Quotes about assurance
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“I assure you. I have no notion of treating men with such respect. That is the way to spoil them.”

Source: Northanger Abbey

“… as long as American life was something to be escaped from, the cartel would always be assured a bottomless pool of new customers.”

Thomas Pynchon book Inherent Vice

Source: Inherent Vice

Life

“According to the moral absolutism that characterizes McCandless's beliefs, a challenge in which a successful outcome is assured isn't a challenge at all.”

Jon Krakauer book Into the Wild

Source: Into the Wild

Success

“A man goes to knowledge as he goes to war, wide awake, with fear, with respect, and with absolute assurance.”

Carlos Castaneda (1925–1998) Peruvian-American author

War, Fear, Knowledge

“Devotion is diligence without assurance. Faith is a way of saying "Yes, I pre-accept the terms of the universe and I embrace in advance what I am presently incapable of understanding.”

Elizabeth Gilbert book Eat, Pray, Love

Source: Eat, Pray, Love

Faith, Way, Understanding, Universe

“I blush to think of her beholding my work," Verl confessed.
So do we," Newel assured him.”

Brandon Mull (1974) American fiction writer

Thinking

“The secret self knows the anguish of our attachments and assures us that letting go of what we think we must have to be happy is the same as letting go of our unhappiness.”

Guy Finley (1949) American self-help writer, philosopher, and spiritual teacher, and former professional songwriter and musician

Secret, Thinking, Happiness

“Love has a way of cheating itself consciously, like a child who plays at solitary hide-and-seek; it is pleased with assurances that it all the while disbelieves.”

George Eliot book Adam Bede

Adam Bede (1859)

Love, Way, Cheating

“With the certitude of a true believer, Vellya Paapen had assured the twins that there was no such thing in the world as a black cat. He said that there were only black cat chaped holes in the universe.”

Arundhati Roy book The God of Small Things

Source: The God of Small Things

World, Cats, Universe

“I assure you, my friends, I am cone sold stober.”

Diana Wynne Jones book Howl's Moving Castle

Source: Howl's Moving Castle

“Up in this air you breathed easily, drawing in a vital assurance and lightness of heart. In the highlands you woke up in the morning and thought: Here I am, where I ought to be.”

Karen Blixen book Out of Africa

Source: Out of Africa

Light, Heart, Drawing

“We'd been assured it wouldn't be painful, though she might experience 'discomfort,' a term beloved of the medical profession that seems to be a synonym for agony that isn't yours.”

Lionel Shriver book We Need to Talk About Kevin

Source: We Need to Talk About Kevin

Pain

“I don't know much about kisses, but I can assure you that hers were no less fierce than a swarm of bullets tearing the air”

Xavier Velasco (1964) Mexican writer

Kiss, Tear

“We don't read novels to have an experience like life. Heck, we're living lives, complete with all the incompleteness. We turn to fiction to have an author assure us that it means something.”

Orson Scott Card (1951) American science fiction novelist

Life, Reading

“I have no word of yours to assure me that our brief friendship held for you the same significance it held for me, but I must go on believing so. Every hope of the future is meaningless unless I have faith that you and I will share it together.”

Elizabeth George Speare book Calico Captive

Source: Calico Captive

Friendship, Faith, Hope, Future

“She must be assured that it is not a criminal offense to love at first sight.”

E.M. Forster book Howards End

Source: Howards End

Love

“Mutually assured destruction.”

Holly Black book Red Glove

Source: Red Glove

“She had found him and was bringing back his thanks. Nor did she forget to mention that he had assured her that she was indeed the most beautiful fairy he had ever set eyes on.”

Cornelia Funke Inkheart trilogy

Source: Inkdeath

Beauty, Forgetting

“Alongside the practical thought something else struggled and, like an escaped butterfly, took wing: the assurance of something wonderful awaiting her. Just around the corner……”

Norah Lofts (1904–1983) British writer

“You know, you’re a little complicated after all.”
“Oh no,” she assured him hastily. “No, I’m not really - I’m just a - I’m just a whole lot of different simple people.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940) American novelist and screenwriter

People

“If all else fails immortality can always be assured by adequate error.”

John Kenneth Galbraith (1908–2006) American economist and diplomat

Source: Money: Whence It Came, Where It Went (1975), Chapter XIII, The Self Inflicted Wounds, p. 176

Error

“I assure you he died screaming like a girl. (Daimon)
Oh, I am so offended by that. What is the deal with that sexist statement? I’m a female and I don’t scream. But I’ve killed many a male Daimon who did. (Danger)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Sins of the Night

Girl

“I assure you, princess, if you saw the real me, you’d run for cover. (Zarek)
Only if I knew you’d be waiting under that cover for me. (Astrid)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon book Dance with the Devil

Source: Dance with the Devil

Waiting, Princess

“Nobody likes children, your mother assured you. That doesn't mean you don't have them.”

