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majority malice man manners marriage martyr Marxism materialism maturity means of grace mediaeval medicine meetings memory men mercy metaphor Methodism Middlesex miracles misery missions mistakes mixed metaphors millennium moderation monasticism money morality mother motivation motto mountains multiculturalism Murphy music mysticism
It does not take a majority to prevail ... but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.- Samuel Adams
Because half-a-dozen grasshoppers under a fern make the
field ring with their importunate chink, whilst thousands of
great cattle, reposed beneath the shadow of the British oak,
chew the cud and are silent, pray do not imagine that those
who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field;
that of course they are many in number; or that, after all,
they are other than the little shrivelled, meagre, hopping,
though loud and troublesome insects of the hour.
Edmund Burke. Reflections on the Revolution in France. P.
344.
One man with God is always a majority. -- Incription on the Reformation Monument, Geneva, attibuted to Knox.
Never attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence. Think about it. People aren't out to get you, they're just stupid.- Jane Espenson
If malice or envy were tangible and had a shape, it would be the shape of a boomerang.-Charley Reese
The true measure of a man is the height of his ideals, the breadth of his sympathy, the depth of his convictions, and the length of his patience.
There are two types of people -- those who come into a room and say, 'Well, here I am!' and those who come in and say, 'Ah, there you are.' -
Mutim dan tara ne. Man only ever scores nine out of ten. - Hausa proverb, Nigeria, reflecting an Islamic theology, for only God is perfect.
he test of every religious, political, or educational system is the man that it forms. -- Henri Frederic Amiel
According to Scripture the essence of man consists in this, that he is the image of God. As such he is distinguished from all other creatures and stands supreme as the head and crown of the entire creation. LOUIS BERKOF
Man is a mere phantom as he goes to and fro: He bustles about, but only in vain; he heaps up wealth, not knowing who will get it. Ps. 39:6 NIV
Man is like a breath; his days are like a fleeting shadow. Ps. 144:4 NIV
This autonomy of man, this attempt of the Ego to understand itself out of itself, is the lie concerning man which we call sin. The truth about man is that his ground is not in himself but in God -- that his essence is not in self sufficient reason but in the Word, in the challenge of God, in responsibility, not in self-sufficiency. The true being of man is realized when he bases himself upon God's Word. Faith is then not an impossibility or a salto mortale [mortal leap], but that which is truly natural; and the real salto mortale (a mortal leap indeed!) is just the assertion of autonomy, self-sufficiency, God-likeness. [It is] through this usurped independence [that] man separates himself from God, and at the same time isolates himself from his fellows. Individualism is the necessary consequence of rational autonomy, just as love is the necessary consequence of faith.... Emil Brunner, The Word and The World [1931]
The workings of the human heart are the profoundest mystery of the universe. One moment they make us despair of our kind, and the next we see in them the reflection of the divine image. Charles W. Chesnutt (1858-1932) "The Marrow of Tradition," 1901.
One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than any star. --Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) _Orthodoxy_ [1908], "The Logic of Elfland"
A wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other."--Charles Dickens
The more I love humanity in general the less I love man in particular. In my dreams, I often make plans for the service of humanity, and perhaps I might actually face crucifixion if it were suddenly necessary. Yet I am incapable of living in the same room with anyone for two days together. I know from experience. As soon as anyone is near me, his personality disturbs me and restricts my freedom. In twenty-four hours I begin to hate the best of men: one because he's too long over his dinner, another because he has a cold and keeps on blowing his nose. I become hostile to people the moment they come close to me. But it has always happened that the more I hate men individually the more I love humanity.- Fyodor Dostoevsky "The Brothers Karamazov"
The release of atom power has changed everything except
our way of thinking...............The solution of this
problem lies in the heart of humankind.
Albert Einstein(1879-1955) Speech to US National Commission
of Nuclear Scientists, 24 May 1946
The real problem is in the hearts and minds of men. It is not a problem of physics but of ethics. It is easier to denature plutonium than to denature the evil spirit of man. --Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
It is not enough to understand what we ought to be, unless we know what we are; and we do not understand what we are, unless we know what we ought to be. Thomas Stearns Eliot
I have found little that is good about human beings. In my experience, most of them are trash. - Sigmund Freud (1856 &endash; 1939)
But possibly the most important discovery we have made about ourselves is that Man is a Wild Animal. He cannot be tamed and remain Man; his genius is bound up in the very qualities which make him wild. With this self-knowledge, bleak, stern, and proud, goes the last hope of permanent peace on Earth; it makes world government unlikely and certainly unstable. [...] Not even the H-bomb could change our inner nature. We learned most bloodily that the H-bomb does nothing that the stone axe did not do -- and neither weapon could tame us. Man can be chained but he cannot be domesticated, and eventually he always breaks his chains. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Third Millennium Opens", _Expanded Universe_
Animals can learn, but it is not by learning that they become dogs, cats, or horses. Only man has to learn to become what he is supposed to be. -- Eric Hoffer
We are in danger of developing a cult of the Common Man, which means a cult of mediocrity. -- Herbert Hoover
Man is the only creature in the animal kingdom that sits
in judgment on the work of the Creator and finds it
bad--including himself and Nature.
Elbert Hubbard, _Notebook_
Faults and defects every work of man must have. -- Samuel Johnson: Milton (Lives of the Poets)
Man is a transitory being, and his designs must partake of the imperfections their author. -- Samuel Johnson: Idler #4
Never, never pin your whole faith on any human being: not if he is the best and wisest in the whole world. There are lots of nice things you can do with sand; but do not try building a house on it. --Clive Staples Lewis (1898-1963) _Mere Christianity_ [1952], Book 4, Chapter 7
Mankind, in the gross, is a gaping monster, that loves to be deceived, and has seldom been disappointed. --Henry MacKenzie
For one restraint, Lords of the World besides. John Milton. 1608-1674. Paradise Lost. Book i 32
I have seen no more evident monstrosity and miracle in the world than myself. --Michel Eyquem de Montaigne (1533-1592) _Essays_, Book III [1595], Ch. 11
To know oneself is to disbelieve utopia. MICHAEL NOVAK
What a chimera then is man! What a novelty! What a monster, what a chaos, what a contradiction, what a prodigy! Judge of all things, feeble earthworm, depository of truth, a sink of uncertainty and error, the glory and the shame of the universe. --Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) _Pensees_ [1670], Number 434
Know then thyself, presume not God to scan,
The proper study of mankind is man.
Plac'd on this isthmus of a middle state,
A being darkly wise, and rudely great:
With too much knowledge for the sceptic side,
With too much weakness for the Stoic's pride,
He hangs between; in doubt to act, or rest;
In doubt to deem himself a God, or beast;
In doubt his mind or body to prefer;
Born but to die, and reas'ning but to err;
Alike in ignorance, his reason such,
Whether he thinks too little or too much:
Chaos of thought and passion, all confus'd;
Still by himself abus'd or disabus'd;
Created half to rise, and half to fall;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl'd:
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!
Thus nature gives us (let it check our pride)
The virtue nearest to our vice ally'd:
Reason the byas turns to good from ill,
And Nero reigns a Titus, if he will.
The fiery soul abhorr'd in Catiline,
In Decius charms, in Curtius is divine:
The same ambition can destroy or save,
And makes a patriot as it makes a knave.
This light and darkness in our chaos join'd,
What shall divide? The God within the mind.
That virtue only makes our bliss below;
And all our knowledge is, ourselves to know.
Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man
Everything is good when it leaves the hands of the Creator; everything degenerates in the hands of man. --Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) _Emile; or, On Education_ [1762]
Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people. -- Carl Sagan
We thus know something wonderful about man. Among other
things, we know his origin and who he is --he is made in the
image of God. Man is not only wonderful when he is 'born
again' as a Christian, he is also wonderful as God made him
in His image. Man has value because of who he was originally
before the Fall.
I was recently lecturing in Santa Barbara, and was
introduced to a boy who had been on drugs. He had a
good-looking face, long curly hair, sandals on his feet and
was wearing blue jeans. He came to hear my lecture and said,
'This is brand new, I've never heard anything like this.' So
he was brought along the next afternoon, and I greeted him.
He looked me in the eyes and said, 'Sir, that was a
beautiful greeting. Why did you greet me like that?' I said,
'Because I know who you are --I know you are made in the
image of God.' We then had a tremendous conversation. We
cannot deal with people like human beings, we cannot deal
with them o the high level of true humanity, unless we
really know their origin--who they are. God tells man who he
is. God tells us that He created man in His image. So man is
something wonderful.-Francis A. Schaeffer, Escape from
Reason Chapter 2 The Reformation and Man p 21
The fact that man is fallen does not mean that he has
ceased to bear God's image. He has not ceased to be man
because he is fallen. He can love, though he is fallen. It
would be a mistake to say that only a Christian can love.
Moreover, a non-Christian painter can still paint beauty.
And it is because they can still do these things that they
manifest that they are God's image-bearers or, to put it
another way, they assert their unique 'mannishness' as
men.
So it is a truly wonderful thing that, although man is
twisted and corrupted and lost as a result of the Fall, yet
he is still man. He has become neither a machine nor an
animal nor a plant. The marks of mannishness are still upon
him-love, rationality, longing for significance, fear of
non-being, and so on. This is the case even when his
non-Christian system leads him to say these things do not
exist. It is these things which distinguish him from the
animal and plant world and from the machine.-Francis A.
Schaeffer, Escape From Reason p.89
I love mankind.....It's PEOPLE I can't stand!!........" - LINUS in Peanuts by Charles Schulz
To feel much for others and little for ourselves; to
restrain our selfishness and exercise our benevolent
affections, constitute the perfection of human nature.
