendered, but speak of favours you have received. ~ Seneca
In human intercourse the tragedy begins, not when there is misunderstanding about words, but when silence is not understood. ~ Henry David Thoreau
Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
I like not only to be loved, but also to be told that I am loved. I am not sure that you are of the same mind. But the realm of silence is large enough beyond the grave. This is the world of light and speech, and I shall take leave to tell you that you are very dear. ~ George Eliot
The earth is rude, silent, incomprehensible at first; Be not discouraged — keep on — there are divine things, well envelop'd; I swear to you there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell. ~ Walt Whitman in Leaves of Grass
He that would live in peace and at ease, must not speak all he knows, nor judge all he sees. ~ Benjamin Franklin
Only tragedy allows the release of love and grief never normally seen. ~ Kate Bush
The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition. ~ Carl Sagan
He, who will not reason, is a bigot; he, who cannot, is a fool; and he, who dares not, is a slave. ~ William Drummond
We don't see things as they are, we see things as we are. ~ Anaïs Nin
The humbleness of a warrior is not the humbleness of the beggar. The warrior lowers his head to no one, but at the same time, he doesn’t permit anyone to lower his head to him. The beggar, on the other hand, falls to his knees at the drop of a hat and scrapes the floor to anyone he deems to be higher; but at the same time, he demands that someone lower than him scrape the floor for him. ~ Carlos Castaneda
The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of a mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one. ~ Wilhelm Stekel
A faith is something you die for, a doctrine is something you kill for. There is all the difference in the world. ~ Tony Benn
The cardinal doctrine of a fanatic's creed is that his enemies are the enemies of God. ~ Andrew Dickson White
A saint is someone who has achieved a remote human possibility. It is impossible to say what that possibility is. I think it has something to do with the energy of love... Something in him so loves the world that he gives himself to the laws of gravity and chance. Far from flying with the angels, he traces with the fidelity of a seismograph needle the state of the solid bloody landscape. His house is dangerous and finite, but he is at home in the world. He can love the shape of human beings, the fine and twisted shapes of the heart. It is good to have among us such men, such balancing monsters of love. ~ Leonard Cohen
What is done out of love always takes place beyond good and evil. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche in Beyond Good and Evil
Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe. ~ H. G. Wells
At least two thirds of our miseries spring from human stupidity, human malice and those great motivators and justifiers of malice and stupidity, idealism, dogmatism and proselytizing zeal on behalf of religious or political idols. ~ Aldous Huxley
Goodness alone is never enough. A hard cold wisdom is required, too, for goodness to accomplish good. Goodness without wisdom invariably accomplishes evil. ~ Robert Heinlein in Stranger in a Strange Land
To do evil that good may come of it is for bunglers in politics as well as morals. ~ William Penn
Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction. ~ Blaise Pascal
We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another. ~ Jonathan Swift
Those who think they know it all are very annoying to those of us who do. ~ Anonymous
The above variant was how this quotation was originally posted. It seems to be derived from this statement attributed to a specific author: Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do. ~ Isaac Asimov
Love is the most important thing in the world. It may be important to great thinkers to examine the world, to explain and despise it. But I think it is only important to love the world, not to despise it, not for us to hate each other, but to be able to regard the world and ourselves and all beings with love, admiration and respect. ~ Hermann Hesse
We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects. ~ Herman Melville
Truth can never be told so as to be understood and not be believed. ~ William Blake

