Quotes about believer
page 88

Peter Porter photo

“A professional
is one who believes he has
invented breathing.”

Peter Porter (1929–2010) British poet

"Japanese Jokes", p. 62.
The Last of England (1970)

John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton photo
Alice A. Bailey photo
Pete Doherty photo
H. G. Wells photo
David Lynch photo

“Speaking in front of a large crowd is not pleasant. Once it gets rolling, it's okay. But beforehand, it's murder. I'm getting a lot better. The first interview I ever did was in 1972, I believe, and I couldn't speak. I couldn't speak one word. I only said, "I painted it black."”

David Lynch (1946) American filmmaker, television director, visual artist, musician and occasional actor

That was my one sentence. And so I have improved.
GreenCine interview (16 November 2005) http://www.greencine.com/article?action=view&articleID=254

Jerome David Salinger photo
Warren Buffett photo
Ba Jin photo
Klaus Kinski photo
Melanie Joy photo
Joseph Strutt photo
Wilfred Thesiger photo
Ellsworth Kelly photo
John Banville photo
Anastasia Ashley photo
Jorge Luis Borges photo

“We all think that fate has dealt us a wretched sort of lot in life, and that others must be better. […] I presume that in the heaven of the Blessèd there are those who believe that the advantages of that locale are much exaggerated by theologists, who have never been there themselves.”

Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, and a key figure in Spanish language literature

"The Duel", in Brodie's Report (1970); tr. Andrew Hurley, Collected Fictions (1998)

Russell Brand photo
George William Curtis photo
Luis Barragán photo
Michel Faber photo
Fulton J. Sheen photo

“The very good never believe themselves very good, because they are judging themselves by the Ideal.”

Fulton J. Sheen (1895–1979) Catholic bishop and television presenter

Source: Peace of Soul (1949), Ch. 6, p. 116

Robert A. Heinlein photo
Ann Coulter photo
Johann Gottlieb Fichte photo

““Whether there can be love without esteem?” Oh yes, thou dear, pure one! Love is of many kinds. Rousseau proves that by his reasoning and still better by his example. La pauvre Maman and Madame N____ love in very different fashions. But I believe there are many kinds of love which do not appear in Rousseau’s life. You are very right in saying that no true and enduring love can exist without cordial esteem; that every other draws regret after it, and is unworthy of any noble soul. One word about pietism. Pietists place religion chiefly in externals; in acts of worship performed mechanically, without aim, as bond-service to god; in orthodoxy of opinion; and they have this among other characteristic marks, that they give themselves more solicitude about other’s piety than their own. It is not right to hate these men,-we should hate no one, but to me they are very contemptible, for their character implies the most deplorable emptiness of the head, and the most sorrowful perversion of the heart. Such my dear friend never can be; she cannot become such, even were it possible-which it is not-that her character were perverted; she can never become such, her nature has too much reality in it. You trust in Providence, your anticipation of a future life, are wise, and Christian. I hope, I may venture to speak of myself, that no one will take me to be a pietist or stiff formalist, but I know no feeling more thoroughly interwoven with my soul than these are.”

Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762–1814) German philosopher

Johann Fichte Letter to Johanna Rahn from Johann Gottlieb Fichte's popular works: Memoir and The Nature of the Scholar<!--pp. 14-15--> https://archive.org/stream/johanngottlieb00fichuoft#page/14/mode/1up

Harry V. Jaffa photo

“The United States is engaged today in a great mission to spread democracy to the Middle East, beginning with Afghanistan, and continuing with Iraq. The inhabitants of Iraq are divided into many groups and factions that hate and distrust each other. The attitude of Sunni and Shia Muslims toward each other resembles that of Catholic and Protestant Christians in the sixteenth century, which persist today in northern Ireland, each regarding the other as heretics. Under the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, the minority of Sunnis persecuted the majority Shias. It is understandable that the minority Sunnis are today resisting majority rule, while the majority Shia favor it. The Sunnis clearly believe that majority rule by Shia will be used as a means of retribution and revenge. The Sunnis look upon majority rule by the Shia the way the South looked upon the election of Lincoln in 1860. It is inconceivable to the Sunnis that the rule of the Shia majority will be anything other than tyranny. Indeed, it is inconceivable to them that any political power, whether of a minority or a majority, would be non-tyrannical. The idea of non-tyrannical government is alien to their history and their experience. They regard our assertions of Jeffersonian or Lincolnian principles as mere hypocrisy, as they see no other form of rule other than that of force. Our government assumes that the people of the Middle East, like people elsewhere, seek freedom for others no less than for themselves. But that is an assumption that has not yet been confirmed by experience.”