Adam Smith (1723-1790)
Without God man has no reference point to define himself. 20th century philosophy manifests the chaos of man seeking to understand himself as a creature with dignity while having no reference point for that dignity. R. C. SPROUL
Our anthropology is intimately bound up with our theology. If God is dead, man is too. If we are not accountable, then we do not count. R. C. SPROUL
Once man ceases to recognize the infinite value of the human soul...then all he can recognize is that man is something to be used. HELMUT THIELICKE
The picture of fallen man as given in Scripture is that he knows God but does not want to recognize Him as God. CORNELIUS VAN TIL
Man never made any material as resilient as the human spirit. --Bern Williams
manners
ASAP = After Someone Asks Politely.
Etiquette tip: More people will get out of your way if you say "I'm gonna puke!" than if you say "Excuse me."
The hardest job kids face today is learning good manners
without seeing any. Fred Astaire 
It is wise to apply the oil of refined politeness to the mechanism of friendship. - Colette (1873-1954)"The Pure and the Impure," ch. 9, 1933; tr. 1966.
Propriety of manners and consideration for others are the two main characteristics of a gentleman.--Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881)
Life is not so short but that there is always time for courtesy. --Ralph Waldo Emerson
Moving parts in rubbing contact require lubrication to avoid excessive wear. Honorifics and formal politeness provide lubrication where people rub together. Often the very young, the untraveled, the naive, the unsophisticated deplore these formalities as "empty," "meaningless," or "dishonest," and scorn to use them. No matter how "pure" their motives, they thereby throw sand into machinery that does not work too well at best. Robert Heinlein
A man's manners are a mirror in which he shows his portrait. -- Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
When once the forms of civility are violated, there remains little hope of return to kindness or decency.-- Samuel Johnson: Rambler #55
Politeness is one of those advantages which we never estimate rightly but by the inconvenience of its loss.-- Samuel Johnson: Rambler #98
Ideological differences are no excuse for rudeness.Judith Martin (1938-____) "Miss Manner's Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior," 1982.
Allowing an unimportant mistake to pass without comment is a wonderful social grace.Judith Martin (1938-____) United Feature Syndicate.
Civility costs nothing, and buys everything. --Lady M. W. Montague
There was a young girl of Connecticut
Who flagged the express with her pecticut.
Which her elders defined,
As presence of mind,
But deplorable absence of ecticut.
Ogden Nash
This is the final test of a gentleman; his respect for those who can be of no possible service to him.-- William Lyon Phelps
...one might wonder why anyone pays attention to people who are so acerbic in their personal presentation style, as to make it difficult to give them a hearing. - Thomas Roche ( with reference to Gary North)
On a cold winter's day, a group of porcupines huddled together to stay warm and keep from freezing. But soon they felt one another's quills and moved apart. When the need for warmth brought them closer together again, their quills again forced them apart. They were driven back and forth at the mercy of their discomforts until they found the distance from one another that provided both a maximum of warmth and a minimum of pain.In human beings, the emptiness and monotony of isolated self produces a need for society. This brings people together, but their many offensive qualities and intolerable faults drive them apart again. The optimum distance that they finally find and that permits them to coexist is embodied in politeness and good manners. Because of this distance between us, we can only partially satisfy our need for warmth, but at the same time, we are spared the stab of one another's quills.--Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)From _Parerga_, Vol II, 413 (4th edition)
The Australian Book of Etiquette is a very slim volume. -- Paul Theroux, The happy isles of Oceania. Paddling the Pacific
Good manners will open doors that the best education cannot. - Clarence Thomas (1948 &endash; )
To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. Voltaire
Marriage is the process of finding out what kind of man your wife would have preferred.
A marriage certificate is just another word for a work permit.
Marriage requires a person to prepare 4 types of
"RINGS":
Engagement Ring
Wedding Ring
SuffeRING
EnduRING
Marriages may be made in heaven, but man is responsible for the maintenance work.
Rich is not how much you have or where you are going or even what you are - rich is who you have beside you.
A man may be a fool and not know it -- but not if he is married.
All men should freely use those seven words which have the power to make any marriage run smoothly: You know dear, you may be right.
My wife says I never listen to her. At least, I think that's what she said.
Son: How much does it cost to get married, Dad?
Father: I don't know son, I'm still paying for it.
Son: Is it true? Dad, I heard that in ancient China, a
man doesn't know his wife until he marries.
Father: That happens everywhere, son, EVERYWHERE!
Love may be blind, but marriage is a real eye-opener.
Nobody will ever win the battle of the sexes. There's too much fraternizing with the enemy.
A successful man is one who makes more money than his wife can spend. A successful woman is one who can find such a man.
There are two times when a man doesn't understand a woman - before marriage and after marriage.
Only two things are necessary to keep one's wife happy. One is to let her think she is having her own way, and the other is to let her have it.
Any married man should forget his mistakes - no use two people remembering the same thing.
Some husbands are living proof that a woman can take a joke.
A woman has the last word in any argument. Anything a man says after that is the beginning of a new argument.
Success in marriage is more than finding the right person. It's becoming the right person
My wife and I were wonderfully happy for 23 years . . . and then we met.
Someone once said that "Marriages are made in heaven"... So is thunder and lightning.
One good turn gets most of the blanket.
Before marriage, a man yearns for the woman he loves. After marriage, the 'Y' becomes silent.
Getting married is very much like going to a restaurant with friends. You order what you want, then when you see what the other fellow has, you wish you had ordered that.
When I was young, I vowed never to marry until I found
the ideal woman.
Well, I found her-but, alas, she was waiting for the ideal
man
Marriage is the process of finding out what kind of man your wife would have preferred.
The only time a woman really succeeds in changing a man is when he's a baby.
Marriage is for life; it just seems longer!
Before marriage a woman is pensive, after marriage, expensive.
Behind every successful man there is a proud wife and surprized mother-in-law.
Adam and Eve had an ideal marriage. He didn't have to hear about all the men she could have married, and she didn't have to hear about the way his mother cooked.
I married Miss Right. I just didn't know her first name was Always.
the second secret of a good marriage is saying what's on
your mind
the first secret is not saying what's on your mind
This is my rule of married life: it's better to be happy than to be right.
Marriage is when a man and woman become as one; the trouble starts when they try to decide which one.
If you want your spouse to listen and pay strict attention to every word you say, talk in your sleep.
If a man is alone in the forest and speaks...and no woman is around to hear him... Is the man still wrong?
After many years of marriage, my wife and I have achieved total sexual compatibility. We both have headaches at night.
I once didn't speak to my wife for a week ... I didn't want to interrupt her!
Man is incomplete until he is married. Then he is finished.
When your wife asks, "Do I look fat?" The correct response is, "Do I look stupid?"
I'm the man of the house. I always have the final word... "Yes, Dear."
Namiji barkono ne. sai a tauna shi a san yajinsa. A
husband is like a pepper. not until you chew do you know how
hot it is.
Hausa proverb, Nigeria.
Don't marry for money; you can borrow it cheaper. -- Scottish Proverb
Marriage is a covered dish. -- Swiss Proverb
A psychiatrist is a fellow who asks you a lot of expensive questions your wife asks for nothing. - Joey Adams
Marriage enlarges the scene of our happiness and of our miseries. A marriage of love is pleasant, of interest, easy, and where both meet, happy. A happy marriage has in it all the pleasures of friendship, all the enjoyments of sense and reason, and, indeed, all the sweets of life.--Joseph Addison
In my house I'm the boss, my wife is just the decision maker. - Woody Allen
In his _Utopia_ his lawe is that the young people are to see each other stark-naked before marriage. Sir William Roper, of Eltham, in Kent, came one morning, pretty early, to my Lord, with a proposall to marry one of his daughters. My Lord's daughters were then both together abed in a truckle- bed in their father's chamber asleep. He carries Sir William into the chamber and takes the Sheete by the corner & suddenly whippes it off. They lay on their Backs, & their smocks up as high as their arme-pitts. This awakened them, & immediately they turned on their bellies. Quoth Roper, I have seen both sides, & so gave a patt on the buttock, he made choice of, sayeing, Thou are mine. Here was all the trouble of the wooeing.--John Aubrey, _Brief Lives_, Sir Thomas More
He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to
fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises,
either of virtue or mischief.
Francis Bacon. 1561-1626. Of Marriage and Single Life.
Wives are young men's mistresses, companions for middle
age, and old men's nurses.
Francis Bacon. 1561-1626. Of Marriage and Single Life.
Marriage is our last, best chance to grow up. Joseph Barth
Keep up you conjugal love in constant heat and vigour. Richard Baxter, A Christian Directory 2.43
A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies. - Prov. 31:10
It is not love that will keep your marriage alive. It is commitment to relationship that will keep your love alive. Ian Bilby
He was happily married - but his wife wasn't. - Victor Borge
He is very fond of me - almost too fond. I could do with less caressing and more rationality. I should like to be less of a pet and more of a friend if I might choose, but i won't complain of that! I am only afraid his affection loses in depth where it gains in ardour. - - Anne Bronte ,The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, p164
Marriage is not just spiritual communion and passionate embraces; marriage is also three meals a day, sharing the workload and remembering to carry out the trash - Joyce Brothers
Husbands are awkward things to deal with; even keeping them in hot water will not make them tender.-- Mary Buckley
The only thing that holds a marriage together is the husband being big enough to step back and see where the wife is wrong. Archie Bunker
I was married by a judge...I should have asked for a jury. - George Burns
It was very good of God to let Carlyle and Mrs Carlyle marry one another and so make only two people miserable instead of four.- Samuel Butler
'You are old,' said the youth, 'and your jaws are too
weak
For anything tougher than suet;
Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak
-
Pray, how did you manage to do it?'
