Quotes about anyone (3430 quotes, page 5)

“To-day we live so cowed under the bombardment of this intellectual artillery that hardly anyone can attain to the inward detachment that is required for a clear view of the monstrous drama. The will-to-power operating under a pure democratic disguise has finished off its masterpiece so well that the object's sense of freedom is actually flattered by the most thorough-going enslavement that has ever existed.”

Oswald Spengler book The Decline of the West

Vol. II, Alfred A. Knopf, 1928, p. 461 https://archive.org/stream/Decline-Of-The-West-Oswald-Spengler/Decline_Of_The_West#page/n931/mode/2up
The Decline of the West (1918, 1923)

Sense , Freedom

“I never can understand how anyone can not smoke — it deprives a man of the best part of life … with a good cigar in his mouth a man is perfectly safe, nothing can touch him — literally.”

Thomas Mann book The Magic Mountain

Source: The Magic Mountain (1924), Ch. 3

Life , Understanding , Parting

“I've never told anyone this, but I suffer from terrible stage fright. True. You can't tell though, can you? Unbelievable, the panic. I nearly die of fear before I go on stage. Something wicked. I can't eat a thing the day before a gig. It'd make me vomit. Once I come off? I could eat a scampied elephant between two buttered mattresses. But I'm kinda glad about the stage fright. I've read Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud about their terror. And I reckon it's what gets the adrenalin going.”

John Lydon (1956) English singer, songwriter, and musician

Interview: Seven Magazine in the London Telegraph (6 January 2008)

Fear , Suffering , Reading

“Leave off wishing to deserve any thanks from anyone, or thinking that anyone can ever become grateful.”
Desine de quoquam quicquam bene velle mereri, Aut aliquem fieri posse putare pium.

Gaio Valerio Catullo list of poems by Catullus

LXXIII, lines 1–2
Carmina

Thinking

“A good traveler has no fixed plans
and is not intent upon arriving.
A good artist lets his intuition
lead him wherever it wants.
A good scientist has freed himself of concepts
and keeps his mind open to what is. Thus the Master is available to all people
and doesn't reject anyone.
He is ready to use all situations
and doesn't waste anything.
This is called embodying the light.”

Laozi book Tao Te Ching

Variants:
A good traveller has no fixed plan and is not intent on arriving.
As quoted in In Search of King Solomon's Mines‎ (2003) by Tahir Shah, p. 217
A true traveller has no fixed plan, and is not intent on arriving.
Source: Tao Te Ching, Ch. 27, as interpreted by Stephen Mitchell (1992)

People , Travel , Light

“The true nature of the international system under which we were living was not realized until it failed. Hardly anyone understood the political function of the international monetary system; the awful suddenness of the transformation thus took the world completely by surprise. And yet the gold standard was the only remaining pillar of the traditional world economy; when it broke, the effect was bound to be instantaneous. To liberal economists the gold standard was a purely economic institution; they refused even to consider it as a part of a social mechanism.”

Karl Polanyi book The Great Transformation

The Great Transformation (1944), Ch. 2 : Conservative Twenties, Revolutionary Thirties

World , Nature , Parting

“You listeners, the ones who found me first are, I believe, the future of great art thinkers. Because anyone that's found me now I really think is grabbing on to the ideas that I have, more than anything. It's about the music but it's also about the story. So thank you guys for loving and reading the story and being as into it and as passionate as I am.”

Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress

Interview with DJ Ron Slomowicz at About.com http://dancemusic.about.com/od/artistshomepages/a/LadyGagaInt_2.htm

Love , Art , Music , Guy

“The worst of his life is not that he thinks that it is living, but that he is satisfied with it, and the most awful thing of life is that he thinks that is how it should be. He can't understand anyone who thinks differently from him, and when he can't understand anything he says: I'm sorry, but I'm only a humble joiner. It's all he can do to accept that fact that I am studying the history of literature and Scandinavian languages: he accepts it not because I will thereby become mentally enriched, but because he thinks that it will enable me to live an easier life that he. Easier but not different.”

Stig Dagerman book A Burnt Child

Source: A Burnt Child (1948), p. 200

Life , History , Literature , Understanding

“We know that the overwhelming majority of police officers do an incredibly hard and dangerous job fairly and professionally. They are deserving of our respect and not our scorn. And when anyone, no matter how good their intentions may be, paints all police as biased or bigoted, we undermine those officers we depend on for our safety. And as for those who use rhetoric suggesting harm to police, even if they don’t act on it themselves -- well, they not only make the jobs of police officers even more dangerous, but they do a disservice to the very cause of justice that they claim to promote.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2016, Memorial Service for Fallen Dallas Police Officers (July 2016)

Justice , Painting , Dependency

“Without the right to life, how would an individual’s rights become vested? How could any other rights be realized if one’s very life could be taken away by another who is exercising their right to liberty or pursuit of happiness? Jefferson articulated a prioritized set of rights; first the right to life, then the right to liberty, then the pursuit of happiness. Each right was carefully prioritized in sequential order because the right to life trumps all other rights. No one can take a human life in exercising their liberties and no one can take a life or take away the liberty of another in their pursuit of happiness. If the right to life can be taken by another, then no right of anyone is protected.”

Steve King (1949) US Representative for Iowa

Rep. Steve King: Protecting the Unborn Reaffirms Jefferson’s Truths http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/11/01/exclusive-rep-steve-king-protecting-the-unborn-reaffirms-jeffersons-truths/ (November 1, 2017)

Life , Exercises , Happiness

“Essentially, we are still the same people as those in the period of the Reformation - and how should it be otherwise? But we no longer allow ourselves certain means to gain victory for our opinion: this distinguishes us from that age and proves that we belong to a higher culture. These days, if a man still attacks and crushes opinions with suspicions and outbursts of rage, in the manner of men during the Reformation, he clearly betrays that he would have burnt his opponents, had he lived in other times, and that he would have taken recourse to all the means of the Inquisition, had he lived as an opponent of the Reformation. In its time, the Inquisition was reasonable, for it meant nothing other than the general martial law which had to be proclaimed over the whole domain of the church, and which, like every state of martial law, justified the use of the extremest means, namely under the assumption (which we no longer share with those people) that one possessed truth in the church and had to preserve it at any cost, with any sacrifice, for the salvation of mankind. But now we will no longer concede so easily that anyone has the truth; the rigorous methods of inquiry have spread sufficient distrust and caution, so that we experience every man who represents opinions violently in word and deed as any enemy of our present culture, or at least as a backward person. And in fact, the fervor about having the truth counts very little today in relation to that other fervor, more gentle and silent, to be sure, for seeking the truth, a search that does not tire of learning afresh and testing anew.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Human, All Too Human