October 2004

When you get to a fork in the road, take it. ~ Yogi Berra
Between two evils, I always pick the one I never tried before. ~ Mae West
Given the choice between two theories, take the one which is funnier. ~ "Blore's Razor" (Author unknown)
As for myself, I always willingly acknowledge my own self as the principal cause of every good and of every evil which may befall me; therefore I have always found myself capable of being my own pupil, and ready to love my teacher. ~ Giacomo Casanova
You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individuals. To that end each of us must work for his own improvement, and at the same time share a general responsibility for all humanity, our particular duty being to aid those to whom we think we can be most useful. ~ Marie Curie
I don't get no respect! ~ Rodney Dangerfield
Every human being, of whatever origin, of whatever station, deserves respect. We must each respect others even as we respect ourselves. ~ U Thant
No one is useless in this world who lightens the burden of it for anyone else. ~ Charles Dickens in Our Mutual Friend
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies. ~ Groucho Marx
You are educated when you have the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or self-confidence. ~ Robert Frost
I don't really know why I care so much. I just have something inside me that tells me that there is a problem, and I have got to do something about it. I think that is what I would call the God in me. All of us have a God in us, and that God is the spirit that unites all life, everything that is on this planet. ~ Wangari Maathai
So many of our dreams at first seem impossible, then they seem improbable, and then, when we summon the will, they soon become inevitable. ~ Christopher Reeve
Here is the test to find whether your mission on earth is finished: If you're alive, it isn't. ~ Richard Bach
It is better to debate a question without deciding it than to decide it without debate. ~ Joseph Joubert
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. ~ Margaret Mead
Nothing endures but change. ~ Heraclitus
Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try. ~ "Yoda" in Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
These children that you spit on as they try to change their worlds are immune to your consultations. They're quite aware of what they're going through... ~ David Bowie
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows. ~ George Orwell in Nineteen Eighty-Four
I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives. ~ Leo Tolstoy
It doesn't matter if we were down 3-0. You've just got to keep the faith. The game is not over until the last out. ~ David Ortiz
There’s a time when a man needs to fight, and a time when he needs to accept that his destiny is lost, that the ship has sailed, and that only a fool would continue. The truth is, I’ve always been a fool. ~ Albert Finney as "Ed Bloom" in Big Fish
You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it. ~ Maya Angelou
Only when we are no longer afraid do we begin to live. ~ Dorothy Thompson
Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can. ~ John Wesley
I'm not against God. I'm against the misuse of God. ~ Marilyn Manson
The antagonism between science and religion, about which we hear so much, appears to me to be purely factitious — fabricated, on the one hand, by short-sighted religious people who confound a certain branch of science, theology, with religion; and, on the other, by equally short-sighted scientific people who forget that science takes for its province only that which is susceptible of clear intellectual comprehension; and that, outside the boundaries of that province, they must be content with imagination, with hope, and with ignorance. ~ T. H. Huxley
We're just being ourselves and having fun playing baseball. The biggest thing is when people look at our team, they can see that we're having a lot of fun. ~ Johnny Damon
The future is not some place we are going to, but one we are creating. The paths are not to be found, but made, and the activity of making them, changes both the maker and the destination. ~ John Schaar
It’s always worthwhile to make others aware of their worth. ~ Malcolm Forbes
Merry meet, and merry part, and Blessed Be. ~ A pagan expression of blessing.

November 2004

The progress of the intellect is to the clearer vision of causes, which neglects surface differences. To the poet, to the philosopher, to the saint, all things are friendly and sacred, all events profitable, all days holy, all men divine. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
We’d all like t’vote fer th’best man, but he’s never a candidate. ~ Kin Hubbard
I remain just one thing, and one thing only — and that is a clown. It places me on a far higher plane than any politician. ~ Charlie Chaplin
ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US. ~ CATS of Zero Wing
America has spoken, and I'm humbled by the trust and the confidence of my fellow citizens. ~ George W. Bush
The secret of success is sincerity. Once you can fake that you've got it made. ~ Jean Giraudoux
Whether we and our politicians know it or not, Nature is party to all our deals and decisions, and she has more votes, a longer memory, and a sterner sense of justice than we do. ~ Wendell Berry
It took a couple of hundred million years to develop a thinking ape and you want a smart one in a lousy few hundred thousand? ~ Spider Robinson
"The time has come", the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes — and ships — and sealing wax —
Of cabbages — and Kings —
And why the Sea is boiling hot —
And whether pigs have wings."
~ Lewis Carroll in Through the Looking-Glass ~
When war is declared, truth is the first casualty. ~ Arthur Ponsonby
All the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month. It was during that minute in nineteen hundred and eighteen, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one another. I have talked to old men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the Voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind. ~ Kurt Vonnegut
Under all speech that is good for anything there lies a silence that is better. Silence is deep as Eternity; speech is shallow as Time. ~ Thomas Carlyle
Anyone who believes in God and the Last Day should not harm his neighbor. Anyone who believes in God and the Last Day should entertain his guest generously. And anyone who believes in God and the Last Day should say what is good or keep quiet. ~ Muhammad
If I want to understand something, I must observe, I must not criticize, I must not condemn, I must not pursue it as pleasure or avoid it as non-pleasure. There must merely be the silent observation of a fact. ~ J. Krishnamurti
Every now and then a clear harmonic cry gave new suggestions of a tune that would someday be the only tune in the world and would raise men's souls to joy. ~ Jack Kerouac in On The Road
When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace. ~ Jimi Hendrix
There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root. ~ Henry David Thoreau
Nowadays most men lead lives of noisy desperation. ~ James Thurber
Unless you choose to do great things with it, it makes no difference how much you are rewarded, or how much power you have. ~ Oprah Winfrey
The one important thing I have learned over the years is the difference between taking one's work seriously and taking one's self seriously. The first is imperative and the second is disastrous. ~ Margot Fonteyn
Fame is something which must be won; honor is something which must not be lost. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer
I'd rather be a climbing ape than a falling angel. ~ Terry Pratchett
Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out. ~ Václav Havel
Great minds have purposes, others have wishes. Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortunes; but great minds rise above them. ~ Washington Irving
Show respect to all people and grovel to none. When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision. ~ Tecumseh
When a person doesn't have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity. A person can almost be defined by his or her attitude toward gratitude. ~ Elie Wiesel
I would rather be able to appreciate things I cannot have than to have things I am not able to appreciate. ~ Elbert Hubbard
Arbitrary power is most easily established on the ruins of liberty abused to licentiousness. ~ George Washington
Find the good — and praise it. ~ Alex Haley
The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook. ~ William James