Harry V. Jaffa (1918–2015) American historian and collegiate professor

2000s, The Central Idea (2006)

Richard Cobden photo

“We believe that nothing worthy of our worship would want our worship.”

Sheri S. Tepper (1929–2016) American fiction writer

Source: Gibbon's Decline & Fall (1996), Chapter 18 (p. 401)

Robert Ley photo
Richie Sambora photo

“This century has been so rich in discovery and so packed with technical innovation that it is tempting to believe that there can never be another like it. That conceit betrays the poverty of our collective imagination.”

John Maddox (1925–2009) Welsh chemist, physicist, journalist and editor

Introduction of [What remains to be discovered: mapping the secrets of the universe, the origins of life, and the future of the human race, Martin Kessler Books, 1998, 068482292X, 1]

Neal Stephenson photo
Chester Bowles photo

“I believe that we should take every opportunity to challenge the assumption that our European allies are doing us a favor whenever they provide us with the necessary facilities from which to defend their own continent.”

Chester Bowles (1901–1986) American politician

Chester Bowles, "The Azores," White House Memorandum to President John F. Kennedy, Washington, DC, June 4, 1962. Quoted in Alexander Cooley and Hendrik Spruyt, Contracting States: Sovereign Transfers in International Relations, Princeton University Press (2009), pg. 100.

George Santayana photo
William Penn photo
Robert Newman photo
John D. Rockefeller, Jr. photo
David Brin photo
Bob Woodward photo
André Maurois photo
Lucy Stone photo

“I know not what you believe of God, but I believe He gave yearnings and longings to be filled, and that He did not mean all our time should be devoted to feeding and clothing the body.”

Lucy Stone (1818–1893) American abolitionist and suffragist

"Disappointment Is the Lot of Women" oration (17 or 18 October 1855) quoted in Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Antony, and Mathilda Gage, History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 1 (1881)

William Morley Punshon photo
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg photo

“First we have to believe, and then we believe.”

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742–1799) German scientist, satirist

K 55
Aphorisms (1765-1799), Notebook K (1789-1793)

Mike Rosen photo
Willa Cather photo

“the meaning of kindness is hard to define, words you believe to be nice could be hurt to others”

Ritsuko Okazaki (1959–2004) Japanese singer

A Happy Life, Rain or Shine
Lyrics

Zygmunt Bauman photo
Meles Zenawi photo

“We believe the problem between ourselves and Eritrea will have to be resolved through dialogue, but it takes two to tango.”

Meles Zenawi (1955–2012) Ethiopian politician; Prime Minister of Ethiopia

On the border dispute with Eritrea, as quoted in "Troop massing designed to send message to Eritrea- Ethiopian PM". Sudan Tribune. 19 March 2005.

Douglas MacArthur photo
John Buchan photo
Donald J. Trump photo
R. Madhavan photo
L. Frank Baum photo

“The scenery and costumes of 'The Wizard of Oz' were all made in New York — Mr. Mitchell was a New York favorite, but the author was undoubtedly a Chicagoan, and therefore a legitimate butt for the shafts of criticism. So the critics highly praised the Poppy scene, the Kansas cyclone, the Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman, but declared the libretto was very bad and teemed with 'wild and woolly western puns and forced gags.' Now, all that I claim in the libretto of 'The Wizard of Oz' is the creation of the characters of the Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman, the story of their search for brains and a heart, and the scenic effects of the Poppy Field and the cyclone. These were a part of my published fairy tale, as thousands of readers well know. I have published fifteen books of fairy tales, which may be found in all prominent public and school libraries, and they are entirely free, I believe, from the broad jokes the New York critics condemn in the extravaganza, and which, the New York people are now laughing over. In my original manuscript of the play were no 'gags' nor puns whatever. But Mr. Hamlin stated positively that no stage production could succeed without that accepted brand of humor, and as I knew I was wholly incompetent to write those 'comic paper side-splitters' I employed one of the foremost New York 'tinkerers' of plays to write into my manuscript these same jokes that are now declared 'wild and woolly' and 'smacking of Chicago humor.' If the New York critics only knew it, they are praising a Chicago author for the creation of the scenic effects and characters entirely new to the stage, and condemning a well-known New York dramatist for a brand of humor that is palpably peculiar to Puck and Judge. I am amused whenever a New York reviewer attacks the libretto of 'The Wizard of Oz' because it 'comes from Chicago.”