Wir sind im Wesentlichen noch dieselben Menschen, wie die des Zeitalters der Reformation: wie sollte es auch anders sein? Aber dass wir uns einige Mittel nicht mehr erlauben, um mit ihnen unsrer Meinung zum Siege zu verhelfen, das hebt uns gegen jene Zeit ab und beweist, dass wir einer höhern Cultur angehören. Wer jetzt noch, in der Art der Reformations-Menschen, Meinungen mit Verdächtigungen, mit Wuthausbrüchen bekämpft und niederwirft, verräth deutlich, dass er seine Gegner verbrannt haben würde, falls er in anderen Zeiten gelebt hätte, und dass er zu allen Mitteln der Inquisition seine Zuflucht genommen haben würde, wenn er als Gegner der Reformation gelebt hätte. Diese Inquisition war damals vernünftig, denn sie bedeutete nichts Anderes, als den allgemeinen Belagerungszustand, welcher über den ganzen Bereich der Kirche verhängt werden musste, und der, wie jeder Belagerungszustand, zu den äussersten Mitteln berechtigte, unter der Voraussetzung nämlich (welche wir jetzt nicht mehr mit jenen Menschen theilen), dass man die Wahrheit, in der Kirche, habe, und um jeden Preis mit jedem Opfer zum Heile der Menschheit bewahren müsse. Jetzt aber giebt man Niemandem so leicht mehr zu, dass er die Wahrheit habe: die strengen Methoden der Forschung haben genug Misstrauen und Vorsicht verbreitet, so dass Jeder, welcher gewaltthätig in Wort und Werk Meinungen vertritt, als ein Feind unserer jetzigen Cultur, mindestens als ein zurückgebliebener empfunden wird. In der That: das Pathos, dass man die Wahrheit habe, gilt jetzt sehr wenig im Verhältniss zu jenem freilich milderen und klanglosen Pathos des Wahrheit-Suchens, welches nicht müde wird, umzulernen und neu zu prüfen.
Section IX, "Man Alone with Himself" / aphorism 633
Human, All Too Human (1878), Helen Zimmern translation

Men , People , Truth , Age

“Let no one think that I am dying of grief over my own dismal and ruined state. The sorrow that I feel, I can not at all express; but I can give a hint of it. From among those of the English community who were murdered at the hands of those disgraced ["black-faced"] black ones, one was my patron, and one was my well-wisher, and one my friend, and one my supporter, and one my pupil. Among the Hindustanis, some dear ones, some friends, some pupils, some beloveds. Thus every one of them was mingled with the dust. How harsh is the mourning for one dear one! He who would be a mourner for so many dear ones— how could his life not be difficult? Alas! So my friends died that now when I die, there would not even be anyone left to mourn for me.”

Ghalib (1797–1869) Urdu-Persian poet

Letter to Munshi Hargopal Tafta, 17/18 July, 1858
Quotes from Letters

Life , Feeling , Communication , Support

“Our country is not flourishing. The enormous creative and spiritual potential of our nations is not being used sensibly. Entire branches of industry are producing goods that are of no interest to anyone, while we are lacking the things we need. A state which calls itself a workers' state humiliates and exploits workers. Our obsolete economy is wasting the little energy we have available.”

Václav Havel (1936–2011) playwright, essayist, poet, dissident and 1st President of the Czech Republic

New Year's Address to the Nation (1990)

Country

“Smashing up McDonald's or Starbuck's is pointless. Not that I give a damn about McDonald's or Starbuck's. I don't care whether anyone smashes them up or not. But that is not a revolutionary activity. Even if every fast-food chain in the world were wiped out the techno-industrial system would suffer only minimal harm as a result, since it could easily survive without fast-food chains. When you attack McDonald's or Starbuck's, you are not hitting where it hurts.”

Theodore Kaczynski (1942) American domestic terrorist, mathematician and anarchist

"Technology Is The Target", point 2
Hit Where It Hurts (2002)

World , Food , Suffering , Hurt

“The condition of mankind is, and always has been, so miserable and depraved that, if anyone were to say to the poet: "For God's sake stop singing and do something useful like putting on the kettle or fetching bandages," what just reason could he give for refusing? But nobody says this. The self-appointed unqualified nurse says: "You are to sing the patient a song which will make him believe that I, and I alone, can cure him. If you can't or won't, I shall confiscate your passport and send you to the mines." And the poor patient in his delirium cries: "Please sing me a song which will give me sweet dreams instead of nightmares. If you succeed, I will give you a penthouse in New York or a ranch in Arizona."”

W. H. Auden book The Dyer's Hand

"Writing", p. 27
The Dyer's Hand, and Other Essays (1962)

God , Dreams , Singing

“How can you expect a beholder to experience my picture as I experienced it? A picture comes to me a long time beforehand; who knows how long a time beforehand, I sensed, saw, and painted it and yet the next day even I do not understand what I have done. How can anyone penetrate my dreams, my instincts, my desires, my thought, which have taken a long time to fashion themselves and come to the surface, above all to grasp what I put there, perhaps involuntary.”

Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer

Richard Friedenthal, (1963, p. 260).
1930s, "Conversations avec Picasso," 1934–35

Dreams , Fashion , Understanding , Sense

“How could anyone expect a court martial to undo what another court martial had done?
I am not even talking about the way the judges were hand-picked. Doesn't the overriding idea of discipline, which is the lifeblood of these soldiers, itself undercut their capacity for fairness? Discipline means obedience. When the Minister of War, the commander in chief, proclaims, in public and to the acclamation of the nation's representatives, the absolute authority of a previous verdict, how can you expect a court martial to rule against him?”

Emile Zola J’accuse…!

J'accuse! (1898)

War , Way , Idea

“This is the first lesson to learn: be determined not to curse anything outside, not to lay the blame upon anyone outside, but stand up, lay the blame on yourself. You will find that is always true. Get hold of yourself.”

Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902) Indian Hindu monk and phylosopher

Pearls of Wisdom

Learning

“Anyone having these desires will make these researches.”

Josiah Willard Gibbs (1839–1903) physicist

About his own scientific work. Quoted in Muriel Rukeyser, Willard Gibbs (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran & Co., 1942), p. 431.
Attributed

“I have always thought that all men should be free; but if any should be slaves, it should be first those who desire it for themselves, and secondly, those who desire it for others. When I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Source: Statement to an Indiana Regiment passing through Washington (17 March 1865); The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln Volume VIII

Men , Feeling , Strong , Personality

“I'd like to say that maybe we could work it out
But I know that it's no use
If I ever find anyone half as good as you
I think maybe that will do”

Tom Odell (1990) British singer-songwriter

Half As Good As You
Lyrics, Jubilee Road

Thinking

“Constantine was Nature's masterpiece, a triumph, as it were, of God's handiwork. One look at him would convince anyone that here was a descendant of the mythical Golden Age of the Greeks, so infinite was his charm.”

Anna Comnena book Alexiad

Of Constantine Doukas
The Alexiad, Book 1

God , Age , Nature

“I intend to set up a thousand-year Reich and anyone who supports me in this battle is a fellow-fighter for a unique spiritual—I would say divine—creation… Rudolf Hess, my assistant of many years standing, would tell you: If we have such a leader, God is with us.”

Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) Führer and Reich Chancellor of Germany, Leader of the Nazi Party

As quoted in Secret Conversations with Hitler: The Two Newly-Discovered 1931 Interviews (1971) by Richard Breiting, p. 68
Other remarks

God , Support

“If you trust in Nature, in the small Things that hardly anyone sees and that can so suddenly become huge, immeasurable; if you have this love for what is humble and try very simply, as someone who serves, to win the confidence of what seems poor: then everything will become easier for you, more coherent and somehow more reconciling, not in your conscious mind perhaps, which stays behind, astonished, but in your innermost awareness, awakeness, and knowledge.”

Rainer Maria Rilke book Letters to a Young Poet

Letter Four (16 July 1903)
Letters to a Young Poet (1934)

Love , Confidence , Nature , Knowledge

“Today, on this day of possibility, we stand in the shadow of a lanky, raw-boned man with little formal education who once took the stage at Old Main and told the nation that if anyone did not believe the American principles of freedom and equality, that those principles were timeless and all-inclusive, they should go rip that page out of the Declaration of Independence.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

Knox College Commencement Address (4 June 2005) http://www.knox.edu/x9803.xml
2005

Education , Freedom

“I have experience and I am employing it in the service of a Chilean road for Chile's problems. We always take advantage of experience wherever it comes from, but adapting it to our reality. I am putting it to use in a Chilean way, for the problems of Chile. We are not anyone's mental colonists.”

