Quotes about break
page 19

Walther Funk photo

“But ignorance of the law is no excuse. A person is guilty even if he breaks the law unknowingly. I shall be perhaps the first of the defendants to get up on that stand and admit that I am at least partly guilty.”

Walther Funk (1890–1960) German economist and politician

To Leon Goldensohn, March 31, 1946 from "The Nuremberg Interviews" by Leon Goldensohn, Robert Gellately - History - 2004

“At break of day I feel as if I'm clasping a bouquet of smiling flowers
But the wind of time does not cease blowing
And the hours wilt like falling petals.”

Xuân Diệu (1916–1985) Vietnamese poet

As quoted in "Shattered Identities and Contested Images: Reflections of Poetry and History in 20th-Century Vietnam" by Neil Jamieson, in Crossroads: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Vol. 7, No. 2, 1992, p. 86

William Blake photo

“Love to faults is always blind,
Always is to joys inclined,
Lawless, winged, and unconfined,
And breaks all chains from every mind.”

William Blake (1757–1827) English Romantic poet and artist

Love to Faults
1790s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1791-1792)

Conrad Aiken photo
M.I.A. photo
Frank Buckles photo
Lee Smolin photo
Thomas Moore photo

“Oh stay! oh stay!
Joy so seldom weaves a chain
Like this to-night, that oh 't is pain
To break its links so soon.”

Thomas Moore (1779–1852) Irish poet, singer and songwriter

Fly not yet.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Michelle Obama photo
Gabrielle Roy photo
William Hazlitt photo

“Some persons make promises for the pleasure of breaking them.”

William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English writer

No. 413
Characteristics, in the manner of Rochefoucauld's Maxims (1823)

Daniel Dennett photo

“What [is] the prevailing attitude today among those who call themselves religious but vigorously advocate tolerance? There are three main options, ranging from the disingenuous Machiavellian--1. As a matter of political strategy, the time is not ripe for candid declarations of religious superiority, so we should temporize and let sleeping dogs lie in hopes that those of other faiths can gently be brought around over the centuries.--through truly tolerant Eisenhowerian "Our government makes no sense unless it is founded on a deeply religious belief — and I don't care what it is" --2. It really doesn't matter which religion you swear allegiance to, as long as you have some religion.--to the even milder Moynihanian benign neglect--3. Religion is just too dear to too many to think of discarding, even though it really doesn't do any good and is simply an empty historical legacy we can afford to maintain until it quietly extinguishes itself sometime in the distant and unforeseeable future.It it no use asking people which they choose, since both extremes are so undiplomatic we can predict in advance that most people will go for some version of ecumenical tolerance whether they believe it or not. …We've got ourselves caught in a hypocrisy trap, and there is no clear path out. Are we like families in which the adults go through all the motions of believing in Santa Claus for the sake of the kids, and the kids all pretend still to believe in Santa Claus so as not to spoil the adults' fun? If only our current predicament were as innocuous and even comical as that! In the adult world of religion, people are dying and killing, with the moderates cowed into silence by the intransigence of the radicals in their own faiths, and many afraid to acknowledge what they actually believe for fear of breaking Granny's heart, or offending their neighbors to the point of getting run out of town, or worse.If this is the precious meaning our lives are vouchsafed thanks to our allegiance to one religion or another, it is not such a bargain, in my opinion. Is this the best we can do? Is it not tragic that so many people around the world find themselves enlisted against their will in a conspiracy of silence, either because they secretly believe that most of the world's population is wasting their lives in delusion (but they are too tenderhearted — or devious — to say so), or because they secretly believe that their own tradition is just such a delusion (but they fear for their own safety if they admit it)?”

Breaking the Spell (2006)

Tom Petty photo

“She's a woman in love
And he's gonna break her heart to pieces.
She don't want to see.
She's a woman in love, but it's not me.”

Tom Petty (1950–2017) American musician

A Woman in Love (It's Not Me), written with Mike Campbell
Lyrics, Hard Promises (1981)

Billy Corgan photo

“Theological condemnation of others, which breaks off fellowship in either judgment or contempt, is impermissible.”