'In my youth,' said his father, 'I took to the law,
And argued each case with my wife;
And the muscular strength that it gave to my jaw,
Has lasted the rest of my life.' - Carroll, Father
William
Madam, we took you in order to have children, not to get advice. ~ Charles XI, King of Sweden 1660-1697 - to his wife
The most happy marriage I can picture would be the union of a deaf man to a blind woman. Coleridge
In the sex-war thoughtlessness is the weapon of the male,vindictiveness of the female. --Cyril Connolly, _The Unquiet Grave_, 1944
Don't go to bed mad...stay up and fight!-- Phyllis Diller
Don't marry the person you think you can live with; marry only the individual you think you can't live without. -- James C. Dobson
The goal in marriage is not to think alike, but to think together. -Robert C. Dodds
What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they are joined for life--to strengthen each other in all labor,to rest on each other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in all pain, to be one with each other in silent, unspeakable memories at the moment of the last parting. --George Eliot
Man's best possession is a sympathetic wife. Euripides. 484-406 B. C. Antigone. Frag 164.
The wife should yield in all things to her lord~ Euripedes 484 BC-406 BC, Electra (415 BC)
All things come to him who mates. F. Scott Fitzgerald
Intelligent women always marry fools ~Anatole France
You can bear your own faults, and why not a fault in your wife? Franklin, Benjamin
Don't you know, that all wives are in the right? It may be you don't, for you are yet a young husband. Benjamin Franklin
I know not which lives more unnatural lives,
Obeying husbands, or commanding wives.
Franklin (1706-1790).
Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards. Benjamin Franklin Poor Richard's Almanack 1738.
For a wife take the daughter of a good mother. --Thomas Fuller
The debate over same-sex marriage, then, is not some
sideline discussion. It _is_ the marriage debate. Either we
win--or we lose the central meaning of marriage. The great
threat unisex marriage poses to marriage as a
socialinstitution is not some distant or nearby slippery
slope, it is an abyss at our feet. If we cannot explain why
unisex marriage is, in itself, a disaster, we have already
lost the marriage ideal. Same-sex marriage would enshrine in
law a public judgment that the desire of adults for families
of choice outweighs the need of children for mothers and
fathers. It would give sanction and approval to the creation
of a motherless or fatherless family as a deliberately
chosen "good." It would mean the law was neutral as to
whether children had mothers and fathers. Motherless and
fatherless families would be deemed just fine.
[...]Meanwhile, _cui bono_? To meet the desires of
whom would we put our most basic social institution at risk?
No good research on the marriage intentions of homosexual
people exists. For what it's worth, the Census Bureau
reports that 0.5 percent of households now consist of
same-sex partners. To get a proxy for how many gay couples
would avail themselves of the health insurance benefits
marriage can provide, I asked the top 10 companies listed on
the Human Rights Campaign's website as providing same-sex
insurance benefits how many of their employees use this
option. Only one company, General Motors, released its data.
Out of 1.3 million employees, 166 claimed benefits for a
same-sex partner, _one one-hundredth of one percent_. --
Maggie Gallagher, "What Marriage Is For", _The Weekly
Standard_, August 4 / August 11, 2003
A wife is a gift bestowed upon man to reconcile him to the loss of paradise. Johann Goethe
I chose my wife, as she did her wedding gown, for qualities that would wear well. --Oliver Goldsmith
Matrimony - the high sea for which no compass has yet been invented. Heine (1797-1856)
I bequeath all my property to my wife on the condition that she remarry immediately. Then there will be at least one man to regret my death.- Heinrich Heine
I came, I saw, SHE conquered. (The original Latin seems to have been garbled.) -- Lazarus Long (Robert Heinlein)
If you want to sacrifice the admiration of many men for the criticism of one, go ahead, get married. Katherine Hepburn
He loves his bonds who, when the first are broke,
Submits his neck into a second yoke.
--Robert Herrick (1591-1674) _Hesperides_ [1648]
Courtship brings out the best. Marriage brings out the rest. - Cullen Hightower
Of all the home remedies, a good wife is the best. -Kin Hubbard
I have learned that only two things are necessary to keep
one's wife happy. First, let her think she's having her way.
And second, let her have it.
Lyndon Johnson
Domestic discord is not inevitably and fatally necessary; but yet it is not easy to avoid. - Samuel Johnson, Rasselas [the princess Nekayah]
To live without feeling or exciting sympathy, to be
fortunate without adding to the felicity of others, or
afflicted without tasting the balm of pity, is a state more
gloomy than solitude; it is not retreat, but exclusion from
mankind. Marriage has many pains, but celibacy has no
pleasures.
Samuel Johnson: Rasselas [from the character Princess
Nekayah]
I am not so much inclined to wonder that marriage is sometimes unhappy, as that it appears so little loaded with calamity; and cannot but conclude that society has something in itself eminently agreeable to human nature, when I find its pleasures so great that even the ill choice of a companion can hardly overbalance them. Samuel Johnson (given to a fictional correspondent) in Rambler #45 (August 21, 1750)
I believe marriages would in general be as happy, and often more so, if they were all made by the Lord Chancellor, upon a due consideration of characters and circumstances, without the parties having any choice in the matter. Boswell: Life of Johnson
He talked of the heinousness of the crime of adultery, by which thepeace of families was destroyed. He said, "Confusion of progeny constitutes the essence of the crime; and therefore a woman who breaks her marriage vows is much more criminal than a man who does it. A man, to be sure, is criminal in the sight of God; but he does not do his wife a very material injury, if he does not insult her; if for instance, from mere wantonness of appetite, he steals privately to her chambermaid. Sir, a wife ought not to greatly resent this. I would not receive home a daughter who had run away from her husband on that account. A wife should study to reclaim her husband by more attention to please him. Sir, a man will not, once in a hundred instances, leave his wife and go to a harlot, if his wife has not been negligent of pleasing.-James Boswell: Life of Johnson
Boswell: "Pray, Sir, do you not suppose that there are fifty women in the world, with any one of whom a man may be as happy, as with any one woman in particular?" Johnson: "Ay, Sir, fifty thousand." -- James Boswell: Life of Johnson
Boswell: "Pray, Sir, do you not suppose that there are fifty women in the world, with any one of whom a man may be as happy, as with any one woman in particular?" Johnson: "Ay, Sir, fifty thousand." -- James Boswell: Life of Johnson
Whoever thinks marriage is a 50-50 proposition doesn't know the half of it. Franklin P. Jones
After marriage, husband and wife become two sides of a coin; they just can't face each other, but still they stay together. Hemant Joshi
Choose in marriage only a woman whom you would choose as a friend if she were a man.- Joubert
The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.-C. G. Jung, (Modern Man in Search of a Soul, 1933)
Marriage is nature's way of keeping us from fighting with strangers. Alan King
A successful marriage is not a gift; it is an achievement. - Ann Landers, 1918 - 2002
She's a lovely person. She deserves a good husband. Marry her before she finds one. Oscar Levant to Harpo Marx upon meeting Harpo's fiancée
Heard an interview with Rev. Robinson this afternoon, and he used a phrase that set my teeth on edge: he referred to partnerships as "life-intentioned." A wonderful weasel word, that: intention. The escape hatch is built right in. It's as if the intention to stay together is equal to the expressed promise to stay together. But it's not. Everyone had a faithless lover who did you wrong, and usually blamed everything but free will. It just happened, you know. Wasn't intending to cheat, but . . . it just happened, okay? Tonight I told my wife that I now regarded our marriage vows not as a solemn promise, but an expression of my intentions. Ever seen those "Bringing Up Father" cartoons where Jiggs flees the house, trailed by a fusillade of rolling pins and frying pans? -- James Lileks, http://www.lileks.com/bleats/archive/03/0803/080703.html
There is no more lovely, friendly and charming relationship, communion or company than a good marriage. -- Martin Luther
The state of matrimony is the chief in the world after religion; but people shun it because of its inconveniences, like one who, running out of the rain, falls into the river. Martin Luther, Table Talk
A marriage without children is the world without the sun. Augustine quoted in Martin Luther, Table Talk
It seems to me that the most delightful walk of life is to be found in a household of moderate means, to live there with an obliging spouse and to be satisfied with little. - Martin Luther DECEMBER 16, 1536, "Table Talk"
Some people claim that marriage interferes with romance. There's no doubt about it. Anytime you have a romance, your wife is bound to interfere. -- Groucho Marx
The husband who wants a happy marriage should learn to keep his mouth shut and his checkbook open. -- Groucho Marx
I never mind my wife having the last word. In fact, I'm delighted when she gets to it. - Walter Matthau (1920 &endash; 2000)
Married happiness is like a tree; it has to grow before you can enjoy its shade. And it doesn't grow if you don't take care of it but run around admiring other plants. It takes many years. If you concentrate your love on a single tree and wait, you can see it grow, and there comes a day when you can lean against it and find coolness in its shade.-Gunnar Mattsson in "The Princess."
My parents died when I was so young, my mother when I was eight, my father when I was ten, that I know little of them but from hearsay. . . He was forty when he married my mother, who was more than twenty years younger. She was a very beautiful woman and he was a very ugly man. . . One of her great friends was Lady Anglesey, an American woman who died at an advanced age not very long ago, and she told me that she had once said to my mother; "You're so beautiful and there are so many people in love with you, why are you faithful to that ugly little man you've married?" And my mother answered: "He never hurts my feelings. --William Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) _The Summing Up_ [1938], Chapter VII
There is a way of transferring funds that is even faster than electronic banking. It's called marriage. - James Holt McGavran
What men, in their egoism, constantly mistake for a deficiency of intelligence in woman is merely an incapacity for mastering that mass of small intellectual tricks...which constitutes the chief mental equipment of the average male. A man thinks that he is more intelligent than his wife because he can add up a column of figures more accurately, and because he understands the imbecile jargon of the stock market, and because he is able to distinguish between the ideas of rival politicians, and because he is privy to the minutiae of some sordid and degrading business or profession, say soap-selling or the law.-- H. L. Mencken
No matter how happily a woman is married, she always hopes that her daughter will grab a better one. H. L. Mencken, _My Life as Author and Editor_, ed. Jonathan Yardley, 1993
Hail wedded love, mysterious law, true source
Of human offspring. John Milton Paradise Lost Line 750
Sleep on,
Blest pair; and O yet happiest if ye seek
No happier state, and know to know no more.