December 2004

Ooh, with a little luck — December will be magic again. ~ Kate Bush
Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it. My optimism, then, does not rest on the absence of evil, but on a glad belief in the preponderance of good and a willing effort always to cooperate with the good, that it may prevail. ~ Helen Keller
The free expression of the hopes and aspirations of a people is the greatest and only safety in a sane society. ~ Emma Goldman
Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels'
hierarchies? and even if one of them suddenly
pressed me against his heart, I would perish
in the embrace of his stronger existence.
For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror
which we are barely able to endure and are awed
because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.
Each single angel is terrifying.
~ Rainer Maria Rilke ~
To be a catalyst is the ambition most appropriate for those who see the world as being in constant change, and who, without thinking that they can control it, wish to influence its direction. ~ Theodore Zeldin
Every man's work, whether it be literature or music or pictures or architecture or anything else, is always a portrait of himself. ~ Samuel Butler
Oh, if a man tried to take his time on earth and prove before he died what one man's life could be worth, I wonder what would happen to this world? ~ Harry Chapin
You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one; I hope some day you'll join us, and the world will live as one. ~ John Lennon
Love alone is capable of uniting living beings in such a way as to complete and fulfill them, for it alone takes them and joins them by what is deepest in themselves. ~ Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in cooperation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms,
Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge,
Now, therefore, The General Assembly, Proclaims this Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations...
~ From the Preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights ~
Adopted and proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly, 10 December 1948
I have never been especially impressed by the heroics of people convinced that they are about to change the world. I am more awed by those who struggle to make one small difference after another. ~ Ellen Goodman
Every single moment of a person's life, both of the understanding and of the will, is a new beginning. ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
How lovely to think that no one need wait a moment, we can start now, start slowly changing the world! How lovely that everyone, great and small, can make their contribution toward introducing justice straightaway... And you can always, always give something, even if it is only kindness! ~ Anne Frank
Loving kindness is greater than laws; and the charities of life are more than all ceremonies. ~ The Talmud
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
The function of the imagination is not to make strange things settled, so much as to make settled things strange. ~ G. K. Chesterton
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring,
Renewed shall be blade that was broken,
The crownless again shall be king.
~ "Arwen" in the film The Return of the King ~
Based upon The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien; In the novel The Lord of the Rings this statement first occurs in The Fellowship of the Ring (Book I, Chapter 10, "Strider") in a letter by Gandalf to Frodo.
The Tree that was withered shall be renewed, and he shall plant it in the high places, and the City shall be blessed. Sing all ye people! ~ J. R. R. Tolkien
From The Lord of the Rings : The Return of the King (Book VI, Chapter 5, "The Steward and the King"); in the novel this is a song of a great Eagle heralding the victory of Aragorn's forces against those of Sauron and the Dark Tower.
In the winter season, for seven days of calm, Alcyone broods over her nest on the surface of the waters while the sea-waves are quiet. Through this time Aeolus keeps his winds at home, and ocean is smooth for his descendants’ sake. ~ Ovid
The dark night of the soul comes just before revelation. When everything is lost, and all seems darkness, then comes the new life and all that is needed. ~ Joseph Campbell
i who have died am alive again today, and this is the sun's birthday... ~ e. e. cummings
Good fortune attend each merry man's friend
That doth but the best that he may,
Forgetting old wrongs with carols and songs
To drive the cold winter away.
~ "All Hail to The Days" (or "The Praise of Christmas") ~
Traditional 17th century English carol
'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free,
'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
'Twill be in the valley of love and delight.
~ Joseph Brackett ~
I danced in the morning
When the world was begun,
And I danced in the moon
And the stars and the sun,
And I came down from heaven
And I danced on the earth,
At Bethlehem
I had my birth.
Dance, then, wherever you may be,
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he,
And I'll lead you all, wherever you may be,
And I'll lead you all in the Dance, said he.
~ Sydney Carter ~
You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. ~ Yeshua (Jesus Christ)
There isn't anyone anywhere that isn't Seymour's Fat Lady. Don't you know that? Don't you know that goddam secret yet? And don't you know — listen to me, now — don't you know who that Fat Lady really is? . . . Ah, buddy. Ah, buddy. It's Christ Himself. Christ Himself, buddy. ~ J. D. Salinger
Shall we make a new rule of life from tonight — always to try to be a little kinder than is necessary? ~ J. M. Barrie
Wikiqoute Quote of the day for the 100th anniversary of the first public performance of Peter Pan.
Physics isn't the most important thing. Love is. ~ Richard Feynman
I will make company with creators, with harvesters, with rejoicers; I will show them the rainbow and the stairway to the Superman. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche in Thus Spoke Zarathustra
I sometimes hold it half a sin
To put in words the grief I feel;
For words, like Nature, half reveal
And half conceal the Soul within.
~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson ~
Wave after wave, each mightier than the last,
Till last, a ninth one, gathering half the deep
And full of voices, slowly rose and plunged
Roaring, and all the wave was in a flame:
And down the wave and in the flame was borne
A naked babe...
~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson in Idylls of the King ~

