I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter
saying that I approved of it.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

You cannot depend on your eyes when your
imagination is out of focus.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities.
Truth isn't.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

It could probably be shown by facts and figures
that there is no distinctly American criminal
class except Congress.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Always acknowledge a fault. This will throw
those in authority off their guard and give
you an opportunity to commit more.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

In the first place, God made idiots. That was
for practice. Then he made school boards.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

It is easier to stay out than get out.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

I was gratified to be able to answer promptly.
I said I don't know.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

The man who doesn't read good books has no
advantage over the man who can't read them.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Wagner's music is better than it sounds.

Bill Nye (1850 - 1896), quoted in Mark Twain's
Autobiography, 1924

Water, taken in moderation, cannot hurt anybody.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

The human race has one really effective weapon,
and that is laughter.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

The human race has one really effective weapon,
and that is laughter.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Often it does seem a pity that Noah and
his party did not miss the boat.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Never put off until tomorrow what you can do
the day after tomorrow.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

My mother had a great deal of trouble with
me, but I think she enjoyed it.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Just the omission of Jane Austen's books alone
would make a fairly good library out of a
library that hadn't a book in it.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

It usually takes more than three weeks to
prepare a good impromptu speech.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

It is better to keep your mouth closed and let
people think you are a fool than to open it and
remove all doubt.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

In Paris they simply stared when I spoke to them
in French; I never did succeed in making those
idiots understand their language.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous,
he will not bite you. This is the principal difference
between a dog and a man.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man
should challenge me, I would take him kindly
and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a
quiet place and kill him.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little
or no influence on society.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Be careful about reading health books.
You may die of a misprint.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Always do right. This will gratify some people
and astonish the rest.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

All you need in this life is ignorance and
confidence; then success is sure.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910), Letter to Mrs
Foote, Dec. 2, 1887

A banker is a fellow who lends you his
umbrella when the sun is shining, but wants
it back the minute it begins to rain.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Few things are harder to put up with than the
annoyance of a good example.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910), Pudd'nhead Wilson (1894)

Good breeding consists of concealing how
much we think of ourselves and how little
we think of the other person.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910), Notebooks (1935)

Familiarity breeds contempt - and children.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910), Notebooks (1935)

The report of my death was an exaggeration.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910), New York Journal, June 2, 1897

Man is the Only Animal that Blushes. Or needs to.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910), Following the Equator (1897)

Truth is more of a stranger than fiction.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

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.

Sir Winston Churchill, Hansard, November 11, 1947

I would say to the House, as I said to
those who have joined this Government:
'I have nothing to offer but blood, toil,
tears, and sweat."

Sir Winston Churchill, Hansard, May 13, 1940

The British nation is unique in this respect.
They are the only people who like to be told
how bad things are, who like to be told the worst.

Sir Winston Churchill, Hansard, June 10, 1941

Don't talk to me about naval tradition.
It's nothing but rum, sodomy and the lash.

Sir Winston Churchill

When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber.

Sir Winston Churchill

When I am abroad, I always make it a rule
never to criticize or attack the government
of my own country. I make up for lost time
when I come home.

Sir Winston Churchill

We make a living by what we get,
we make a life by what we give.

Sir Winston Churchill

There are a terrible lot of lies going around
the world, and the worst of it is half of them are true.

Sir Winston Churchill

Success is the ability to go from one failure
to another with no loss of enthusiasm.

Sir Winston Churchill

Personally I'm always ready to learn,
although I do not always like being taught.

Sir Winston Churchill

The reserve of modern assertions is sometimes
pushed to extremes, in which the fear of being
 contradicted leads the writer to strip himself
of almost all sense and meaning.

Sir Winston Churchill

One ought never to turn one's back on a
threatened danger and try to run away from
it. If you do that, you will double the danger.
But if you meet it promptly and without flinching,
you will reduce the danger by half.

Sir Winston Churchill

Never, never, never believe any war will be
smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks
on the strange voyage can measure the tides
and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman
who yields to war fever must realize that once
the signal is given, he is no longer the master
of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and
uncontrollable events.

Sir Winston Churchill

Never, never, never believe any war will be
smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks
on the strange voyage can measure the tides
and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman
who yields to war fever must realize that once
the signal is given, he is no longer the master
of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and
uncontrollable events.

Sir Winston Churchill

Never hold discussions with the monkey
when the organ grinder is in the room.

