Quotes about affair
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Ann Coulter photo
Warren Farrell photo
Tsunetomo Yamamoto photo
Henri Fayol photo
Hugh Macmillan, Baron Macmillan photo
Hans Christian Andersen photo
Nathanael Greene photo
James K. Morrow photo

“If You intervene too profusely in Earth’s affairs, I’ve noticed, the inhabitants become chronically distracted, and they forget to worship You.”

James K. Morrow (1947) (1947-) science fiction author

"Bible Stories for Adults, No. 20: The Tower" p. 67 (originally published in Author’s Choice Monthly #8: Swatting at the Cosmos)
Short fiction, Bible Stories for Adults (1996)

Shankar Dayal Sharma photo

“We are continuing our endevours to normalize relations with China on the basis of mutual respect for sovereignty, territorial integrity, and non-interference in each other’s internal affairs. We hail the restoration of normal relations between Japan and China and we hope that it will contribute to peace and security in Asia.”

Shankar Dayal Sharma (1918–1999) Indian politician

Source: Kedar Nath Kumar Political Parties in India, Their Ideology and Organisation http://books.google.co.in/books?id=x3pJ8t4rxIsC&pg=PA153, Mittal Publications, 1 January 1990, p. 153

As President of Indian National Congress in 1972

William T. Sherman photo

“I regard the death and mangling of a couple thousand men as a small affair, a kind of morning dash — and it may be well that we become so hardened.”

William T. Sherman (1820–1891) American General, businessman, educator, and author.

Letter to his wife (July 1864)
1860s, 1864

Harold Holt photo
Adolf Hitler photo
Muhammad photo
Elton Mayo photo
Richard Cobden photo

“I say that if England takes due advantage of her insular position, and confines herself to her own affairs, and does not run into needless and rash disputes with other countries, there never was a time when she stood so free from danger of war as at the present moment.”

Richard Cobden (1804–1865) English manufacturer and Radical and Liberal statesman

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1849/feb/26/financial-reform in the House of Commons (26 February 1849).
1840s

Florence Nightingale photo
Adolf A. Berle photo
Wallace Stevens photo

“He imposes orders as he thinks of them,
As the fox and snake do. It is a brave affair.”

Wallace Stevens (1879–1955) American poet

Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction (1942), It Must Give Pleasure

Heinrich von Treitschke photo
Horace Walpole photo

“He was my counsel in affairs, was my oracle in taste, the standard to whom I submitted my trifles, and the genius that presided over poor Strawberry.”

Horace Walpole (1717–1797) English art historian, man of letters, antiquarian and Whig politician

On the death of his friend John Chute (1776)
As quoted in The National Trust Magazine, Spring 2011, p. 09

Walker Percy photo
Orson Pratt photo

“But by and by the time came when the Christian Church apostatized and turned away, and began to follow after their own wisdom, and the Prophets and Apostles ceased, so far as the affairs of the Christian Church on the earth were concerned. Revelations, and visions, and the various gifts of the spirit were also taken away, according to their unbelief and apostacy; but in the latter days God intends to again raise up a Christian Church upon the earth. Do not be startled, you who think that God will no more have a Church on the earth, for he has promised that he would again have one, and that he would set up his kingdom, and when he does you may look out for a great many Prophets and inspired men; and if you ever see a Church arise, calling itself a Christian Church, and it has not inspired Apostles like those in ancient times, you may know that it is a spurious church, and that it makes pretensions to something that it does not enjoy. If you ever find a church called a Christian Church that has no men to foretell future events, you may know, at once, that it is not a Christian Church. If you find a Christian Church that has not the ancient gifts, for instance the gift of healing, opening the eyes of the blind, unstopping the ears of the deaf, causing the tongue of the dumb to speak and the lame to walk; if you ever find a people calling themselves a Christian Church and they have not these gifts among them, you may know with a perfect knowledge that they do not agree with the pattern given in the New Testament. The Christian Church is always characterized with inspired men, whose revelations are just as sacred as any contained in the Bible; and, if written and published, just as binding upon the human family. The Christian Church will always lay hands upon the sick in the name of Jesus, in order that the sick may be healed. The Christian Church will always have those among its members who have heavenly visions, the ministration of angels, and the various gifts that are promised according to the Gospel.”

