Quotes about choice
page 7

“People will want you to behave a certain way, to make a certain choice because it reinforces the way they see the world… But you have to do what's right for you.”

Jennifer Weiner (1970) American writer

Source: Fly Away Home

People, World, Way

“We live out our lives as we are meant to live them-with some choice, with some chance, but mostly as a result of the persons we are.”

Terry Brooks The Druid of Shannara

Source: The Druid of Shannara

Chance, Personality

“The most important story we'll ever write in life is our own—not with ink, but with our daily choices.”

Richard Paul Evans (1962) American writer

Life

“When swimming into a dark tunnel, there arrives a point of no return when you no longer have enough breath to double back. your choice is to swim forward into the unknown…. and pray for an exit”

Dan Brown book Inferno

Source: Inferno

“I urge you to examine in your own mind the assumptions which must lay behind using the police power to insist that once-sovereign spirits have no choice but to submit to being schooled by strangers.”

John Taylor Gatto (1935–2018) American teacher, book author

School

“I advise those who want to become writers to study veterinary medicine, which is easier. You don't want to be a writer unless you have no choice - and if you have no choice, good luck to you.”

Robin McKinley (1952) American fantasy writer

Study

“What if evil doesn't really exist? What if evil is something dreamed up by man, and there is nothing to struggle against except out own limitations? The constant battle between our will, our desires, and our choices?”

Libba Bray book Rebel Angels

Source: Rebel Angels

Dreams, Evil

“He could have had his choice of any woman in the district. And he chose solitude. Not solitude – that sounds too peaceful. More like solitary confinement.”

Suzanne Collins book Catching Fire

Source: Catching Fire

Peace, Solitude

“Accounts are not quite settled between us," said she, with a passion that equaled my own. "I can love, and I can hate. You had your choice. You chose to spurn the first; now you must test the other.”

Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930) Scottish physician and author

Love, Hate, Passion

“There is no man, and no place, without war. The only thing we can do is choose a side, and fight. That is the only choice we get - who we fight for, who we fight against. That is life.”

Gregory David Roberts book Shantaram

Source: Shantaram

Life, War, Fight

“Look, the point is there's no way to be a hundred percent sure about anyone or anything. So you're left with a choice. Either hope for the best or just expect the worst.”

Sarah Dessen Lock and Key

Source: Lock and Key

Hope, Way

“You got one choice at the beginning but if you didn't choose right, things got narrow real quick.”

Ron Rash book Serena

Source: Serena

“Interdependence is a choice only independent people can make”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

Source: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

People

“You have a choice. Live or die. Every breath is a choice. Every minute is a choice. To be or not to be.”

Chuck Palahniuk (1962) American novelist, essayist

“They were two lovely choices. One of them meant giving up every chance of a decent life forever… and the other one scared me out of my mind.”

Frederik Pohl book Gateway

Source: Gateway

Love, Life, Chance

“I'm an outsider by choice, she said, but I'm hoping that won't be my choice forever.”

Brian Andreas (1956) American artist

Source: Trusting Soul

Hope

“Grief is natural,' she said. 'Overcoming it is a matter of choice.”

Jeffrey Eugenides book The Virgin Suicides

Source: The Virgin Suicides

Nature

“She (Daisy) dug her nails into her palms and told herself she had no choice. "I, Theodosia…" She gulped for air. "… take thee Alexander…" She gulped again. "… to be my awful wedded husband…”

Susan Elizabeth Phillips (1948) American writer

Source: Kiss an Angel

Wedding

“The point wasn’t that you tried to live forever; the point was that you lived, and did everything you could to live well. The point was the choices you made and the people you loved.”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

Source: Angels Twice Descending

Love, People

“We had no choice. Sadness was a dangerous as panthers and bears. the wilderness needs your whole attention.”