L. Frank Baum (1856–1919) Children's writer, editor, journalist, screenwriter

Letter to "Music and the Drama", The Chicago Record-Herald (3 February 1903)
Letters and essays

Victor Villaseñor photo
David Duke photo
Kage Baker photo
Jack London photo
Rory Bremner photo
S.M. Stirling photo

“A libertarian is someone who can believe that the police are no more than a gang of thugs without realizing that in the absence of police, thugs will gather into gangs.”

S.M. Stirling (1953) Canadian-American author, primarily of speculative fiction

Usenet group rec.arts.sf.written (7 July 2000) http://groups.google.com/group/rec.arts.sf.written/msg/19970c9f41512518

Calvin Coolidge photo
Phil Brooks photo

“Punk: Hey, Jeff. Jeff, aren't you nervous sitting way up there so… high? Especially in the condition you're in, and by "condition", I mean that you're probably drunk right now, just like all these people here tonight. (Crowd boos) Yeah, that's something to be proud of, I mean, you'd have to be under the influence to stomach this "live in the moment" crap that you spew. What's living in the moment gotten you, Jeff? I know it got you a night in a hospital, and for what? The adulation of these people? One brief moment of attention? (Crowd chants "Hardy") You know, I don't know what's more pathetic—all these people hanging on your every word, waiting for the next pitiful example for you to set that they can lead, or you and your egotistical addiction to their cheers and support and adulation. Listen, listen to them, Jeff. They actually believe that you can beat me at SummerSlam. (Crowd cheers)
Jeff: So do I.
Punk: So does our general manager. Teddy Long's the guy that said TLC is your match. It's Jeff Hardy's match, everybody. They're right, it is your match. This TLC is your last match. I know what I have to accomplish to get everything I want. When I beat you at SummerSlam and I take back my World Heavyweight Title, it will validate everything I've said in the past. I will prove once and for all, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that straight edge is the right way, that straight edge means I'm better than you. Jeff, I have to get rid of you to teach these people the difference between right and wrong. I have to get rid of you to teach them how to say, "just say no." I have to get rid of you so they stop living in your moment, and they wake up, and they start living in my reality. Make no mistake about it, Jeff; there's no turning back from this point on. You can talk about the space from the top of that ladder to this mat, but from here on out, there's nothing left. At SummerSlam, I will hurt you, and I will remove you and the stain of all your bad examples from the WWE forever.
Jeff: Punk, you can't destroy me, you can't destroy what I've created over my ten years here. Kansas City's not gonna listen to you. You won't beat me at SummerSlam, Punk. I will prove that I'm better than you in my specialty: Tables, Ladders, & Chairs.
Punk: You're right, Jeff. You know what, you wouldn't be here if it wasn't for them, because you need them to enable you. You need them to justify your reckless behavior with their support and their cheers, just like they need you to somehow justify their reckless behavior, with their smoking and their drinking and their use of prescription medication. They try in vain to live vicariously through a man who, by way of his lifestyle, thinks he can fly.”

Phil Brooks (1978) American professional wrestler and mixed martial artist

Interrupting Jeff Hardy's promo from the top of a ladder. August 21, 2009.
Friday Night SmackDown

Alice Roosevelt Longworth photo

“I've always believed in the adage that the secret of eternal youth is arrested development.”

Alice Roosevelt Longworth (1884–1980) American writer and prominent socialite

As quoted in Alice, The Life and Times of Alice Roosevelt Longworth (1979) by Howard Teichmann, p. 237.

Detlef Dürr photo

“It is widely believed that in our quantum world physical facts about occurrences in space time must be grounded in the wave function. There are several long recognized and much discussed difficulties with this view.”

Detlef Dürr (1951) German mathematician and physicist

Daniel Bedingham, Detlef Dürr, GianCarlo Ghirardi, Sheldon Goldstein, Roderich Tumulka, Nino Zanghì, "Matter Density and Relativistic Models of Wave Function Collapse", J Stat Phys (2014) 154:623–631

Herbert Spencer photo
David Icke photo
Richard Rodríguez photo
Diane Sawyer photo

“Whatever you want in your life, other people are going to want too. Believe in yourself enough to accept the idea that you have an equal right to it.”