Salvador Allende (1908–1973) Chilean physician and politician

Interview with Saul Landau (1971)

Way , Problem , Reality

“I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace, a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity, and if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it and see it still.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1980s, Second term of office (1985–1989), Farewell Address (1989)

Life , God , People , Peace

“When you see anyone complaining
of such and such a person's ill-nature and bad temper,
know that the complainant is bad-tempered,
forasmuch as he speaks ill of that bad-tempered person,
because he alone is good-tempered who is quietly forbearing
towards the bad-tempered and ill-natured.”

Rumi (1207–1273) Iranian poet

IV, 771-4
Jewels of Remembrance (1996)

Nature , Personality

“What would the Senate do with me, an inexperienced legislator who lacks the faculty of self-deception, essential requisite for anyone wanting to guide others.”

Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa book The Leopard

Che cosa se ne farebbe il Senato di me, di un legislatore inesperto cui manca la facoltà d'ingannare sé stesso, questo requisito essenziale per chi voglia guidare gli altri?
Page 148
Il Gattopardo (1958)

“And traffic! Traffic's a nightmare! That's how people describe it, a nightmare. Has anyone had this nightmare? "AAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!" "What is it, darling? Are you all right?" "No, I'm not all right at all!" "What was it?"”

Michael McIntyre (1976) British comedian

"TRAFFIC!!!"
Live and Laughing (2008)

People

“And I would like to say we've got no lesson on that score to take from the McConnells, from anyone that has been dominating Quebec like a bunch of Rhodesians! The white group. If we have colours here you feel it and that is something we will not stand any more. This paternalistic, WASP … and it is that, typically, WASP arrogance of the ones that have been leading our government and to the slush funds that they contribute to leaving both of our hacked bodies by the road for too long.”

René Lévesque (1922–1987) Quebec politician

The Champions, Part 2: Trappings of Power

Feeling

“His reputation will go on increasing because scarcely anyone reads him.”

Voltaire (1694–1778) French writer, historian, and philosopher

Sa réputation s’affermira toujours, parce qu’on ne le lit guère.
"Dante http://www.voltaire-integral.com/Html/18/dante.htm" (1765)
Citas, Dictionnaire philosophique (1764)

Reading

“The world would be a happier place than it is if acquisitiveness were always stronger than rivalry. But in fact, a great many men will cheerfully face impoverishment if they can thereby secure complete ruin for their rivals. Hence the present level of taxation.
Vanity is a motive of immense potency. Anyone who has much to do with children knows how they are constantly performing some antic, and saying "Look at me." "Look at me" is one of the most fundamental desires of the human heart. It can take innumerable forms, from buffoonery to the pursuit of posthumous fame.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

1950s, What Desires Are Politically Important? (1950)

Men , Children , World , Motivation

“For anyone who is alone, without God and without a master, the weight of days is dreadful. Hence one must choose a master, God being out of style.”

Albert Camus book The Fall

The Fall (1956)

God

“She was not an easy woman to categorize or to explain. If I´ve ever known anyone in my life, man or woman, who was unique, it was she. There was nobody like her before or since. Never will be. In every way. In talent, in looks, in character, in temperament. Everything. There sure wasn't anybody who didn't fall under her spell.”

Henry Fonda (1905–1982) American actor

About first wife Margaret Sullavan. Haywire (1977) by Brooke Hayward. Jonathan Cape Ltd., pp. 162-63. ISBN 0224014269.

Life , Way

“The first thing that we are calling you to is Islam. The religion of the Unification of God; of freedom from associating partners with Him, and rejection of this; of complete love of Him, the Exalted; of complete submission to His Laws; and of the discarding of all the opinions, orders, theories and religions which contradict with the religion He sent down to His Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). Islam is the religion of all the prophets, and makes no distinction between them - peace be upon them all. It is to this religion that we call you; the seal of all the previous religions. It is the religion of Unification of God, sincerity, the best of manners, righteousness, mercy, honour, purity, and piety. It is the religion of showing kindness to others, establishing justice between them, granting them their rights, and defending the oppressed and the persecuted. It is the religion of enjoining the good and forbidding the evil with the hand, tongue and heart. It is the religion of Jihad in the way of Allah so that Allah's Word and religion reign Supreme. And it is the religion of unity and agreement on the obedience to Allah, and total equality between all people, without regarding their colour, sex, or language. It is the religion whose book - the Quran - will remained preserved and unchanged, after the other Divine books and messages have been changed. The Quran is the miracle until the Day of Judgment. Allah has challenged anyone to bring a book like the Quran or even ten verses like it.”

Osama bin Laden (1957–2011) founder of al-Qaeda

2000s, 2002, Letter to the American people (2002)

Love , God , People , Books

“How can anyone be against love?”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

By Any Means Necessary (1970)

Love

“Whatever happens, I cannot be a silent witness to murder or torture. Anyone who is a partner in this is a despicable individual. I am sorry I cannot be moderate about it…”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

Quoted in The New York Times Biographical Service, Vol. I (1970), p. 294 (said by Russell "in the spring of 1967")
1960s

“Are there any paranoids in the audience tonight? (the crowd cheers) Is there anyone who worries about things? (the crowd cheers again) Pathetic. This is for all the weak people in the audience! Is there anyone here who's weak? (the crowd cheers once more) This is for you, it's called Run Like Hell! (the song starts)”

Roger Waters (1943) English songwriter, bassist, and lyricist of Pink Floyd

During the Los Angeles performance of "The Wall" at the Los Angeles Arena, California, February 1980
Miscellaneous

People , Hell

“Don’t let anyone impose on you. Don’t be quarrelsome, but stand up for your rights. If you've got to fight, fight hard and well. To my mind, a coward is the only thing meaner than a liar.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

Talk to schoolchildren in Oyster Bay, Christmastime (1898) http://www.trsite.org/content/pages/speaking-loudly, as quoted in The Bully Pulpit : A Teddy Roosevelt Book of Quotations (2002) by H. Paul Jeffers, p. 22
1890s

Fight

“Our faith should be expressed in working toward a better planet for our children and not the selfish, juvenile hope for a better afterlife for ourselves. I don't think anyone is going to Hell, because it only exists in the minds of people who wish ill will on others.”

Greg Graffin (1964) American musician

Bozell, Brent, Punk Rockers Knock Christmas, townhall.com, December 20, 2013, http://townhall.com/columnists/brentbozell/2013/12/20/punk-rockers-knock-christmas-n1766181, 2013-12-25

Children , People , Faith , Hope

“Today is a big step in our march toward equality. Gay and lesbian couples now have the right to marry, just like anyone else. #LoveWins.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

President Barack Obama on Twitter at June 26, 2015 https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/614435467120001024
2015

“Taiwan is an inalienable part of Chinese territory. We will continue to make every effort and endeavor with every sincerity to strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification of the two sides across the Taiwan Straits. We will work with our Taiwan compatriots to promote the peaceful development of cross-strait relations. However, we will never allow anyone to make Taiwan secede from China by any means.”

Hu Jintao (1942) former General Secretary of the Communist Party of China

2000s, White House speech (2006)

Peace , Effort , Parting , Sincerity

“For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in his Father's glory with angels.”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Mark 8:35-37
Bible References

Life , World , Angels , Soul

“No one has to thank me for accepting the burden, because it is so big sacrifice for me to please or I would not do for kindness to anyone. I do this to for my country, as a duty of conscience, coldly, calmly completed.”

