Quotes about time
page 43

“Terrible thing to live in fear. Brooks Hatlen knew it. Knew it all too well. All I want is to be back where things make sense. Where I won't have to be afraid all the time.”

Stephen King book Different Seasons

Source: Different Seasons

Fear, Sense

“The lifetime of a human being is measured by decades, the lifetime of the Sun is a hundred million times longer. Compared to a star, we are like mayflies, fleeting ephemeral creatures who live out their lives in the course of a single day.”

Carl Sagan book Cosmos

Source: Cosmos

Star, Sun

“You replaced me with a shaved poodle?”

“He’s got mad skills.”

Derek’s eyebrows crept up.

“He can vomit and urinate at the same time and he doesn’t make fun of my car.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Bleeds

Cars, Madness

“Wisdom is oft-times nearer when we stoop
Than when we soar.”

William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Romantic poet

Source: The Excursion 1814

Wisdom

“In time you shall see Fate approach you
In the shape of your own image in the mirror;
Or you shall sit alone by your own hearth,
And suddenly the chair by you shall hold a guest,
And you shall know that guest,
And read the authentic message of his eyes.”

Edgar Lee Masters book Spoon River Anthology

Lyman King
Source: Spoon River Anthology

Fate, Reading

“Workaholics don't actually accomplish more than nonworkaholics. They may claim to be perfectionists, but that just mean they're wasting time fixating on inconsequential details instead of moving on to the next task.”

David Heinemeier Hansson (1979) programmer, racing driver, creator of Ruby of Rails, 2012-2016 World Endurance Championship driver

Source: Rework

“You are wasting time by suffering twice. I mention this only to show how many things the mind cannot will itself to do, even if it wants to.”

Elizabeth Strout (1956) American writer

Source: My Name is Lucy Barton

Suffering

“Heaven would be Hell in no time if every cruel, selfish, vicious soul went to Heaven.”

Anne Rice book Memnoch the Devil

Source: Memnoch the Devil

Soul, Hell, Selfishness

“History has rewritten itself so many times I'm not really sure how it was to begin with -- it's a bit like trying to guess the original color of a wall when it's been repainted eight times.”

Jasper Fforde book Something Rotten

Source: Something Rotten

Color, History

“It is not difficult to deceive the first time, for the deceived possesses no antibodies; unvaccinated by suspicion, she overlooks latenesses, accepts absurd excuses, permits the flimsiest patchings to repair great rents in the quotidian.”

John Updike book Couples

Source: Couples (1968), Ch. 2

“Never complain of that of which it is at all times in your power to rid yourself.”

Adam Smith (1723–1790) Scottish moral philosopher and political economist

Source: The Theory Of Moral Sentiments

“He was like some wild, untamed creature that you could keep and feed for a time, but in the end you knew you'd have to let it go for its own sake as well as yours.”

Sherrilyn Kenyon Night Embrace

Source: Night Embrace

“Time rises and rises, and when it reaches the level of your eyes you drown.”

Margaret Atwood book The Blind Assassin

Source: The Blind Assassin

“Oleander time, she said. Lovers who kill each other now will blame it on the wind.”

Janet Fitch book White Oleander

Source: White Oleander

Lovers

“In The Right Light, At The Right Time. Everything Is Extraordinary.”

Aaron Rose (1969) American film director

Light

“The body knows things a long time before the mind catches up to them. I was wondering what my body knew that I didn't.”

Sue Monk Kidd book The Secret Life of Bees

Source: The Secret Life of Bees

“It is wonderful how much time good people spend fighting the devil. If they would only expend the same amount of energy loving their fellow men, the devil would die in his own tracks of ennui.”

Helen Keller book The Story of My Life

Source: The Story of My Life, Part III, Ch. 5: Literary Style

Love, Men, People, Fight

“and the two of them loved each other for a long time in silence without making love again.”

Gabriel García Márquez book Love in the Time of Cholera

Source: Love in the Time of Cholera

Love, Making love, Silence

“There are times when the world is rearranging itself, and at times like that, the right words can change the world.”

Orson Scott Card book Ender's Game

Source: Ender's Game

World, Change

“To know you're going to die, and to be prepared for it at any time.
That's better. That way you can actually be more involved in your life
while you're living.”