Orson Pratt (1811–1881) Apostle of the LDS Church

Journal of Discourses 18:171-172 (March 26, 1876).
Apostacy

Alexis De Tocqueville photo
André Maurois photo
Rosalind Russell photo

“Success is a public affair. Failure is a private funeral.”

Rosalind Russell (1907–1976) actress from the United States

Halliwell's Who's Who in the Movies (2001 ed): Art. Rosalind Russell p. 383

Noam Chomsky photo
C. Wright Mills photo
William James photo

“Our colleges ought to have lit up in us a lasting relish for the better kind of man, a loss of appetite for mediocrities, and a disgust for cheapjacks. We ought to smell, as it were, the difference of quality in men and their proposals when we enter the world of affairs about us.”

William James (1842–1910) American philosopher, psychologist, and pragmatist

The Social Value of the College-Bred http://www.des.emory.edu/mfp/jaCollegeBred.html
1910s, Memories and Studies (1911)

Noam Chomsky photo
Woodrow Wilson photo

“We are not put into this world to sit still and know; we are put into it to act.
It is true that in order to learn men must for a little while withdraw from action, must seek some quiet place of remove from the bustle of affairs, where their thoughts may run clear and tranquil, and the heats of business be for the time put off; but that cloistered refuge is no place to dream in.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

“ Princeton for the Nation's Service http://infoshare1.princeton.edu/libraries/firestone/rbsc/mudd/online_ex/wilsonline/4dn8nsvc.html”, Inaugural address as President of Princeton (25 October 1902); this speech is different from his 1896 speech of the same title.
1900s

Joseph Hayne Rainey photo
Elfriede Jelinek photo
Clarence Thomas photo
Carl Linnaeus photo

“The Lord himself hath led him with his own Almighty hand.
He hath caused him to spring from a trunk without root, and planted him again in a distant and more delightful spot, and caused him to rise up to a considerable tree.
Inspired him with an inclination for science so passionate as to become the most gratifying of all others.
Given him all the means he could either wish for, or enjoy, of attaining the objects he had in view.
Favoured him in such a manner that even the not obtaining of what he wished for, ultimately turned out to his great advantage.
Caused him to be received into favour by the "Mœcenates Scientiarum"; by the greatest men in the kingdom; and by the Royal Family.
Given him an advantageous and honourable post, the very one that, above all others in the world, he had wished for.
Given him the wife for whom he most wished, and who managed his household affairs whilst he was engaged in laborious studies.
Given him children who have turned out good and virtuous.
Given him a son for his successor in office.
Given him the largest collection of plants that ever existed in the world, and his greatest delight.
Given him lands and other property, so that though there has been nothing superfluous, nothing has he wanted.
Honoured him with the titles of Archiater, Knight, Nobleman, and with Distinction in the learned world.
Protected him from fire.
Preserved his life above 60 years.
Permitted him to visit his secret council-chambers.
Permitted him to see more of the creation than any mortal before him. Given him greater knowledge of natural history than any one had hitherto acquired.
The Lord hath been with him whithersoever he hath walked, and hath cut off all his enemies from before him, and hath made him a name, like the name of the great men that are in the earth. 1 Chron. xvn. 8.”

Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist

As quoted in The Annual Review and History of Literature http://books.google.com.mx/books?id=hx0ZAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=es#v=onepage&q=%22The%20Lord%20himself%20hath%20led%20him%20with%20his%20own%20Almighty%20hand%22&f=false (1806), by Arthur Aikin, T. N. Longman and O. Rees, p. 472.
Also found in Life of Linnaeus https://archive.org/stream/lifeoflinnaeus00brigiala#page/176/mode/2up/search/endeavoured (1858), by J. Van Voorst & Cecilia Lucy Brightwell, London. pp. 176-177.
Linnaeus Diary

Hannah Arendt photo
James Anthony Froude photo

“The Providence that watches over the affairs of men works out of their mistakes, at times, a healthier issue than could have been accomplished by their wisest forethought.”