Sir Winston Churchill

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but
most of them pick themselves up and hurry off
as if nothing ever happened.

Sir Winston Churchill

I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look
down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.

Sir Winston Churchill

I have always felt that a politician is to be
judged by the animosities he excites among his
opponents.

Sir Winston Churchill

I cannot pretend to feel impartial about colours.
I rejoice with the brilliant ones and am genuinely
sorry for the poor browns.

Sir Winston Churchill

History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.

Sir Winston Churchill

He has all the virtues I dislike and none
of the vices I admire.

Sir Winston Churchill

From now on, ending a sentence with a preposition
is something up with which I will not put.

Sir Winston Churchill

Every day you may make progress. Every step
may be fruitful. Yet there will stretch out
before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending,
ever-improving path. You know you will never
get to the end of the journey. But this, so
far from discouraging, only adds to the joy
and glory of the climb.

Sir Winston Churchill

Broadly speaking, the short words are the best,
and the old words best of all.

Sir Winston Churchill

Never give in--never, never, never, never,
in nothing great or small, large or petty,
never give in except to convictions of honour
and good sense. Never yield to force; never
yield to the apparently overwhelming might
of the enemy.

Sir Winston Churchill, Speech, 1941, Harrow School

A love of tradition has never weakened a nation,
indeed it has strengthened nations in their hour
of peril; but the new view must come, the world
must roll forward.

Sir Winston Churchill, speech in the House of
Commons, November 29, 1944

We shall show mercy, but we shall not ask for it.

Sir Winston Churchill, speech in the House of
Commons, July 14, 1940

Now this is not the end. It is not even the
beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the
end of the beginning.

Sir Winston Churchill, Speech in November 1942

From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the
Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across
the Continent.

Sir Winston Churchill, Speech in March 1946

For myself I am an optimist - it does not seem
to be much use being anything else.

Sir Winston Churchill, speech at the Lord Mayor's
banquet, London, November 9, 1954

The empires of the future are the empires of the mind.

Sir Winston Churchill, Speech at Harvard University,
September 6, 1943

One day President Roosevelt told me that he was
asking publicly for suggestions about what the
war should be called. I said at once
'The Unnecessary War'.

Sir Winston Churchill, Second World War (1948)

It is a good thing for an uneducated man to
read books of quotations. Bartlett's Familiar
Quotations is an admirable work, and I studied
it intently. The quotations when engraved upon
the memory give you good thoughts. They also
make you anxious to read the authors and look
for more.

Sir Winston Churchill, Roving Commission:
My Early Life, 1930, Chapter 9

Here is the answer which I will give to President
Roosevelt... We shall not fail or falter; we shall
not weaken or tire. Neither the sudden shock of
battle nor the long-drawn trials of vigilance and
exertion will wear us down. Give us the tools and
we will finish the job.

Sir Winston Churchill, Radio speech, 1941

I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia.
It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an
enigma: but perhaps there is a key. That key
is Russian national interest.

Sir Winston Churchill, Radio speech, 1939

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

I am prepared to meet my Maker.
Whether my Maker is prepared for
the great ordeal of meeting me
is another matter.

Sir Winston Churchill, on the eve
of his 75th birthday

So they [the Government] go on in strange paradox,
decided only to be undecided, resolved to be
irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity,
all-powerful to be impotent.

Sir Winston Churchill, Hansard, November 12, 1936

I did never know so full a voice issue from so empty a heart:
but the saying is true 'The empty vessel makes the greatest sound'.

William Shakespeare

I am not bound to please thee with my answers.

William Shakespeare

How use doth breed a habit in a man.

William Shakespeare

How poor are they who have not patience!
What wound did ever heal but by degrees.

William Shakespeare

His life was gentle; and the elements
So mixed in him, that Nature might stand up,
And say to all the world, THIS WAS A MAN!

William Shakespeare

He who has injured thee was either stronger or
weaker than thee. If weaker, spare him;
if stronger, spare thyself.

William Shakespeare

He is winding the watch of his wit;
by and by it will strike.

William Shakespeare

God bless thee; and put meekness in thy
mind, love, charity, obedience, and true duty!

William Shakespeare

Glory is like a circle in the water,
Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself,
Till by broad spreading it disperses to naught.

William Shakespeare

Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice;
take each man's censure but reserve thy judgement.