John Milton, Paradise Lost Book IV, 773 - 75
If the marriage relationship reflects/is a symbol for the
relationship between Christ and the church (i.e.
individuals) then there are a lot of "wives" out there who
are saying... "I'm not really in the mood - I have a
headache - Do you really have to do that? - Please don't
touch me there - Sure, I love you... do you really want me
say it every time? - What again tonight?"
Melody Monte
It has been said that a bride's attitude towards her
betrothed can be summed up in three words: Aisle. Altar.
Hymn.
Frank Muir, Upon My Word!
To keep your marriage brimming,
With love in the loving cup,
Whenever you're wrong, admit it;
Whenever you're right, shut up.
Ogden Nash
So I hope husbands and wives will continue to debate and combat over everything debatable and combatable, Because I believe a little incompatibility is the spice of life, particularly if he has income and she is pattable. --Ogden Nash
The secrets of success are a good wife and a steady job. My wife told me. Howard Nemerov (1920 &endash; 1991)
When entering into a marriage one ought to ask oneself: do you believe you are going to enjoy talking with this woman up into your old age? Everything else in marriage is transitory, but most of the time you are together will be devoted to conversation. Friedrich Nietzsche
The difficulties arise when we ask how much this polar complementarity [of the sexes] should be reflected in the structure of social life, both domestic and public. The New Testament (again, and notoriously, in the person of St Paul) assumes that there will be places other than the bedroom in which men and women assume consciously differentiated roles. They will do so in the affairs of the home, in which the wife is to "submit" to her husband (Eph. 5:22ff) as head. They will do so even outside the context of family life, since man is "head" of woman in some sense; in quite another context, when the Church is at worship (I Cor. 11:2ff). In order that St Paul should not be misjudged, we must note--(a) that this relational ordering of male and female presupposes a fundamental generic equality (I Cor. 11:1 ff); and (b) that the "submission" of the wife is a special case of a "submission" of all Christians to one another, and complements a husband's love that is to be expressed in self-sacrifice (Eph. 5:2lff, 25ff). The apostle is not an apologist for male tyranny. ... Oliver O'Donovan (1945- ), "Marriage and the Family," in The Changing World
I require three things in a man: he must be handsome, wealthy, and stupid.- Dorothy Parker
In marriage do thou be wise: prefer the person before money, virtue before beauty, the mind before the body; then thou hast a wife, a friend, a companion, a second self. William Penn
Men are teflon. Women are velcro.-Mike Peters, Mother Goose & Grimm (6/24/01)
If you want your wife to listen to you, talk to another woman. -Bob Phillips
Sola scriptura, sola fide, solum Christus, and you betcha sola my wife! -- JR <cubanito@POL.NET>
When a girl marries, she exchanges the attentions of many men for the inattention of one. Helen Rowland
Before marriage, a man declares that he would lay down his life to serve you; after marriage, he won't even lay down his newspaper to talk to you. - Helen Rowland, 1876 - 1950
Such duty as the subject owes the prince,
Even such a woman oweth to her husband.
William Shakespeare. The Taming of the Shrew. Act iv. Sc.
2.
A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing. George Bernard Shaw
A person's character is but half formed till after wedlock. --Charles Simmons
All men make mistakes, but married men find out about them sooner. -Red Skelton
My advice to you is get married: if you find a good wife you'll be happy; if not, you'll become a philosopher. Socrates (470-399 B.C.)
I would say that the surest measure of a man's or a woman's maturity is the harmony, style, joy, and dignity he creates in his marriage, and the pleasure and inspiration he provides for his spouse. - Benjamin McLane Spock, 1903 - 1998
A great proportion of the wretchedness which has
embittered married life, has originated in a negligence of
trifles. Connubial happiness is a thing of too fine a
texture to be handled roughly. It is a sensitive plant,
which will not bear even the touch of unkindness; a delicate
flower, which indifference will chill and suspicion blast.
It must be watered by showers of tender affections, expanded
by the cheering glow of kindness, and guarded by the
impregnable barrier of unshaken confidence. Thus matured, it
will bloom with fragrance in every season of life, and
sweeten even the loneliness of declining years.
Thomas Sprat (1636-1713)
Marriage: A ceremony in which rings are put on the finger of the lady and through the nose of the gentleman. Herbert Spencer
I have yet to hear a man ask for advice on how to combine marriage and a career. -- Gloria Steinhem
Some pray to marry the man they love,
My prayer will somewhat vary;
I humbly pray to Heaven above,
That I love the man I marry.-
Rose Pastor Stokes (1879-1933), _My Prayer_
He who is without a wife dwells without blessing, life, joy, help, good, & peace. The Talmud, as quoted by Leo Rosten
Marriage has in it less of beauty, but more of safety, than the single life; it hath not more ease, but less danger; it is more merry and more sad; it is fuller of sorrows and fuller of joys; it lies under more burdens, but is supported by all the strengths of love and charity; and those burdens are delightful. Marriage is the mother of the world, and preserves kingdoms, and fills cities and churches, and heaven itself. --Jeremy Taylor
Celibacy, like the fly in the heart of an apple, dwells in perpetual sweetness, but sits alone, and is confined and dies insingularity; but marriage, like the useful bee, builds a house, and gathers sweetness from every flower, and labors and unites into societies and republics, and sends out colonies, and feeds the world with delicacies, and keeps order, and exercises many virtues, and promotes the interest of mankind, and is that state of good to whiGod hath designed the present constitution of the world.--Jeremy Taylor
'Tis strange what a man may do, and a woman yet think him an angel. --William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863) _Henry Esmond_ [1852], Book I, Chapter 7
Never criticize your spouse's faults; if it weren't for them, your mate might have found someone better than you.--Jay Trachman, _One to One_
This is what marriage really means: helping one another to reach the full status of being persons, responsible beings who do not run away from life. -- Paul Tournier
After my marriage she edited everything I wrote. And what is more, she not only edited my works, she edited me. ~Mark Twain
Marriage is like a three-speed gearbox: affection, friendship, love. It is not advisable to crash your gears and go right through to love straightaway. You need to ease your way through. The basis of love is respect, and that needs to be learned from affection and friendship. Peter Ustinov
At the end of a happy marriage to Sidney Hook, Beatrice Webb was asked, "Why was your marriage so happy?" She said, "Sidney takes all the long-term decisions, I take all the unimportant decisions, and I determine which are the long-term decisions." - Beatrice Webb
Ever a various, changeful thing is woman. Vergil
Men always want to be a woman's first love. Women have a more subtle instinct: What they like is to be a man's last romance.--Oscar Wilde
Most marriage failures are caused by failures marrying. Henny (Henry) Youngman
Someone stole all my credit cards, but I won't report it. The thief spends less than my wife.- Henty Youngman
I take my wife everywhere, but she keeps finding her way back.- Henty Youngman
The secret of a happy marriage remains a secret. -Henny Youngman
We always hold hands. If I let go, she shops.- Henty Youngman
Although prepared for martyrdom, I prefer that it be postponed. -- Winston Churchill (1874-1965) P
atriots have toil'd, and in their country's cause
Bled nobly; and their deeds, as they deserve,
Receive proud recompence. We give in charge
Their names to the sweet lyre. The historic muse,
Proud of the treasure, marches with it down
To latest times; and Sculpture, in her turn,
Gives bond in stone and ever-during brass
To guard them, and to immortalize her trust:
But fairer wreaths are due, though never paid,
To those who, posted at the shrine of Truth,
Have fallen in her defence. A patriot's blood,
Well spent in such a strife, may earn indeed,
And for a time ensure to his loved land,
The sweets of liberty and equal laws;
But martyrs struggle for a brighter prize,
And win it with more pain. Their blood is shed
In confirmation of the noblest claim&emdash;
Our claim to feed upon immortal truth,
To walk with God, to be divinely free,
To soar, and to anticipate the skies.
Yet few remember them. They lived unknown
Till persecution dragg'd them into fame,
And chased them up to heaven. Their ashes flew
&emdash;No marble tells us whither. With their names
No bard embalms and sanctifies his song:
And history, so warm on meaner themes,
Is cold on this. She execrates indeed
The tyranny that doom'd them to the fire,
But gives the glorious sufferers little praise.
He is the freeman whom the truth makes free,
And all are slaves beside.
Cowper, The Task
'When I am dead and my body is opened,' she said to those around her, 'ye shall find CALAIS written on my heart'. I should have thought, if anything were written on it, they would have found the words JANE GREY, HOOPER, ROGERS, RIDLEY, LATIMER, CRANMER, AND THREE HUNDRED PEOPLE BURNT ALIVE WITHIN FOUR YEARS OF MY WICKED REIGN, INCLUDING SIXTY WOMEN AND FORTY LITTLE CHILDREN. But it is enough that their deaths were written in Heaven. -- Charles Dickens, _A Child's History of England_ on Queen Mary I of England
I would rather have the whole world against me but know that the Almighty God is with me, be called an apostate but know that I have the approval of the God of glory - Mehdi Dibaj, Iran, from his defence at his trial for apostasy, Dec 1993s
It is more difficult, and it calls for higher energies of soul, to live a martyr than to die one.- Horace Mann (1796-1859) In "Correct Quotes for DOS," WordStar International, 1991.
Let us be perfectly honest. The historical record is indisputable.Marxism means the persecution of Christians, the execution of right wing dissidents, massive slave labor camps, and grinding poverty for countless millions of terrified, muzzled human beings. -- J.R. Nyquist
Marxism has not only failed to promote human freedom, it
has failed to produce food.
John Dos Passos, "Occasions & Protests", 1964
Marxism is the opium of the intellectuals. Edmund Wilson
The best things in life aren't things. -Art Buchwald
The sole perfection which modern civilization attains is a mechanical one; machines are splendid and flawless, but the life which serves them or is served by them, is neither superb nor brilliant, nor more perfect nor more graceful; nor is the work of the machines perfect; only they, the machines, are like gods.- Karel Capek, "Letters from England"
Things are in the saddle,
And ride mankind.