António de Oliveira Salazar (1889–1970) Prime Minister of Portugal

In the speech over as Finance Minister, Speeches, Volume 1 - Page 3; of António de Oliveira Salazar, Oliveira Salazar - Published by Coimbra Editora, 1945

Country

“For someone like me, it is a very strange habit to write in a diary. Not only that I have never written before, but it strikes me that later neither I, nor anyone else, will care for the musings of a thirteen-year-old schoolgirl.”

Anne Frank (1929–1945) victim of the Holocaust and author of a diary

20 June 1942
(1942 - 1944)

“Anyone who thinks of homosexual *love* is our enemy. We reject anything which emasculates our people and makes it a plaything for our enemies, for we know that life is fight, and it is madness to think that men will ever embrace fraternally.”

Heinrich Himmler (1900–1945) Nazi officer, Commander of the SS

14 May 1928
1920s

Love , Life , Men , People

“[W]ho that has understanding will suppose that the first, and second, and third day, and the evening and the morning, existed without a sun, and moon, and stars? and that the first day was, as it were, also without a sky? And who is so foolish as to suppose that God, after the manner of a husbandman, planted a paradise in Eden, towards the east, and placed in it a tree of life, visible and palpable, so that one tasting of the fruit by the bodily teeth obtained life? and again, that one was a partaker of good and evil by masticating what was taken from the tree? And if God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening, and Adam to hide himself under a tree, I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance, and not literally. Cain also, when going forth from the presence of God, certainly appears to thoughtful men as likely to lead the reader to inquire what is the presence of God, and what is the meaning of going out from Him. …”

Origen (185–254) Christian scholar in Alexandria

On First Principles, Bk. 4, ch. 2, par 16
On First Principles

Life , Men , God , History

“Do you know that there’s hardly anyone left of last year’s Caucasian governments? I’ve tried to stop it, but in vain. Yet they can’t all be Trotskyites and traitors.”

Lavrentiy Beria (1899–1953) Georgian Soviet NKVD police chief under fellow Georgian and Soviet leader Stalin

Quoted in “The Kremlin and the People” - Page 126 - by Walter Duranty - History – 2007

“Why is honesty so vital? Because where honesty and integrity are present, other virtues follow. … Men and women of integrity understand intrinsically that theirs is the precious right to hold their heads in the sunlight of truth, unashamed before anyone. Embodied within this simple principle and character trait rests the foundational virtue of every person and of every society.”

Gordon B. Hinckley book Standing for Something

Standing for Something: Ten Neglected Virtues That Will Heal Our Hearts and Homes.

Women , Men , Truth , Understanding

“We do not want a single foot of foreign territory; but of our territory we shall not surrender a single inch to anyone.”

Joseph Stalin (1879–1953) General secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

Russian: Чужой земли мы не хотим ни пяди, но и своей вершка ни отдадим.

Political Report of the C.C. to XVI Party Congress (29 June 1930) http://marx2mao.com/Stalin/SC30.html
Stalin's speeches, writings and authorised interviews

“There isn't anyone anywhere that isn't Seymour's Fat Lady. Don't you know that? Don't you know that goddam secret yet? And don't you know — listen to me, now — don't you know who that Fat Lady really is? . . . Ah, buddy. Ah, buddy. It's Christ Himself. Christ Himself, buddy.”

Jerome David Salinger book Franny and Zooey

Franny and Zooey (1961), Zooey (1957)
Context: I don't care where an actor acts. It can be in summer stock, it can be over a radio, it can be over television, it can be in a goddam Broadway theatre, complete with the most fashionable, most well-fed, most sunburned-looking audience you can imagine. But I'll tell you a terrible secret — Are you listening to me? There isn't anyone out there who isn't Seymour's Fat Lady. That includes your Professor Tupper, buddy. And all his goddam cousins by the dozens. There isn't anyone anywhere that isn't Seymour's Fat Lady. Don't you know that? Don't you know that goddam secret yet? And don't you know — listen to me, now — don't you know who that Fat Lady really is?... Ah, buddy. Ah, buddy. It's Christ Himself. Christ Himself, buddy.

Secret , Christ

“That’s why our military can look the way it does — every shade of humanity, forged into common service. That’s why anyone who threatens our values, whether fascists or communists or jihadists or homegrown demagogues, will always fail in the end.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2016, DNC Address (July 2016)
Context: America has changed over the years. But these values that my grandparents taught me — they haven’t gone anywhere. They’re as strong as ever, still cherished by people of every party, every race, every faith. They live on in each of us. What makes us American, what makes us patriots is what’s in here. That’s what matters. … And that’s why we can take the food and music and holidays and styles of other countries, and blend it into something uniquely our own. That’s why we can attract strivers and entrepreneurs from around the globe to build new factories and create new industries here. That’s why our military can look the way it does — every shade of humanity, forged into common service. That’s why anyone who threatens our values, whether fascists or communists or jihadists or homegrown demagogues, will always fail in the end.
That is America. That is America. Those bonds of affection; that common creed. We don’t fear the future; we shape it. We embrace it, as one people, stronger together than we are on our own.

Way

“The idea of education has been so tied to schools, universities, and professors that many assume that there is no other way, but education is available to anyone within reach of a library, a post office, or even a newsstand.”

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

Source: Education of a Wandering Man (1989), Ch. 1
Context: The idea of education has been so tied to schools, universities, and professors that many assume that there is no other way, but education is available to anyone within reach of a library, a post office, or even a newsstand.
Today you can buy the Dialogues of Plato for less than you would spend on a fifth of whiskey, or Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire for the price of a cheap shirt. You can buy a fair beginning of any education in any bookstore with a good stock of paperback books for less than you would spend on a week's supply of gasoline.
Often I hear people say they do not have time to read. That's absolute nonsense. In the one year during which I kept that kind of record, I read twenty-five books while waiting for people. In offices, applying for jobs, waiting to see a dentist, waiting in a restaurant for friends, many such places. I read on buses, trains, and planes. If one really wants to learn, one has to decide what is important. Spending an evening on the town? Attending a ball game? Or learning something that can be with you your life long?

Education , School , Way , Idea

“Does anyone bathe in a mighty little time? Don't say that he does it ill, but in a mighty little time. Does anyone drink a great quantity of wine? Don't say that he does ill, but that he drinks a great quantity. For, unless you perfectly understand the principle from which anyone acts, how should you know if he acts ill? Thus you will not run the hazard of assenting to any appearances but such as you fully comprehend.”

Epictetus (50–138) philosopher from Ancient Greece

45
The Enchiridion (c. 135)

Drink , Understanding , Appearance , Wine

“I'm sorry, but I don't want to be an emperor. That's not my business. I don't want to rule or conquer anyone.”

Charlie Chaplin (1889–1977) British comic actor and filmmaker

The Great Dictator (1940), The Barber's speech
Context: I'm sorry, but I don't want to be an emperor. That's not my business. I don't want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone, if possible, Jew, gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other's happiness — not by each other's misery. We don't want to hate and despise one another.
In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men's souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.
The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men, cries out for universal brotherhood, for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world — millions of despairing men, women and little children — victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me, I say — do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed — the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people and so long as men die, liberty will never perish.
Soldiers! Don't give yourselves to brutes — men who despise you — enslave you — who regiment your lives — tell you what to do — what to think or what to feel! Who drill you, diet you, treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don't give yourselves to these unnatural men — machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don't hate! Only the unloved hate — the unloved and the unnatural!
Soldiers! Don't fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the 17th Chapter of St. Luke it is written: "the Kingdom of God is within man" — not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people have the power — the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.
Then, in the name of democracy, let us use that power! Let us all unite! Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give youth the future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power, but they lie! They do not fulfill their promise; they never will. Dictators free themselves, but they enslave the people! Now, let us fight to fulfill that promise! Let us fight to free the world, to do away with national barriers, to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men's happiness.
Soldiers! In the name of democracy, let us all unite!
[Cheers]
Hannah, can you hear me? Wherever you are, look up, Hannah. The clouds are lifting. The sun is breaking through. We are coming out of the darkness into the light. We are coming into a new world, a kindlier world, where men will rise above their hate, their greed and brutality. Look up, Hannah. The soul of man has been given wings, and at last he is beginning to fly. He is flying into the rainbow — into the light of hope, into the future, the glorious future that belongs to you, to me and to all of us. Look up, Hannah. Look up.

