Meher Baba (1894–1969) Indian mystic
47 : The Question and its Answer, p. 78.
The Everything and the Nothing (1963)
Source: Success! (1977), p. 272; often quoted as "Success has always been easy to measure. It is the distance between one's origins and one's final achievement."
Context: In America, success has always been easy to measure. It is the distance between one's origins and one's final achievement that matters.
Meher Baba (1894–1969) Indian mystic
47 : The Question and its Answer, p. 78.
The Everything and the Nothing (1963)
Charles Darwin (1809–1882) British naturalist, author of "On the origin of species, by means of natural selection"
Letter to J.D. Hooker, 29 March 1863
In The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, volume 11, 1863; Frederick Burkhardt, Duncan Porter, Sheila Ann Dean, Jonathan R. Topham, Sarah Wilmot, editors; Cambridge University Press, September 1999, page 278
Sometimes paraphrased as “One might as well speculate about the origin of matter.”
Other letters, notebooks, journal articles, recollected statements
Thomas Hylland Eriksen (1962) Norwegian social anthropologist and professor
Source: What is Anthropology? (2nd ed., 2017), Ch. 2 : Key Concepts
Nick Drake (poet) (1961) British writer
ibid
The Rahotep series, Book 2: Tutankhamun
Context: Rhetoric is a dangerous art. It is the manipulation of the difference, one might say the distance, between truth and image [... ] And in our times, that distance has become the means by which power is exercised [... ] Rhetoric has been a force for persuasion since man began to speak, and to convince his enemy that he was indeed his friend.
Leo Strauss (1899–1973) Classical philosophy specialist and father of neoconservativism
Source: Natural Right and History (1953), p. 86
Frédéric Chopin (1810–1849) Polish composer
As quoted in If Not God, Then What?
Source: If Not God, Then What? (2007) by Joshua Fost, p. 93
Vera Rubin (1928–2016) American astronomer
As quoted in [Astronomer Vera Rubin—The Doyenne of Dark Matter, Discover Magazine, http://discovermagazine.com/2002/jun/breakdialogue] (1 June 2002)