Junot Díaz book This Is How You Lose Her

Source: This Is How You Lose Her

Children

“I am a fallen woman, but I assure you: I did not fall. I was pushed.”

Michel Faber (1960) novelist

“And finally, in our time a beard is the one thing that a woman cannot do better than a man, or if she can her success is assured only in a circus.”

John Steinbeck book Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Source: Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Time, Success

“By the way, a gendarme assured me this is not a prison.”

E.E. Cummings The Enormous Room

Source: The Enormous Room

Way

“When all usefulness is over, when one is assured of an unavoidable and imminent death, it is the simplest of human rights to choose a quick and easy death in place of a slow and horrible one.”

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935) American feminist, writer, commercial artist, lecturer and social reformer

Death

“If you meet a woman of whatever complexion who sails her life with strength and grace and assurance, talk to her! And what you will find is that there has been a suffering, that at some time she has left herself for hanging dead.”

Sena Jeter Naslund (1942) American writer

Source: Ahab's Wife, or The Star-Gazer

Life, Suffering, Time, Dead

“If men only felt about death as they do about sleep, all terrors would cease… Men sleep contentedly, assured that they will wake the following morning. They should feel the same about their lives.”

Richard Matheson book What Dreams May Come

Source: What Dreams May Come

Death, Men, Feeling, Sleep

“Your reputation invites scandal. Your temperament assures it.”

Carolyn Jewel

Scandal

“It is a disaster that wisdom forbids you to be satisfied with yourself and always sends you away dissatisfied and fearful, whereas stubbornness and foolhardiness fill their hosts with joy and assurance.”

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

Source: The Complete Essays

Wisdom, Fear, Joy

“We can do subtle," I assured her.
"It's our middle name," Andrea added.
For some odd reason Rene didn't look convinced.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Slays

“Bad form, Regin! Wrong car."
Immediately after, the house shook again. "Oh, much better!" Nix assured them. "That was Bowen's!”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Wicked Deeds on a Winter's Night

Cars, Housing

“There are and will be those who think I have gone overboard. Let them rest assured that this assessment is correct, probably beyond their wildest imagination, and that I will continue to do so.”

Mary Daly (1928–2010) American radical feminist philosopher and theologian

Imagination, Thinking

“History isn't the lies of the victors, as I once glibly assured Old Joe Hunt; I know that now. It's more the memories of the survivors, most of whom are neither victorious or defeated.”

Julian Barnes book The Sense of an Ending

Source: The Sense of an Ending

History, Memory, Victory

“Devotion is diligence without assurance”

Elizabeth Gilbert (1969) American writer

“There is a line of poetry, a sentence in a fable, a word in an essay, by which my existence is justified; find that line, and immortality is assured.”

Alberto Manguel (1948) writer

Source: The Library at Night

“FUTURE, n.
That period of time in which our affairs prosper, our friends are true and our happiness is assured.”

Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914) American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist, and satirist

Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Time, Future, Happiness

“If we suspect that a man is lying, we should pretend to believe him; for then he becomes bold and assured, lies more vigorously, and is unmasked.”

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German philosopher

Lying

“To be independent of public opinion is the first formal condition of achieving anything great or rational whether in life or in science. Great achievement is assured, however, of subsequent recognition and grateful acceptance by public opinion, which in due course will make it one of its own prejudices”

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel book Elements of the Philosophy of Right

Sect. 318, as translated by T. M. Knox, (1952)
Elements of the Philosophy of Right (1820/1821)

Life, Science

“The more someone assures you that everything is okay, the more you can be assured that it's not.”

Richard Paul Evans (1962) American writer

Source: The Walk

“Someday your prince will come," I assure him.
"And the first thing I'm going to say to him is, 'What took you so long?”

David Levithan Boy Meets Boy

Source: Boy Meets Boy

“Why d'ye talk to yourself?'
'It assures me of a good listener.”

Diana Gabaldon book A Breath of Snow and Ashes

Source: A Breath of Snow and Ashes

“I sit on a man's back, choking him, and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by any means possible, except getting off his back.”

Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian writer

Writings on Civil Disobedience and Nonviolence (1886)
Source: What Then Must We Do?

“In our reasonings concerning matter of fact, there are all imaginable degrees of assurance, from the highest certainty to the lowest species of moral evidence..”