Business

“I have never given a litmus test to anyone that I have appointed to the bench…. I feel very strongly about those social issues, but I also place my confidence in the fact that the one thing that I do seek are judges that will interpret the law and not write the law.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Interview with LA Times http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1986/62386e.htm (23 June 1986)
1980s, Second term of office (1985–1989)
Context: I have never given a litmus test to anyone that I have appointed to the bench.... I feel very strongly about those social issues, but I also place my confidence in the fact that the one thing that I do seek are judges that will interpret the law and not write the law. We've had too many examples in recent years of courts and judges legislating. They're not interpreting what the law says and whether someone has violated it or not. In too many instances, they have been actually legislating by legal decree what they think the law should be, and that I don't go for. And I think that the two men that we're just talking about here, Rehnquist and Scalia, are interpreters of the Constitution and the law.

Law , Feeling , Confidence

“I don't want to stay in touch. I don't want anyone to know where I am.”

William H. Macy (1950) American actor, screenwriter, teacher and director in theater, film and television

Interview in The Guardian (2011)
Context: I could become a hermit if I'm not careful; I like that. When people on Facebook say stay in touch – I don't want to stay in touch. I don't want anyone to know where I am.

“The Prophet (peace_be_upon_him) said: If you find anyone doing as Lot's people did, kill the one who does it, and the one to whom it is done.”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Narrated Abdullah ibn Abbas, in AbuDawud, Book 38, Number 4447
Sunni Hadith

People

“The occupation with things of the mind has by now itself become “practical,” a business with strict division of labor, departments and restricted entry. The man of independent means who chooses it out of repugnance for the ignominy of earning money will not be disposed to acknowledge the fact. For this he is punished. He … is ranked in the competitive hierarchy as a dilettante no matter how well he knows his subject, and must, if he wants to make a career, show himself even more resolutely blinkered than the most inveterate specialist. The urge to suspend the division of labor which, within certain limits, his economic situation enables him to satisfy, is thought particularly disreputable: it betrays a disinclination to sanction the operations imposed by society, and domineering competence permits no such idiosyncrasies. The departmentalization of mind is a means of abolishing mind where it is not exercised ex officio, under contract. It performs this task all the more reliably since anyone who repudiates this division of labor—if only by taking pleasure in his work—makes himself vulnerable by its standards, in ways inseparable from elements of his superiority.”

Theodor W. Adorno book Minima Moralia

E. Jephcott, trans. (1974), § 1
Minima Moralia (1951)
Context: The son of well-to-do parents who … engages in a so-called intellectual profession, as an artist or a scholar, will have a particularly difficult time with those bearing the distasteful title of colleagues. It is not merely that his independence is envied, the seriousness of his intentions mistrusted, that he is suspected of being a secret envoy of the established powers. … The real resistance lies elsewhere. The occupation with things of the mind has by now itself become “practical,” a business with strict division of labor, departments and restricted entry. The man of independent means who chooses it out of repugnance for the ignominy of earning money will not be disposed to acknowledge the fact. For this he is punished. He … is ranked in the competitive hierarchy as a dilettante no matter how well he knows his subject, and must, if he wants to make a career, show himself even more resolutely blinkered than the most inveterate specialist. The urge to suspend the division of labor which, within certain limits, his economic situation enables him to satisfy, is thought particularly disreputable: it betrays a disinclination to sanction the operations imposed by society, and domineering competence permits no such idiosyncrasies. The departmentalization of mind is a means of abolishing mind where it is not exercised ex officio, under contract. It performs this task all the more reliably since anyone who repudiates this division of labor—if only by taking pleasure in his work—makes himself vulnerable by its standards, in ways inseparable from elements of his superiority. Thus is order ensured: some have to play the game because they cannot otherwise live, and those who could live otherwise are kept out because they do not want to play the game.

Money , Pleasure , Way , Exercises

“I'll tell you a terrible secret — Are you listening to me? There isn't anyone out there who isn't Seymour's Fat Lady.”

Jerome David Salinger book Franny and Zooey

Franny and Zooey (1961), Zooey (1957)
Context: I don't care where an actor acts. It can be in summer stock, it can be over a radio, it can be over television, it can be in a goddam Broadway theatre, complete with the most fashionable, most well-fed, most sunburned-looking audience you can imagine. But I'll tell you a terrible secret — Are you listening to me? There isn't anyone out there who isn't Seymour's Fat Lady. That includes your Professor Tupper, buddy. And all his goddam cousins by the dozens. There isn't anyone anywhere that isn't Seymour's Fat Lady. Don't you know that? Don't you know that goddam secret yet? And don't you know — listen to me, now — don't you know who that Fat Lady really is?... Ah, buddy. Ah, buddy. It's Christ Himself. Christ Himself, buddy.

Secret

“Time and those waves are at the disposal of anyone who wants to use them.”

Frank Zappa (1940–1993) American musician, songwriter, composer, and record and film producer

As quoted in No Commercial Potential : The Saga of Frank Zappa (1972) by David Walley, p. 3.
Context: I consider that the building materials are exactly the same as what anybody else makes the thing out of. It's just the way they look at those materials is perhaps a narrower perspective. Time and those waves are at the disposal of anyone who wants to use them.

Time

“By day certainly the combatants have a clearer notion, though even then by no means of all that takes place, no one knowing much of anything that does not does not go on in his own immediate neighborhood; but in a night engagement ( and this was the only one that occurred between great armies during the war) how could anyone know anything for certain?”

Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War

Book VII, 7.44-[1]
History of the Peloponnesian War, Book VII

War , Night

“Without language, how can we tell anyone what we feel, or what we think? It might be said that until he developed language, man had no soul, for without language how could he reach deep inside himself and discover the truths that are hidden there, or find out what emotions he shared, or did not share, with his fellow men and women.”

Robertson Davies (1913–1995) Canadian journalist, playwright, professor, critic, and novelist

On Seeing Plays (1990).
Context: It is mankind's discovery of language which more than any other single thing has separated him from the animal creation. Without language, what concept have we of past or future as separated from the immediate present? Without language, how can we tell anyone what we feel, or what we think? It might be said that until he developed language, man had no soul, for without language how could he reach deep inside himself and discover the truths that are hidden there, or find out what emotions he shared, or did not share, with his fellow men and women. But because this greatest gift of all gifts is in daily use, and is smeared, and battered and trivialized by commonplace associations, we too often forget the splendour of which it is capable, and the pleasures that it can give, from the pen of a master.