Ralph Waldo Emerson. 1803-1882. Ode, inscribed to W. H. Channing.
Most people seek after what they do not possess and are enslaved by the very things they want to acquire.... Anwar El-Sadat
We talk about the American Dream, and want to tell the world about the American Dream, but what is that Dream, in most cases, but the dream of material things? I sometimes think that the United States for this reason is the greatest failure the world has ever seen. --Eugene O'Neill (1888-1953)
It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly. --Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life, are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind. --Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) _Walden_, "Economy" [1854]
You are only young once, but you can stay immature indefinitely. Flanders Dunbar
Maturity is the capacity to endure uncertainty. John Finley
Maturity is achieved when a person accepts life as full of tension. -Joshua L. Liebman
The secret of eternal youth is arrested development. Alice Roosevelt Longworth
I think age is a very high price to pay for maturity. Tom Stoppard
Use thy duties, as Noah's dove did her wings, to carry thee to the ark of the Lord Jesus Christ, where only there is rest. ISAAC AMBROSE
Neither be idle in the means, nor make an idol of the means. WILLAIM SECKER
There are no men more careful of the use of means than those that are surest of a good issue and conclusion, for the one stirs up diligence in the other. Assurance of the end stirs up diligence in the means. For the soul of a believing Christian knows that God has decreed both. RICHARD SIBBES
Means must be neither trusted nor neglected. JOHN TRAPP
There is something odd in the fact that when we reproduce
the Middle Ages it is always some such rough and
half-grotesque part of them that we reproduce . . . Why is
it that we mainly remember the Middle Ages by absurd things?
. . . Few modern people know what a mass of illuminating
philosophy, delicate metaphysics, clear and dignified social
morality exists in the serious scholastic writers of
mediaeval times. But we seem to have grasped somehow that
the ruder and more clownish elements in the Middle Ages have
a human and poetical interest. We are delighted to know
about the ignorance of mediaevalism; we are contented to be
ignorant about its knowledge. When we talk of something
mediaeval, we mean something quaint. We remember that
alchemy was mediaeval, or that heraldry was mediaeval. We
forget that Parliaments are mediaeval, that all our
Universities are mediaeval, that city corporations are
mediaeval, that gunpowder and printing are mediaeval, that
half the things by which we now live, and to which we look
for progress, are mediaeval.
G K Chesterton {"The True Middle Ages," The Illustrated
London News, 14 July 1906}
A night with Venus means a lifetime with Mercury.
A bartender is just a pharmacist with a limited inventory.
Prov. 17:22 A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.
The those two great medicines: Diet and Self-Control.--Max Bircher (As quoted in Gordon Young's _Doctors Without Drugs_ [1962])
A prudent pharmacist often vends something for your complaint. But wine merchant you do this invariably.~ Thomas Campion 1567-1620 , The Epigrams of Thomas Campion.
The cure for anything is salt water -- sweat, tears, or the sea. Isak Dinesen (1885-1962)
All those who drink of this remedy recover in a short time, except those whom it does not help, who die. Therefore, it is obvious that it fails only in incurable cases. --Galen (circa 100 A.D.)
The Lord created medicines from the earth, and a sensible man will not despise them. ECCLESIASTICUS (38:4)
Half of the modern drugs could well be thrown out of the window, except that the birds might eat them." -Dr. Martin Henry Fischer
All those who drink of this remedy recover in a short time, except those whom it does not help, who die. Therefore, it is obvious that it fails only in incurable cases.--Galen (circa 100 A.D.)
Find that medicine, if you can,
For your decrepit man;
Who would fain his strength renew
Were it but to pleasure you
Robert Herrick, 'To His Mistress'
Leave your drugs in the chemist's pot if you can heal the patient with food. -Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine
Tranquilizers to overcome angst, pep pills to wake us up, life pills to ensure blissful sterility. I will lift up my ears unto the pills whence cometh my help.~Malcolm Muggeridge, New Statesman (Aug 3, 1962)
I was under medication when I made the decision not to burn the tapes. -Richard Nixon, U.S. President
One of the first duties of the physician is to educate the masses not to take medicine.-Sir William Osler (1849 - 1919), Aphorisms from his Bedside Teachings (1961) p. 105
The best of healers is good cheer. Pindar, "Nemean Ode"
A healthy population means a dead pharmaceutical industry. -Hans Reesch, Naked Express Second Witch
When religion was strong and science weak,men looked to magic for medicine; Now,when science is strong and religion weak,men look to medicine for magic.--Thomas Szasz ,_The Untamed Tongue: A Dissenting Dictionary_.
Physicians pour drugs of which they know little, to cure diseases of which they know less, into humans of which they know nothing. -Francois Voltaire (1694-1778)
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings...they did it by killing all those who opposed them.
Meetings are held because men seek companionship or, at a minimum, wish to escape the tedium of solitary duties. They yearn for the prestige which accrues to the man who presides over meetings, and this leads them to convoke assemblages over which they can preside. Finally, there is the meeting which is called not because there is business to be done, but because it is necessary to create the impression that business is being done. Such meetings are more than a substitute for action. They are widely regarded as action. John Kenneth Galbraith , The Great Crash 1929
Meetings are indispensable when you don't want to do anything.- John Kenneth Galbraith
I have left orders to be awakened at any time in case of national emergency, even if I'm in a cabinet meeting. - Ronald Reagan
Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?
Ever stop to think, and forget to start again?
So live that your memories will be part of your happiness.
There are three kinds of memory - good, bad and convenient.
Memory can glean, but never renew. It brings us joys faint as is the perfume of flowers, faded and dried, of the summer that is gone. -- Henry Ward Beecher
Pleasure is the flower that passes; remembrance, the lasting perfume.-Jean de Boufflers, 1738-1815
Of joys departed, not to return, how painful the remembrance. -- Robert Blair
Memory seldom fails when its office is to show us the tombs of our buried hopes.Lady Marguerite Blessington (1789-1849)
Joy's recollection is no longer joy, while sorrow's memory is sorrow still. -- Byron
She glances at the photo, and the pilot light of memory flickers in her eyes. -Frank Deford
Just as loss of memory in an individual is a psychiatric defect calling for a medical treatment, so too any community which has no social memory is suffering from an illness.-- Eerdmans Handbook to the History of Christianity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1977), p. 2.
If the days grow dark, if care and pain
Press close and sharp on heart and brain;
Then lovely pictures still shall bloom,
Upon the walls of memory's room
--Charles Monroe Dickinson (1842-1924)_My Burdens_
Memory is a child walking along a seashore. You never know what small pebble it will pick up and store away among its treasured things.--Pierce Harris
There is a remembrance of the dead, to which we turn even from the charms of the living. These we would not exchange for the song of pleasure or the bursts of revelry. -- Washington Irving
If you don't go far enough back in memory or far enough
ahead in hope, your future will be impoverished.
Art Linkletter (1912-____) From an internet collection of
quotations
When Time who steals our years away
Shall steal our pleasures too,
The mem'ry of the past will stay,
And half our joys renew.
Thomas Moore 1779-1852 , Song. From Juvenile Poems.
Cherish all your happy moments - they make a fine cushion for old age. -- Christopher Morley (1890 - 1957)
ROLL OF HONOUR
When, of a Sunda, Ah sits i mi pew,
Ah sees a list o lads at yance Ah knew,
An then it ardlins seems a day sin last
Ah spooak tiv em, though monny yeears es passed.
There's Dick at war a champion wi t'ploo,
Ti set a rig an furrow straight an true,
An Ben at snickled monny a fine fat hare,
E'll nivver trouble t'keepers onny mair!
'Arry, that oor Sarah used ti cooart,
An Bob at war a dab at ivvry spooart,
When Ah war young, Ah palled on wiv em all,
Bud noo they're nobbut neeams upon t'choch wall.
Q Nicholas An East Yorkshire Anthology
Memory is a great betrayer. --Anais Nin (1903-1977)_The Diary of Anais Nin_, Volume V [1974], "Letter to Geismar" 16 Jan
The popularity of video cameras arises from a simple
misunderstanding. Somehow people have the idea that they
won't mind being old if they can turn on the TV and see what
they were like when they were young. This is not true.
The best memories are ones that have been allowed to evolve
unhindered by documentary proof. I often cheer myself up by
thinking back on my days as a football star.
These recollections would be less thrilling if they were
accompanied by a video showing that I weighed 80 pounds and
spent most of my time on the bench. Memory is better than a
video because it's free and it doesn't work very well.
--David Owen
We do not remember days, we remember moments. - Cesane Pareso
Recollection is the only paradise from which we cannot be turned out. --Johann Richter [Jean Paul] (1763-1825)
We cannot change our memories, but we can change their meaning and the power they have over us. DAVID SEAMANDS
God gave His children memory that in life's garden there might be June roses in December. --Geoffrey Anketell Studdert-Kennedy (1883-1929) _Roses in December_
I remember things that happened sixty years ago, but if you ask me where I left my car keys five minutes ago, that's sometimes a problem. -- Lou Thesz
Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most. Mark Twain
When I was younger I could remember anything, whether it happened or not. -- Mark Twain
In the memory of oppression, oppression peretuates itself. The scar does the work of the wound. That is the real tragedy: that injustice retains the power to distort long after it has ceased to be real. It is a posthumous victory for the oppressors, when pain becomes a tradition. This is the unfairly difficult dilemma of the newly emancipated and the newly enfranchised: an honorable life is not possible if they remember too little, and a normal life is not possible if they remember too much. -- Leon Wieseltier, "Scar Tissue", _The New Republic_, June 5, 1989
"Should old acquaintance be forgot? That depends on how
they behave themselves."
