You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the struggle for independence.
—Charles Austin Beard
We should remember that it is easy and foolish to sneer at the mistakes or barbarities of remote ages.
—Hermann Hesse
A pessimist sees only the dark side of the clouds, and mopes; a philosopher sees both sides, and shrugs; an optimist doesn't see the clouds at all—he's walking on them.
—Leonard Louis Levinson
Begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life.
—Seneca
I think on-stage nudity is disgusting, shameful and damaging to all things American. But if I were 22 with a great body, it would be artistic, tasteful, patriotic and a progressive religious experience.
—Shelley Winters
Men stumble over pebbles, never over mountains.
—Marilyn French
Life is such a miracle, a series of small miracles. It really is, if you learn how to look at it with the right perspective.
—James Patterson in Suzanne's Diary for Nicholas
Our parents got divorced when we were kids, and it was kind of cool. We got to go to divorce court with them. It was like a game show. My mom won the house and car. We were all excited. My dad got some luggage.
—Tom Arnold
Marriage is a perilous and fearful effort, it seems to me.… It creates pain that it is the only cure for. It is the only comfort for its hardships.… Though we had our troubles, we had them in a true perspective. The universe, as we could see any night, is unimaginably large, and mostly empty, and mostly dark. We knew we needed to be together more than we needed to be apart.
—Wendell Berry
This increasingly intelligent, fast-moving civilization needs to be applying some of its intelligence to things that change slowly.… If we are constantly tending to the immediate, day-to-day problems, we'll lose that sense of the long term, and then we could be really sorry.
—Stewart Brand
A desk is a dangerous place from which to watch the world.
—John le Carre
The only reason that we don't open our hearts and minds to other people is that they trigger confusion in us that we don't feel brave enough or sane enough to deal with. To the degree that we look clearly and compassionately at ourselves, we feel confident and fearless about looking into someone else's eyes.
—Pema Chödrön
Who, being loved, is poor?
—Oscar Wilde
Most advances in science come when a person for one reason or another is forced to change fields.
—Peter Borden
One man's ceiling is another man's floor.
—Paul Simon