Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
all religions seem alike to me, one mass of absurdities and lies - I know that there is a God, but I know no more of him; and I believe that all those are liars who pretend to know more than I do.
The less manifest the work, the stronger: as though a secret law demanded it always be hidden in what it shows, thus showing what must remain hidden, only showing it, in the end, by dissimulation.
Who's more likely to succeed - someone with high skill and no ambition, or no skill and high ambition? If you're an entrepreneur, you can hire as many skilled people for your business as you want.
A good teacher always refuses to have disciples! Let everyone goes his own way, in his own path instead of following others! If the direction is correct, there will be a meeting in the same place!
I can understand how someone might read wearing a blonde wig as a desire to be white, but I suspect that the same shaming smirk can happen if you wear a big afro or any number of other hairstyles.
Love and pain are not the same. But sometimes it feels like they should be. Love is put to test everyday. Pain is not. Yet the two of them are inseparable because true love cannot bear separation.
Everybody you work with has their own voice, and if you do your job well enough, even their closest friends or their partner of 40 years isn't going to recognise the fingerprints of a ghostwriter.
Vice leaves repentance in the soul, like an ulcer in the flesh, which is always scratching and lacerating itself; for reason effaces all other griefs and sorrows, but it begets that of repentance.
I see several animals that live so entire and perfect a life, some without sight, others without hearing: who knows whether to us also one, two, or three, or many other senses, may not be wanting?
It is a stupid presumption to go about despising and condemning as false anything that seems to us improbable; this is a common fault in those who think they have more intelligence than the crowd.
In the first place, I'm pretty thorough about whom I choose. I instinctively look for the kind of actor who is going to be trusting. There are all kinds of insecure people out there called actors.
Sin is more than turning our backs on God - it is turning our backs on life! Immorality is much more than adultery and dishonesty: it is living drab, colorless, dreary, stale, unimaginative lives.
If your book is set in the plantation days of the slave-owning South and you write a little romance between two slave owners without acknowledging the system they live, that's a political gesture.
My characters are all "just people" - people you might know - and the things that happen are things that anybody might do if they lived on a freighter that spent most of its time in the Deep Dark.
Most writers are secretly worried that they're not really writers. That it's all been happenstance, something came together randomly, the letters came together, and they won't coalesce ever again.
Of course, individuals are responsible for individual actions - the pilots who flew over Pearl Harbor and dropped bombs on those ships did a terrible thing as part of an attack on a military base.
Every word is an adamantine shell which encloses a great explosive force. To discover its meaning you must let it burst inside you like a bomb and in this way liberate the soul which it imprisons.
True teachers use themselves as bridges over which they invite their students to cross; then, having facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse, encouraging them to create bridges of their own.
I like to have memories of a place. It brings something extra. I'm not even sure what it is. I mean, it's the same part of it as I like using friends in small parts or people I know or my doorman.
I guess I'm interested in people who are very sophisticated in intellectual ways, while being completely off the mark in emotional ones, with these huge blind spots in terms of their own behavior.
There is this difference between the grief of youth and that of old age; youth's burden is lightened by as much of it as another shares; old age may give and give, but the sorrow remains the same.
The best art is about individualism, free self-expression and realising a unique, imaginative perspective- A true artist takes no notice whatever of the public. The public are to him non-existent.
It is a very poor consolation to be told that the man who has given one a bad dinner, or poor wine, is irreproachable in private life. Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees.
The 19thc hatred of Realism is Caliban's enraged reaction to seeing his own face in the mirror. The 19thc rejection of Romanticism is Caliban's fury at not seeing his face reflected in the mirror.
And, as for what is called improving conversation, that is merely the foolish method by which the still more foolish philanthropist feebly tries to disarm the just rancour of the criminal classes.
To trust God when we have securities in our iron chest is easy, but not thankworthy; but to depend on him for what we cannot see, as it is more hard for man to do, so it is more acceptable to God.
While not exactly disgruntled, he was far from feeling gruntled. He spoke with a certain what-is-it in his voice, and I could see that, if not actually disgruntled, he was far from being gruntled.
The cosy glow which had been enveloping the Duke became shot through by a sudden chill. It was as if he had been luxuriating in a warm shower bath, and some hidden hand had turned on the cold tap.
He sighed. " I don't think an apology will do, Mercy. Because an apology implies that you wouldn't do it again. And, under the circumstances, you wouldn't do anything differently, would you?" "No.
It's one thing to not want an evil-sorcerer type villain in your story, but it's another thing to avoid having any sort of antagonist at all. A story without an antagonist gets weird pretty quick.
The pleasure of writing fiction is that you are always spotting some new approach, an alternative way of telling a story and manipulating characters; the novel is such a wonderfully flexible form.
Nature supplies the game of chess with its implements; science with its system; art with its aesthetic arrangement of its problems; and God endows it with its blessed power of making people happy.
I was a public affairs officer. I worked with the media, but I didn't just stay at my desk. I assisted in military duties, travelled around Anbar province, hung out with a wide variety of Marines.
It is not the simple statement of facts that ushers in freedom; it is the constant repetition of them that has this liberating effect. Tolerance is the result not of enlightenment, but of boredom.
The ultimate proof of total forgiveness takes place when we sincerely petition the Father to let those who have hurt us off the hook—even if they have hurt not only us, but also those close to us.
I'm drawn in some strangely natural way to immersing myself in a milieu whose rules I don't understand, where there are things you can't access simply by being intelligent or doing well in school.
We seem to want mass production, but we must remember that men are individuals not to be satisfactorily dealt with in masses, and the making of men is more important than the production of things.
It was at a big swap meet that I discovered you could buy other people's old discarded family photos and vacation pictures for pretty cheap - a quarter, 50 cents, five bucks for a really nice one.
Love. Fall in love and stay in love. Write only what you love, and love what you write. The key word is love. You have to get up in the morning and write something you love, something to live for.
I know you've heard it a thousand times before. But it's true - hard work pays off. If you want to be good, you have to practice, practice, practice. If you don't love something, then don't do it.
We are entering an era of heightened disaster, thanks to climate change. Being prepared for disaster will mean being prepared to sift truth from rumour, and being prepared to adjust our worldview.
Take this one in my belly. He (or she) is determined to be here. I can feel the force of his being. It's as if he has something to do here and just wants to arrive and grow up so he can get to it.
If you want to meet someone who can fix any situation you don't like, who can bring you happiness in spite of what other people say or believe, look in a mirror, then say this magic word: 'Hello.'
Individuals somehow are led to find my books at times that are important to them. The mail that I get very, very often will say, "I was at a difficult time in my life, and someone gave me a copy."
The Ploughmen is part inspired fever-dream, part adventure story, a lyric parable of not just goodand evil but of the vast and beautiful and often lonely country in-between. Kim Zupan is a wonder.
Language is decanted and shared. If only one person is left alive speaking a language - the case with some American Indian languages - the language is dead. Language takes two and their multiples.
Look wide, beyond your immediate surroundings and limits, and you see things in their right proportion. Look above the level of things around you and see a higher aim and possibility to your work.
Yet one more item is needed to complete success, and that is the rendering of service to others in the community. Without this the mere satisfaction of selfish desire does not reach the top notch.
There is no indisputable proof for the big bang," said Hollus. "And there is none for evolution. And yet you accept those. Why hold the question of whether there is a creator to a higher standard?
When I was a child, I spoke like a child. When I was an adult, I no longer spoke like a child. When I became old and wise, I spoke again like a child. I wish I had spoken all my life like a child.