
“If I were a tree, I would have no reason to love a human.”
The Raven Cycle Series, The Raven Boys (2012)
“If I were a tree, I would have no reason to love a human.”
The Raven Cycle Series, The Raven Boys (2012)
“A ship is safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for.”
Attributed without citation in Gary Ninneman, C.I.A.: Church in Atrophy (Xulon Press, 2006), p. 167. This is possibly a confusion with John Augustus Shedd.
“Formal education will make you a living. Self-education will make you a fortune.”
“A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.”
I Never Had It Made (1972) by Robinson, as told to Alfred Duckett; excerpted in "Why 'I Never Had It Made': Jackie Robinson's Own Story," http://www.mediafire.com/view/bkybh5wfo9zf32o Newsday (November 5, 1972)
“I would rather die of passion than of boredom”
Not by van Gogh, but from Emile Zola's novel The Ladies' Paradise (1883)
Misattributed
“Dead people receive more flowers than the living ones because regret is stronger than gratitude.”
Source: Unsourced
Source: Poem "The Road Not Taken"
Context: Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
“In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity”
“Be Yourself. Everyone Else Is Already Taken.”
Anonymous advertising copywriter for Menards chain of hardware stores (2000), according to Quote Investigator http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/01/20/be-yourself
Misattributed
“Silence is deep as Eternity, speech is shallow as Time.”
“Life is to be lived, not controlled.”
“Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.”
“To accomplish great things we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.”
Variant: To accomplish great things, we must dream as well as act.
Source: Discours de réception, Séance De L'académie Française (introductory speech at a session of the French Academy), 24th December 1896, on Ferdinand de Lesseps' work on the Suez Canal.
Context: To accomplish great things we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.
“Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it's always your choice.”
“I am not young enough to know everything.”
Variant: I am not young enough to know everything.
As quoted in The Power of Respect : Benefit from the Most Forgotten Element of Success (2009) by Deborah Norville, p. 65
“You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don't try.”
As quoted in Incredible Quotations : 230 Thought-Provoking Quotes with Prompts to Spark Students' Writing, Thinking, and Discussion (1997) by Jacqueline Sweeney
“As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.”
“Education begins the gentleman, but reading, good company and reflection must finish him.”
“There is love in holding and there is love in letting go.”
Variant: There is love in holding, and there is love in letting go.
Source: The Year of Pleasures
“Some rise by sin, and some by virtues fall.”
“The past is never dead. It's not even past.”
Act 1, sc. 3; this has sometimes been paraphrased or misquoted as "The past isn't over. It isn't even past."
Source: Requiem for a Nun (1951)
“You have to learn the rules of the game. And then you have to play better than anyone else.”
An abbreviated version of a quote by California politician Dianne Feinstein, from an interview with Cosmopolitan magazine in October 1985 https://books.google.com/books?id=zmxNAQAAIAAJ&dq=You+have+to+learn+the+rules+of+the+game+and+then+you+have+to+play+better+than+anyone+else&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=%22rules+of+the+game%22, on the topic of women running for public office. The original was: "... I really do have staying power. That's important for women who run for office. When you get in there and push for a lot of new things all at once and don't get them, you don't just leave. You have to commit, be a team player, learn the rules of the game. And then you have to play it better than anyone else."
Misattributed
“You have to believe in it to get it…”
Source: Heart of the Sea
“I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen.”
“Stupidity lies in wanting to draw conclusions.”
“They muddy the water, to make it seem deep.”
“The important thing is not to stop questioning.”
Old Man's Advice to Youth: "Never Lose a Holy Curiosity," http://books.google.com/books?id=dlYEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PP1&dq=Life%2C%202%20May%201955&pg=PA61#v=onepage&q=Life,%202%20May%201955&f=false LIFE magazine (2 May 1955) statement to William Miller, p. 64.
1950s
Context: The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existence. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery each day. Never lose a holy curiosity. … Don't stop to marvel.
“All generalizations are dangerous, even this one.”
“At the end of the day, we can endure much more than we think we can.”
“He who does not understand your silence will probably not understand your words.”
“Really great people make you feel that you, too, can become great.”
Variant: great people are those who make others feel that they, too, can become great.
“In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn.”
“Folks are usually about as happy as they make their minds up to be.”
Often misquoted as: "I have found that most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be." or "People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be."
