Wikiquote:Quote of the day/May 2023

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Today is Thursday, May 2, 2024; it is now 10:22 (UTC)
May 1
 
Good nature is more agreeable in conversation than wit, and gives a certain air to the countenance which is more amiable than beauty.
~ Joseph Addison ~
 

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May 2
 
I don't know what's right and what's real anymore
And I don't know how I'm meant to feel anymore
And when do you think it will all become clear?
'Cause I'm being taken over by the fear.
~ Lily Allen ~
 

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May 3
 
Hail hero, hail hero, child of your fate
Come into the kitchen don't stand by the gate
And show us your wisdom before it's too late.
~ Gordon Lightfoot ~
 

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May 4
 
I was brought up to believe that there is no virtue in conforming meekly to the dominant opinion of the moment. I was encouraged to believe that simple conformity results in stagnation for a society, and that American progress has been largely owing to the opportunity for experimentation, the leeway given initiative, and to a gusto and a freedom for chewing over odd ideas.
~ Jane Jacobs ~
 

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May 5
 
A man who leaves memoirs, whether well or badly written, provided they be sincere, renders a service to future psychologists and writers, giving them not only a faithful picture, but likewise human documents that may be relied upon.
~ Henryk Sienkiewicz ~
 

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May 6
 
Coming and going by the dance, I see
That what I am not is a part of me.
Dancing is all that I can ever trust,
The dance is all I am, the rest is dust.
I will believe my bones and live by what
Will go on dancing when my bones are not.
~ Sydney Carter ~
 

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May 7
 
We comprehend the earth only when we have known heaven. Without the spiritual world the material world is a disheartening enigma.
~ Joseph Joubert ~
 

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May 8
 
There is really no way of considering a book independently of one's special sensations in reading it on a particular occasion. In this as in everything else one must allow a certain relativity. In a sense, one can never read the book that the author originally wrote, and one can never read the same book twice.
~ Edmund Wilson ~
 

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May 9
 
We never understand how little we need in this world until we know the loss of it.
~ J. M. Barrie ~
 

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May 10
 
You know I used to think the future was solid or fixed, something you inherited like an old building that you move into when the previous generation moves out or gets chased out. But it's not. The future is not fixed, it's fluid. … The world is more malleable than you think and it's waiting for you to hammer it into shape.
~ Bono ~
 

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May 11
 
Those who really desire to understand, who are looking to find that which is eternal, without beginning and without an end, will walk together with a greater intensity, will be a danger to everything that is unessential, to unrealities, to shadows. And they will concentrate, they will become the flame, because they understand. Such a body we must create, and that is my purpose. Because of that real understanding there will be true friendship. Because of that true friendship — which you do not seem to know — there will be real cooperation on the part of each one. And this not because of authority, not because of salvation, not because of immolation for a cause, but because you really understand, and hence are capable of living in the eternal.
~ Jiddu Krishnamurti ~
 

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May 12
 
The way to live with God is to live with Ideals — not merely to think about ideals, but to do and suffer for them. Those who have to work on men and women must above all things have their Spiritual Ideal, their purpose, ever present. The "mystical" state is the essence of common sense.
~ Florence Nightingale ~
 

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May 13
 
Each brotherly compassion that man hath on his fellow Christians, with charity, it is Christ in him.
~ Julian of Norwich ~
 

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May 14
 
All the measures now proposed are only a compromise with the errors of the present systems; but as these errors now almost universally exist, and must be overcome solely by the force of reason; and as reason, to effect the most beneficial purposes, makes her advance by slow degrees, and progressively substantiates one truth of high import after another, it will be evident, to minds of comprehensive and accurate thought, that by these and similar compromises alone can success be rationally expected in practice. For such compromises bring truth and error before the public; and whenever they are fairly exhibited together, truth must ultimately prevail.
~ Robert Owen ~
 

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May 15
 
I have no patience with this dreadful idea that whatever you have in you has to come out, that you can’t suppress true talent. People can be destroyed; they can be bent, distorted and completely crippled. To say that you can’t destroy yourself is just as foolish as to say of a young man killed in war at twenty-one or twenty-two that that was his fate, that he wasn’t going to have anything anyhow.
I have a very firm belief that the life of no man can be explained in terms of his experiences, of what has happened to him, because in spite of all the poetry, all the philosophy to the contrary, we are not really masters of our fate. We don’t really direct our lives unaided and unobstructed. Our being is subject to all the chances of life. There are so many things we are capable of, that we could be or do. The potentialities are so great that we never, any of us, are more than one-fourth fulfilled.
~ Katherine Anne Porter ~
 

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May 16
 
The Voice had promised me that, as soon I came to the King, he would receive me. Those of my party knew well that the Voice had been sent me from God; they have seen and known this Voice, I am sure of it. My King and many others have also heard and seen the Voices which came to me: there were there Charles de Bourbon and two or three others. There is not a day when I do not hear this Voice; and I have much need of it. But never have I asked of it any recompense but the salvation of my soul.
~ Joan of Arc ~
 