Daily British Whig, Kingston, Ontario 23 July 1869
And when the wind and winter harden
All the loveless land,
It will whisper of the garden
You will understand
OW, Poems (1881) - to Constance
My wife complains I never listen to her...or something like that.
Duke University Medical Center is reporting an unusual occurrence in the Obstetrics department: a child was born with both male and female organs. A penis and a brain. Laffaday, 19 May 1999
Boys will be boys, and so will a lot of middle-aged men. Frank McKinney "Kin" Hubbard
All along one of my complaints was his absence from home, and even worse, his absence when he *was* home--Sonia Johnson, From Housewife to Heretic.
The silliest woman can manage a clever man; but it needs
a very clever woman to manage a fool.
Rudyard Kipling, Plain Tales from the Hills
Complete masculinity and stupidity are often indistinguishable. -- H.L. Mencken
No matter how long he lives, no man ever becomes as wise as the average woman of forty-eight. H. L. Mencken, _My Life as Author and Editor_, ed. Jonathan Yardley, 1993
A bachelor, in my opinion, is only half alive. -- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Men are nicotine-soaked, beer-besmirched, whisky-greased, red-eyed devils. - Carry Nation (1846 &endash; 1911)
Some women want the strong silent type, so they can tell him to shut up and rearrange the furniture. -- P.J. O'Rourke
There are three types of men in the world. One type learns from books. One type learns from observations. And one type just has to urinate on the electric fence himself. -Will Rogers
The real problem is not whether machines think, but whether men do. B.F. Skinner, Contingencies of Reinforcement
Men and girls, men and girls:
Artificial swine and pearls. Gertrude Stein
Male silence is not the same as listening ~Gloria Steinem
Talking with a man is like trying to saddle a cow. You work like hell, but what's the point? -- Gladys Upham
He that hath deserved hanging may be glad to escape with a whipping.-Thomas Brooks
They who truly come to God for mercy, come as beggars, and not as creditors: they come for mere mercy, for sovereign grace, and not for anything that is due. JONATHAN EDWARDS
To argue from mercy to sin is the devil's logic.JAMES
JANEWAY
The quality of mercy is not strain'd,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
T is mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway,
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's,
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,
That in the course of justice none of us
Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy.
William Shakespeare. The Merchant of Venice. Act iv. Sc. 1.
A God all mercy is a God unjust. Edward Young. 1684-1765. Night iv Line 233.
To argue from mercy to sin is the devil's logic.JAMES JANEWAY
The greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learned from others; and it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an intuitive perception of the similarity in dissimilars. s--Aristotle, _Poetics_, 22, 1459a 5-7
John Wesley's conversation is good, but he is never at leisure. He is always obliged to go at a certain hour. This is very disagreeable to a man who loves to fold his legs and talk. --Samuel Johnson, quoted Boswell, _Life of Johnson_. 31 March
How many taps are there on a Methodist bath?
Three: The hot, the cold and the strangely warm Phil
Nevard
It is a pleasure to me to know that I was even born in so sweet a village as Southgate ... Middlesex in general ... is a scene of trees and meadows, of 'greenery' and nestling cottages; and Southgate is a prime specimen of Middlesex. It is a place lying out of the way of innovation, therefore it has the pure, sweet air of antiquity about it... Leigh Hunt, 1850
An acre in Middlesex is better than a principality in Utopia. T. B. Macaulay, 1837
We therefore condemn all who deny a real resurrection of the flesh . . . or who do not have a correct view of the glorification of bodies. We also condemn those who thought that the devil and all the ungodly would at some time be saved, and that there would be and end to punishments . . . .. We further condemn Jewish dreams that there will be a golden age on earth before the Day of Judgement, and that the pious, having subdued all their godless enemies, will possess all the kingdoms of the earth . . . The Second Helvetic Confession, XI
I realize that for postmillenialists, the good old days are in the future. -- G E Veith
The great and Almighty author of nature, who at first
established those rules which regulate the world, can as
easily suspend those laws whenever his providence sees
sufficient reason for such suspension. This can be no
objection, then, to the miracles of Jesus Christ.
John Adams; in his Diary Mar. 1, 1756.; Works II, p.8
Faith in God is less apt to proceed from miracles than miracles from faith in God. -- Frederick Buechner, _Wishful Thinking_, 1971
We must remember that Satan has his miracles, too. John Calvin
I don't believe in miracles - I depend upon them. Raymond Dale
The rejection as unhistorical of all passages which
narrate miracles is sensible if we start by knowing that the
miraculous... never occurs. Now, I do not want here to
discuss whether the miraculous is possible: I only want to
point out that this is a purely philosophical question.
Scholars, as scholars, speak on it with no more authority
than anyone else. The canon, "If miraculous, unhistorical",
is one they bring to their study of the texts, not one they
have learned from it. If one is speaking of authority, the
united authority of all the Biblical critics in the world
counts for nothing. On this they speak simply as men -- men
obviously influenced by, and perhaps insufficiently critical
of, the spirit of the age they grew up in.
C. S. Lewis (1898-1963), "Fern-seed and Elephants"
Misery loves company, but company does not reciprocate.
Misery is caused for the most part, not by a heavy crush
of disaster, but by the corrosion of less visible evils,
which canker enjoyment, and undermine security. The visit of
an invader is necessarily rare, but domestic animosities
allow no cessation.
Samuel Johnson: Journey to the Western Islands of
Scotland
Who is unhappy at not being a king, except a deposed king? All of these miseries of man prove man s greatness. They are the miseries of a deposed king. BLAISE PASCAL
Charles Grant started his campaign for missions in
1786-87. The unbridled religious liberty for missionaries of
all religious shades was wrested from the British Parliament
only in 1833. It took 46 years to force England to allow
Western missions to operate freely in India.
The Missionary Conspiracy: Letters to a Post modern Hindu,
Vishal Mangalwadi, (p. 138, 1st ed.)
So, while the Christian missions received no money from
John Company or the Government until 1858, at least 26,589
Hindu temples were receiving financial support from the East
India Company in the Bombay presidency alone!
The Missionary Conspiracy: Letters to a Post modern Hindu,
Vishal Mangalwadi, (p. 138, 1st ed.)
The British Empire would have been an unqualified evil if the evangelicals had not conspired to inspire the British Christians to see their moral obligation to love India.--The Missionary Conspiracy: Letters to a Post modern Hindu, Vishal Mangalwadi, (p. 139, 1st ed.)
The breadth and depth of [William] Carey's
missionary service [in India] is well illustrated in
the principles laid down for themselves by the Serampore
Brotherhood to be read three times a year in each station in
their charge. Here is a summary:
1. To set an infinite value on men's souls.
2. To abstain from whatever deepens India's prejudice
against the Gospel.
3. To watch for every chance of doing the people good.
4. To preach Christ crucified as the grand means of
conversions.
5. To esteem and treat Indians always as equals.
6. To be instant in the nurture of personal religion.
7. To cultivate the spiritual gifts of the Indian brethren,
ever pressing upon them their missionary obligation, since
only Indians can win India for Christ. ... Hugh Martin,
Great Christian Books
Why is it that some Christians cross land and sea, continents and cultures, as missionaries? What on earth impels them? It is not in order to commend a civilization, an institution or an ideology, but rather a person, Jesus Christ, whom they believe to be unique. This is particularly clear in the Christian mission to the world of Islam. 'Our task', wrote scholarly missionary Bishop Stephen Neill, 'is to go on saying to the Muslim with infinite patience, 'Sir, consider Jesus". We have no other message ... It is not the case that the Muslim has seen Jesus of Nazareth and has rejected him; he has never seen him ...' &emdash;&emdash; John Stott (John Stott, The Incomparable Christ [Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2001],
The history of missions is the history of answered prayer . . . It [prayer] is the key to the whole missionary problem. All human means are secondary. - S.M. Zwemer
Everyone has a right to make mistakes, but you are abusing the privilege.
One good thing about being wrong is the joy it brings to others.
Mistakes are often the stepping stones to utter failure.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three rights make a left.
You always find something in the last place you look.
Learn from the mistakes of others.You won't live long enough to make them all yourself.
The fellow who will never admit he was wrong really is saying he is no smarter now than he used to be.
We all make mistakes, as the hedgehog said as he climbed off the scrubbing brush.
He who makes no mistakes makes nothing.
To err is human. So, what's your excuse! Bazooka Joe
I don't want to make the wrong mistake - Yogi Berra(1925-____)
There is no mistake so great as the mistake of not going on. - William Blake
Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little Burke, Edmund
"You are old," said the youth, "as I mentioned before
And make errors few people could bear;
You complain about everyone's English but yours --
Do you really think this is quite fair?"
"I make lots of mistakes," Father William declared,
"But my stature these days is so great
That no critic can hurt me -- I've got them all scared,
And to stop me it's now far too late."
L Caroll
A man who has committed a mistake and doesn't correct it, is committing another mistake. Confucius
DM: Do you feel you've learnt by your mistakes here?
PC: I think I have, yes, and I think I can probably repeat
them almost perfectly. I know my mistakes inside out.
Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, "The Frog and Peach"
To err is human, to repent divine, to persist devilish.- Benjamin Franklin, 1706 - 1790
An error gracefully acknowledged is a victory won. Gascoigne, Caroline
No man ever became great or good except through many and great mistakes.-- Gladstone
To err is human; to blame it on the other guy is even more human. --Bob Goddard
A man's errors are what make him amiable. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)
It is the true nature of mankind to learn from mistakes, not from example. Fred Hoyle
The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.-Elbert Hubbard
I have betrayed myself with my own tongue; The case is altered. Ben Jonson
Look upon the errors of others in sorrow, not in anger.--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882)
Allowing an unimportant mistake to pass without comment is a wonderful social grace. Judith Martin, "Miss Manners"
Beware of the learned man's error, because he is the most honoured one among the people and because the people follow his error. -- Hazrat Mu'az, Hadith
It is necessary for us to learn from others' mistakes. You will not live long enough to make them all yourself. - Hyman G. Rickover (1900 &endash; 1986)
A life spent in making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.--George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950)_The Doctor's Dilemma_ [1913]
I presume you are mortal, and may err. ~James Shirley 1596-1666 The Lady of pleasure (1637)
We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success. We often discover what will do by finding out what will not do; and probably he who never made a mistake never made a discovery."-Samuel Smiles (1816-1904)
Well, don't worry about it. It's nothing.- Lieutenant Kermit Tyler, Duty Officer at the Shafter Information Center, Hawaii, responds to a report of the radar sighting of 50 warplanes approaching Pearl Harbor at 180 mph on 7 December 1941.