Mitch Albom Tuesdays with Morrie

Source: Tuesdays with Morrie

Life, Way

“This morning Jackson had told Matthew, "You mention death one more time, and I"ll knock you into next week.?"
"Already been there," Matthew had answered.”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Poison Princess

Death

“Dear Depression, please keep your distance. Don’t be nasty. Find some other person with more reason than me to look in the mirror and say: “What a pointless existence.” Whether you like it or not, I know how to defeat you. You’re wasting your time.”

Paulo Coelho book Adultery

Source: Adultery

Personality

“I want to marry a [guy], so i can rest my soul with [him] till we both get old. This can't go on all the time-- all this franticness and jumping around. We've got to go someplace, find something.”

Jack Kerouac book On the Road

Source: On the Road

Guy, Soul

“Because Father said clocks slay time. He said time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by little wheels; only when the clock stops does time come to life.”

William Faulkner book The Sound and the Fury

Variant: Clocks slay time... time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by little wheels; only when the clock stops does time come to life.
Source: The Sound and the Fury (1929)

Life, Dead

“But hurry, let's entwine ourselves as one, our mouth broken, our soul bitten by love, so time discovers us safely destroyed.”

Federico García Lorca (1898–1936) Spanish poet, dramatist and theatre director

Love, Soul

“Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times, shame on both of us.”

Stephen King (1947) American author

Source: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

Fools

“It was time to pull my moral socks up and behave myself.”

Charlaine Harris book Club Dead

Source: Club Dead

“The first time her laughter unfurled its wings in the wind, we knew that the world would never be the same”

Brian Andreas (1956) American artist

World, Laughter

“Fate already warned us to pack it in. We just didn’t hear it in time.”

Jonathan Tropper (1970) American writer

Source: This is Where I Leave You

Fate

“It was in a way a comforting idea; if there was all the time in the world, then the happenings of a given moment became less important.”

Diana Gabaldon book Outlander

Source: Outlander

World, Way, Idea

“First time it's a stranger. Second time its just a coincidence. Third time it's a tail”

Ally Carter Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy

Source: Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy

“…there is no nakedness that compares to being naked in front of someone for the first time.”

John Irving book A Widow for One Year

Source: A Widow for One Year

“… I would have let him go one finger at a time, until, without his realizing, he'd be floating without me. And then I thought, perhaps that is what it means to be a [parent] - to teach your child to live without you.”

Nicole Krauss (1974) American novelist

Parent

“I had forgotten that time wasn't fixed like concrete but in fact was fluid as sand, or water. I had forgotten that even misery can end.”

Joyce Carol Oates (1938) American author

Source: I Am No One You Know: Stories

Water

“The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight times.”

Paulo Coelho book The Alchemist

Introduction, p. xi.
Source: The Alchemist (1988)
Context: I ask myself: are defeats necessary?
Well, necessary or not, they happen. When we first begin fighting for a dream, we have no experience and make mistakes. The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight times.

Wise, Life, Secret

“Sitting high above the city, Father Time realized that knowing something and understanding it were not the same thing.”

Mitch Albom (1958) American author

Source: The Time Keeper

Understanding

“We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, Letter from a Birmingham Jail (1963)
Context: I had also hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth concerning time in relation to the struggle for freedom. I have just received a letter from a white brother in Texas. He writes: "All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but it is possible that you are in too great a religious hurry. It has taken Christianity almost two thousand years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth." Such an attitude stems from a tragic misconception of time, from the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually, time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively. More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.

Men, God, Hate, People

“It's a very salutary thing to realize that the rather dull universe in which most of us spend most of our time is not the only universe there is. I think it's healthy that people should have this experience.”

Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) English writer

Source: Moksha: Writings on Psychedelics & the Visionary Experience

People, Thinking, Universe

“I'm killing time and it's dying hard.”

Raymond Chandler book The Long Goodbye

Variant: Mostly I just kill time," he said, "and it dies hard.
Source: The Long Goodbye

“I saw a bank that said '24 Hour Banking,' but I didn’t have that much time.”

Steven Wright (1955) American actor and author

“The Wonder of it All:
Sitting there in your pajamas & all the time in the world & if I could keep any moment it would be this: watching you & holding my breath with the wonder of it all.”

Brian Andreas (1956) American artist

World

“You are thirty minutes late."
"Yes."
"Would you be thirty minutes late to a wedding or a funeral?"
"No."
"Why not, pray tell?"
"Well, if the funeral was mine I'd have to be on time. If the wedding was mine it would be my funeral.”