Women , Men , Truth , Feeling

“Whenever you’re going after something that belongs to you, anyone who’s depriving you of the right to have it is a criminal. Understand that. Whenever you are going after something that is yours, you are within your legal rights to lay claim to it. And anyone who puts forth any effort to deprive you of that which is yours, is breaking the law, is a criminal.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (April 3, 1964)
Variant: Whenever you’re going after something that belongs to you, anyone who’s depriving you of the right to have it is a criminal. Understand that. Whenever you are going after something that is yours, you are within your legal rights to lay claim to it. And anyone who puts forth any effort to deprive you of that which is yours, is breaking the law, is a criminal.
Context: Whenever you’re going after something that belongs to you, anyone who’s depriving you of the right to have it is a criminal. Understand that. Whenever you are going after something that is yours, you are within your legal rights to lay claim to it. And anyone who puts forth any effort to deprive you of that which is yours, is breaking the law, is a criminal. And this was pointed out by the Supreme Court decision. It outlawed segregation. Which means segregation is against the law. Which means a segregationist is breaking the law. A segregationist is a criminal. You can’t label him as anything other than that. And when you demonstrate against segregation, the law is on your side. The Supreme Court is on your side. Now, who is it that opposes you in carrying out the law? The police department itself. With police dogs and clubs. Whenever you demonstrate against segregation, whether it is segregated education, segregated housing, or anything else, the law is on your side, and anyone who stands in the way is not the law any longer. They are breaking the law; they are not representatives of the law.

Law , Understanding , Effort

“A disciple asked, "Who is a Master?"
The Master replied, "Anyone to whom it is given to let go of the ego. Such a person's life is then a masterpiece."”

Anthony de Mello (1931–1987) Indian writer

Source: One Minute Nonsense (1992), p. 47

“People talk about imitating Christ, and imitate Him in the little trifling formal things, such as washing the feet, saying His prayer, and so on; but if anyone attempts the real imitation of Him, there are no bounds to the outcry with which the presumption of that person is condemned.”

Florence Nightingale (1820–1910) English social reformer and statistician, and the founder of modern nursing

Cassandra (1860)
Context: The great reformers of the world turn into the great misanthropists, if circumstances or organisation do not permit them to act. Christ, if He had been a woman, might have been nothing but a great complainer. Peace be with the misanthropists! They have made a step in progress; the next will make them great philanthropists; they are divided but by a line.
The next Christ will perhaps be a female Christ. But do we see one woman who looks like a female Christ? or even like "the messenger before" her "face", to go before her and prepare the hearts and minds for her?
To this will be answered that half the inmates of Bedlam begin in this way, by fancying that they are "the Christ."
People talk about imitating Christ, and imitate Him in the little trifling formal things, such as washing the feet, saying His prayer, and so on; but if anyone attempts the real imitation of Him, there are no bounds to the outcry with which the presumption of that person is condemned.

People , Christ , Personality

“None of the films is about me. Not a single one. None. I have my life and I'll simply never tell anyone what part of me is in my films.”

Krzysztof Kieślowski (1941–1996) Polish film director and screenwriter

As quoted in "Kieślowski's Many Colours" by Patrick Abrahamsson, in Oxford University Student newspaper (2 June 1995)
Context: I don't make biographical films … None of the films is about me. Not a single one. None. I have my life and I'll simply never tell anyone what part of me is in my films. I won't ever tell anyone about that, because I don't consider that to be anyone else's business but mine. Nobody will guess where and how and in what way I fill them with my own pains. And that's an intimate aspect of my work that I keep to myself. … I won't even tell my wife — ever.

Life , Parting

“It’s not a sign of strength. Anybody can make threats. Anyone can move an army. Anyone can show off a missile. That doesn’t make you strong. It does not lead to security, or opportunity, or respect. Those things don't come through force. They have to be earned.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2014, Address to European Youth (March 2014)
Context: It’s not a sign of strength. Anybody can make threats. Anyone can move an army. Anyone can show off a missile. That doesn’t make you strong. It does not lead to security, or opportunity, or respect. Those things don't come through force. They have to be earned. And real strength is allowing an open and participatory democracy, where people can choose their own leaders and choose their own destiny. And real strength is allowing a vibrant society, where people can think and pray and speak their minds as they please, even if it’s against their leaders -- especially if it’s against their leaders. Real strength is allowing free and open markets that have built growing, thriving middle classes and lifted millions of people out of poverty.

Strong

“Anyone who thinks he has a better idea of what's good for people than people do is a swine.”

P. J. O'Rourke (1947) American journalist

All the Trouble in the World (1994)

People , Idea , Thinking , Swine

“Foreigners may pretend otherwise, but if English is spoken loudly enough, anyone can understand it, the British included. Actually, there’s no such thing as a foreign language. The world is just filled with people who grunt and squeak instead of speaking sensibly. French may be an exception. But since it’s impossible to figure out what French people are saying, we’ll never know for sure.”

P. J. O'Rourke (1947) American journalist

Modern Manners (1983)

People , World , Understanding

“Does anyone really believe that a guy who’s spent his 70 years on this Earth showing no regard for working people is suddenly going to be your champion? Your voice?”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2016, DNC Address (July 2016)
Context: You know, the Donald is not really a plans guy. He’s not really a facts guy, either. He calls himself a business guy, which is true, but I have to say, I know plenty of businessmen and women who’ve achieved remarkable success without leaving a trail of lawsuits, and unpaid workers, and people feeling like they got cheated.
Does anyone really believe that a guy who’s spent his 70 years on this Earth showing no regard for working people is suddenly going to be your champion? Your voice?
If so, you should vote for him. But if you’re someone who’s truly concerned about paying your bills, if you're really concerned about pocketbook issues and seeing the economy grow, and creating more opportunity for everybody, then the choice isn’t even close. If you want someone with a lifelong track record of fighting for higher wages, and better benefits, and a fairer tax code, and a bigger voice for workers, and stronger regulations on Wall Street, then you should vote for Hillary Clinton.

People , Guy

“Gentlemen: you have now reached the last point. If anyone of you doesn’t mean business let him say so now.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

Address to U.S. Army recruits (1898), as quoted in U.S. Army Field Manual 22-5 (1986)
1890s
Context: Gentlemen: you have now reached the last point. If anyone of you doesn’t mean business let him say so now. An hour from now will be too late to back out. Once in, you’ve got to see it through. You’ve got to perform without flinching whatever duty is assigned you, regardless of the difficulty or the danger attending it. If it is garrison duty, you must attend to it. If it is meeting fever, you must be willing. If it is the closest kind of fighting, anxious for it. You must know how to ride, how to shoot, how to live in the open. Absolute obedience to every command is your first lesson. No matter what comes you mustn’t squeal. Think it over — all of you. If any man wishes to withdraw he will be gladly excused, for others are ready to take his place.

Business

“The slightest study of business conditions will satisfy anyone capable of forming a judgment that the personal equation is the most important factor in a business operation; that the business ability of the man at the head of any business concern, big or little, is usually the factor which fixes the gulf between striking success and hopeless failure.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

1900s, First Annual Message to Congress (1901)
Context: The captains of industry who have driven the railway systems across this continent, who have built up our commerce, who have developed our manufactures, have on the whole done great good to our people. Without them the material development of which we are so justly proud could never have taken place. Moreover, we should recognize the immense importance of this material development of leaving as unhampered as is compatible with the public good the strong and forceful men upon whom the success of business operations inevitably rests. The slightest study of business conditions will satisfy anyone capable of forming a judgment that the personal equation is the most important factor in a business operation; that the business ability of the man at the head of any business concern, big or little, is usually the factor which fixes the gulf between striking success and hopeless failure.

Failure , Business , Study , Success

“Don´t trust anyone over 30.”

John Lennon (1940–1980) English singer and songwriter

“I've seen gambling houses, too-in my travels, you understand-and I never saw anyone point a gun at a man and make him go in. Tve never heard of anyone being forced to go to a place to have some fun.”