Diane Sawyer (1945) American journalist

Attributed to Diane Sawyer in: R.J. Ackerman (1995) Before It's Too Late. p. 95

Bill Maher photo
Anne Morrow Lindbergh photo
Craig Ferguson photo

“For malice will with joy the lie receive,
Report, and what it wishes true, believe.”

Thomas Yalden (1670–1736) English poet

The Second Book of Ovid's Art of Love, lines 706–707.

Mikhail Gorbachev photo
Common (rapper) photo
Ehud Barak photo

“[How is it consistent with what you advocated this evening in terms of a vision for peace, that you continued to allow the building of settlements in the West Bank, during your primeministership? ] Let me tell you, first of all, during my term as a Prime Minister, we have not built a single new settlement. I ordered the dismantling of many voluntary -- I don't know how to call it -- new settlements that had been set on top of hills in different parts of the West Bank, basically. But, I allowed contracts, contracts that had been signed, legally, in Israel, beforehand. To build new neighborhoods in some big cities in the West Bank, cities with 25,000 or 30,000 people. And very few new homes, in small settlements, where youngsters, who came back from the army service, asked to build their home near the home of their parents. Now, Israel is a law-abiding state, you cannot break contracts, there is Supreme Court. If the government behaves in a way that is not proper, any individual can appeal and change whatever we decide. Realizing that this is a sensitive issue from the Palestinian side, I talked to Arafat, at the beginning of my term as a Prime Minister, and I told him: Mr. Chairman, I know that you are worried about it, it creates some problems, in your own constituency. But let me tell you, we have a great opportunity here to put an end to the whole conflict, in a year and a half. When President Clinton that invested unbelievable amount of energy and political capital in trying to solve it, and he's still in power. Now, I understand your problem with settlement if there is no end, there is no time limit, and you are afraid that maybe the accumulation of new settlements will change the nature of the situation, for the worse, from your position. So I tell you, out of our own considerations, independent of you, we have decided not to set even a single new settlement. We will not allow anyone to establish his own private initiatives on the hills, for our own reasons, not because of you. But at the same time I will respect any contract that has been signed, under law, in Israel. But -- and here is a point -- bearing in mind that we can put an end to the conflict, to reach an agreement within a year and a half, why the hell it will matter? To build a new building in Israel takes more than a year and a half, so you won't see any building that is not already emerging from the ground, having it's roof before we can reach an agreement. Now if such a building happens to be in a settlement that will become, under the agreement, part of the new independent Palestine, why the hell you have to care? Take it, use it, put some refugees in it. And if it will happen to be a part of what will be agreed, as Israel, in a mutual agreement that is signed by you, why the hell do you care, if you agree? I believe that that simple answer would not solve his public -- or internal political -- problems, but it would solve the real issue if the will was there to make peace, and not just to politically maneuver and manipulate.”

Ehud Barak (1942) Israeli politician and prime minister

Speech at UC Berkeley http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/19324/edition_id/391/format/html/displaystory.html, November 22, 2002

“Off she'd go to the hospital, a place I believe she secretly liked because they treat you like a child there.”

Wilfrid Sheed (1930–2011) English-American novelist and essayist

"Miss Jean Stafford," p. 71
Essays in Disguise (1990)

Stephen Harper photo

“I believe that all taxes are bad.”

Stephen Harper (1959) 22nd Prime Minister of Canada

CTV.ca news, December 1, 2005, "Tory tax cut promise dominates campaign".
2005

Noel Gallagher photo
Halldór Laxness photo

“Everyone always believes everything nasty of everyone else, and especially if it's a lie.”

Halldór Laxness (1902–1998) Icelandic author

Vegmey Hansdóttir
Heimsljós (World Light) (1940), Book Two: The Palace of the Summerland

Jeffrey Tucker photo

“Someone asked me the other day if I believe in conspiracies. Well, sure. Here's one. It is called the political system. It is nothing if not a giant conspiracy to rob, trick and subjugate the population.”