James Anthony Froude (1818–1894) English historian, novelist, biographer, and editor of Fraser's Magazine

Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 278.

Cesare Pavese photo

“The really clever thing, in affairs of this sort, is not to win a woman already desired by everyone, but to discover such a prize while she is still unknown.”

Cesare Pavese (1908–1950) Italian poet, novelist, literary critic, and translator

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

Bill Mollison photo
Agatha Christie photo
Woodrow Wilson photo

“In most parts of our country men work, not for themselves, not as partners in the old way in which they used to work, but generally as employees,—in a higher or lower grade,—of great corporations. There was a time when corporations played a very minor part in our business affairs, but now they play the chief part, and most men are the servants of corporations.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

Section I: “The Old Order Changeth”, p. 5 http://books.google.com/books?id=MW8SAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA5&dq=%22In%20most%20parts%20of%20our%20country%22
1910s, The New Freedom (1913)

Clement Attlee photo

“You have no right whatever to speak on behalf of the Government. Foreign affairs are in the capable hands of Ernest Bevin. His task is quite sufficiently difficult without the irresponsible statements of the kind you are making... I can assure you there is widespread resentment in the Party at your activities and a period of silence on your part would be welcome.”

Clement Attlee (1883–1967) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Letter to Harold Laski, Chairman of the Labour Party (1946), quoted in David Butler and Gareth Butler, Twentieth Century British Political Facts (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), p. 289.
Prime Minister

Saddam Hussein photo
George Holyoake photo

“Mr. Owen looked upon men through the spectacles of his own good-nature. He seldom took Lord Brougham's advice "to pick his men." He never acted on the maxim that the working class are as jealous of each other as the upper classes are of them. The resolution he displayed as a manufacturer he was wanting in as a founder of communities…. No leader ever took so little care as Mr, Owen in guarding his own reputation. He scarcely protested when others attached his name to schemes which were not his. The failure of Queenwood was not chargeable to him. When his advice was not followed he would say : "Well, gentlemen, I tell you what you ought to do. You differ from me. Carry out your own plans. Experience will show you who is right." When the affair went wrong then it was ascribed to him. Whatever failed under his name the public inferred failed through him. Mr. Owen was a general who never provided himself with a rear guard. While he was fighting in the front ranks priests might come up and cut off his commissariat. His own troops fell into pits against which he had warned them. Yet he would write his next dispatch without it occurring to him to mention his own defeat, and he would return to his camp without missing his army. Yet society is not so well served that it need hesitate to forgive the omissions of its generous friends. To Mr. Owen will be accorded the distinction of being a philosopher who devoted himself to founding a Science of Social Improvement and a philanthropist who gave his fortune to advance it. Association, which was but casual before his day, he converted into a policy and taught it as an art. He substituted Co-operation for coercion in the conduct ot industry and the willing co-operation of intelligence certain of its own reward, for sullen labour enforced by the necessity of subsistence, seldom to be relied on and never satisfied.”

George Holyoake (1817–1906) British secularist, co-operator, and newspaper editor

George Jacob Holyoake in The History of Co-operation in England (1875; 1902).

Christopher Hitchens photo
Margaret Hughes photo
Maxwell D. Taylor photo
Dwight D. Eisenhower photo

“We are deeply unified in our support of basic principles: our belief in stability in our financial structure, in our determination we must have fiscal responsibility, in our determination not to establish and operate a paternalistic sort of government where a man's initiative is almost taken away from him by force. Only in the last few weeks, I have been reading quite an article on the experiment of almost complete paternalism in a friendly European country. This country has a tremendous record for socialistic operation, following a socialistic philosophy, and the record shows that their rate of suicide has gone up almost unbelievably and I think they were almost the lowest nation in the world for that. Now, they have more than twice our rate. Drunkenness has gone up. Lack of ambition is discernible on all sides.. Therefore, with that kind of example, let's always remember Lincoln's admonition. Let's do in the federal Government only those things that people themselves cannot do at all, or cannot so well do in their individual capacities. Now, my friends, I know that these words have been repeated to you time and time again until you're tired of them. But I ask you only this, to contemplate them and remember this--Lincoln added another sentence to that statement. He said that in all those things where the individual can solve his own problems the Government ought not to interfere, for all are domestic affairs and this comprehends the things that the individual is normally concerned with, because foreign affairs does belong to the President by the Constitution--and they are things that really require constant governmental action.”