David Hume book An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding

Source: An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding

Imagination

“The pressure of his touch through my jacket and my sweater was more assurance than any promise ever made to me. It was a touch that said, I have your back and I am here for you. If a girl wasn't careful, she could fall in love with a touch like that.”

Justina Chen (1968) American writer

Source: North of Beautiful

Love, Girl

“I'm not often bored,' I assured her. "Life's not long enough for that.”

Agatha Christie book Murder in Mesopotamia

Source: Murder in Mesopotamia

Life

“Power doesn't have to show off. Power is confident, self-assuring, self-starting and self-stopping, self-warming and self-justifying. When you have it, you know it.”

Ralph Ellison book Invisible Man

Source: Invisible Man (1952), Chapter 6.

Confidence

“When falsehood can look so like the truth, who can assure themselves of certain happiness?”

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus

Source: Frankenstein

Truth, Happiness

“A man goes to knowledge as he goes to war: wide-awake, with fear, with respect, and with absolute assurance. Going to knowledge or going to war in any other manner is a mistake, and whoever makes it might never live to regret it”

Carlos Castaneda (1925–1998) Peruvian-American author

Source: The Wheel of Time: Shamans of Ancient Mexico, Their Thoughts About Life, Death and the Universe, (1998), Quotations from The Teachings of Don Juan (Chapter 4)

War, Fear, Knowledge

“When you looked up to the sky and cried 'Why?' sometimes the sky shrugged, yet other times it answered with warm assurance of linked hands.”

Libba Bray (1964) American teen writer

Source: Beauty Queens

Time

“Peace fell upon her spirit. Strong comfort and assurance bathed her whole being. Life was so solid and splendid, and so good.”

Thomas Wolfe book You Can't Go Home Again

Source: You Can't Go Home Again

Life, Peace, Strong

“Do not wake me from this slumber, but be assured that just as I have wept much, I have also wandered many roads with my thoughts.”

Mark Z. Danielewski book House of Leaves

Source: House of Leaves

“Living well is an art that can be developed: a love of life and ability to take great pleasure from small offerings and assurance that the world owes you nothing and that every gift is exactly that, a gift.”

Maya Angelou book Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now

Source: Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now

Love, Life, Pleasure, World

“The self-assured believer is a greater sinner in the eyes of God than the troubled disbeliever.”

Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism

God

“Azazello begged her not to worry, assuring her that he had seen not only naked women but also women with their skin flayed clean off”

Mikhail Bulgakov book The Master and Margarita

Source: The Master and Margarita

Women

“He was reading from the beginning so that he could get to the end, where the reader was assured that the knight and the fair maiden lived together happily ever after.”

Kate DiCamillo book The Tale of Despereaux

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

Reading

“Let me assure you that my intent is not to offend or merely be provocative. I'm simply worried.”

Sam Harris (1967) American author, philosopher and neuroscientist

“Moreover, I wish to assure you both that I did not make any amorous advances on female monkeys.”

Cassandra Clare The Bane Chronicles

Giulana and Magnus Bane in 1791, p. 13.
Source: The Bane Chronicles, What Really Happened in Peru (2013)
Context: "But of course you should have retreated at once from the dominant male. Are you an idiot? You are extremely lucky he was distracted from ripping out your throat by the fruit. He thought you were trying to steal his females."
"Pardon me, but we did not have the time to exchange that kind of personal information. I could not have known! Moreover, I wish to assure both of you that I did not make any amorous advances on female monkeys. [... ] I didn't actually see any, so I didn't get the chance."

“Do not worry about your difficulties in Mathematics. I can assure you mine are still greater.”

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

Letter to high school student Barbara Lee Wilson (7 January 1943), Einstein Archives 42-606
1940s

Mathematics

“Such is the inconsistency of real love, that it is always awake to suspicion, however unreasonable; always requiring new assurances from the object of its interest.”

Ann Radcliffe book The Mysteries of Udolpho

Source: The Mysteries of Udolpho

Love

“But then I remembered something Grandmere had once assured me of: No one has ever died of embarrassment-never, not once in the whole history of time.”

Meg Cabot (1967) Novelist

Source: Forever Princess

History, Time

“There are, he assures her, no such things as curses. There is luck, maybe, bad or good. A slight inclination of each day towards success or failure. But no curses.”

Anthony Doerr book All the Light We Cannot See

Source: All the Light We Cannot See

Failure, Success

“We are all honorable men here, we do not have to give each other assurances as if we were lawyers.”