Charles Bukowski book Ham on Rye

Source: Ham on Rye

Wedding

“So much of adolescence is an ill-defined dying,
An intolerable waiting,
A longing for another place and time,
Another condition.”

Theodore Roethke (1908–1963) American poet

Source: Words for the Wind: The Collected Verse

Waiting

“The further you go, the more you have to be proud of. At the same time, in order to come a long way, you have to be behind to begin with. IN the end, though maybe it's not how you reach a place that matters. Just that you get there at all.”

Sarah Dessen Lock and Key

Source: Lock and Key

Way

“Antonio-
"Just in time, Pete. Five more minutes of reading this and she'd have been in a coma."
Peter-
"Are we such bad company that you'd rather hide out in here reading that old thing?”

Kelley Armstrong book Bitten

Source: Bitten

Reading

“He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and third time, till at length it becomes habitual; he tells lies without attending to it, and truths without the world's believing him. This falsehood of tongue leads to that of the heart, and in time depraves all its good dispositions.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

1780s, Letter to Peter Carr (1785)

Truth, Lie, World, Heart

“You look lousy,"Simon said.
Jace blinked."Seems an odd time to start an insult contest, but if you insist, I could probably think up something good”

Cassandra Clare book City of Fallen Angels

Source: City of Fallen Angels

Thinking

“There may be a time when we'll attend Weather Theatres to recall the sensation of rain.”

Jim Morrison (1943–1971) lead singer of The Doors

Source: The Lords and The New Creatures

Weather

“Only through time time is conquered”

T.S. Eliot book Four Quartets

Source: Four Quartets

“Now is no time to think of what you do not have. Think of what you can do with what there is.”

Ernest Hemingway book The Old Man and the Sea

Variant: Now is no time to think of what you do not have.
Think of what you can do with that there is
Source: The Old Man and the Sea (1952)

Thinking

“A mistake constantly made by those who should know better is to judge people of the past by our standards rather than their own. The only way men or women can be judged is against the canvas of their own time.”

Louis L'Amour (1908–1988) Novelist, short story writer

Source: Education of a Wandering Man (1989), Ch. 10

Women, Men, People, Way

“It's a long life, sweetheart, and time heals all wounds.”

Cheryl Strayed book Torch

Source: Torch

Life

“I knew I had to be careful. I had to keep my distance. If she knew how much I still cared, it was all over. I wouldn’t be able to walk away again. The first time was hard enough.”

Jenny Han (1980) American writer

Source: We'll Always Have Summer

“Warmth, perfume, rugs, soft lights, books. They do not appease me. I am aware of time passing, of all the world contains that I have not seen, of all the interesting people I have not met.”

Anaïs Nin (1903–1977) writer of novels, short stories, and erotica

Source: A Cafe in Space: The Anais Nin Literary Journal, Volume 3

People, Books, World, Light

“There are times in your life when, despite the steel weight of your memories and the sadness that seems to lie at your feet like a shadow, you suddenly and strangely feel perfectly okay.”

Kevin Brockmeier book The View from the Seventh Layer

Source: The View from the Seventh Layer

Life, Lie, Sadness, Feeling

“As always at these times when he felt really in need of God the front of his mind was serene, but the deeper part, where faith did constant battle with doubt, was terrified that there would be no answer.”

Stephen King book Desperation

Source: Desperation

God, Faith, Parting

“Each time he suggested they get married, she said no. They were too happy, precariously so, and she wanted to guard that bond; she feared that marriage would flatten it into a prosaic partnership.”

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie book Half of a Yellow Sun

Source: Half of a Yellow Sun

Marriage, Fear, Partnership, Happiness

“True love would look a second time. True love would not be thwarted. True love would not accept no for an answer. He would search the world and certainly look again and again in every cottage until he finds you.”

Alex Flinn (1966) American children's writer

Source: A Kiss in Time

Love, World, Search

“We live in stirring times- tea-stirring times.”

Christopher Isherwood (1904–1986) English novelist

Tea

“If I were at any time to set out on a career of deceit, it would be of Miss Marple that I should be afraid.”

Agatha Christie (1890–1976) English mystery and detective writer

“Aubrey, crouching on a nearby counter, watched me with squinty eyes, apparently pondering why anyone would willingly immerse themselves in water ever, let alone for extended periods of time.”