William Shakespeare

Free from gross passion or of mirth or anger
constant in spirit, not swerving with the blood,
garnish'd and deck'd in modest compliment,
not working with the eye without the ear,
and but in purged judgement trusting neither?
Such and so finely bolted didst thou seem.

William Shakespeare

For they are yet ear-kissing arguments.

William Shakespeare

Cowards die many times before their deaths,
The valiant never taste of death but once.

William Shakespeare

Blow, blow, thou winter wind
Thou art not so unkind,
As man's ingratitude.

William Shakespeare

Be great in act, as you have been in thought.

William Shakespeare

Assume a virtue, if you have it not.

William Shakespeare

And thus I clothe my naked villainy
With old odd ends, stol'n forth of holy writ;
And seem a saint, when most I play the devil.

William Shakespeare

And since you know you cannot see yourself,
so well as by reflection, I, your glass,
will modestly discover to yourself,
that of yourself which you yet know not of.

William Shakespeare

A wretched soul, bruised with adversity,
We bid be quiet when we hear it cry;
But were we burdened with like weight of pain,
As much or more we should ourselves complain.

William Shakespeare

The beauty of the world has two edges, one
of laughter, one of anguish, cutting the heart
asunder.

Wolf, Virginia

Beauty is a form of genius - is higher, indeed,
than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the
great facts in the world like sunlight, or springtime,
or the reflection in dark water of that silver shell
we call the moon.

Wilde, Oscar

No object is so beautiful that, under
certain conditions, it will not look ugly.

Wilde, Oscar

Is there anything in the universe more beautiful
and protective than the simple complexity of a
spider's web?

White, E.B.

Truth exists for the wise, beauty for the
feeling heart.

von Schiller, Johann

Someday there is going to be a book about a
middle-aged man with a good job, a beautiful
wife and two lovely children who still manages
to be happy.

Vaughan, Bill

What a strange illusion it is to suppose that beauty is goodness.

Tolstoy, Leo

It is something to be able to paint a particular
picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few
objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to
carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium
through which we look, which morally we can do.
To affect the quality of the day, that is the
highest of arts.

Thoreau, Henry David

To give pain is the tyranny; to make happy,
the true empire of beauty.

Steele, Richard

I would warn you that I do not attribute
to nature either beauty or deformity, order
or confusion. Only in relation to our
imagination can things be called beautiful
or ugly, well-ordered or confused.

Spinoza, Benedict

Beauty is a short-lived tyranny.

Socrates

What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason;
how infinite in faculties; in form and moving, how
express and admirable! In action, how like an angel;
in apprenhension, how like a god; the beauty of the
world the paragon of animals! And yet to me what is
this quintessence of dust?

Shakespeare, William

Honesty coupled to beauty is to have honey a sauce to sugar.

Shakespeare, William

A bachelor never quite gets over the idea that
he is a thing of beauty and a boy forever.

Rowland, Helen

Beauty attracts us men; but if, like an armed
magnet it is pointed, beside, with gold and
silver, it attracts with tenfold power.

Richter, Jean Paul

Beauty is power; a smile is its sword.

Reade, Charles

Remember if you marry for beauty, thou bindest
thyself all thy life for that which perchance,
will neither last nor please thee one year: and
when thou hast it, it will be to thee of no price
at all.

Raleigh, Walter

For, when with beauty we can virtue join,
We paint the semblance of a form divine.

Prior, Matthew

Conceit is to nature what paint is to beauty;
it is not only needless, but impairs what it
would improve

Pope, Alexander

Age before beauty ... And pearls before swine.

Parker, Dorothy

We live in a wonderful world that is full
of beauty, charm and adventure. There is no
end to the adventures that we can have if
only we seek then with our eyes open.

Nehru, Jawaharial

Walk on a rainbow trail; walk on a trail of song,
and all about you will be beauty. There is a way
out of every dark mist, over a rainbow trail.

Navajo Song

In every man's heart there is a secret nerve
that answers to the vibrations of beauty.

Morley, Christopher

Beauty is nature's brag, and must be shown in courts,
at feasts, and high solemnities, where most may wonder
at the workmanship.

Milton, John

Beauty is the first present nature gives to
woman and the first it takes away.

George Brossin

Time's gradual touch has moulder'd into beauty
many a tower which when it frown'd with all its
battlements, was only terrible.