Laura Ingalls Wilder (1867–1957) American children's writer, diarist, and journalist

Sadness

“People sometimes make unexpected choices when they're lonely”

Jeanne Birdsall (1951) American children's writer

Source: The Penderwicks: A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy

People

“You can figure out what the villain fears by his choice of weapons.”

Connie Brockway (1954) American writer

Source: The Bridal Season

Fear

“How can you do the right thing when you can't figure out what that is? When all you have before you are choices in various shades of wrong?”

Neal Shusterman (1962) American novelist

Source: Bruiser

“Nobody gets everything in this life. You decide your priorities and you make your choices. I'd decided long ago that any cake I had would be eaten.”

Donald E. Westlake (1933–2008) American novelist

Source: Two Much (1975), Ch. 21

Life

“I shouldn't precisely have chosen madness if there had been any choice, but once such a thing has taken hold of you, you can't very well get out of it.”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

Madness

“There is no choice more intensely personal, after all, than whom you choose to marry; that choice tells us, to a large extent, who you are.”

Elizabeth Gilbert book Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage

Source: Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage

Personality

“The choice of life is not between fame and fortune, nor wealth and poverty, but between good and evil.”

Boyd K. Packer (1924–2015) American Mormon leader

Life, Evil, Wealth

“There are many teenage vampire books you could have purchased instead. I'm grateful you made this choice.”

Mindy Kaling book Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

Source: Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

Books

“Serenity comes from the ability to say “Yes” to existence. Courage comes from the ability to say “No” to the wrong choices made by others.”

Ayn Rand book Philosophy: Who Needs It

Source: Philosophy: Who Needs It

Courage

“True love means that you care for another person's happiness more than your own, no matter how painful the choices you face might be.”

Nicholas Sparks book Dear John

Source: Dear John

Love, Pain, Happiness, Personality

“There seemed to be three choices: to give up trying to love anyone, to stop being selfish, or to learn to love a person while continuing to be selfish.”

Lydia Davis (1947) American writer

Love, Learning, Personality, Selfishness

“There is everything you know and there is everything that happens. When the two do not line up, you make a choice.”

Mitch Albom For One More Day

Source: For One More Day

“Homework is not an option. My bed is sending out serious nap rays. I can't help myself. The fluffy pillows and warm comforter are more powerful than I am. I have no choice but to snuggle under the covers.”

Laurie Halse Anderson Speak

Source: Speak

Help

“Happiness is a choice. It is not always an easy one.”

Richard Bach (1936) American spiritual writer

Source: Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah

Happiness

“The problem, simply put, is that we cannot choose everything simultaneously. So we live in danger of becoming paralyzed by indecision, terrified that every choice might be the wrong choice.”

Elizabeth Gilbert book Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage

Source: Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage

Problem, Indecision

“Because to take away a man's freedom of choice, even his freedom to make the wrong choice, is to manipulate him as though he were a puppet and not a person.”

Madeleine L'Engle (1918–2007) American writer

Freedom, Personality

“People cain't help being what they are any more than a skunk can help being a skunk. Don't you think if they had their choice they would rather be something else? Sure they would. People are just weak.”

Fannie Flagg book Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

Source: Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

People, Thinking, Help

“Chosen motherhood is the real liberation. The choice to have a child makes the whole experience of motherhood different, and the choice to be generative in other ways can at last be made, and is being made by many women now, without guilt.”

Betty Friedan book The Feminine Mystique

Source: The Feminine Mystique

Women, Way

“Science is a bit like the joke about the drunk who is looking under a lamppost for a key that he has lost on the other side of the street, because that's where the light is. It has no other choice.”

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

Light, Science

“Life was messy. Always had been and always would be and that was just the way it was, so why bother complaining? You either did something about it or you didn’t, and then you lived with the choice you made.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Best of Me

Source: The Best of Me

Life, Way

“« Are you hungry, baby?” Curran asked.
“Starving.”
“I think we should go to dinner.”
“Great idea.”
“What are you going to wear?”
“My badass face.”
“Good choice,” he said. »”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Rises

Idea, Thinking, Baby

“Then you've made the only choice. But there's a penalty attached, as there is to most things you want. It's loneliness.”