Richelle Mead (1976) American writer

Source: Succubus Blues

Water

“Saumensch, du dreckiges—it’s about time!”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

The Book Thief

“But at the best of times she feels like a character in a Muriel Spark novel — independent, bookish, sharp-minded, secretly romantic.”

David Nicholls book One Day

Source: One Day

Feeling

“One day at a time, sweet Jesus. Whoever wrote that one hadn’t a clue. A day is a fuckin’ eternity”

Roddy Doyle Paula Spencer

Source: Paula Spencer

“Nothing had been okay, not for a long time. And every moment that I thought I was getting close, like the one I’d had earlier, seemed to remind the universe that I didn’t deserve that, not yet.”

Sarah Dessen (1970) American writer

Source: Saint Anything

Universe

“Have patience awhile; slanders are not long-lived. Truth is the child of time; erelong she shall appear to vindicate thee.”

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) German philosopher

As quoted in Gems of Thought (1888) edited by Charles Northend

Truth, Appearance, Patience

“We're [parents]) always bluffing, pretending we know best, when most of the time we're just praying we won't screw up too badly.”

Jodi Picoult book House Rules

Source: House Rules

Parent

“Do you ever feel like screaming?' Clary asked him [Jace].
'Some of the time.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Ashes

Source: City of Ashes

Feeling

“They seem to have noticed her for the first time”

Jenny Han (1980) American writer

“We have a saying that time has no single measure, that time can be like frost or lightning or a tear or siege or storm or sunset, or even like a rock.”

James Clavell book Shōgun

Source: Shōgun

Tear

“All photographs are memento mori. To take a photograph is to participate in another person’s (or thing’s) mortality, vulnerability, mutability. Precisely by slicing out this moment and freezing it, all photographs testify to time’s relentless melt.”

Susan Sontag book On Photography

Variant: to take a photograph is to participate in another person's mortality, vulnerability, mutability. precisely by slicing out this moment and freezing it, all photographs testify to time's relentless melt.
Source: On Photography

Personality

“He seemed only… annoyed. Annoyed, and sweaty, and hot.
"Yeah, well," he said, "the next time you decide to sneak out of our magically warded apartment through a door that shouldn't really exist, leave a note.”

Cassandra Clare The City of Lost Souls

Source: City of Lost Souls

“Not many people can lay claim to having broken Time, and we did it purely by accident.”

James A. Owen The Search for the Red Dragon

Source: The Search for the Red Dragon

People

“A Witch is born out of the true hungers of her time,” she said. “I was born out of New York. The things that are most wrong here summoned me. ("Drink Entire: Against The Madness Of Crowds")”

Ray Bradbury book Long After Midnight

Source: Long After Midnight

Hunger, Drink, Madness

“Television is a medium of entertainment which permits millions of people to listen to the same joke at the same time, and yet remain lonesome.”

T.S. Eliot (1888–1965) 20th century English author

People

“It is important for this country to make its people so obsessed with their own liberal individualism that they do not have time to think about a world larger than self.”

Bell Hooks (1952) American author, feminist, and social activist

Source: Black Genius: African-American Solutions to African-American Problems

People, World, Thinking, Country

“Sometimes you're sure dogs have some secret, superior intelligence, and other times you know they're only their simple, goofy selves.”

Deb Caletti (1963) American writer

Source: The Six Rules of Maybe

Secret, Dogs, Intelligence

“Answers to Frequently Asked Questions:
Yes.
Yes.
No.
One time in high school.
Three times in my twenties.
Rocks no salt.
Yes.
Four.
Never. And how dare you!
I will take no further questions.”

Ellen DeGeneres (1958) American stand-up comedian, television host, and actress

Source: Seriously... I'm Kidding

School, Question

“Time flows away like the water in the river.”

Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher

Water

“The rose is a rose from the time it is a seed to the time it dies. Within it, at all times, it contains its whole potential. It seems to be constantly in the process of change: Yet at each state, at each moment, it is perfectly all right as it is.”

Paulo Coelho (1947) Brazilian lyricist and novelist

Source: Warrior of the Light

Change

“Once upon a time, there was a man as great as the gods…
But even the great can tremble with fear.
Even the great can fall”

Mary E. Pearson book The Kiss of Deception

Source: The Kiss of Deception

God, Fear

“Looks like it's time to liven up this dead little town!" - Saint Dane (The Reality Bug)”

D.J. MacHale book The Reality Bug

Source: The Reality Bug

Reality, Dead

“What is there to forgive?… Ignore forgive and concentrate on living. Life for you is short; far too short to allow small jealousies to infringe on the happiness which can be yours only for the briefest of times.”