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969) American general and politician, 34th president of the United States (in office from 1953 to 1961)

July 27, 1960 Remarks at the Republican National Committee Breakfast, Morrison Hotel, Chicago, Illinois http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=11891#ixzz1fU73Watz
1960s

Errico Malatesta photo
Rudy Rucker photo
Donald Barthelme photo

“MAGGIE: Did you have a good time?
HILDA: The affair ran the usual course. Fever, boredom, trapped.
MAGGIE: Hot, rinse, spin dry.”

Donald Barthelme (1931–1989) American writer, editor, and professor

“The Conservatory” [play], p. 292.
The Teachings of Don. B: Satires, Parodies, Fables, Illustrated Stories, and Plays of Donald Barthelme (1992)

James Jeans photo
Allen C. Guelzo photo
Matt Taibbi photo
Mao Zedong photo

“Whatever happens, I shall never be alone,
I shall always have a fare, an affair, or a revolution.”

Stephen Spender (1909–1995) English poet and man of letters

'The Uncreating Chaos" — This poem was originally published in Poems (1933) where it reads: Whatever happens, I shall never be alone.
I shall always have a boy, a railway fare, or a revolution.
The Still Centre (1939)

Ilana Mercer photo

“Those of us who want the U. S. to stay solvent—and out of the affairs of others—recognize that sovereign nation-states that resist, not enable, our imperial impulses, are the best hindrance to hegemonic overreach.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“The Speaker vs. The Decider,” http://www.ocregister.com/opinion/foreign-56997-power-pelosi.html The Orange County Register, April 10, 2007.
2000s, 2007

Alexander Bain photo
Herman Kahn photo

“Equally important to not appearing "trigger-happy" is not to appear prone to either accidents or miscalculations. Who wants to live in the 1960's and 1970's in the same world with a hostile strategic force that might inadvertently start a war? Most people are not even willing to live with a friendly strategic force that may not be reliably controlled. The worst way for a country to start a war is to do it accidentally, without any preparations. That might initiate an all- out "slugging match" in which only the most alert portion of the forces gets off in the early phase. Both sides are thus likely to be clobbered," both because the initial blow was not large enough to be decisive and because the war plans are likely to be inappropriate. To repeat: On all these questions of accident, miscalculation, unauthorized behavior, trigger-happy postures, and excessive destructiveness, we must satisfy ourselves and our allies, the neutrals, and, strangely important, our potential enemies. Since it is almost inevitable that the future will see more discussion of these questions, i will be important for us not only to have made satisfactory preparations, but also to have prepared a satisfactory story. Unless every-body concerned, both laymen and experts, develops a satisfactory image of strategic forces as contributing more to security than insecurity it is most improbable that the required budgets, alliances, and intellectual efforts will have the necessary support. To the extent that people worry about our strategic forces as themselves exacerbating or creating security problems, or confuse symptoms with the disease, we may anticipate a growing rejection of military preparedness as an essential element in the solution to our security problem and a turning to other approaches not as a complement and supplement but as an alternative. In particular, we are likely to suffer from the same movement toward "responsible" budgets pacifism, and unilateral and universal disarmament that swept through England in the 1920's and 1930's. The effect then was that England prematurely disarmed herself to such an extent that she first almost lost her voice in world affairs, and later her independence in a war that was caused as much by English weakness as by anything else.”

Herman Kahn (1922–1983) American futurist

The Magnum Opus; On Thermonuclear War

Gore Vidal photo

“I can understand companionship. I can understand bought sex in the afternoon, but I cannot understand the love affair.”

Gore Vidal (1925–2012) American writer

Quoted in profile by Martin Amis, "Mr. Vidal: Unpatriotic Gore" (1977) in The Moronic Inferno (1987)
1970s

Koenraad Elst photo
Max Frisch photo

“You merely had an affair with me, to be exact, and therefore no right to prevent me from another affair.”

