Quotes about accident
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“After all, our lives are but a sequence of accidents - a clanking chain of chance events. A string of choices, casual or deliberate, which add up to that one big calamity we call life.”

Rohinton Mistry A Fine Balance

Source: A Fine Balance

Life, Chance

“That night I lay in bed, remembering the moment when her hand touched mine. I wondered what it would be like to have her touch me not by accident, to maybe have her let me touch her.”

Alex Flinn book Beastly

Source: Beastly

Night

“Happiness is an accident of nature, a beautiful and flawless aberration.”

Pat Conroy The Lords of Discipline

Source: The Lords of Discipline

Happy, Beauty, Nature, Happiness

“Oh no. I've just accidently paid a visit to the cakeshop of love. I haven't put back my Italian cakey, but I have accidentally picked up a Dave the Tart.”

Louise Rennison (1951–2016) British writer

Source: Dancing in My Nuddy-Pants

Love

“… people liking you or not liking you is an accident and is to do with them and not you. That goes for love too, only more so.”

Edna O'Brien book Girls in Their Married Bliss

Source: Girls in Their Married Bliss

Love, People

“Maybe that is what beauty was, for humans. Accidents, imperfections, placed inside a pretty pattern. Asymmetry. The defiance of mathematics.”

Matt Haig (1975) British writer

Source: The Humans

Beauty, Mathematics

“Life is a gamble. You can get hurt, but people die in plane crashes, lose their arms and legs in car accidents; people die every day. Same with fighters: some die, some get hurt, some go on. You just don't let yourself believe it will happen to you.”

Muhammad Ali (1942–2016) African American boxer, philanthropist and activist

Hurtful, Life, People, Cars

“Man is ultimately concerned about that which determines his ultimate destiny beyond all preliminary necessities and accidents.”

Paul Tillich (1886–1965) German-American theologian and philosopher

Systematic Theology (1951–63)
Context: Man is infinitely concerned about the infinity to which he belongs, from which he is separated, and for which he is longing. Man is totally concerned about the totality which is his true being and which is disrupted in time and space. Man is unconditionally concerned about that which conditions his being beyond all the conditions in him and around him. Man is ultimately concerned about that which determines his ultimate destiny beyond all preliminary necessities and accidents.

“A single gentle rain makes the grass many shades greener. So our prospects brighten on the influx of better thoughts. We should be blessed if we lived in the present always, and took advantage of every accident that befell us.”

Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist

Source: Walden, or Life in the Woods

Grass

“I am the inferior of any man whose rights I trample under foot. Men are not superior by reason of the accidents of race or color. They are superior who have the best heart — the best brain.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

Liberty.
Source: The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. IX

Men, Color, Heart

“Gravity is a contributing factor in nearly 73 percent of all accidents involving falling objects.”

Dave Barry (1947) American writer

“The greatest pleasure I know is to do a good action by stealth, and to have it found out by accident.”

Charles Lamb (1775–1834) English essayist

Quoted in "Table Talk" http://books.google.com/books?id=LIxUAAAAcAAJ&q=%22greatest+pleasure+I+know+is+to+do+a+good+action+by+stealth+and+to+have+it+found+out+by+accident%22&pg=PA14#v=onepage in The Athenaeum magazine (4 January 1834).

Pleasure

“They're funny things, Accidents. You never have them till you're having them.”

A.A. Milne book The House at Pooh Corner

Source: The House at Pooh Corner

“Things happen to people by accident.”

Frances Hodgson Burnett A Little Princess

Source: A Little Princess

People

“Yes she met with a slight accident involving a stake." Ash said "funny how that happens sometimes…”

L.J. Smith (1965) American author

Source: Night World, No. 1

“It takes two to make an accident.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby

Source: The Great Gatsby

“Quality is never an accident. It is always the result of intelligent effort. There must be the will to produce a superior thing.”

John Ruskin (1819–1900) English writer and art critic

Intelligence, Effort

“Your strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others.”