Ernst Käsemann (1906–1998) German theologian

Commentary on the Romans (1980), p. 369: Describing Paul's view

Alain Badiou photo
John Zerzan photo
Winston S. Churchill photo

“It is, thank heaven, difficult if not impossible for the modern European to fully appreciate the force which fanaticism exercises among an ignorant, warlike and Oriental population. Several generations have elapsed since the nations of the West have drawn the sword in religious controversy, and the evil memories of the gloomy past have soon faded in the strong, clear light of Rationalism and human sympathy. Indeed it is evident that Christianity, however degraded and distorted by cruelty and intolerance, must always exert a modifying influence on men's passions, and protect them from the more violent forms of fanatical fever, as we are protected from smallpox by vaccination. But the Mahommedan religion increases, instead of lessening, the fury of intolerance. It was originally propagated by the sword, and ever since, its votaries have been subject, above the people of all other creeds, to this form of madness. In a moment the fruits of patient toil, the prospects of material prosperity, the fear of death itself, are flung aside. The more emotional Pathans are powerless to resist. All rational considerations are forgotten. Seizing their weapons, they become Ghazis—as dangerous and as sensible as mad dogs: fit only to be treated as such. While the more generous spirits among the tribesmen become convulsed in an ecstasy of religious bloodthirstiness, poorer and more material souls derive additional impulses from the influence of others, the hopes of plunder and the joy of fighting. Thus whole nations are roused to arms. Thus the Turks repel their enemies, the Arabs of the Soudan break the British squares, and the rising on the Indian frontier spreads far and wide. In each case civilisation is confronted with militant Mahommedanism. The forces of progress clash with those of reaction. The religion of blood and war is face to face with that of peace. Luckily the religion of peace is usually the better armed.”

The Story of the Malakand Field Force: An Episode of Frontier War (1898), Chapter III.
Early career years (1898–1929)

Chuck Palahniuk photo
Thom Yorke photo

“Are you hungry?
Are you sick?
Are you begging for a break?
Are you sweet?
Are you fresh?
Are you strung up by the wrists?”

Thom Yorke (1968) English musician, philanthropist and singer-songwriter

"We Suck Young Blood"
Lyrics, Hail to the Thief (2003)

Brian W. Aldiss photo

“You know that if you had been in charge of creation you would have found some medium less heart-breaking than Time to stage it in.”

Brian W. Aldiss (1925–2017) British science fiction author

“Poor Little Warrior!” p. 79
Short fiction, Who Can Replace a Man? (1965)

Letitia Elizabeth Landon photo
Dane Cook photo
David Bowie photo

“And if you say run, I'll run with you
And if you say hide, we'll hide.
Because my love for you
Would break my heart in two.
If you should fall
Into my arms
And tremble like a flower.”

David Bowie (1947–2016) British musician, actor, record producer and arranger

Let's Dance
Song lyrics, Let's Dance (1983)

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg photo
Siddharth Katragadda photo

“When you have a big problem to solve, break it down to smaller ones first.”

Siddharth Katragadda (1972) Indian writer

page 5
Dark Rooms (2002)

Hugh Laurie photo
Pope Benedict XVI photo
Chris Cornell photo
Walter Scott photo
Earl Holliman photo
Tim Shieff photo
Mike Oldfield photo
Georges Rouault photo

“Like the ostrich, head under wing
When the roaring storm breaks,
So many people take refuge
Under the soft pillow
Of specious arguments.”

Georges Rouault (1871–1958) French painter

Le Cirque de l'étoile filante. (1938)
Quotes, 1930-1940

Arnold J. Toynbee photo
Fernand Léger photo
Étienne de La Boétie photo

“Resolve to serve no more, and you are at once freed. I do not ask that you place hands upon the tyrant to topple him over, but simply that you support him no longer; then you will behold him, like a great Colossus whose pedestal has been pulled away, fall of his own weight and break in pieces.”

Soyez résolus à ne plus servir, et vous voilà libres. Je ne vous demande pas de le pousser, de l'ébranler, mais seulement de ne plus le soutenir, et vous le verrez, tel un grand colosse dont on a brisé la base, fondre sous son poids et se rompre.
Discourse on Voluntary Servitude (1548)

Peter Akinola photo
Jacob Epstein photo

“A sculptor is supposed to be a dull dog anyway, so why should he not break out in colour sometimes, and in my case I'd as soon be hanged for a sheep as a lamb.”