Mario Puzo The Godfather

Source: The Godfather

Men

“These problems never seemed to baffle my grandfather nor cause him any anxiety; difficulties which in most people's eyes would have led to endless complications were disposed of by my grandfather almost without thinking, with the easy assurance of a sleepwalker who strolls along a ledge halfway down a hundred-foot precipice—yes, I am tempted to say with the same disregard for the laws of nature as a ghost passing through locked doors.”

Halldór Laxness (1902–1998) Icelandic author

Brekkukotsannáll (The Fish Can Sing) (1957)

People, Law, Nature, Problem

“Mathematics because of its nature and structure is peculiarly fitted for high school instruction [Gymnasiallehrfach]. Especially the higher mathematics, even if presented only in its elements, combines within itself all those qualities which are demanded of a secondary subject. It engages, it fructifies, it quickens, compels attention, is as circumspect as inventive, induces courage and self-confidence as well as modesty and submission to truth. It yields the essence and kernel of all things, is brief in form and overflows with its wealth of content. It discloses the depth and breadth of the law and spiritual element behind the surface of phenomena; it impels from point to point and carries within itself the incentive toward progress; it stimulates the artistic perception, good taste in judgment and execution, as well as the scientific comprehension of things. Mathematics, therefore, above all other subjects, makes the student lust after knowledge, fills him, as it were, with a longing to fathom the cause of things and to employ his own powers independently; it collects his mental forces and concentrates them on a single point and thus awakens the spirit of individual inquiry, self-confidence and the joy of doing; it fascinates because of the view-points which it offers and creates certainty and assurance, owing to the universal validity of its methods. Thus, both what he receives and what he himself contributes toward the proper conception and solution of a problem, combine to mature the student and to make him skillful, to lead him away from the surface of things and to exercise him in the perception of their essence. A student thus prepared thirsts after knowledge and is ready for the university and its sciences. Thus it appears, that higher mathematics is the best guide to philosophy and to the philosophic conception of the world (considered as a self-contained whole) and of one’s own being.”

Christian Heinrich von Dillmann (1829–1899) German educationist

Source: Die Mathematik die Fackelträgerin einer neuen Zeit (Stuttgart, 1889), p. 40.

Truth, World, School, Law

“Often in the theatre I can hardly hear myself talking or assuring my doxy that so-and-so is the same fellow that played so-and-so in so-and-so, he's very good, he's a civil servant in the Department of Agriculture, I met a sister of his in Skerries, and so on. Actors should conduct themselves like the rest of us and practise the unobtrusive intonation of the gentleman.”

Flann O'Brien (1911–1966) Irish writer

Page 37
The Best of Myles (1968)

Sister

“What has art to do with those things [Revolution, socialism]? Art will never come except from some little disregarded corner where some isolated man is studying the mysteries of nature, fully assured that the answer which he ﬁnds and which is good for him is good also for humanity, whatever may be the number of succeeding generations.”

Théodore Rousseau (1812–1867) French painter (1812-1867)

as quoted by Romain Rolland in his book Millet, c. 1900; transl. Miss Clementina Black; published by Duckworth & Co, Londo / E. P. Dutton & Co, New York, 1919, p. 8
undated quotes

Art, Nature, Study

“I wish to assure you that there can never be any return to the state of armed conflict which existed before our commitment to peace and the democratic process of election under the Lancaster House agreement.”

Robert Mugabe (1924–2019) former President of Zimbabwe

Address to the nation by the Prime Minister-elect http://web.archive.org/web/20040312141228/http://www.gta.gov.zw/Presidential+Speeches/1980_Nat_Add.html <br class="br">Broadcast speech on Zimbabwe-Rhodesia Television, 4 March 1980, on winning the election. <br class="br">1980s

Peace, Housing

“The decline of Indian Buddhism was centrally due to the fact that it never offered the Indian laity a complete religion. Early Buddhism knew no ceremonies for birth and death, marriage, illness, and other critical turns of private life… Only for the community of monks did Buddhism provide a complete and well-defined way of life. …But Brahmins were needed for all the ordinary crises in life, ready with their rites and sacred formulas to ward off danger or minimize the damage. This elemental fact assured the survival of Brahminism in India.”

William H. McNeill book The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community

The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community (1963)

Life, Death, Marriage, Religion

“Commonplace people have an answer for everything and nothing ever surprises them. They try to look as though they knew what you were about to say better than you did yourself, and when it is their turn to speak, they repeat with great assurance something that they have heard other people say, as though it were their own invention.”

Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863) French painter

25 February 1852 (p. 152)
1831 - 1863, Delacroix' 'Journal' (1847 – 1863)

People

“A very bold political measure of Lycurgus is his redistribution of the land. For there was a dreadful inequality in this regard, the city was heavily burdened with indigent and helpless people, and wealth was wholly concentrated in the hands of a few. Determined, therefore, to banish insolence and envy and crime and luxury, and those yet more deep-seated and afflictive diseases of the state, poverty and wealth, he persuaded his fellow-citizens to make one parcel of all their territory and divide it up anew, and to live with one another on a basis of entire uniformity and equality in the means of subsistence, seeking preëminence through virtue alone, assured that there was no other difference or inequality between man and man than that which was established by blame for base actions and praise for good ones.”

Plutarch book Parallel Lives

Lycurgus, sec. 8. The bolded phrase is often quoted in a paraphrase by Ugo Foscolo: "Wealth and poverty are the oldest and most deadly ailments of all republics" (Le ricchezze e la povertà sono le più antiche e mortali infermità delle repubbliche), Monitore Italiano, 5 February 1798.
Parallel Lives

People, Disease, Affliction, Envy

“The reputation of a Don Juan gives to a man the most dangerous power. Wise virgins resist it, but foolish virgins frequently yield to the desire to take a celebrated lover from a rival - even from a friend. This emotion is a complex one, mad up of vanity, respect for another woman's taste, and the need to establish self-assurance by winning a difficult victory. Don Juan chose his first mistresses; later he was chosen. Byron said that he had been raped oftener than anyone since the Trojan War.”

André Maurois (1885–1967) French writer

Un Art de Vivre (The Art of Living) (1939), The Art of Loving

War, Lovers, Victory, Madness

“Monsieur, mon cousin,

I have seen the letters you have sent me by Buckingham herald, whereby I understand that you want my friendship in good form and manner, which contents me well enough; for I have no intention of breaking such truces as have previously been concluded between the late King of most noble memory, my brother, and you for as long as they still have to run. Nevertheless, the merchants of this my kingdom of England, seeing the great provocation your subjects have given them in seizing ships and merchandise and other goods, are fearful of venturing to go to Bordeaux and other places under your rule until they are assured by you that they can surely and safely carry on trade in all the places subject to your sway, according to the rights established by the aforesaid truces. Therefore, in order that my subjects and merchants may not find themselves deceived as a result of this present ambiguous situation, I pray you that by my servant this bearer, one of the grooms of my stable, you will let me know in writing your full intentions, at the same time informing me if there is anything I can do for you in order that I may do it with a good heart. And farewell to you, Monsieur mon cousin.”

Richard III of England (1452–1485) English monarch

Letter sent, as King of England, 18 August, 1483, to Louis XI of France. Reprinted in Richard the Third (1956) http://books.google.com/books?id=dNm0JgAACAAJ&dq=Paul+Murray+Kendall+Richard+the+Third&ei=TZHDR8zXKZKIiQHf2NCpCA

Friendship, Fear, Understanding, Memory

“2) We, on our part, would agree — upon the establishment of adequate arrangements through the United Nations to ensure the carrying out and continuation of these commitments — (a) to remove promptly the quarantine measures now in effect and (b) to give assurances against an invasion of Cuba. I am confident that other nations of the Western Hemisphere would be prepared to do likewise.”

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

1962, Second Letter to Nikita Khrushchev

Confidence, Parting

“I thank your Excellency for your generous and obliging offer. Most certain, my inclination leads me to a resignation. My reputation I value more than any advantages of gain; and I consider it in great danger. I wrote your Excellency lengthy upon this subject yesterday, and therefore shall say but little upon it to-day. I intend to write to Congress to day, upon the subject of my apprehensions and determination; and, if they do not give me those kinds of assurances, which are necessary to guard my reputation from malice and detraction. I shall insist upon leaving the business. The politics of Congress are really alarming, and the state of the finances astonishing; where they will end, time only can unfold.”

Nathanael Greene (1742–1786) American general in the American Revolutionary War

Letter to George Washington (26 April 1779)

Business, Time

“But with the passing of the day of lands so cheap as to be well-nigh free, we are coming to confront a new set of conditions. It has been found necessary to inquire whether under these new conditions we can be sure of finding employment for the diverse elements and enormous numbers of new immigrants that are offered to us. We are all agreed, whether we be Americans of the first or of the seventh generation on this soil, that it is not desirable to receive more immigrants than can reasonably be assured of bettering their condition by coming here. For the sake both of those who would come and more especially of those already here, it has been thought wise to avoid the danger of increasing our numbers too fast. It is not a reflection on any race or creed. We might not be able to support them if their numbers were too great. In such event, the first sufferers would be the most recent immigrants, unaccustomed to our life and language and industrial methods. We want to keep wages and living conditions good for everyone who is now here or who may come here.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, The Genius of America (1924)

Life, Support, Suffering

“If I have sometimes seemed to make fun of Woman, I assure you it has only been for the purpose of egging her on.”