Mason

There are three great questions which in life we have
over and over again to answer: Is it right or wrong?
Is it true or false? Is it beautiful or ugly? Our
education ought ot help us to answer these questions.

Lubbock, John

Every man feels instinctively that all the beautiful
sentiments in the world weigh less than a single
lovely action.

Lowell, James Russell

Nothing makes a woman more beautiful than
the belief she is beautiful.

Loren, Sophia

Delusions are often functional. A mother's
opinions about her children's beauty, intelligence,
goodness, et cetera ad nauseam, keep her from
drowning them at birth.

Long, Lazarus

My heart that was rapt away by the wild cherry
blossoms -- will it return to my body when they
scatter?

Kotomichi

I'm tired of all this nonsense about beauty being
only skin deep. That's deep enough. What do you want,
an adorable pancreas?

Kerr, Jean

Beauty is truth, truth beauty, that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

Keats, John

Rare is the union of beauty and purity.

Juvenal

Beauty is only skin deep, but it's a valuable
asset if you're poor or haven't any sense.

Hubbard, Kin

Nothing's beautiful from every point of view.

Horace

Plain women know more about men than beautiful
ones do. But beautiful women don't need to know
about men. It's the men who have to know about
beautiful women.

Hepburn, Katherine

The criterion of true beauty is, that it
increases in examination; of false, that
it lessens. There is something, therefore,
in true beauty that corresponds with the
right reason, and it is not merely the
creature of fancy.

Grenville

When a girl ceases to blush, she has lost
the most powerful charm of her beauty.

Gregory I

Beauty is an outward gift which is seldom despised,
except by those to whom it has been refused.

Gibbon, Edward

Ten years of rejection slips is nature's way
of telling you to stop writing.

Geis, R.

The vain beauty cares most for the conquest
which employed the whole artillery of her charms.

Garrett, Edward

Beauty and folly are old companions.

Franklin, Benjamin

There's a difference between beauty and charm.
A beautiful woman is one I notice. A charming
woman is one who notices me.

Erskine, John

Love that has nothing but beauty to keep it in
good health is short lived, and apt to have ague
fits.

Erasmus

A beautiful form is better than a beautiful face;
it gives a higher pleasure than statues or pictures;
it is the finest of the fine arts.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Beauty without grace is the hook without
the bait.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

It seems to me we can never give up longing
and wishing while we are thoroughly alive.
There are certain things we feel to be beautiful
and good, and we must hunger after them.

Eliot, George

It is good that the young are beautiful;
it is the only advantage they have.

Duchess of Windsor

Beauty, like ice, our footing does betray;
Who can tread sure on the smooth, slippery way:
Pleased with the surface, we glide swiftly on,
And see the dangers that we cannot shun.

Dryden, John

Love built on beauty, soon as beauty dies.

Donne, John

The average man is more interested in a woman
who is interested in him than he is in a woman,
any woman, with beautiful legs.

Dietrich. Marlene

Beauty is not caused. It is.

Dickinson, Emily

Champagne is the only wine a woman can drink
and still remain beautiful.

de Pompadour, Madame

Imagination is the one weapon in the war
against reality.

de Gaultier, Jules

There is no cosmetic for beauty like happiness.

Countess of Blessington

Pleasure is to Women what the Sun is to
the Flower; if moderately enjoyed, it
beautifies, it refreshes, and it improves;
if immoderately, it withers, etiolates,
and destroys.

Colton

Let no man value at a little price a virtuous
woman's counsel; her winged spirit is feathered
often times with heavenly words, and, like her
beauty, ravishing and pure.

Chapman

Everything beautiful has its moment and then passes away

Cernuda, Luis

Beauty is unbearable, drives us to despair,
offering us for a minute the glimpse of an
eternity that we should like to stretch out
over the whole of time.

Camus, Albert

Beauty's tears are lovelier than her smile.

Campbell Thomas

In life, as in art, the beautiful moves in curves.

Bulwer-Lytton, Edward Robert

The beautiful seems right by force of beauty,
and the feeble wrong because of weakness.

Browning, Elizabeth B.

Exuberance is beauty.

Blake, William

Beauty, n: the power by which a woman
charms a lover and terrifies a husband.

Bierce, Ambrose

...It's a sort of bloom on a woman. If you
have it you don't need to have anything else;
and if you don't have it, it doesn't much matter
what else you have.

Barrie, James Matthew

Beauty itself is but the sensible image of the Infinite.