This quote is not found in the various Lincoln sources which can be searched online (e.g. Gutenberg). Niether does Lincoln appear more generally to use the phrase "making up {one's} mind". The saying was first quoted, ascribed to Lincoln but with no source given, in 1914 by Frank Crane and several times subsequently by him in altered versions. It was later quoted in How to Get What You Want (1917) by Orison Swett Marden (Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1917), 74, again without source. Alternative versions quoted are: "I have found that most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be" and "People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be."
Source: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/10/20/happy-minds/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CPeople%20are%20about%20as%20happy,up%20their%20minds%20to%20be.%E2%80%9D&text=Remember%20Lincoln's%20saying%20that%20%E2%80%9Cfolks,up%20their%20minds%20to%20be.%E2%80%9D
Curiously in later books Crane, e.g. Four Minute Essays, 1919, Adventures in Common Sense, 1920, "21", 1930, Crane mentions other routes to happiness and does not again use this quote.
Marden used a great many quotes in his writings, without giving sources. Whilst sources for many of the quotes can be found, this is not true for all. For instance he mentions another story in which Lincoln says "Madam, you have not a peg to hang your case on"; this also does not seem to found in Lincoln sources.
“Common sense is in spite of, not the result of, education.”
“A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval.”
“Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.”
In his letter to Theo, from The Hague, 22 October 1882, http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/letter/11/237.htm
1880s, 1882
“Go as far as you can see and you will see further.”
Variant: Go so far as you can see and when you get there you will always be able to see farther.
Source: See You at the Top (2000), p. 164; Variant: When obstacles arise, you change your direction to reach your goal; you do not change your decision to get there.
Context: Go so far as you can see and when you get there you will always be able to see farther. … as you head toward your goals, be prepared to make some slight adjustments to your course. You don't change your decision to go — you do change your direction to get there.
“The art of love… is largely the art of persistence.”
“Think big thoughts but relish small pleasures.”
Source: Life's Little Instruction Book
“Optimism is the one quality more associated with success and happiness than
any other.”
“Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe it can achieve.”
p.32 -->
Variant: Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.
Source: Think and Grow Rich: A Black Choice
“A clear conscience is the sure sign of a bad memory.”
“What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite.”
Variant: The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no to almost everything.
“Happiness is the feeling that power increases - that resistance is being overcome.”
Source: The Anti-Christ
“The better you feel about yourself, the less you feel the need to show off.”
As quoted in Secrets of Superstar Speakers: Wisdom from the Greatest Motivators of Our Time (2000) by Lilly Walters, p. 96
Variant: What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals.
Isaac Asimov's Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), edited with Jason A. Shulman, p. 281
General sources
Preface
1910s, The Doctor's Dilemma (1911)
Variant: A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.
Context: Attention and activity lead to mistakes as well as to successes; but a life spent in making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.
“What makes night within us may leave stars.”
Variant: Whatever causes night in our souls may leave stars.
Source: Ninety-Three
“An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.”
The Epigrams of Oscar Wilde, edited by Alvin Redman (1954)
“Most people would sooner die than think; in fact, they do so.”
“You can, you should, and if you’re brave enough to start, you will.”
Source: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
No published occurrence of such an attribution has yet been located prior to one in Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre — Band 3 http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2411/pg2411.html by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Disputed
Variant: Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.
“If you obey all of the rules, you miss all of the fun.”
Variant: If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun
“All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then Success is sure.”
Mark Twain's Notebook, 1887
Letter to Cordelia Welsh Foote (Cincinnati), 2 December 1887. Letter reprinted http://www.twainquotes.com/Success.html in Benjamin De Casseres's When Huck Finn Went Highbrow https://www.worldcat.org/title/when-huck-finn-went-highbrow/oclc/2514292 (1934)
“It is not I who am strong, it is reason, it is truth.”
“Not to be absolutely certain is, I think, one of the essential things in rationality.”
"Don't Be Too Certain!"
1940s, Am I An Atheist Or An Agnostic? http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/russell8.htm (1947)
Source: Am I an Atheist or an Agnostic?
“no expectations, no disappointments!”
Sleeping with Strangers
“There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love.”
1960s, (1963)
“Remember your humanity, and forget the rest.”
“A quick temper will make a fool of you soon enough.”
“Motivation gets you going and habit gets you there.”