Joseph Conrad book Heart of Darkness

Source: Heart of Darkness

“All great discoveries… are products as much of doubt as of certainty, and the two in opposition clear the air for marvelous accidents.”

Mark Helprin book Winter's Tale

Source: Winter's Tale

“Besides, it happens fast for some people and slow for some, accidents or gravity, but we all end up mutilated. Most women know this feeling of being more and more invisible everyday.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Invisible Monsters

Source: Invisible Monsters

Women, People, Feeling

“Family is just accident, Jessie. It's nothing personal, hon. They don't mean to get on your nerves. They don't even mean to be your family, they just are.”

Marsha Norman 'night, Mother

Source: 'night, Mother

Family, Personality

“We have become, by the power of a glorious evolutionary accident called intelligence, the stewards of life's continuity on earth. We did not ask for this role, but we cannot abjure it. We may not be suited to it, but here we are.”

Stephen Jay Gould (1941–2002) American evolutionary biologist

Source: The Flamingo's Smile: Reflections in Natural History

Life, Intelligence

“Our only kiss was like an accident- a beautiful gasoline rainbow.”

Alice Sebold book The Lovely Bones

Source: The Lovely Bones

Beauty, Kiss

“What we share may be a lot like a traffic accident but we get one another. We are survivors of each other. We have been shark to one another, but also lifeboat. That counts for something.”

Margaret Atwood book Cat's Eye

Source: Cat's Eye

“What kills a person at twenty-five? Leukemia. An accident. But George knows the better odds are that someone who passes at that age dies of unhappiness. Drug overdose. Suicide. Reckless behavior.”

Scott Turow book Limitations

Source: Limitations

Age, Behavior, Suicide, Personality

“Razo was sorely tempted to assert that all was true and he'd lost his horns and tail in a tragic childhood accident”

Shannon Hale River Secrets

Source: River Secrets

Childhood

“There are things in this universe that we cannot control, and then there are the things we can…. Let fate, coincidence, and accident conspire; human beings must act on reason.”

David Guterson book Snow Falling on Cedars

Source: Snow Falling on Cedars

Fate, Universe

“Intelligence is an accident of evolution, and not necessarily an advantage.”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

Intelligence

“Can all this just be an accident? Or could there be some alien intelligence behind it?”

Gene Roddenberry (1921–1991) American television screenwriter and producer

Intelligence

“Everyone makes mistakes, even if some are worse than others. Accidents happen.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Best of Me

Source: The Best of Me

“The fear of death is the most unjustified of all fears, for there's no risk of accident for someone who's dead.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Death, Fear, Dead

“Coach," Annabeth said, "it was an accident. We were talking, and we fell asleep."
"Besides," Percy said, "you're starting to sound like Terminus."
Hedge narrowed his eyes. "Is that an insult, Jackson? 'Cause I'll-I'll Terminus you, buddy!”

Rick Riordan The Mark of Athena

Source: The Mark of Athena

“Jamie, I had found out by accident a few days previously, had never mastered the art of winking one eye. Instead, he blinked solemnly, like a large red owl.”

Diana Gabaldon book Outlander

Variant: That's not precisely what I had in mind."
Jamie, I had found out by accident a few days previously, had never mastered the art of winking one eye. Instead, he blinked solemnly, like a large red owl.
Source: Outlander

Art

“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, Time

“sometimes an accident can be an unhappy womans best friend”

Stephen King (1947) American author

“To build a better world we need to replace the patchwork of lucky breaks and arbitrary advantages today that determine success--the fortunate birth dates and the happy accidents of history--with a society that provides opportunities for all.”

Malcolm Gladwell (1963) journalist and science writer

Source: Outliers: The Story of Success

World, History, Birth, Success

“I don't like people who like me because I'm a Negro; neither do I like people who find in the same accident grounds for contempt. I love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. I think all theories are suspect, that the finest principles may have to be modified, or may even be pulverized by the demands of life, and that one must find, therefore, one's own moral center and move through the world hoping that this center will guide one aright.”