Bancroft, George

The beautiful are never desolate, but someone
always loves them.

Bailey

The best part of beauty is that which no
picture can express.

Bacon, Francis

There is no excellent beauty that hath
not some strangeness in the proportion.

Bacon, Francis

Personal beauty is a greater recommendation
than any letter of reference.

Aristotle

Two stones build two houses, three stones
build six houses, four build twenty-four houses,
five build one hundred and twenty houses,
six build seven hundred and twenty houses and
seven build five thousand and forty houses. From
thence further go and reckon what the mouth cannot
express and the ear cannot hear.

Yezirah, Sepher

Knowledge is not achieved until shared.

Unknown

Knowledge may give weight, but accomplishments
give lustre, and many more people see than weigh

Stanhope, Philip D.

The learning and knowledge that we have, is,
at the most, but little compared with that of
which we are ignorant.

Plato

Insurrection of thought always precedes insurrection of arms.

Phillips, Wendell

In expanding the field of knowledge we but
increase the horizon of ignorance.

Miller, Henry

The only good is knowledge, and the only evil is ignorance.

Laertius, Diogenes

If a little knowledge is dangerous, where is
the man who has so much as to be out of danger?

Huxley, Thomas H.

Of all men's miseries the bitterest is this:
to know so much and to have control over nothing.

Herodotus

Much learning does not teach understanding.

Heraclitus

Learning is its own exceeding great reward.

Hazlitt, William

Seldom ever was any knowledge given to keep,
but to impart; the grace of this rich jewel
is lost in concealment.

Hall, Joseph

The one self-knowledge worth having
is to know one�s own mind.

Bradley, F.H.

If thou would'st have that stream of
hard-earn'd knowledge, of Wisdom heaven-born,
remain sweet running waters, thou should'st not
leave it to become a stagnant pond.

Blavatsky, H. P.

He that hath knowledge spareth his words. (Proverbs 17:27)

Bible

I'm not smart, but I like to observe. Millions
saw the apple fall, but Newton was the one who
asked why.

Baruch, Bernard Mannes

If a man will begin with certainties, he will
end in doubts; but if he will be content to
begin with doubts, he will end in certainties.

Bacon, Francis

If a man will begin with certainties, he will
end in doubts; but if he will be content to
begin with doubts, he will end in certainties.

Bacon, Francis

Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body.

Addison, Joseph

There is a point at which even justice does injury.

Sophocles

Justice without force is powerless;
force without justice is tyrannical.

Blaise Pascal

Justice is an unassailable fortress, built
on the brow of a mountain which cannot be
overthrown by the violence of torrents,
nor demolished by the force of armies.

Koran

Fidelity is the sister of justice.

Horace

If we are to keep our democracy, there must
be one commandment: "Thou shalt not ration justice."

Learned Hand

Justice delayed, is justice denied.

William E. Gladstone

We win justice quickest by rendering
justice to the other party.

Mahatma Gandhi

There is no such thing as justice - in or out of court.

Clarence S. Darrow

Justice, sir, is the great interest of man
on earth. It is the ligament which holds
civilized beings and civilized nations together.

Daniel Webster

Justice consists in doing no injury to men;
decency in giving them no offense.

Cicero

He who is only just is cruel. Who on earth
could live were all judged justly?

Lord Byron

Judges must beware of hard constructions and
strained inferences, for there is no worse
torture than that of laws.

Francis Bacon

To be perfectly just is an attribute of the
divine nature; to be so to the utmost of our
abilities, is the glory of man.

Joseph Addison

A child is a gift from God.
He is not an accident or a consequence.

Unknown

Children are the keys of paradise.

Stoddard, Richard

Call not that man wretched, who whatever
ills he suffers, has a child to love.

Southey, Robert

That children link us with the future is
hardly news. . . . When we participate in
the growth of children, a sense of wonder
must take hold of us, providing for us a
sense of future.

Nemiroff, Greta Hofmann

A torn jacket is soon mended; but hard words
bruise the heart of a child.

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth

Children are remarkable for their intelligence
and ardor, for their curiosity, their intolerance
of shams, the clarity and ruthlessness of their
vision.

Huxley, Aldous

It is the malady of our age that the young are
so busy teaching us that they have no time left
to learn.

Hoffer, Eric

Many children, many cares; no children, no felicity.

Bovee, Christian Nestell

A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic.

Stalin, Joseph

The stroke of death is as a lover's pinch,
Which hurts and is desired.