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May 17
 
That society is badly arranged which forces nearly all women to be servants.
~ Henri Barbusse ~
 

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May 18
 
Conventional people are roused to fury by departures from convention, largely because they regard such departures as a criticism of themselves. They will pardon much unconventionality in a man who has enough jollity and friendliness to make clear, even to the stupidest, that he is not engaged in criticizing them.
~ Bertrand Russell ~
in
~ The Conquest of Happiness ~
 

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May 19
 
Unhappiness is best defined as the difference between our talents and our expectations.
~ Edward de Bono ~
 

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May 20
 
The best state for human nature is that in which, while no one is poor, no one desires to be richer, nor has any reason to fear being thrust back by the efforts of others to push themselves forward.
~ John Stuart Mill ~
 

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May 21
 
We fatuously hoped that we might pluck from the human tragedy itself a consciousness of a common destiny which should bring its own healing, that we might extract from life’s very misfortunes a power of cooperation which should be effective against them.
~ Jane Addams ~
 

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May 22
 
We need to unite and make Russia the last aggressor. So that only peace reigns after the defeat of its invasion of Ukraine.
We, people, have different cultures, different views, different national flags. But we equally want security for ourselves, our children and grandchildren. And our lives are equally burned to ashes if, God forbid, war comes.
Everyone in the world must do everything possible to ensure that wars leave only shadows on the stones of history and that this can only be seen in museums.
Everyone in the world must respect other nations.
Everyone in the world must recognize state borders.
Everyone in the world must defend justice.
Everyone in the world must care about life.
Everyone in the world must take peace as their duty.
~ Volodymyr Zelenskyy ~
 

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May 23
 
I'd like to be remembered as someone who kept the comic novel going for another generation or so. I fear the comic novel is in retreat. A joke is by definition politically incorrect — it assumes a butt, and a certain superiority in the teller. The culture won't put up with that for much longer.
~ Martin Amis ~
 

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May 24
 
I renounce war for its consequences, for the lies it lives on and propagates, for the undying hatred it arouses, for the dictatorships it puts in place of democracy, for the starvation that stalks after it. I renounce war, and never again, directly or indirectly, will I sanction or support another.
~ Harry Emerson Fosdick ~
 

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May 25
 
We are all born with a mission, a purpose, that only we can fulfill.
When you live with a joyful sense of purpose, when you infuse your life with a greater purpose beyond your individual self, every aspect of your karma can become a brilliant facet of your mission. You can transform sorrow and adversity of any sort into joy, stability, health, and prosperity. By changing poison into medicine and accomplishing your inner revolution, you can use every experience of karma to encourage others who suffer from the same problems that you overcame.
You can become an ambassador of hope, an essential and radiant treasure of humanity, in which you recognize that all who have ever lived are members of your extended family.
As you continue to spread light in this way, actively doing good in the world, that energy will come back to you in abundant positivity. When you refuse to perpetuate any bad that has been done to you, you can free yourself from the chains of negativity.
~ Tina Turner ~
 

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May 26
 
The clouds never expect it
When it rains
But the sea changes color
But the sea does not change
And so with the slow graceful flow of age
I went forth with an age old desire to please
On the edge of seventeen.
~ Stevie Nicks ~
 

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May 27
 
The artist discards all theories, both his own and those of others. He forgets everything when he is in front of his canvas.
~ Georges Rouault ~
 

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May 28
 
Those whom the Gods wish to destroy, they first make bored.
~ Ian Fleming ~
 

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May 29
 
We are neither "warmongers" nor "appeasers," neither "hard" nor "soft." We are Americans, determined to defend the frontiers of freedom, by an honorable peace if peace is possible, but by arms if arms are used against us. And if we are to move forward in that spirit, we shall need all the calm and thoughtful citizens that this great University can produce, all the light they can shed, all the wisdom they can bring to bear. It is customary, both here and around the world, to regard life in the United States as easy. Our advantages are many. But more than any other people on earth, we bear burdens and accept risks unprecedented in their size and their duration, not for ourselves alone but for all who wish to be free.
~ John F. Kennedy ~
 

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May 30
 
There is but one way to bring about the triumph of liberty, of justice, and of peace in Europe's international relations, to make civil war impossible between the different peoples who make up the European family; and that is the formation of the United States of Europe.
~ Mikhail Bakunin ~
 

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May 31
 
The sum of all known reverence I add up in you whoever you are,
The President is there in the White House for you, it is not you who are here for him,
The Secretaries act in their bureaus for you, not you here for them,
The Congress convenes every Twelfth-month for you,
Laws, courts, the forming of States, the charters of cities, the going and coming of commerce and malls, are all for you.
~ Walt Whitman ~
in
~ Leaves of Grass ~
 

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Today is Thursday, May 2, 2024; it is now 10:22 (UTC)
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