Margaret Mitchell (1900–1949) American author and journalist

Penalty, Loneliness

“Did she ever regret her choices? Were her decisions more clear-cut than mine - or are there always shades of gray whe it comes to matters of the heart?”

Emily Giffin (1972) American writer

Source: Love the One You're With

Decision, Heart

“Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof.”

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

Economics, Peace and Laughter (1971), p. 50

Business, Change

“We are doomed to choose and every choice may entail irreparable loss.”

Isaiah Berlin (1909–1997) Russo-British Jewish social and political theorist, philosopher and historian of ideas

Loss

“Now the choices you make are not about finding your path. Rather, they are choices to open the path you have found.”

Ilchi Lee (1950) South Korean businessman

Source: Human Technology: A Toolkit for Authentic Living

“We can spend our days bemoaning our losses, or we can grow from them. Ultimately the choice is ours. We can be victims of circumstance or masters of our own fate, but make no mistake, we cannot be both.
The Walk - Epilogue Page 288”

Richard Paul Evans (1962) American writer

Source: The Walk

Fate, Loss

“I made the wrong choice," I whispered.
My mother shook her head.
"A child should never have to choose.”

Mitch Albom For One More Day

Source: For One More Day

“What hope is there?” I asked. “If even angels fall, what hope is there for the rest of us?”

“There isn’t,” he said. “We’re on our own. And we have to make the choices we think are best for our own survival.”

Richelle Mead (1976) American writer

Source: Succubus Dreams

Hope, Angels, Thinking

“Fate is how your life unfolds when you let fear determine your choices. A path of destiny reveals itself to you, however, when you confront your fear and make conscious choices.”

Caroline Myss (1952) author from the United States

Life, Fate, Fear

“What better way to get to know someone than through her choice and treatment of books?”

Diane Setterfield book The Thirteenth Tale

Source: The Thirteenth Tale

Books, Way

“If everything's the same, then there aren't any choices! I want to wake up in the morning and decide things!”

Lois Lowry book The Giver

Source: The Giver

“One way to define wisdom is the ability to see, into the future, the consequences of your choices in the present. That ability can give you a completely different perspective on what the future might look like.”

Andy Andrews (1959) author and corporate speaker

Source: The Noticer: Sometimes, All a Person Needs Is a Little Perspective

Wisdom, Way, Future

“It's a choice, Annabel. And if you make the wrong one, you have only yourself to blame when there are consequences.”

Sarah Dessen book Just Listen

Source: Just Listen

“How we are almost nothing. We think, in our youth, we are the centre of the universe, but we simply respond, go this way or that by accident, survive or improve by the luck of the draw, with little choice or determination on our part.”

Michael Ondaatje book Divisadero

Source: Divisadero

Youth, Way, Thinking, Universe

“What is the spiritual battle? Well, the soul is a garden divided into two parts. On one half are planted thorny bushes, and on the other half flowers. We also have a water pump with two taps and two channels. The one guides the water to the thorns and the other to the flowers. I always have the choice to open one or the other tap. I leave the thorns without water and they dry up, I water the flowers and they blossom.”

Porphyrios Bairaktaris (1906–1991) Greek Saint

Precious Vessels of the Holy Spirit - The Lives and Counsels of Contemporary Elders of Greece, p. 170