“He who opens a school, closes a prison”
Also cited as Opening a school is closing a prison
This quotation has been attributed to Victor Hugo since the nineteenth century, but the earliest citations attribute the saying instead to French education minister Victor Duruy:
Déjà M. Duruy avait posé en fait, quouvrir une école, c'est fermer une prison (1865)
English translation: M. Duruy had already suggested that opening a school is closing a prison
Disputed
Source: Journal des Economistes, March 1865, p. 489 http://hdl.handle.net/2027/nyp.33433022399574?urlappend=%3Bseq=495
“Every strike brings me closer to the next home run.”
As quoted in Weird Ideas That Work : 11 1/2 practices for promoting, managing, and sustaining innovation (2001) by Robert I. Sutton, p. 95
“They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.”
" Eleonora http://www.classicreader.com/read.php/sid.6/bookid.9/" (1841).
“Become such as you are, having learned what that is”
Pythian 2, line 72.
Variant translations:
Be what you know you are
Be true to thyself now that thou hast learnt what manner of man thou art
Having learned, become who you are
The quote is usually regarded as anonymous, but is often attributed to her on several websites, as well as in several books, including My Life Is an Open Book http://books.google.es/books?id=qCOa1k--dt4C&printsec=frontcover&hl=es#v=onepage&q=eleanor%20roosevelt&f=false (2008), The Spirituality of Mary Magdalene http://books.google.es/books?hl=es&id=BLRuINwzVZcC&dq=eleanor+roosevelt++%22past+is+history%22&q=eleanor+roosevelt#v=snippet&q=eleanor%20roosevelt&f=false (2008), Mis cuatro estaciones http://books.google.es/books?hl=es&id=QCgANqKq8EIC&dq=ayer+es+historia%2C+ma%C3%B1ana++misterio.+Hoy+regalo+de+Dios+presente&q=%22eleanor+roosevelt%22#v=snippet&q=%22eleanor%20roosevelt%22&f=false (2008), and Gilles Lamontagne http://books.google.es/books?ei=MdG9UqGQK-fL2wX5zYC4Dw&hl=es&id=WyFKAQAAIAAJ&dq=Hier+est+de+l%27histoire%2C+demain+est+un+myst%C3%A8re+et+aujourd%27hui+est+un+cadeau.+C%27+est+pourquoi+nous+l%27appelons+%C2%AB+le+pr%C3%A9sent+roosevelt&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=eleanor+roosevelt (2010). None of these works cite any original reference.
Disputed
Jesus' Course in Miracles (2000) by Helen Schucman and William Thetford, Ch. 16 The Forgiveness of Illusions, p. 162
“The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.”
From Marthe Troly-Curtin's Phrynette Married (1912). Misattributed to Bertrand Russell due to an ambiguous entry in Laurence J. Peter's Peter’s Quotations: Ideas for Our Time (1977) http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/06/11/time-you-enjoy/
Misattributed
This quotation, often attributed on the Internet to Plato, cannot be found in any of Plato's writings, nor can it be found in any published work anywhere until recent years. If it really were a quotation by Plato, then some author in the recorded literature of the last several centuries would have mentioned that quote, but they did not. The sentiment isn't new, however. The ancient Roman Seneca, in his work on "Morals," quoted an earlier Roman writer, Lucretius (who wrote about the year 50 B.C.), as saying "we are as much afraid in the light as children in the dark." (Seneca was paraphrasing a longer passage by Lucretius from De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things), Book II, lines 56 et seq.)
Misattributed
“To avoid criticism, say nothing, do nothing, be nothing.”
Glenn
Liebman
Hockey Shorts: 1,001 of the games funniest one liners
1996
70, 113 & 229
Contemporary Books
0-8092-3351-7
“There is only one way to avoid criticism: do nothing, say nothing and be nothing.”
Misattributed
Source: Elbert Hubbard, Little Journeys to the Homes of American Statesmen (1898), p. 370 http://hdl.handle.net/2027/osu.32435065322687?urlappend=%3Bseq=458: "If you would escape moral and physical assassination, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing—court obscurity, for only in oblivion does safety lie." Other versions of the saying were repeated in several of Hubbard's later writings.
My Day (1935–1962)
Context: It takes courage to love, but pain through love is the purifying fire which those who love generously know. We all know people who are so much afraid of pain that they shut themselves up like clams in a shell and, giving out nothing, receive nothing and therefore shrink until life is a mere living death. (1 April 1939)
“It's not how hard you hit. It's how hard you get hit…and keep moving forward.”
The Last Lecture (2008)
“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. ”
“Nothing is impossible, the word itself says: «I'm possible!»”
Source: yt