Al Capone (1899–1947) American gangster

Travel , Making love , Housing , Understanding

“It seems to me that inspiration theoretically enhances one’s ability traversing difficulties as they move toward a goal. The highly inspired, encounter less obstacles and traverse mountains easier than others on their path through life. They appear to view roadblocks and detours as normal life events and in many cases move through them unscathed and undeterred. While the obstacles exist as they would for anyone else, they don’t view them in the same manner.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

Mountain , Life , Appearance

“Listening will never get anyone in trouble but opening their mouth will.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

1979

“I intend to do what little one man can do to awaken the public conscience, and in the meantime I am not frightened by your menaces. I am not a giant physically; I shrink from pain and filth and vermin and foul air, like any other man of refinement; also, I freely admit, when I see a line of a hundred policemen with drawn revolvers flung across a street to keep anyone from coming onto private property to hear my feeble voice, I am somewhat disturbed in my nerves. But I have a conscience and a religious faith, and I know that our liberties were not won without suffering, and may be lost again through our cowardice. I intend to do my duty to my country.”

Upton Sinclair (1878–1968) American novelist, writer, journalist, political activist

Letter to the Louis D. Oaks, Los Angeles Chief of Police (17 May 1923)

Pain , Faith , Suffering , Country

“My life has been a privilege. I come from a very humble family. No one in my family was an artist or worked in film…I’m not special. I completely understand that what I did, anyone can do it … I learned to do the things I love to do when I didn’t want to do them.”

Edward James Olmos (1947) American actor and director

On his journey as an actor in “Edward James Olmos Reflects on the Legacy of ‘Stand and Deliver,’ Three Decades Later” https://remezcla.com/features/film/edward-james-olmos-stand-and-deliver-30-years/ in Remezcla (2019 May 30)

Family , Understanding , Learning , Love

“All these points are so obvious that anyone who says that Hinduism is as foreign to India as Islam or Christianity, deserves to have his head examined. The followers of both Islam and Christianity have full knowledge of and pride in the time and place of origin of their religions outside India, the early history of their religions outside India, the arrival of their religions into India (brought in by invaders and imperialists), and the manner in which their religions were established in India. On the other hand, until the Aryan invasion theory was mooted by the European imperialists, no Hindu had ever suspected that any foreign connection could be attributed to his religion. Even today, with the Aryan invasion theory being instilled into every Hindu brain right from childhood, no Hindu worth his salt would accept the contention that Hinduism is of foreign origin.”

Shrikant Talageri (1958) Indian author

The Aryan Invasion Theory and Indian Nationalism (1993)

Childhood , Religion , Time , History

“I should like to restore with one hand what I destroy with the other. When pruning an old tree one should avoid destroying the buds and fruit; you know this is as well as anyone.”

Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865) French politician, mutualist philosopher, economist, and socialist

Preface
What is Property? (1840)

Tree

“Basically we have not got hatred for anyone, but when one is demoniac or atheistic, we should try to avoid their company. A preacher’s business is to love God, to make friendship with devotees, to enlighten the innocent, and to avoid the demons. This principle we shall follow.”

A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (1896–1977) Indian guru

Letter to Satsvarupa, San Francisco, (9 April 1968)

God , Friendship , Business , Love

“I didn’t want to scare you. We don’t want to scare anyone.”

Octavia E. Butler book Adulthood Rites

“No? Well, sometimes it’s a good thing to scare people. Sometimes fear is all that will keep them from doing stupid things.”
Part II “Phoenix” chapter 15 (p. 381)
Adulthood Rites (1988)

“The cool-person syndrome is peculiarly American. Part of that has to do with the way the educational business is run in the U. S. It’s not based on how much you can teach your child: it’s based on how much money the suppliers of basic materials can make off your child. Somewhere along the line most people pick up the desire to be a cool person, which is just another way to make them buy things. Once you’ve decided that you need to be a cool person, it makes you a possible victim of anyone whose products are the equivalent of bottled smoke. Somebody tells you to buy this particularly useless item and you’ll be a cool person. No matter how stupid it seems, you have to buy it. Pet Rocks. Pringle’s potato chips. whatever it is — the newest, the latest. Since the cool-person thing is something you learn in school, and since the school business is pretty suspicious and definitely tied up with the government, it makes you wonder whether or not the desire to be cool is part of a government plot to make you buy stupid things.”

Frank Zappa (1940–1993) American musician, songwriter, composer, and record and film producer

Oui interview (1979)

Money , School , Business , Personality

“Hear no evil, and see no evil, abase not thyself, neither sigh and weep. Speak no evil, that thou mayest not hear it spoken unto thee, and magnify not the faults of others that thine own faults may not appear great; and wish not the abasement of anyone, that thine own abasement be not exposed.”

Bahá'u'lláh book The Hidden Words

The Hidden Words

Appearance , Evil

“Why would anyone (referring to the Tibetans) choose self-immolation to take their own life? That is weird. Why self-immolation? I do not get it.”

Ko Wen-je (1959) Taiwanese politician and physician

Ko Wen-je (2019) cited in " Tibetan group demands apology from Ko Wen-je http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2019/10/25/2003724598" on Taipei Times, 25 October 2019.

Self-confidence , Life

“As we were very much pressed for time we were unable to see as much of the jail as we wanted to. We had an impression that we had been shown the brighter side of jail life. Nonetheless, two facts stood out. One was that we had actually seen desirable and radical improvements over the old system prevailing even now in most countries and the second and even more important fact was the mentality of the prison officials, and presumably the higher officials of the government also, in regard to jails. Actual conditions may or may not be good but the general principles laid down for jails are certainly far in advance of anything we had known elsewhere in practice. Anyone with a knowledge of prisons in India and of the barbarous way in which handcuffs, fetters and other punishments are used will appreciate the difference. The governor of the prison in Moscow who took us round was all the time laying stress on the human side of jail life, and how it was their endeavour to keep this in the front and not to make the prisoner feel in any way dehumanised or outcasted. I wish we in India would remember this wholesome principle and practise it in our daily lives even outside jail…. It can be said without a shadow of doubt that to be in a Russian prison is far more preferable than to be a worker in an Indian factory, whose lot is 10 to 11 hours work a day and then to live in a crowded and dark and airless tenement, hardly fit for an animal. The mere fact that there are some prisons like the ones we saw is in itself something for the Soviet Government to be proud of.”

Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964) Indian lawyer, statesman, and writer, first Prime Minister of India

Soviet Russia: Some Random Sketches and Impressions (1949)

Time , Country , Animals , Knowledge

“Nothing is perhaps more confusing to the student of Russia than the conflicting reports that come of the treatment of prisoners and of the criminal law. We are told of the Red Terror and ghastly and horrible details are provided for our consumption; we are also told that the Russian prison is an ideal residence where anyone can live in comfort and ease and with a minimum of restraint. Our own visit to the chief prison in Moscow created a most favourable impression on our minds.”

Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964) Indian lawyer, statesman, and writer, first Prime Minister of India

Soviet Russia: Some Random Sketches and Impressions (1949)

Law

“But what does it profit the men who are killed? What does it profit their mothers and sisters, their wives and their sweethearts? What does it profit their children? What does it profit anyone except the very few to whom war means huge profits? Yes, and what does it profit the nation?”

Smedley D. Butler book War Is a Racket

War is a racket (1935)

War , Sister , Children , Men

“He who can buy bravery is brace, though a coward. As money is not exchanged for anyone specific quality, for any one specific thing, or for any particular human essential power, but for the entire objective world of man and nature, from the standpoint of its possessor it therefore serves to exchange every property for every other, even contradictory, property and object: it is the fraternization of impossibilities. It makes contradictions embrace.”

Karl Marx book Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844

Source: Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, p. 105, The Marx-Engels Reader

Money , World , Making love , Nature

“If ever anyone did something which might provoke communal sentiments, Premchand not only put down the incident but endeavoured to eradicate the very basis of such differences. Considerations of high and low, Hindu and Muslim, and untouchability were all anathema to him.”