Even if a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.
If you let that sort of thing go on, your bread and butter will be cut right out from under your feet. - Ernest Bevin
Take the bull by the tail and face the situation ~ W.C. Fields
Sometimes a man just has to take the bull by the horns and face the situation. -W. C. Fields
There's no doubt about it, the Jesuits in England are
flying a kite testing the temperature of the water.
I R K Paisley quoted in Christians in Ulster. E Gallagher p
22
It was difficult being a conscientious objector in the 1940s, but I felt I had to stick to my guns. -- Harold Pinter at the Hay-on-Wye Literary Festival
Throw moderation to the winds, and the greatest pleasures bring the greatest pains. Democritus
A thing moderately good is not so good as it ought to be.
Moderation in temper is always a virtue, but moderation
in
principle is always a vice. Thomas Paine The Rights of Man
(1792)
I do not wonder that, where the monastic life is permitted, every order finds votaries, and every monastery inhabitants. Men will submit to any rule, by which they may be exempted from the tyranny of caprice and of chance. They are glad to supply by external authority their own want of constancy and resolution, and court the government of others, when long experience has convinced them of their own inability to govern themselves. Samuel Johnson
Budget: A method for going broke methodically.
It's not hard to meet expenses, they're everywhere.
Money is an article which may be used as a universal passport to everywhere except heaven and as a universal provider of everything except happiness.
If money could talk, it would say goodbye.
All I ask is a chance to prove that money can't make me happy.
I am having an out of money experience.
I have taken a vow of poverty. To annoy me send money.
If money is the root of all evil, why do churches want it so bad?
Don't lend people money, it gives them amnesia.
When money talks, nobody notices what grammar it uses.
If money be not thy servant, it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that may be said to possess him.--- Francis Bacon
I don't care too much for money
Money can't buy me love
The Beatles
Can anybody remember when the times were not hard, and money not scarce? Ralph Waldo Emerson
Nowadays the rage for possession has got to such a pitch that there is nothing in the realm of nature, whether sacred or profane, out of which profit cannot be squeezed.-- Erasmus
The rich who are unhappy are worse off than the poor who are unhappy; for the poor, at least, cling to the hopeful delusion that more money would solve their problems -- but the rich know better. -- Sydney J. Harris
Put not your trust in money; but, rather, put your money in trust. Oliver Wendell Holmes
The safest way to double your money is to fold it over once and put it in your pocket. Frank McKinney Hubbard
A man may be a tough, concentrated, successful money-maker and never contribute to his country anything more than a horrible example. - Sir Robert Menzies (1894 &endash; 1978)
Antichrist is Mammon's son. - JOHN MILTON
There are many things that money can't buy, but it's very funny -- Have you ever tried to buy them _without_ money? -- Ogden Nash
If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to. Dorothy Parker
Cheque enclosed are the two most beautiful words in the English language --Dorothy Parker
The buck stopped before it got here. Bob Phillips
The lust of lucre has so thoroughly seized upon mankind that their wealth seems rather to possess them, than they to possess their wealth. --Pliny, "Letters"
I believe the power to make money is a gift of God...to be developed and used to the best of our abiblity for the good of mankind. Having been endowed with the gift I possess, I believe it is my duty to make money and still more money, and to use the money I make for the good of my fellow man according to the dictates of my conscience. --John D. Rockefeller, Sr, in Matthew Josephson, _The Robber Barons_
Misers are no fun to live with but they make great ancestors.--Tom Snyder
His money is twice tainted: 'taint yours and 'taint mine. Mark Twain
O cursed lust for gold,
To what dost thou not drive the heart of man?
Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro) (70-19BC).
He who is void of virtuous attachments in private life is, or very soon will be, void of all regard for his country. There is seldom an instance of a man guilty of betraying his country, who had not before lost the feeling of moral obligations in his private connections. Samuel Adams, letter to James Warren, Nov. 4, 1775
A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader...if virtue and knowledge are diffused among the people, they will never be enslaved. This will be their great security.--Samuel Adams
Of course my standards are out of date! That's why they're called standards. - Alan Bennett
The greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and legislation.-- Jeremy Bentham
Morals today are corrupted by our worship of riches. - Cicero
Morality and immorality are not defined by man's changing attitudes and social customs. They are determined by the God of the universe, whose timeless standards cannot be ignored with impunity. Dr. James Dobson
Values imparted by the reigning culture have now received
the sanction of the state. This is reflected in the
distribution of condoms in schools, in the prohibition of
school prayer, in the official rhetoric--"nonmarital
childbearing" or "alternative lifestyle"--and in other
ways.
It takes a great effort for the individual to decide that
something is immoral and to act on that belief when the law
declares it legal and the culture deems it acceptable.
--Gertrude Himmelfarb _The De-Moralization of Society_
The foundation of all morality is to have done, once and for all, with lying; to give up pretending to believe that for which there is no evidence, and repeating unintelligible propositions about things beyond the possibilities of knowledge-- Thomas Henry Huxley
The rules of morality are not the conclusion of our reason. David Hume in F A Hayek, The Fatal Conceit.
Morality cannot be legislated but behavior can be regulated. Judicial decrees may not change the heart, but they can restrain the heartless.-Martin Luther King, Jr.
No man in the world acts up to his own standard of right. --T. B. Macaulay, _Hallam_, 1828 (Edinburgh Review, Sept.)
'... belief in survival after death - the individual survival of John Smith, still conscious of himself as John Smith - is enormously less widesread than it was. Even among professing Christians it is probably decaying: other people, as a rule, don't even entertain the possibility that it might be true. ... There is little doubt that the modern cult of power worship is bound up with the modern man's feeling that life here and now is the only life there is. ... I would say that the decay of belief in personal immortality has been as important as the rise of machine civilization. ... I do not want the belief in life after death to return.... What I do point out is that its disappearance has left a big hole, and that we ought to take notice of that fact. ... [Mankind] is not likely to salvage civilization unless he can evolve a system of good and evil which is independent of heaven and hell.-George Orwell, 'As I Please' 3 March 1944
The weakling and the coward cannot be saved by honesty alone; but without honesty, the brave and able man is merely a civic wild beast who should be hunted down by every lover of righteousness. No man who is corrupt, no man who condones corruption in others, can possibly do his duty by the community. Theodore Roosevelt, "The Eighth and Ninth Commandments in Politics" _Outlook_ (May 12, 1900)
My show is not about mental health, It's about moral health. I don't give advice. I give my never-to-be-humble opinion -- Laura Schlessinger
Modesty is the proof morality is sexy. -- Wendy Shallit
The nations morals are like its teeth, the more decayed they are the more it hurts to touch them. George Bernard Shaw
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 should spoil the lives of better and simpler people. --Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)_Across the Plains_ [1892], "Lay Morals"
A person educated in mind and not in morals is a menace to society. --Juanita Kidd Stout (1919- )
The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his
intellectual superiority to other creatures; but the fact
that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any
creature that cannot.
Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens), What Is Man?(1906)
Our society is afflicted with the scourge of AIDS and other diseases that owe their origin to promiscuity. Yet the cry is not, "How can we stop promiscuity?" but rather, "How can we cure AIDS?" --Terry Virgo _Men Of Destiny_ [1987], "Blessed Are Those Who Mourn"
Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. Washington
This country has spent about 30 years trying very hard to prove that no one, not even children, should be fettered by anyone else's idea of proper behavior. Now we have no norms. Or at least none that we hold in common. Are we happy yet? The Wall Street Journal, editorial, 1999
What is morality in any given time or place? It is what the majority then and there happen to like, and immorality is what they dislike. Alfred North Whitehead
There is no way to be a perfect mother, and a million ways to be a good one. Jill Churchill, Grime & Punishment (Bantam)
Any mother could perform the jobs of several air traffic controllers with ease (Lisa Alther)
There was once a dog who boasted to his canine friends
that he could run faster than anyone. One day he chased a
rabbit and failed to catch it. His friends ridiculed
him.
"All right," said the dog, "I did not make good on my boast.
But remember, the rabbit was running for his life and I was
only running for my dinner."
Incentive is all-important in motivation. -- Cited in The
Best of BITS & PIECES
Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else tries to light that fireunder you, chances are it will burn very briefly.-Stephen R. Covey (1932 - ____) US consultant, author
Great minds have purposes, others have wishes.--Washington Irving
Actions are visible, though motives are secret.- Samuel Johnson: Lives of the Poets (Cowley)
Inquiries into the heart are not for man. - Samuel Johnson: Dryden (Lives of the Poets)
No, Sir; to act from pure benevolence is not possible for
finite beings. Human benevolence is mingled with vanity,
interest, or some other motive.
Samuel Johnson (Boswell: Life of Johnson
We are all prompted by the same motives, all deceived by the same fallacies, all animated by hope, obstructed by danger, entangled by desire, and seduced by pleasure. -- Samuel Johnson: Rambler #60
Look out for #1. Don't step in #2 either.
The Lawyer's Motto: "Insofar as manifestations of functional deficiencies are agreed by any and all concerned parties to be imperceivable, and are so stipulated, it is incumbent upon said heretofore mentioned parties to exercise the deferment of otherwise pertinent maintenance procedures." In other words: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."
Great things are done when men and mountains meet;
This is not done by jostling in the street.