Jacob Epstein (1880–1959) American-born British sculptor

Autobiography (Fletcher & Sons, Norwich, 1963)

Ramakrishna photo
Adolf Hitler photo
Ray Bradbury photo
Richard Dawkins photo

“The absolute morality that a religious person might profess would include what, stoning people for adultery, death for apostasy, punishment for breaking the Sabbath. These are all things which are religiously based absolute moralities. I don’t think I want an absolute morality. I think I want a morality that is thought out, reasoned, argued, discussed and based upon, I’d almost say, intelligent design [pun intended]. Can we not design our society, which has the sort of morality, the sort of society that we want to live in – if you actually look at the moralities that are accepted among modern people, among 21st century people, we don’t believe in slavery anymore. We believe in equality of women. We believe in being gentle. We believe in being kind to animals. These are all things which are entirely recent. They have very little basis in Biblical or Quranic scripture. They are things that have developed over historical time through a consensus of reasoning, of sober discussion, argument, legal theory, political and moral philosophy. These do not come from religion. To the extent that you can find the good bits in religious scriptures, you have to cherry pick. You search your way through the Bible or the Quran and you find the occasional verse that is an acceptable profession of morality and you say, ‘Look at that. That’s religion,’ and you leave out all the horrible bits and you say, ‘Oh, we don’t believe that anymore. We’ve grown out of that.’ Well, of course we’ve grown out it. We’ve grown out of it because of secular moral philosophy and rational discussion.”

Richard Dawkins (1941) English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author

Richard Dawkins-George Pell Q&A (2012)

Mick Mulvaney photo
Will Cuppy photo

“The moral of the story of the Pilgrims is that if you work hard all your life and behave yourself every minute and take no time out for fun you will break practically even, if you can borrow enough money to pay your taxes.”

Will Cuppy (1884–1949) American writer

The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody (1950), Part VI: Now We're Getting Somewhere, Miles Standish

Dorothy L. Sayers photo
Heather Brooke photo
Max Beckmann photo
Huston Smith photo
Brad Paisley photo
Seneca the Younger photo
Orson Scott Card photo
Jacopone da Todi photo

“Now, a new creature, I in Christ am born,
The old man stripped away; -- I am new-made;
And mounting in me, like the sun at morn,
Love breaks my heart, even as a broken blade:
Christ, First and Only Fair, from me hath shorn
My will, my wits, and all that in me stayed,
I in His arms am laid,
I cry and call --
O Thou my All,
O let me die of Love!”

Jacopone da Todi (1236–1306) Italian Franciscan mystic

From All Saints: Daily Reflections on Saints, Prophets, and Witnesses for Our Time, As air becomes the medium for light when the sun rises, and as wax melts from the heat of fire, so the soul drawn to that light is resplendent, feels self melt awayby Robert Ellsberg

Jadunath Sarkar photo
Anne Ross Cousin photo
Allan Kardec photo
John Gay photo
Buddy Holly photo

“It's so easy to fall in love — it's so easy to fall in love.
People tell me love is for fools,
So here I go breaking all of the rules.”

Buddy Holly (1936–1959) American singer-songwriter

It's So Easy, written by Buddy Holly and Norman Petty (1958)
Song lyrics, Singles

Amir Khusrow photo
Winston S. Churchill photo
Patrick Buchanan photo

“I don't know anything about records. I just know that I'm gonna break the record.”

Jessica Dubroff (1988–1996) American child pilot trainee

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5gw1yEV0gs

Statius photo

“So a lioness that has newly whelped, beset by Numidian hunters in her cruel den, stands upright over her young, gnashing her teeth in grim and piteous wise, her mind in doubt; she could disrupt the groups and break their weapons with her bite, but love for her offspring binds her cruel heart and from the midst of her fury she looks round at her cubs.”
Ut lea, quam saeuo fetam pressere cubili venantes Numidae, natos erecta superstat, mente sub incerta torvum ac miserabile frendens; illa quidem turbare globos et frangere morsu tela queat, sed prolis amor crudelia vincit pectora, et a media catulos circumspicit ira.

Source: Thebaid, Book X, Line 414

Bill Maher photo
Robert Lowell photo
Madhuri Dixit photo
Nicholas Brendon photo

“There are so many different phases of stuttering, and it always breaks my heart. I always wish I could say, 'When I'm done hugging you... your stuttering will be gone.”