James Thurber (1894–1961) American cartoonist, author, journalist, playwright

"The Duchess and the Bugs", 'Lanterns & Lances (1961).
From Lanterns and Lances‎

“The old world is engaged in a struggle to find a way by which each race living on its own soil, separated by definite national boundaries, can be assured freedom and peace in the full development of its national life and in the realization of international opportunities. The task of America is different. It is for her to find the way by which these races, living on one soil, under one form of government, with no territorial lines, can be assimilated and become a part of her integral national life.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

Life, World, Peace, Way

“Our country has a larger Army and a more powerful Navy, costing annually almost twice as much as it ever before had in time of peace. I am a thorough believer in a policy of adequate military preparation. We are constantly working to perfect our defenses in every branch, land forces, air forces, surface and submarine forces. That work will continue. Our Military Establishment of the Army and Navy, the National Guard, and the Reserve Corps is far superior to anything we have ever maintained before, except in time of war. In the past six years we have expended about $4,000,000,000 for this purpose. That ought to show results, and those who have correct information know that it does show results. The country can rest assured that if security lies in military force, it was never so secure before in all its history.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Toleration and Liberalism (1925)

War, Peace, History, Time

“With phones moving to technologies such as Apple Pay, an unwillingness to assure security could create a Target-like exposure that wipes Apple out of the market.”

Rob Enderle (1954) American financial analyst

How to Spot a Tech Company That's About to Lose http://cio.com/article/2686157/leadership-management/how-to-spot-a-tech-company-thats-about-to-lose.html in CIO (19 September 2014)

“There may be a rationalist who has never wavered in his conviction of the mortality of the soul, and there may be a vitalist who has never wavered in his faith in immortality; but at the most this would prove that just as there are natural monstrosities, so there are those who are stupid as regards heart and feeling, however great their intelligence, and those who are stupid intellectually, however great their virtue. But, in normal cases, I cannot believe those who assure me that never, not in a fleeting moment, not in the hours of direst loneliness and grief, has this murmur of uncertainty breathed upon their consciousness.”

Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936) 19th-20th century Spanish writer and philosopher

The Tragic Sense of Life (1913), VI : In the Depths of the Abyss

Stupidity, Faith, Feeling, Soul

“My error? Why, I may be charged with having committed a breach of faith with the Hindus. I asked them to lay their lives and their property at the disposal of the Mussalmans for the protection of their Holy Places. Even to-day I am asking them to practise Ahimsa, to settle quarrels by dying but not by killing. And what do I find to be the result? How many temples have been desecrated? How many sisters came to me with complaints? As I was saying to Hakimji [Ajmal Khan] yesterday, Hindu women are in mortal fear of Mussalman goondas. I had a letter from… How can I bear the way in which his little children were molested? How can I now ask Hindus to put up with everything patiently? I gave the assurance that the friendship with Mussalmans was bound to bear fruit. I asked them to befriend them, regardless of results. It is not in my power to make good that assurance. And yet I must ask the Hindus even to-day to die rather than kill. I can only do so by laying down my own life. I can teach them the way to die by my own example.”

Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism during British-ruled India

September 1924. Mahadev Desai, Day to Day with Gandhi, Volume 4, p. 165.
1920s

Life, Women, Friendship, Children

“Had President Kennedy not pledged the nation to bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, and oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty?”

William Westmoreland book A Soldier Reports

Source: A Soldier Reports (1976), p. 409.

Support, Success

“We would most gladly ye came yourself if that ye may, and if ye may not, we pray you not to fail, but to accomplish in all diligence our said commandment, to send our Seal incontinent upon the sight hereof, as we trust you, with such as ye trust and the Officers pertaining to attend with it; praying you to ascertain us of your News. Here, loved be God, is all well and truly determined, and for to resist the Malice of him that had best Cause to be true, the Duke of Buckingham, the most untrue creature living; whom with God’s Grace we shall not be long till that we will be in those parts, and subdue his Malice. We assure you there was never false traitor better purveyed for, as this bearer Gloucester shall show you.”