William Blake, "Gnomic Verses"
Then the idiot who praises, with enthusiastic tone,
All centuries but this, and every country but his
own....
W. S. Gilbert, _The Mikado; or, The Town of Titipu"
Not one of the multicultural classicists really wishes to live under indigenous pre-Colombian ideas of government, Arabic protocols for female behavior, Chinese canons of medical ethics, Islamic traditions of church and state, African approaches to science, Japanese ideas of race, Indian social castes, or Native American notions of private property.-- Victor Davis Hanson, John Heath, _Who Killed Homer? : TheDemise of Classical Education and the Recovery of Greek Wisdom_
I'm an unrestrained enthusiast for restraint. I would hope we could act in a more cautious, moderate way. But I think in our culture there is the assumption of universalism, the assumption that everyone else in the world is basically like us in terms of culture and values. If they are not like us, they want to become like us. And if they don't want to become like us, then there is something wrong with them. They don't understand their true interests, and we have to persuade them to want to become like us. That's a most unfortunate set of assumptions on our part, and it underlies a lot of what we do. We're going to have to get used to living in a world where there are different cultures, different civilizations, different values and priorities. There may be some sort of convergence, but only over a very long period of time. -- Samuel Huntington
Barbarian invasions would be superfluous: We are our own Huns. -- Bertrand de Jouvenal
In place of the old beliefs of a civilization based on godliness, judgment and historical loyalty, young people are given the new beliefs of a society based on equality and inclusion, and are told that the judgment of other lifestyles is a crime. ... The "non-judgmental" attitude towards other cultures goes hand-in-hand with a fierce denunciation of the culture that might have been one's own -...Roger Scruton, The West and the Rest, ISI Books, 2002 p81
What "multiculturalism" boils down to is that you can praise any culture in the world except Western culture -- and you cannot blame any culture in the world except Western culture.~ Thomas Sowell
If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe, then someone will do it.-Edward A. Murphy, Jr.
Nothing is as easy as it looks.
Everything takes longer than you think.
If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.
If there is a worse time for something to go wrong, it will happen.
If anything simply cannot go wrong, it will anyway.
If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which a procedure can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way, unprepared for, will promptly
.Left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse.
If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something.
Nature always sides with the hidden flaw.
Mother nature is a bitch.
It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious.
Whenever you set out to do something, something else must be done first.
Every solution breeds new problems.
Bare feet magnetise sharp metal objects so they point upward from the floor -- especially in the dark.
Shake and shake
The catsup bottle,
None will come,
And then a lot'll.
There are two types of dirt: the dark kind, which is attracted to light objects, and the light kind, which is attracted to dark objects.
If I travelled to the end of the rainbow
As Dame Fortune did intend,
Murphy would be there to tell me
The pot's at the other end.
Shin: A device for finding furniture in the dark.
There is always one more imbecile than you counted on.
In 1949, George Nichols, project manager with the Californian aviation firm, Northrop, heard his colleague, Captain E. Murphy, of Wright Field Aviation Laboratory, claim: If anything can go wrong, it will...
The other line moves faster.-- Ettore's Observation
Anything dropped in the bathroom falls in the toilet. -- Flucard's Corollary
Enough research will tend to support your theory. - Murphy's Law of Research
Anything that can go wrong, will -Larry Niven ,Finagle's Law of Dynamic Negatives,
Nothing is impossible for those who don't have to do it. -From Murphy's Laws of Combat
Reporter: What do you think of Stainer's Crucifixion?
Music critic: Good idea
How do you know when it's time to tune your bagpipes?
Musicians duet better.
Who is he bearing the sense of a man which is not ashamed toende the day without the singing of Psalms, seeing even the littlebirds with solemne devotion of sweet notes do both begin and end thedaie.-- Ambrose, Praise of Musicke
Twentieth century music is like paedophilia. No matter how persuasively and persistently its champions urge their cause, it will never be accepted by the public at large, who will continue to regard it with incomprehension, outrage and repugnance.-- Kingsley Amis
The aim and final end of all music should be none other than the glory of God and the refreshment of the soul. If heed is not paid to this, it is not true music but a diabolical bawling and twanging. J. S. Bach
There is nothing to it,. You only have to hit the right
notes at the right time and the instrument plays itself.
J S Bach Of the Organ, in K Geiringer, The Bach Family,
1954
An agreeable harmony for the honour of God and the
permissible delights of the soul.
J S Bach's definition of music, in Derek Watson, Music
Quotations, 1911
Madam, you have between your legs an instrument capable
of giving pleasure to thousands - and all you can do is
scratch it.
Sir Thomas Beecham to a lady cellist during a rehearsal
When we sing, 'All we like sheep have gone astray', might
we, please, have a little more regret and a little less
satisfaction? -
Sir Thomas Beecham while rehearsing for a performance of
Messiah; Beecham stopped the proceedings and addressed the
choir.
'Have you heard any Stockhausen?' Sir Thomas Beecham was asked. 'No,' he replied, 'but I believe I have trodden in some.'
Handel is the greatest composer who ever lived. I would bare my head and kneel at his grave. - Ludwig van Beethoven, 1770 - 1827
If Bach is not in Heaven, I am not going! - William F. Buckley
When music fails to agree to the ear, to soothe the ear and the heart and the senses, then it has missed its point.... Maria Callas
In truth we know by experience that song has great force and vigour to move and inflame the hearts of men to invoke and praise God with a more vehement and ardent zeal.- John Calvin (1509-64)
Musicke doth withdraw our mindes from earthly cogitations, lifteth up our spirits into heaven, maketh them light and celestial. --. John Chrysostom
Music hath charm to soothe a savage breast,
To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.
William Congreve(1670 &endash; 1729)
If one were asked to name one musician who came closest to composing without human flaw, I suppose general consensus would choose Johann Sebastian Bach. - Aaron Copland, 1900 - 1990
As from the pow'r of sacred lays
The spheres began to move,
And sung the great Creator's praise
To all the bless'd above;
So when the last and dreadful hour
This crumbling pageant shall devour,
The trumpet shall be heard on high,
The dead shall live, the living die,
And music shall untune the sky.
JOHN DRYDEN (1631-1700) A SONG FOR ST. CECILIA'S DAY,
1687
Mozart's music is so pure and beautiful that I see it as a reflection of the inner beauty of the universe.--Albert Einstein (1879-1955) (In Armin Hermann's _Albert Einstein_ [1994])
Music is the wine that fills the cup of silence. - Robert Fripp (1946 &endash; )
Bach almost persuades me to be a Christian. -- Roger Fry
Bach is a colossus of Rhodes, beneath whom all musicians pass and will continue to pass. Mozart is the most beautiful, Rossini the most brilliant, but Bach is the most comprehensive: he has said all there is to say. If all the music written since Bach's time should be lost, it could be reconstructed on the foundation which Bach laid.- Charles Gounod
I did think I did see all Heaven before me and the great God himself. - Handel about the composition of the Messiah
I occasionally play works by contemporary composers and for two reasons. First, to discourage the composer from writing any more, and secondly, to remind myself how much I appreciate Beethoven. -- Jascha Heifetz
He did not see any reason why the devil should have all the good tunes.- E. W. Broome quoting Rowland Hill (1744-1833)
Her singing was mutiny on the high Cs. -- Hedda Hopper ((1890-1966)
Far too noisy, my dear Mozart. Far too many notes.-Emperor Joseph II on the première of 'The Marriage of Figaro', 1 May 1786.
Beautiful music is the art of the prophets that can calm the agitations of the soul; it is one of the most magnificent and delightful presents God has given us. --Martin Luther (1483-1546)
Music makes people kinder, gentler, more staid and
reasonable. The devil flees before the sound of music almost
as much as before the word of God.
Martin Luther
Nothing on earth is so well-suited to make the sad merry, the merry sad, to give courage to the despairing, to make the proud humble, to lessen envy and hate, as music. Martin Luther
Next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world. MARTIN LUTHER
Of all the noises known to man, opera is the most expensive. - Jean-Baptiste Moliere (1622 &endash;1673)
Ahh, the soothing o' the Pipes... Whenever I find myself missing its melodious sounds, I just toss the cat in the dryer on low heat... Jordan Montgomery
I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to. Elvis Presley (1935-1977)
When Handel's servant used to bring him his chocolate in the morning, "he often stood silent with astonishment to see his master's tears mixing with he ink as he penned his divine compositions." And Burgh relates that "A friend, calling upon the great musician when in the act of setting those pathetic words, 'He was despised and rejected of men,' found him absolutely sobbing.---William Rockstro, _The Life of George Frederick Handel_, 1883
Is it not strange that sheep's guts should hale souls out of men's bodies? ~W.S., Much Ado About Nothing II,iii (1598)
The only winner in the War of 1812 was Tchaikovsky. - Solomon Short
Glorious the song, when God's the theme. - Cristopher Smart (1722-71)
If I were to begin life again, I would devote it to music. It is the only cheap and unpunished rapture upon earth. Sydney Smith 1771-1845
The Church knew what the Psalmist knew: music praises God. Music is as well, or better, able to praise Him than the building of a church and all its decoration; it is the Church's greatest ornament.... Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)
The joy of the heart begets song.--The Talmud
The significant thing is that rationalistic, humanistic man began by saying that Christianity was not rational enough. Now he has come around in a wide circle and ended as a mystic -- though a mystic of a special kind. He is a mystic with nobody there. The old mystics always said that there was somebody there, but the new mystic says that does not matter, because faith is the important thing. It is faith in faith, whether expressed in secular or religious terms. The leap is the thing and not the terms in which the leap is expressed. The verbalization -- i.e., the symbol systems -- can change; whether the systems are religious or nonreligious and whether more radical or more conservative religious terms are used, whether they use one word or another is incidental. Modern man is committed to finding his answer upstairs, by a leap away from rationality and away from reason. -- Francis Schaeffer "Upper Story Experiences," Chapter 3, _Escape From Reason_.