January 2005

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.
~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson ~
We are all in this together. ~ English proverb
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee… ~ John Donne
I know this in no way alleviates the enormous amounts of pain and loss experienced by those who have suffered from the tsunami, but I hope it can make a difference. ~ Sandra Bullock on her large donation to tsunami relief efforts of the American Red Cross
I can not do everything, but I can do something. I must not fail to do the something that I can do. ~ Helen Keller
I know the biggest crime is just to throw up your hands and say "This has nothing to do with me, I just want to live as comfortably as I can." ~ Ani DiFranco
The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew. ~ Abraham Lincoln
The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them: that's the essence of inhumanity. ~ George Bernard Shaw
Each time a person stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, these ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance. ~ Robert F. Kennedy
The best things in life are nearest: Breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of right just before you. Then do not grasp at the stars, but do life's plain, common work as it comes, certain that daily duties and daily bread are the sweetest things in life. ~ Robert Louis Stevenson
If men would consider not so much where they differ, as wherein they agree, there would be far less of uncharitableness and angry feeling in the world. ~ Joseph Addison
Do not think of knocking out another person's brains because he differs in opinion from you. It would be as rational to knock yourself on the head because you differ from yourself ten years ago. ~ Horace Mann
Wisdom tends to grow in proportion to one's awareness of one's ignorance. ~ Anthony de Mello
Appearances are a glimpse of the unseen. ~ Æschylus
The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
If we win here we will win everywhere. The world is a fine place and worth the fighting for and I hate very much to leave it. ~ Ernest Hemingway
The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern. The law of liberty tends to abolish the reign of race over race, of faith over faith, of class over class. ~ Lord Acton
My experience of men has neither disposed me to think worse of them, or indisposed me to serve them; nor in spite of failures, which I lament, of errors which I now see and acknowledge; or of the present aspect of affairs; do I despair of the future.
The truth is this: The march of Providence is so slow, and our desires so impatient; the work of progress is so immense and our means of aiding it so feeble; the life of humanity is so long, that of the individual so brief, that we often see only the ebb of the advancing wave and are thus discouraged. It is history that teaches us to hope. ~ Robert E. Lee
The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world. ~ George W. Bush
An avidity to punish is always dangerous to liberty. It leads men to stretch, to misinterpret, and to misapply even the best of laws. He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself. ~ Thomas Paine
Even as the fingers of the two hands are equal, so are human beings equal to one another. No one has any right, nor any preference to claim over another. You are brothers. ~ Muhammad
So long as there is death there will be sorrow, and so long as there is sorrow it can be no part of the duty of human beings to increase its amount, in spite of the fact that a few rare spirits know how to transmute it. ~ Bertrand Russell
A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving. ~ Albert Einstein
If I have been able to see further, it was only because I stood on the shoulders of giants. ~ Isaac Newton on his intellectual debt to those who preceded him.
Give me a place to stand, and I shall move the world. ~ Archimedes
Remind yourself that all men assert that wisdom is the greatest good, but that there are few who strenuously seek out that greatest good. ~ Pythagoras
Wise men don't need to prove their point;
men who need to prove their point aren't wise.
The Master has no possessions.
The more he does for others, the happier he is.
The more he gives to others, the wealthier he is.
The Tao nourishes by not forcing.
By not dominating, the Master leads.
~ Lao Zi ~
Time's glory is to command contending kings,
To unmask falsehood, and bring truth to light.
~ William Shakespeare ~
Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe... No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time. ~ Winston Churchill
I have one major rule: everybody is right. More specifically, everybody — including me — has some important pieces of the truth, and all of those pieces need to be honored, cherished, and included in a more gracious, spacious, and compassionate embrace. ~ Ken Wilber

February 2005

There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. ~ American proverb</