Richard III of England (1452–1485) English monarch

Postscript from a letter to his Chancellor, 12 October, 1483. Reprinted in Richard the Third (1956) http://books.google.com/books?id=dNm0JgAACAAJ&dq=Paul+Murray+Kendall+Richard+the+Third&ei=TZHDR8zXKZKIiQHf2NCpCA

Love, God, Parting, Falseness

“Our plan will put America First. Americanism, not globalism, will be our credo. As long as we are led by politicians who will not put America First, then we can be assured that other nations will not treat America with respect.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, July, (21 July 2016)

“Imagination, devotion, perseverance, together with divine grace, will assure your success.”

Haile Selassie (1892–1975) Emperor of Ethiopia

Address on the 18th anniversary of his coronation (2 November 1948)

Imagination, Success, Perseverance

“Americans cleave to the things of this world as if assured that they will never die,… They clutch everything but hold nothing fast, and so lose grip as they hurry after some new delight. An American will build a house in which to pass his old age and sell it before the roof is on; he will plant a garden and rent it just as the trees are coming into bearing; he will clear a field and leave others to reap the harvest; he will take up a profession and leave it, settle in one place and soon go off elsewhere with his changing desires. If his private business allows him a moment’s relaxation, he will plunge at once into the whirlpool of politics. Then, if at the end of a year crammed with work he has a little spare leisure, his restless curiosity goes with him traveling up and down the vast territories of the United States. Thus he will travel five hundred miles in a few days as a distraction from his happiness. Death steps in in the end and stops him before he has grown tired of this futile pursuit of that complete felicity which always escapes him. At first sight there is something astonishing in this spectacle of so many lucky men restless in the midst of abundance. But it is a spectacle as old as the world; all that is new is to see a whole people performing in it.”

Alexis De Tocqueville book Democracy in America

Book Two, Chapter XIII.
Democracy in America, Volume II (1840), Book Two

Death, Men, People, Age

“Grace and peace from God to you, respected, honoured, wise clement, gracious and beloved Masters: An exceedingly unfortunate affair has happened to me, in that I have been publicly accused before your worships of having reviled you in unseemly words and, be it said with all respect, of having called you heretics, my gracious rulers of the State. I am so far from applying this name to you, that I should as soon think of calling heaven hell. For all my life I have thought and spoken of you in terms of praise and honour, gentlemen of Abtzell, as I do to-day, and, as God favours me, shall do to the end of my days. But it happened not long ago when I was preaching against the Catabaptists that I used these words: 'The Catabaptists are now doing so much mischief to the upright citizens of Abtzell and are showing so great insolence, that nothing could be more infamous. You see, gentle sirs, with what modesty I grieved on your account, because the turbulent Catabaptists caused you so much trouble. Indeed I suspect that the Catabaptists are the very people who have set this sermon against me in circulation among you, for they do many of those things which do not become true Christians. Therefore, gentle and wise sirs, I beg most earnestly that you will have me exculpated before the whole community, and, if occasion arise, that you will have this letter read in public assembly. Sirs, I assure you in the name of God our Saviour, in these perilous times you have never been our of my thoughts and my solicitious anxiety; and if in any way I shall be able to serve you I will spare no pains to do so. In addition to the fact that I never use such terms even against my enemies, let me say that it never entered my mind to apply such insulting epithets to you, pious and wise sirs. Sufficient of this. May God preserve you in safety, and may He put a curb on these unbridled falsehoods which are being scattered everywhere, which is an evidence of some great peril - and may He hold your worships and the whole state in the true faith of Christ@ Take this letter of mine in good part, for I could not suffer that so base a falsehood against me should lie uncontradicted.”

Huldrych Zwingli (1484–1531) leader of the Protestant Reformation in Switzerland, and founder of the Swiss Reformed Churches

Letter to Abtzell February 12, 1526 (vi., 473), ibid, p.250-251

Life, God, Pain, People

“… Assad’s survival—if Saddam Hussein’s murderous rampage in 1991 is any indication—will without a shadow of a doubt translate into hundreds of thousands of Syrian dead, mostly butchered after his victory has been assured. The comparison comes to mind because the two Ba’thi regimes of Saddam Hussein and Bashar Assad bear an unmistakable resemblance—they are mirror images of one another, one might say. Both are minority dominated, single party regimes originating in the same quasi-fascist pan-Arab ideology built on the principle that any form of disagreement is an act of “betrayal” to the “revolution.””