James Baldwin (1924–1987) (1924-1987) writer from the United States

Autobiographical Notes (1952)
Context: I don't like people who like me because I'm a Negro; neither do I like people who find in the same accident grounds for contempt. I love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. I think all theories are suspect, that the finest principles may have to be modified, or may even be pulverized by the demands of life, and that one must find, therefore, one's own moral center and move through the world hoping that this center will guide one aright. I consider that I have many responsibilities, but none greater than this: to last, as Hemingway says, and get my work done.
I want to be an honest man and a good writer.

Love, Life, People, World

“Clary wondered how many boyfriends she'd turned into rats by accident.
-Clary to Isabelle, pg.245”

Cassandra Clare book City of Bones

Source: City of Bones

“You weren't an accident. You weren't mass produced. You aren't an assembly-line product. You were deliberately planned, specifically gifted, and lovingly positioned on the earth by the Master Craftsman.”

Max Lucado (1955) American clergyman and writer

Source: The Christmas Candle

“The imporant things in life never happened by accident. But even with those things that were meant to be, sometimes you had to wait awhile and then maybe give them a little nudge.”

Nicholas Evans (1950) British producer and writer

Life, Waiting

“I came to Party Crashing because accidents happen. People you love will die. Nothing you treasure will last forever. And I need to accept and embrace that fact.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Rant

Source: Rant

Love, People

“Beauty comes naturally, but it's hard to be stunning by accident.”

David Levithan book Every Day

Source: Every Day

Beauty, Nature

“I find it impossible to experience either pride or shame over accidents of genetics in which I had no active part. I'm not necessarily proud to be female. I am not even proud to be human—I only love to be so.”

Zadie Smith (1975) British writer

Love, Parting

“If you die of pneumonia, I'm pretty sure there are at least a dozen guys who'll try to kill me and make it look like an accident
(Hale)”

Ally Carter book Heist Society

Source: Heist Society

Guy

“We don't usually write up accidents involving rabbits.
- Joe Morelli”

Janet Evanovich Hard Eight

Source: Hard Eight

“Stupidity and wisdom meet in the same centre of sentiment and resolution, in the suffering of human accidents.”

Michel De Montaigne (1533–1592) (1533-1592) French-Occitan author, humanistic philosopher, statesman

Source: The Complete Essays

Wisdom, Stupidity, Suffering

“A thief never makes a noise by accident.”

Megan Whalen Turner The Thief

Source: The Thief

“Accident ruled every corner of the universe except the chambers of the human heart.”

David Guterson book Snow Falling on Cedars

Source: Snow Falling on Cedars (1994), Ch. 32, last page.

Universe, Heart

“I just got out of the hospital. I was in a speed reading accident. I hit a book mark and flew across the room.”

Steven Wright (1955) American actor and author

Books, Reading, Speed

“It is no accident that the photographer becomes a photographer any more than the lion tamer becomes a lion tamer.”

Dorothea Lange (1895–1965) American photojournalist

“Revolutions spring not from accident, but from necessity. A revolution is a return from the factitious to the real. It takes place because it must.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

Spring

“Omissions are not accidents.”

Marianne Moore (1887–1972) American poet and writer

The Complete Poems of Marianne Moore (1967), Author's note, p. vi

“Let us save what remains: not by vaults and locks which fence them from the public eye and use in consigning them to the waste of time, but by such a multiplication of copies, as shall place them beyond the reach of accident.”

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

Letter to a Mr. Hazard (18 February 1791) published in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (1853), Vol. 2, edited by Henry Augustine Washington, p. 211
1790s
Context: I learn with great satisfaction that you are about committing to the press the valuable historical and State papers you have been so long collecting. Time and accident are committing daily havoc on the originals deposited in our public offices. The late war has done the work of centuries in this business. The last cannot be recovered, but let us save what remains; not by vaults and locks which fence them from the public eye and use in consigning them to the waste of time, but by such a multiplication of copies, as shall place them beyond the reach of accident.

Time