Shakespeare, William

That which is so universal as death must be a benefit.

Schiller, Johann Von

He whom the gods love dies young, while
he is in health, has his senses and his
judgments sound.

Plautus, Titus Maccius

Property is unstable, and youth perishes in
a moment. Life itself is held in the grinning
fangs of Death, Yet men delay to obtain release
from the world. Alas, the conduct of mankind
is surprising.

Nagarjuna

Death, they say, acquits us of all obligations.

Montaigne, Michel De

If you don't know how to die, don't worry;
Nature will tell you what to do on the spot,
fully and adequately. She will do this job
perfectly for you; don't bother your head
about it.

Montaigne, Michel De

It is not death, it is dying that alarms me.

Montaigne, Michel De

Death is delightful. Death is dawn, The waking
from a weary night Of fevers unto truth and light.

Miller, Joaquin

Of all escape mechanisms, death is the most efficient.

Mencken, H.L.

We begin to die as soon as we are born,
and the end is linked to the beginning.

Manilius

The gods conceal from men the happiness of
death, that they may endure life.

Lucan

We look at death through the cheap-glazed
windows of the flesh, and believe him the
monster which the flawed and cracked glass
represents him.

Lowell, James Russell

Dying is like getting out of a car. You
leave a shell behind, but you're the same
person as ever.

Klein

Strange - is it not? - that of the myriads
who Before us passed the door of Darkness
through, Not one returns to tell us of the
road Which to discover we must travel too.

Khayyam, Omar

Pale death, with impartial step, knocks at
the hut of the poor and the towers of kings.

Horace

This man is freed from servile bands,
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall;
Lord of himself, though not of lands,
And leaving nothing, yet hath all.

Herrick, Robert

We sometimes congratulate ourselves at the
moment of waking from a troubled dream;
it may be so at the moment after death.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel

And I hear from the outgoing ship in the bay
The song of the sailors in glee:
So I think of the luminous footprints that bore
The comfort o'er dark Galilee,
And wait for the signal to go to the shore,
To the ship that is waiting for me.

Harte, Bret

Man has the possibility of existence after death.
But possibility is one thing and the realization
of the possibility is quite a different thing.

Gurdjieff

Death is a commingling of eternity with time;
in the death of a good man, eternity is seen
looking through time.

Goethe, Johann Von

The goal of all life is death.

Freud, Sigmund

We do not know what to do with this short life,
yet we yearn for another that will be eternal.

France, Antole

All changes, even the most longed for, have
their melancholy; for what we leave behind
us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one
life before we can enter another.

France, Antole

The The path of immortality is hard, and
only a few find it. The rest await the Great
Day when the wheels of the universe shall be
stopped and the immortal sparks shall escape
from the sheaths of substance. Woe unto those
who wait, for they must return again, unconscious
and unknowing, to the seed-ground of stars, and
await a new beginning.

Divine Pymander

The Few cross the river of time and are able
to reach non-being. Most of them run up and
down only on this side of the river. But those
who when they know the law follow the path of
the law, they shall reach the other shore and
go beyond the realm of death.

Dhammapada

The life of the dead is placed in the memory
of the living.

Cicero

That last day does not bring extinction to
us, but change of place.

Cicero

If there is a sin against life, it consists
perhaps not so much in despairing of life as
in hoping for another life and in eluding the
implacable grandeur of this life.

Camus, Albert

Death, so called, is a thing which makes men weep,
And yet a third of life is passed in sleep.

Byron, Lord

There are five things which no one is able
to accomplish in this world: first, to cease
growing old when he is growing old; second,
to cease being sick; third, to cease dying;
fourth, to deny dissolution when there is
dissolution; fifth, to deny non-being.

Buddha

The mark of your ignorance is the depth of
your belief in in justice and tragedy. What
the caterpillar calls the end of the world,
the master calls a butterfly.

Bach, Richard

Labour not after riches first, and think thou
afterwards wilt enjoy them. He who neglecteth
the present moment, throweth away all that he
hath. As the arrow passeth through the heart,
while the warrior knew not that it was coming;
so shall his life be taken away before he knoweth
that he hath it.

Akhenaton

The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.

Wilde, Oscar

I generally avoid temptation unless I can't
resist it.

West, Mae

If you haven't all the things you want,
be grateful for the things you don't have
that you wouldn't want.