Kanan Makiya (1949) American orientalist

"Intervention In Syria is a Moral and Human Imperative", New Republican (February 24, 2012)

Betrayal, Victory, Dead

“But the First Amendment protects against the Government; it does not leave us at the mercy of noblesse oblige. We would not uphold an unconstitutional statute merely because the Government promised to use it responsibly. […] The Government’s assurance that it will apply [a statutory provision] more restrictively than its language provides is pertinent only as an implicit acknowledgment of the potential constitutional problems with a more natural reading.”

John Roberts (1955) Chief Justice of the United States

United States v. Stevens, 559 U.S. ___, 130 S.Ct. 1577 (2010) (Opinion of the Court).

Nature, Problem, Reading

“When a woman appears to express fear, we cannot assure her without at least releasing her from responsibility; when we interpret the same emotion in a man as anger, we want to blame him and be certain he acknowledges responsibility. We want to find her guiltless; we want to find him guilty.”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

Source: Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000), p. 22.

Fear, Appearance, Anger

“The narrow way, the way of holiness, not only leads to life, but it is life. Walking there, serene are our days, peaceful our nights, happy — high above the disorders and miseries of a wretched world—shall be our hourly communion with God; happy — full of assurance, of calm and sacred triumph, shall be our dying hour.”

Richard Fuller (minister) (1804–1876) United States Baptist minister

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 316.

Life, God, World, Peace

“I love to write and I assure you I write regularly… But I write for myself, for my own pleasure. And I want to be left alone to do it.”

Jerome David Salinger (1919–2010) American writer

Interview in The Baton Rouge Advocate (1980), as quoted in "J.D. Salinger, author of 'Catcher in the Rye,' dies" in The Washington Post (28 January 2010) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/28/AR2010012803177.html

Love, Pleasure

“How does the rest of the world perceive America under Obama? We're the nation that stood by and didn't lift a finger when the Iranian public was protesting their government. We voiced no support and did not try to help in any significant way, and the protest was soon quelled. We're the nation that drew red lines in Syria and watched them being crossed without a whimper. We're the nation that only uttered a few lukewarm words as Putin invaded the Crimea and the Ukraine. We're the nation that traded five of the world's most dangerous terrorists for one American deserter. We're the nation that gave away the store to insure that Iran can finance its terrorist attacks and be assured of having a nuclear device in a few years.”

Charlie Daniels (1936) American singer and musician

2010s, 2016, Letter to America's Enemies (2016)

World, Way, Support, Help

“The playing of Soviet pianists of the younger generation differed significantly from the composer’s performing style, as discussed above. (Here I am referring to the generation of Richter and Gilels or younger, as opposed to Prokofiev’s coevals such as Neuhaus and Samuil Feinberg, who also had Prokofiev’s works in their repertoires.) Since we know that Prokofiev appreciated their playing, does it mean that he accepted their approach? Should we regard the new generation’s playing as a distortion of the composer’s intentions or as a natural evolution of interpretive style?
I believe that Prokofiev, having been exposed to the new performing style of the Soviet pianists, accepted at least some of its qualities. We can mention assertive muscular playing, open expressivity, and a gripping commitment to the music among those traits that brought recognition to Soviet pianists and assured their success in the international arena. These characteristics were concordant with the evolving compositional style of Prokofiev, whose later works became both more virile (often heroic) and expressive in a warmer and more open way.”

Boris Berman (1948) Russian/American musician

Prokofiev’s piano sonatas : a guide for the listener and the performer (2008), Prokofiev the pianist

Music, Way, Nature, Success

“Denis Healey: Can he assure us there is no question of American military intervention as this could only make the situation worse?
Sir Geoffrey Howe: There is no question of that.”

Geoffrey Howe (1926–2015) British Conservative politician

"British and American warships standing by", The Times, 25 October 1983, p. 4.
Answering a question on Grenada in the House of Commons, 24 October 1983. The United States invaded that night.

Question

“What we eventually run up against are the forces of humourlessness, and let me assure you that the humourless as a bunch don't just not know what's funny, they don't know what's serious. They have no common sense, either, and shouldn't be trusted with anything.”

Martin Amis (1949) Welsh novelist

"Political Correctness: Robert Bly and Philip Larkin" (1997)

Sense

“If the miser reaches the point of sacrificing his health, his pleasures, and even his very honesty for the love of his money, shall we not succeed in learning to love so noble an aim as intellectual work sufficiently to make us sacrifice our laziness for a few hours every day? … Should not our young people therefore spend at least five hours a day at their work-table in order to assure for themselves, both now and in the future, the manifold joys of intellectual culture?”

Jules Payot (1859–1940) French educationist

Source: The Education of the Will (1920), p. 110

Love, Money, People, Health

Quotes about assurance page 2

Quotes about assurance
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