Premchand (1880–1936) Hindi writer

When he was superintendent of the schools boarding house of the National School quoted in "Munshi Premchand: The Voice of Truth", page =1915.

Communication

“Besides being a political stalwart…he was an all-rounder in a way. His contribution towards rebuilding modern India, his contribution in the making of West Bengal, can never be forgotten by anyone.”

Bidhan Chandra Roy (1882–1962) Former Chief Minister of West Bengal, India

Rajiv Gandhi, the former Prime Minister described him in "Bharat Ratna Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy".

Way , Making love

“For anyone seeking meaning for his life a figure from Greek mythology comes to mind. It is that of Atlas, bearing with endless perseverance the weight of the heavens on his back.”

Hyman George Rickover (1900–1986) United States admiral

Atlas, resolutely bearing his burden and accepting his responsibility that gives us the example we seek. To seek out and accept responsibility; to persevere; to be committed to excellence; to be creative and courageous; to be unrelenting in the pursuit of intellectual development; to maintain high standards of ethics and morality; and to bring these basic principles of existence to bear through active participation in life — these are some of my ideas on the goals which must be met to achieve meaning and purpose in life.
And finally, the man who knows his purpose in life accepts praise humbly. He knows whatsoever talents we has were given him by the Lord and that these talents must be developed and used. In this way man renders thanks for the Lord's gift — and finds meaning in his life.
Thoughts on Man's Purpose in Life (1974)

Life , Perseverance

“I am a free man-and I need my freedom. I need to be alone. I need to ponder my shame and my despair in seclusion. I need sunshine and paving tones of the streets without companions, without conversation, face to face with myself with only the music of my heart for company. What do you want of me? When I have something to say, I put it in print. When I have something to give, I give it. Your prying curiosity turns my stomach! Your compliments humiliate me. Your tea poisons me! I owe nothing to anyone, I would've responsible to God alone-if he exited!”

Henry Miller book Tropic of Cancer

Source: Tropic of Cancer (1934), Chapter Four, Pappin

Despair , God , Freedom , Heart

“I have a message for anyone coming to the Ozzfest this summer (Summer, 2000): If you're planning to jump up onstage during my set, please do not give me any bear hugs, because they fucking hurt. Listen to me, I'm dead serious. On the first night of last year's tour, this enormous guy jumped up onstage and gave me a huge bear hug. He crushed 3 of my ribs and I had to do the whole tour in absolute agony. I couldn't believe it, the first fucking show!”

Ozzy Osbourne (1948) English heavy metal vocalist and songwriter

Guitar World Issue 37, 2000.

Hurt , Night , Dead , Guy

“Let me make it very clear to you, it is no doubt that the state language of Pakistan is going to be Urdu and no other language. Anyone who tries to mislead you is really the enemy of Pakistan. Without state language, no nation can remain tied up solidly together and function. Look at the history of every government judgement substitute language. Therefore, so far as the State language is concerned, Pakistan's state language shall be Urdu.”

Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876–1948) Founder and 1st Governor General of Pakistan

Address to a huge public rally in w:Dhaka, w:East Bengal (then the eastern wing of the w:Dominion of Pakistan and now the independent state of w:Bangladesh) (21 March 1948)

Making love , History

“Human beings free of debt, insecurity, and fear become much more amiable. With no one out to sell anyone anything or to deprive another of possessions or money, the basis for unhealthy human aggression is outgrown. People no longer are burdened by the nagging concerns that consume so much attention such as mortgages, health care costs, education fees, fire insurance, economic recession or depression, the loss of jobs, and taxes. With the elimination of these burdens and the removal of the conditions that create feelings of envy, greed, and competition, people’s lives would be far more meaningful.”

Jacque Fresco (1916–2017) American futurist and self-described social engineer

Source: The Best That Money Can't Buy: Beyond Politics, Poverty, & War (2002), p. 76

Money , Loss , Fear , People

“I advise you to fear Allah alone, with no partner of associate. I advise you to treat the first Muhâjireen well and acknowledge their seniority. I advise you to treat the Ansār well, and show approval of those among them who do well, and forgive those among them who make mistakes. I advise you to treat the people of the outlying regions well, for they are a shield against the enemy and conduits of fay; do not take anything from them except that which is surplus to their needs. I advise you to treat the people of the desert well, for they are the original Arabs and the protectors of Islam. Take from the surplus of their wealth and give it to their poor. I advise you to treat ahl adh-dhīmmah well, to defend them against their enemies and not burden them with more than they can bear if they fulfill their duties towards the believers or pay the Jizyāh with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued. I advise you to fear Allah and fear His wrath, lest you do anything wrong. I advise you to fear Allah with regard to the people, but do not fear the people with regard to Allah. I advise you to treat the people justly, and to devote yourself to looking after them and protecting them against their enemies. Do not show any favour to the rich over the poor. That will be better for your spiritual well being and will help to reduce your burden of sin, and it will be better for your Hereafter, until you meet the One Who knows what is in your heart. I instruct you to be strict with regard to the commands of Allah, His sacred limits and disobedience with all people, both relatives and others. Do not show any mercy to anyone until you have settled the score with him according to his offence. Treat all people as equal, and do not worry about who is as fault or fear the blame of the blamers. Beware of showing favouritism among the believers with regard to the fay that Allah has put you in charge of, lest that lead to injustice. Keep away from that. You are in a position between this world and the Hereafter. If you conduct your affairs justly in this world and refrain from indulgence, that will earn you faith and divine pleasure. I advise you not to let yourself or anyone else do wrong to ahl al-dhimmah. I advise you sincerely to seek thereby the Countenance of Allah and the Hereafter. I have chosen advice for you that I would offer to myself or my son. If you do as I have advised you and follow my instructions, you will have gained a great deal. If you don not accept it or pay attention to it, and do not handle your affairs in the way that pleases Allah, that will be a shortcoming on your part and you will have failed to be sincere, because whims and desires are the same and the cause of sin is Iblīs, who calls man to everything that will lead to his doom. He misguided the generations who came before you and led them to Hell, what a terrible abode. What a bad deal it is for a man to take the enemy of Allah as his friend, who calls him to disobey Allah. Adhere to the truth, strive hard to reach it and admonish yourself. I urge you by Allah to show mercy to the Muslims, honour their elderly, show compassion to their young ones and respect the knowledgeable ones among them. Do not harm them or humiliate them, and do not keep the fay for yourself lest you anger them. Do not deprive them of their stipends when they become due, thus making them poor. Do not keep them away on campaigns for so long that they end up having no children. Do not allow wealth to circulate only among the rich. Do not close your door to the people or allow the strong to oppress the weak. This is my advice to you, as Allah is my witness, and I greet you with peace.”

Umar (585–644) Second Caliph of Rashidun Caliphate and a companion of Muhammad

Umar ibn al-Khattab, Vol. 2, p. 389-390, also quoted in At-Tabqaat ul-Kabir, Vol. 3, p. 339
Last Advise

Sincerity , Forgiveness , Hell , Anger

“But listen: If anyone here should wind up on a gurney in a lethal-injection facility, maybe the one at Terre Haute, here is what your last words should be: "This will certainly teach me a lesson."”

Kurt Vonnegut book Armageddon in Retrospect

"At Clowes Hall, Indianapolis, April 27 2007" - p.22 [Page numbers per the 2008 Jonathan Cape hardback edition.]
(From a speech written by Kurt Vonnegut before his death but delivered posthumously on his behalf by son Mark Vonnegut.)
Armageddon in Retrospect (2008)

Quotes about anyone page 5

Quotes about anyone
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