“It is really intolerable that we can say only one thing at a time; for social behavior displays many features at the same time, and so in taking them up one by one we necessarily do outrage to its rich, dark, organic unity.”

— George C. Homans

Source: Social behavior: Its Elementary Forms, 1961, p. 114

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George C. Homans 7

American sociologist 1910–1989

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“We must preserve the sense of unity and the sense of diversity and multiplicity. We must recognize that the One and the Many are the same thing viewed from different angles. The One is the Many. The One is manifested only in and through the Many. It has no separate existence apart from the Many. Equally the Many are the One. Even during their temporary separation, they are always part of the One, and always united with the One. Every one of us is always part of the One, and can unite with the One at any time we choose”

Alexis Karpouzos (1967)

Source: https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/14108295.alexis_karpouzos?page=2

“We can no longer separate things as we once could: everything tends towards unity; one thing, one action, in one place, at one time.”

Samuel Butler (1835–1902) novelist

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Context: We can no longer separate things as we once could: everything tends towards unity; one thing, one action, in one place, at one time. On the other hand, we can no longer unify things as we once could; we are driven to ultimate atoms, each one of which is an individuality. So that we have an infinite multitude of things doing an infinite multitude of actions in infinite time and space; and yet they are not many things, but one thing.

“Remember one thing about democracy. We can have anything we want and at the same time, we always end up with exactly what we deserve.”

Edward Albee (1928–2016) American playwright

As quoted in Unleashing Intellectual Capital (2000) by Charles Ehin, p. 99

“I'm probably not the only one up at this table that is more outraged by the outrage than we are by the treatment.”

James Inhofe (1934) American politician

regarding Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse, quoted in [2004-05-12, GOP senator labels abused prisoners 'terrorists', CNN, http://articles.cnn.com/2004-05-11/politics/inhofe.abuse_1_naked-prisoners-iraqi-prisoners-james-inhofe]

“If you keep a light before a thousand people, it reaches all without making any distinction. Anyone may take it. Where there is light, there is no darkness. In the darkness there is no light. There can only be one thing (either light or darkness), not two at the same time. One's nature should be like the sun; one's Chitta must be cool like the moon.”

Bhagawan Nityananda (1897–1961) Hindu guru and saint

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“This is how we go on: one day a time, one meal at a time, one pain at a time, one breath at a time. Dentists go on one root canal at a time; boat builders go on one hull at a time. If you write books, you go on one page at a time. We turn from all we know and all we fear. We study catalogues, watch football games, choose Sprint over AT&T. We count the birds in the sky and will not turn from the window when we hear the footsteps behind as something comes up the hall; we say yes, I agree that clouds often look like other things - fish and unicorns and men on horseback - but they are really only clouds. Even when the lightning flashes inside them we say they are only clouds and turn our attention to the next meal, the next pain, the next breath, the next page. This is how we go on.”

Stephen King book Bag of Bones

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“Time takes it all whether you want it to or not, time takes it all. Time bares it away, and in the end there is only darkness. Sometimes we find others in that darkness, and sometimes we lose them there again.”

Stephen King book The Green Mile

Variant: Time takes it all, whether you want it to or not. Time takes it all, time bears it away, and in the end there is only darkness. Sometimes we find others in that darkness, and sometimes we lose them there again.
Source: The Green Mile

“A cigarette only takes a certain amount of time to smoke and though this takes time it seems to take less and less with each one and you can only smoke so many, there comes a time when you have to stop, when you just cant light the next one... at least not for a while.”

Hubert Selby Jr. book Last Exit to Brooklyn

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“So much easier is it to do many things than to do one thing for a long time continuously.”
Adeo facilius est multa facere quam diu.

Quintilian (35–96) ancient Roman rhetor

Book I, Chapter XII, 7; translation by H. E. Butler
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“It's important for me to find different things and prove I can do them. … Someone told me that inside all actors are many sleeping princesses, and each time we do a role, one of those princesses wakes up. Inside us there is everything. We just have to look for it.”

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As quoted in "It's Monica Mania" by Richard Corliss in TIME (10 March 2003) http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1004378,00.html

“It is really intolerable that we can say only one thing at a time; for social behavior displays many features at the same time, and so in taking them up one by one we necessarily do outrage to its rich, dark, organic unity.”

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George C. Homans 7

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