Jasper Fforde book The Eyre Affair

Source: The Eyre Affair

Life, Jealousy, Forgiveness, Happiness

“Time is a keyhole, he thought as he looked up at the stars. Yes, I think so. We sometimes bend and peer through it. And the wind we feel on our cheeks when we do - the wind that blows through the keyhole- is the breath of all the living universe.”

Stephen King (1947) American author

Source: The Wind Through the Keyhole

Feeling, Star, Thinking, Universe

“And why had Deb's last boyfriend dumped her?
I dumped him.
Maybe you didn't French-kiss him enough.
I promise you that wasn't it.
Tell me how many times a day you kissed, and I'll say if it was enough.
Four hundred.
Not enough.”

Miranda July (1974) American performance artist, musician and writer

Source: No One Belongs Here More Than You

Kiss

“And there the wicked witch stayed for a long long time.'
Did she ever come out?'
Not yet.”

Gregory Maguire (1954) Novelist

“Although there are times I'd give anything to have her back, I'm glad she went first. Losing her was like being cleft down the middle. It was the moment it all ended for me, and I wouldn't have wanted her to go through that.”

Sara Gruen book Water for Elephants

Source: Water for Elephants

“No one had ever called me unnatural before, except for the time I put ketchup on a taco.”

Richelle Mead Blood Promise

Source: Blood Promise

“Prisons are the temples where devils learn to prey. Every time we turn the key we twist the knife of fate, because every time we cage a man we close him in with hate.”

Gregory David Roberts book Shantaram

Source: Shantaram

Hate, Fate, Learning

“Remembering bred its own peculiar sorrow. It seemed so unfair: that time should render both sadness and happiness into a source of pain.”

Rohinton Mistry A Fine Balance

Source: A Fine Balance

Pain, Sadness, Happiness

“For you, a thousand times over." Then I turned and ran. It was only a smile, nothing more. It didn't make everything alright. It didn't make anything all right. Only a smile. A tiny thing. But I'll take it. With open arms.”

Khaled Hosseini book The Kite Runner

Source: The Kite Runner

Smile

“But now we have time. Endless time stretches before us.”

Emily Giffin Something Borrowed

Source: Something Borrowed

“When I break into the clearing, she's on the ground, hopelessly entangled in a net. She just has the time to reach her hand through the mesh and say my name before the spear enters her body.”

Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games

Source: The Hunger Games

“There are no drive-thru breakthroughs. Breakthroughs take time.”

Joyce Meyer (1943) American author and speaker

“That's what I told myself five hundred times: impossibility. I can tell you this much: the word is a great big log thrown on the fires of love. ~Page 133.”

Sue Monk Kidd book The Secret Life of Bees

Source: The Secret Life of Bees

Love

“If I had done this, if I had said that, in the end you are always more tormented by what you didn't do than what you did, actions already performed can always be rationalized in time, the neglected deed might have changed the world.”

Damon Galgut book In a Strange Room

Source: In a Strange Room

World, Change

“Oh, I used to lie all the time as a kid." I didn't think of it as lying, though. I thought of it as playing make-believe. I told Kitty she was adopted and her real family was in a traveling circus. It's why she took up gymnastics.”

Jenny Han book To All the Boys I've Loved Before

Source: To All the Boys I've Loved Before

Lie, Family, Travel, Lying

“Because God is with you all the time, no place is any closer to God than the place where you are right now.”

Rick Warren (1954) Christian religious leader

Source: The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here for?

God

“You can fool too many of the people too much of the time.”

James Thurber (1894–1961) American cartoonist, author, journalist, playwright

"The Owl who was God", The New Yorker (29 April 1939); Fables for Our Time & Famous Poems Illustrated (1940). Parody of "You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time."
From Fables for Our Time and Further Fables for Our Time

People, Fools

“I was on HPD--Heathcliff Protection Duty--in Wuthering Heights for two years, and believe me, the ProCaths tried everything. I personally saved him from assassination eight times.”

Jasper Fforde book Lost in a Good Book

Source: Lost in a Good Book

Personality

Quotes about time page 43

Quotes about time
page 43