Unknown

Help me to resist temptation, Lord,
especially when I know no one is looking.

Unknown

What is my loftiest ambition? I've always
wanted to throw an egg at an electric fan.

Unknown

I never resist temptation, because I have
found that things that are bad for me do
not tempt me.

Shaw, George Bernard

There are two tragedies in life. One
is to lose your heart's desire. The
other is to gain it.

Shaw, George Bernard

I'm a simple man. All I want is enough sleep
for two normal men, enough whiskey for three,
and enough women for four.

Rosenberg, Joel

Whatever you want too much you can't have,
so when you REALLY want something, try to
want it a little less.

Rosenberg, Joel

Those who flee temptation generally leave a
forwarding address.

Olinghouse, Lane

Lord, grant that I may always desire more
than I accomplish.

Michelangelo

Ambition is a poor excuse for not having
sense enough to be lazy.

McCarthy, Charlie

It's not peace I want, not mere contentment.
It's boundless joy and ecstasy for me.

Kugell

You know, sometimes a man just can't satisfy
all of a woman's desires. Which is why God
invented dental floss.

Kollrack , Susanne

Love and desire are the spirit's wings
to great deeds.

Goethe, Johann Von

Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his
grasp -- or what's a heaven for?

Browning, Robert

Better murder an infant in its cradle than
nurse an unacted desire.

Blake, William

When one door closes another door opens;
but we so often look so long and so regretfully
upon the closed door, that we do not see the
ones which open for us.

Bell, Alexander Graham

what a tangled web we weave when first we
practise to deceive!

Sir Walter Scott

I believed thee true,
And I was blest in thus believing;
But now I mourn that ever I knew
A girl so fair and so deceiving.

Thomas Moore

One who deceives will always find those
who allow themselves to be deceived.

Niccolo Machiavelli

It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver.

La Fontaine, Jean

Distrust all those who love you extremely
upon a very slight acquaintance and without
any visible reason.

Lord Chesterfield

The road goes ever on and on down from
the door where it began. Now far ahead
the road has gone and I must follow if
I can. Pursuing it with weary feet until
it joins some larger way, where many paths
and errands meet -and whither then, I cannot say.

Tolkien, J.R.R.

Fate is not satisfied with inflicting one calamity.

Syrus, Publilius

Immortality--a fate worse than death.

Shoaff, Edgar A.

There is no armor against fate;
Death lays his icy hand on kings.

Shirley, James

Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.

Shakespeare, William

Fate leads the willing and drags along
the unwilling.

Seneca

We may become the makers of our fate when
we have ceased to pose as its prophets.

Popper, Karl

But blind to former as to future fate,
What mortal knows his pre-existent state?

Pope, Alexander

There's someone out there for everyone-even
if you need a pickaxe, a compass, and night
goggles to find them. (L.A. Story)

Martin, Steve

It matters not how straight the gate
How charged with punishments the scroll
I am the master of my fate
I am the captain of my soul.

Henley, William E.

What lies behind us and what lies before
us are tiny matters compared to what lies
within us.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Death and life have their determined
appointments; riches and honours depend
upon heaven.

Confucius

I do not believe in a fate that falls on men
however they act; but I do believe in a fate
that falls on them unless they act.

Chesterton, G.K.

There is no fate that cannot be surmounted by scorn.

Camus, Albert

Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a
matter of choice; it is not a thing to be
waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.

Bryan, William Jennings

Fate is not an eagle, it creeps like a rat.

Bowen, Elizabeth

Destiny: A tyrant's authority for crime and
a fool's excuse for failure.

Bierce, Ambrose

Ability lies in the mind and the heart.
To tell your mind to limit your abilities
and to ignore the calls of your heart is
only disabling yourself.

Unknown

No one knows what he can do until he tries.

Syrus, Publilius

Ability is the art of getting credit for all
the home runs somebody else hits.

Stengel, Casey

Competence, like truth, beauty and contact
lenses, is in the eye of the beholder.

Peter, Laurence J.

Ability hits the mark where presumption
overshoots and diffidence falls short.

Newman, John Henry

From each according to his abilities,
to each according to his needs.

Marx, Karl

Ability wins us the esteem of the true men;
luck that of the people.

La Rochefoucauld, Fran�ois

There is great ability in knowing how to conveal
one's ability.

La Rochefoucauld, Fran�ois

The extraordinary ability of a woman to
forget is not the same as the talent of
a lady not to be able to remember.