Nicholas Brendon (1971) actor

Make-over artist: Nicholas Brendon goes for laughs in 'Celeste in the City', BostonHerald.com, March 12, 2004 http://www.nickbrendon.com/archives/000049.html

Linda McQuaig photo
Vladimir Lenin photo

“The bourgeoisie incites the workers of one nation against those of another in the endeavor to keep them disunited. Class-conscious workers, realising that the break-down of all the national barriers by capitalism is inevitable and progressive, are trying to help to enlighten and organise their fellow-workers from the backward countries.”

Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution

"Capitalism and Workers’ Immigration", in Za Pravdu No. 22 (29 October 1913) http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1913/oct/29.htm; Collected Works, Vol. 24.
1910s

Joseph Heller photo
Eric Hobsbawm photo
Josh Homme photo
Cyrano de Bergerac photo
Stephenie Meyer photo

“Meyer, Stephenie. (2008). Breaking Dawn. Park Avenue, New York: Little, Brown and Company, 754..”

Stephenie Meyer (1973) American author

References
Variant: Meyer, Stephenie. (2008). The Host. Park Avenue, New York: Little, Brown and Company, 619.

Hartley Coleridge photo
Jim Webb photo
Konrad Heiden photo
Victor Villaseñor photo
Winston S. Churchill photo

“I do think unpunctuality is a vile habit, and all my life I have tried to break myself of it.”

Winston S. Churchill (1874–1965) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Source: My Early Life: A Roving Commission (1930), Chapter 7 (Hounslow).

Henry George photo
Roger Penrose photo
Bayard Taylor photo
Albert Einstein photo

“Dear Habicht, / Such a solemn air of silence has descended between us that I almost feel as if I am committing a sacrilege when I break it now with some inconsequential babble… / What are you up to, you frozen whale, you smoked, dried, canned piece of soul…?”

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

Lieber Habicht! / Es herrscht ein weihevolles Stillschweigen zwischen uns, so daß es mir fast wie eine sündige Entweihung vorkommt, wenn ich es jetzt durch ein wenig bedeutsames Gepappel unterbreche... / Was machen Sie denn, Sie eingefrorener Walfisch, Sie getrocknetes, eingebüchstes Stück Seele...?
Opening of a letter to his friend Conrad Habicht in which he describes his four revolutionary Annus Mirabilis papers (18 or 25 May 1905) Doc. 27 http://einsteinpapers.press.princeton.edu/vol5-doc/81?ajax
1900s

José Rizal photo

“It breaks immortality's neck
Contemplates crime and therefore halts it;
It humbles barbarous nations
And makes of savages, champions.”

José Rizal (1861–1896) Filipino writer, ophthalmologist, polyglot and nationalist

"Por La Education" (To Education, c. 1876) - translator unknown

Benjamín Netanyahu photo
Huldrych Zwingli photo

“Within a few days I will go to the papal Legate [Pucci], and if he shall open a conversation on the subject as he did before, I will urge him to warn the Pope not to issue an excommunication [against Luther], for which I think would be greatly against him [the Pope]. For if it be issued I believe the Germans will equally despise the Pope and the excommunication. But do you be of good cheer, for our day will not lack those who will teach Christ faithfully, and who will give up their lives for Him willingly, even though among men their names shall not be in good repute after this life…So far as I am concerned I look for all evil from all of them: I mean both ecclesiastics and laymen. I beseech Christ for this one thing only, that He will enable me to endure all things courageously, and that He break me as a potter's vessel or make me strong, as it pleased Him. If I be excommunicated I shall think of the learned and holy Hilary, who was exiled from France to Africa, and of Lucius, who though driven from his seat at Rome returned again with great honour. Not that I compare myself with them: for as they were better than i so they suffered what was a greater ignominy. And yet if it were good to flory I would rejoice to suffer insult for the name of Christ. But let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. Lately I have read scarcely any thing of Luther's; but what I have seen of his hitherto does not seem to me to stray from gospel teaching. You know - if you rememeber - that what I have always spoken of in terms of the highest commendation in him is that he supports his position with authoritative witness.”

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

As cited in Huldreich Zwingli, the Reformer of German Switzerland, 1484-1531 by Samuel Macauley Jackson, John Martin Vincent, Frank Hugh Foster, p.148-149

Dido photo
Daniel Tosh photo
Luis Buñuel photo

“God and Country are an unbeatable team; they break all records for oppression and bloodshed.”

Luis Buñuel (1900–1983) film director

Mon Dernier soupir (My Last Sigh, 1983)