Jeffrey Tucker (1963) American writer

Source: Conspiracies and How to Defeat Them, lfb.org, 2016-05-30 http://lfb.org/conspiracies-and-how-to-defeat-them/,

Graham Greene photo

“Can you hate something you don't believe in? And yet he called himself a free-thinker. What an impossible paradox, to be free and to be so obsessed.”

Graham Greene (1904–1991) English writer, playwright and literary critic

"The Hint of an Explanation" (1948), Twenty-One Stories, 1954
Short Stories

André Breton photo
Melvyn Bragg photo
Chuck Palahniuk photo
Sidney Lee photo

“I believe that the luxuriance of Shakespeare's dramatic instinct largely dominates that outburst of lyric melody which gives the Sonnets their life.”

Sidney Lee (1859–1926) English biographer and critic

"The Impersonal Aspect of Shakespeare's Art" (English Association Leaflet, 13, July 1909)

Russell Brand photo
Rufus Wainwright photo

“And you will believe in love
And all that it's supposed to be
But just until the fish start to smell
And you're struck down by a hammer.”

Rufus Wainwright (1973) American-Canadian singer-songwriter and composer

April Fool's
Song lyrics, Rufus Wainwright (1998)

Bonar Law photo

“These people in the North-east of Ireland, from old prejudices perhaps more from anything else, from the whole of their past history, would prefer, I believe, to accept the government of a foreign country rather than submit to be governed by honourable gentlemen below the gangway”

Bonar Law (1858–1923) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

i.e. the Irish Nationalist Party
Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1913/jan/01/clause-1-establishment-of-irish in the House of Commons (1 January 1913) rejecting the Home Rule Bill

Aron Ra photo

“When I read the gospels, I don’t see a wise and benevolent sage imparting truth. I see a religious extremist and faith-healer, who is just as much of a scam artist as any of the exorcists still practicing today. Remember that Jesus taught his disciples how to do faith healing too, just like tele-evangelists still do. Jesus didn’t believe in washing your hands because he didn’t know about pathogens. He believed in demons instead. And he cursed a fig tree because he didn’t know they were out-of-season. Likewise he didn’t know that the farmers of his day already knew about other seeds that were smaller than mustard seeds. My best evidence was Jesus’ complaint that the people who knew him since childhood wouldn’t buy any of his bullshit. So the only indications I had to believe in a historic Jesus were the very points that implied that he could not be a god nor have any real connection to God. So there are only two possibilities: Jesus was either an ignorant 1st century charlatan and cult leader heavily exaggerated like Robin Hood, or he’s a completely imaginary legendary figure like Hercules. Remember how Jesus said that he came not to bring peace but a sword; that he would divide husbands from their wives and children from their parents all on behalf of beliefs based on faith? Remember also that faith, (an unreasonable assertion of complete conviction which is not based on reason and is defended against all reason) —is the most dishonest position it is possible to have. Any belief which requires faith should be rejected for that reason.”

Aron Ra (1962) Aron Ra is an atheist activist and the host of the Ra-Men Podcast

"Jesus never existed" http://www.patheos.com/blogs/reasonadvocates/2015/11/03/jesus-never-existed/, Patheos (November 3, 2015)
Patheos

Bill O'Neill photo
Arthur Seyss-Inquart photo

“I hope that this execution is the last act of the tragedy of the Second World War, and that the lesson taken from this world war will be that peace and understanding should exist between peoples. I believe in Germany.”

Arthur Seyss-Inquart (1892–1946) austrian chancellor and politician, convicted of crimes against humanity in Nuremberg Trials and sentenced …

Last words, 10/16/46. Quoted in "Justice at Nuremberg" - Page 506 - by Robert E. Conot - History - 1984

Michele Bachmann photo
Michael Moore photo

“I'm a millionaire, I'm a multi-millionaire, I'm filthy rich. You know why I'm a multi-millionaire? 'Cause multi-millions like what I do. That's pretty good, isn't it? There's millions that believe in what I do. Pretty cool, huh?”

Michael Moore (1954) American filmmaker, author, social critic, and liberal activist

Responding to criticism over his purchase of a million-dollar home, as quoted in the Arcata Eye (3 March 2002); and in "Moore Lies, Moore Fun at Stanford" by Joe Fairbanks in the Stanford Review (17 April 2002) http://www.stanfordreview.org/Archive/Volume_XXVIII/Issue_4/Opinion/opinion2.shtml
2002

Richard Feynman photo
Kent Hovind photo