Kraus, Karl

When people find a man of the most distinguished
abilities as a writer their inferior while he is
with them, it must be highly gratifying to them.

Johnson, Samuel

A man dies still if he has done nothing,
as one who has done much.

Homer

Skill and confidence are an unconquered army.

Herbert, George

The carpenter is not the best who makes more
chips than all the rest.

Guiterman, Arthur

Reason and the ability to use it are two separate skills.

Grillparzer, Franz

The winds and the waves are always on the side of
the ablest navigators.

Gibbon, Edward

'Tis skill not strength that governs a ship.

 Fuller, Thomas

Education is the ability to listen to almost
anything without losing your temper or your
self-confidence.

Frost, Robert

If they try to rush me, I always say, I've only
got one other speed and it's slower.

Ford, Glenn

Our chief want in life is somebody who
shall make us do what we can.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

People are always ready to admit a man's ability
after he gets there.

Edwards, Bob

The ability to get to the verge without getting
into the war is the necessary art.... If you try
to run away from it, if you are scared to go to
the brink, you are lost.

Dulles, John Foster

If you can't learn to do it well, learn to enjoy
doing it badly.

Brilliant, Ashleigh

Men take only their needs into consideration
never their abilities.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

Ability is of little account without opportunity.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

Ability is commonly found to consist mainly
in a high degree of solemnity.

Bierce, Ambrose

Natural abilities are like natural plants,
that need pruning by study; and studies themselves
do give forth directions too much at large, except
they be bounded in by experience.

Bacon, Francis

Do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow
will be anxious for itself. Let the day's own
trouble be sufficient for the day.

Christ, Jesus

Heaven lent you a soul Earth will lend a grave.

-- Chinese Proverb

Earth took her shining station as a star,
In Heaven's dark hall, high up the crowd of
worlds.

-- Gamaliel Bailey

Fact of the matter is, there is no hip world,
there is no straight world. There's a world,
you see, which has people in it who believe in
a variety of different things. Everybody believes
in something and everybody, by virtue of the fact
that they believe in something, use that something
to support their own existence.

Zappa, Frank

At the core of all well founded belief,
lies belief that is unfounded.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig

A thing is not necessarily true because a
man dies for it.

Wilde, Oscar

To believe is very dull. To doubt is intensely
engrossing. To be on the alert is to live, to be
lulled into security is to die.

Wilde, Oscar

Man can believe the impossible, but can never
believe the improbable.

Wilde, Oscar

We are never deceived; we deceive ourselves.

von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang

Belief is not the beginning but the end of
all knowledge.

von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang

Doubt is not a pleasant condition,
but certainty is absurd.

Voltaire

If you resist reading what you disagree with,
how will you ever acquire deeper insights into
what you believe? The things most worth reading
are precisely those that challenge our convictions.

Unknown

We all live in the protection of certain
cowardices which we call our principles.

Twain, Mark

Most people are bothered by those passages
of Scripture they do not understand, but the
passages that bother me are those I do
understand.

Twain, Mark

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.

Tolstoy, Leo

You believe that easily which you hope for
earnestly.

Terence

The man scarce lives who is not more credulous
than he ought to be. The natural disposition is
always to believe. It is acquired wisdom and
experience only that teach incredulity, and they
very seldom teach it enough.

Smith, Adam

Martyrdom has always been a proof of the
intensity, never of the correctness of a belief.

Schnitzler, Arthur

In all affairs it's a healthy thing now and then
to hang a question mark on the things you have
long taken for granted.

Russell, Bertrand

What we think, or what we know, or what we
believe is, in the end, of little consequence.
The only consequence is what we do.

Ruskin, John

Those who obstinately oppose the most widely
held opinions more often do so because of pride
than lack of intelligence. They find the best
places in the right set already taken, and they
do not want backseats.

Rochefoucauld, Francois

So as this only point among the rest remaineth
sure and certain, namely, that nothing is certain...

Pliny the Elder

A very popular error: having the courage of
one's convictions; rather it is a matter of
having the courage for an attack on one's
convictions.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

One person with a belief is equal to a force
of ninety-nine who have only interests.

Mill, John Stuart

The public demands certainties; it must be
told definitely and a bit raucously that this
is true and that is false. But there are no
certainties.

Mencken, H.L.

You can always pick up your needle
and move to another groove.

Leery, Timothy