Max Frisch (1911–1991) Swiss playwright and novelist

I'm not Stiller (1955)

Al Gore photo
Basil of Caesarea photo
Noam Chomsky photo

“We cannot say much about human affairs with any confidence, but sometimes it is possible. We can, for example, be fairly confident that either there will be a world without war, or there won't be a world—at least, a world inhabited by creatures other than bacteria and beetles, with some scattering of others.”

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

Talk titled "A World Without War" at the 2nd World Social Forum, in Porto Alegre, Brazil, January 31, 2002 http://www.chomsky.info/talks/200202--.htm.
Quotes 2000s, 2002

Paul Klee photo
George Steiner photo

“To shoot a man because one disagrees with his interpretation of Darwin or Hegel is a sinister tribute to the supremacy of ideas in human affairs — but a tribute nevertheless.”

George Steiner (1929–2020) American writer

"Marxism and the Literary Critic," Encounter, XI (November 1958).
Language and Silence: Essays 1958-1966 (1967)

Andrei Sakharov photo
David Lloyd George photo

“Most retired business people "know how to work but they don't know how to play; they are completely devoid of the spirit of relaxation and recreation. Such forced idleness is ruinous to the morale of many of the more capable men of affairs."”

Burrill Bernard Crohn (1884–1983) American gastroenterologist

Speaking at the second annual graduate fortnight of the New York Academy of Medicine, 15 October 1929. [Lays Nervous Ills to Use of Tobacco: Dr. B.B. Crohn Says Excessive Smoking Is More Serious Problem Than Drinking: Warns Against Cigarette: Medical Fortnight Speaker Lists Excitable States, Hyperacidity and Ulcers as Effects, The New York Times, 16 October 1929, http://search.proquest.com.dclibrary.idm.oclc.org/docview/104691648/87889E05D1964D8EPQ/1?accountid=46320]

“It is my considered opinion that the so called Kashmir problem, we have been facing, since 1947 has never been viewed in a historical perspective. That is why it has defied solution so far, and its end is not in sight in the near future. Politicians at the helm of affairs during this nearly half a century have been living from hand to mouth and are waiting for Pakistan to face them with a fait accompli. Once againg they are out to hand over Kashmir and its people to be butchers who have devastated this fair land and destroyed its rich eulture. … It is therefore high time that we renounce this ritual and have a look at the problem in a historical perspective. I should like to warn that histories of Kashmir written by Kashmiri Hindus in modern times are worse than useless for this purpose. I have read almost all of them, only to be left wondering at the piteous state to which the Hindu mind in Kashmir has been reduced. I am not taking these histories into account except for bits and pieces which fall into the broad pattern. … What distinguishes the Hindu rulers of Kashmir from Hindu rulers elsewhere is that they continued to recruit in their army Turks from Central Asia without realizing that the Turks had become Islamicized and as such were no longer mere wage earners. One of Kashmir's Hindu rulers Harsha (1089-1101 CE) was persuaded by his Muslim favourites to plunder temple properties and melt down icons made of precious metal. Apologists of Islam have been highlighting this isolated incident in order to cover up the iconoclastic record of Islam not only in Kashmir but also in the rest of Bharatvarsha. At the same time they conceal the fact that Kashmir passed under the heel of Islam not as a result of the labours of its missionaries but due to a coup staged by an Islamicised army. … Small wonder that balance of farces in Kashmir should have continued to tilt in favour of Islamic imperialism till the last Hindu has been hounded out of his ancestral homeland. Small wonder that the hoodlums strut around not only in the valley but in the capital city of Delhi with airs of injured innocence. Small wonder that the Marxist-Muslim combine of scribes who dominate the media blame Jagmohan for arranging an overnight and enmasse exodus of the Hindus from the valley. (They cannot forgive Jagmohan for bringing back Kashmir to India at a time when the combine was hoping that Pakistan would face India with an accomplished fact.) Small wonder that what Arun Shourie has aptly described as the "Formula Factory"”

Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist

the Nayars, the Puris, the Kotharis, the Dhars, the Haksars, the Tarkundes - should be busy devising ways for handing over the Kashmir Hindus to their age-old oppressors.
Kashmir: The Problem is Muslim Extremism by Sita Ram Goel https://web.archive.org/web/20080220033606/http://www.kashmir-information.com/Miscellaneous/Goel1.html

Primo Levi photo
James Russell Lowell photo
Will Cuppy photo
Calvin Coolidge photo
John F. Kennedy photo

“This is a great country and requires a good deal of all of us, so I can imagine nothing more important than for all of you to continue to work in public affairs and be interested in them, not only to bring up a family, but also give part of your time to your community, your state, and your country.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

"Remarks to the Delegates of Girls Nation (322)" (2 August 1963) http://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Research-Aids/Ready-Reference/JFK-Quotations.aspx
1963

Joseph Hayne Rainey photo
Chen Shui-bian photo

“After I improved our foreign affairs, I shall improve the economy in Taiwan.”

Chen Shui-bian (1950) Taiwanese politician

CKS Airport, June, 5, 2001
Pet Phrases, 2001

Francis Escudero photo
Nick Cave photo
William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield photo
Heather Brooke photo

“Transparency is seen as the antidote to corruption because secrecy is, if not its cause, then at least a necessary precondition. This is especially so for corruption involving private enrichment from public goods. Transparency is a power-reducing mechanism so it matters whose affairs are made transparent and for what purpose.”

Heather Brooke (1970) American journalist

Attributed, In the Media
Source: Financial Times http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/7ba47200-015c-11e6-99cb-83242733f755.html#axzz45lPGQfQg "Transparency thwarts the abuse of power to enrich the powerful", Column in the Financial Times, 13 April 2016.

Louis Brownlow photo
Francis Bacon photo
Donald J. Trump photo
Ko Wen-je photo

“It (Mainland China) should be wiser in handling cross-strait affairs.”

Ko Wen-je (1959) Taiwanese politician and physician

Ko Wen-je (2018) cited in " Taiwan denounces China for taking its allies, brutish suppression http://focustaiwan.tw/news/acs/201808210024.aspx" on Focus Taiwan, 21 August 2018.

Hannah Arendt photo
Dejan Stojanovic photo

“Serious affairs and history are carefully laid snares for the uninformed.”

Dejan Stojanovic (1959) poet, writer, and businessman

"Game III," p. 98
The Sun Watches the Sun (1999), Sequence: “A Game”

Kurt Lewin photo

“One should view the present situation – the status quo – as being maintained by certain conditions or forces. A culture – for instance, the food habits of a certain group at a given time – is not a static affair but a live process like a river which moves but still keeps to a recognizable form…Food habits do not occur in empty space. They are part and parcel of the daily rhythm of being awake and asleep; of being alone and in a group; of earning a living and playing; of being a member of a town, a family, a social class, a religious group... in a district with good groceries and restaurants or in an area of poor and irregular food supply. Somehow all these factors affect food habits at any given time. They determine the food habits of a group every day anew just as the amount of water supply and the nature of the river bed determine the flow of the river, its constancy or change.”

Kurt Lewin (1890–1947) German-American psychologist

Kurt Lewin (1943) "Psychological ecology". In: D. Cartwright (Ed.) Field Theory in Social Science. London: Social Science Paperbacks. As cited in: Bernard Burnes (2004) " Kurt Lewin and the Planned Approach to Change: A Re-appraisal https://blackboard.le.ac.uk/bbcswebdav/institution/College%20of%20Social%20Science/School%20of%20Management/DL%20Materials/MBA/2.%20Organizational%20Behaviour/Section%208/Burnes.pdf" in: Journal of Management Studies. Vol 41. Nr 6. p. 977-1002.
1940s

“Ninth-century castles were relatively small and simple affairs designed to safeguard a relatively small number of people and intended as a refuge during times of trouble.”

Marilyn Stokstad (1929–2016) art historian

Source: Medieval castles (2005), Ch. 1 : The Great Tower : Norman and Early Plantagenet Castles