Soul, Flowers, Water, Parting

“Society is indeed a contract. Subordinate contracts for objects of mere occasional interest may be dissolved at pleasure — but the state ought not to be considered as nothing better than a partnership agreement in a trade of pepper and coffee, calico or tobacco, or some other such low concern, to be taken up for a little temporary interest, and to be dissolved by the fancy of the parties. It is to be looked on with other reverence; because it is not a partnership in things subservient only to the gross animal existence of a temporary and perishable nature. It is a partnership in all science; a partnership in all art; a partnership in every virtue, and in all perfection. As the ends of such a partnership cannot be obtained in many generations, it becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are to be born. Each contract of each particular state is but a clause in the great primaeval contract of eternal society, linking the lower with the higher natures, connecting the visible and the invisible world, according to a fixed compact sanctioned by the inviolable oath which holds all physical and all moral natures, each in their appointed place. This law is not subject to the will of those, who by an obligation above them, and infinitely superior, are bound to submit their will to that law. The municipal corporations of that universal kingdom are not morally at liberty at their pleasure, and on their speculations of a contingent improvement, wholly to separate and tear asunder the bands of their subordinate community, and to dissolve it into an unsocial, uncivil, unconnected chaos of elementary principles. It is the first and supreme necessity only, a necessity that is not chosen, but chooses, a necessity paramount to deliberation, that admits no discussion, and demands no evidence, which alone can justify a resort to anarchy. This necessity is no exception to the rule; because this necessity itself is a part too of that moral and physical disposition of things, to which man must be obedient by consent or force: but if that which is only submission to necessity should be made the object of choice, the law is broken, nature is disobeyed, and the rebellious are outlawed, cast forth, and exiled, from this world of reason, and order, and peace, and virtue, and fruitful penitence, into the antagonist world of madness, discord, vice, confusion, and unavailing sorrow.”

Edmund Burke book Reflections on the Revolution in France

Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790)

Pleasure, World, Peace, Law

“Family life itself, that safest, most traditional, most approved of female choices, is not a sanctuary: It is, perpetually, a dangerous place.”

Margaret Drabble (1939) Novelist, biographer and critic

"The Limits of Mother Love", in The New York Times Book Review, March 31, 1985

Life, Family

“This democracy… The elections in Iraq were held despite the American opposition. It was the will of the Iraqi people and the religious authorities. [The elections] were the result of pressure by Ayatollah Sistani, by the Iraqi religious authorities, and by the fighting forces in Iraq on America. They left the US no choice but to allow the elections.”

Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani (1934–2017) Iranian politician, Shi'a cleric and Writer

Rafsanjani: the U.S. Sold Biological and Chemical Weapons to Saddam Hussein. Elections in Iraq Were Held against America's Will http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/560.htm February 2005 <br class="br">2005

People, Democracy, Fight

“Have I ever remarked on how completely ridiculous it is to ask high school students to decide what they want to do with the rest of their lives and give them nearly no support in doing so? Support like, say, spending a day apiece watching twenty different jobs and then another week at their top three choices, with salary charts and projections and probabilities of graduating that subject given their test scores? The more so considering this is a central allocation question for the entire economy?”

Eliezer Yudkowsky (1979) American blogger, writer, and artificial intelligence researcher

A comment on Memetic Hazards in Videogames (September 2010) http://lesswrong.com/lw/2pe/memetic_hazards_in_videogames/2l8y

School, Question, Support

“A referendum is little more than a "rumour of choice." The idea behind the mechanism, ever since its first modern manifestations two centuries ago under Napoleon, has been to replace democracy with the sensation of democracy. That is: to replace the slow, complex, eternally unclear continuity of democracy, and all the awkwardness of citizen participation, with something clear and fast which allows those in power to impose their agenda. Through an apparently simple question with a one-syllable answer, those who ask can get a blank cheque from the citizenry; that is, if they choose their moment well and come up with a winning question.”

John Ralston Saul (1947) Canadian author and essayist

Reflections of a Siamese Twin (1997)

Democracy, Idea, Question

“Fervor is the weapon of choice of the impotent.”

Frantz Fanon book Black Skin, White Masks

Introduction,Page 9
Black Skin, White Masks (1952)

“By 1954, when Brown came up for decision, it had been apparent for some time that segregation rarely if ever produced equality. Quite aside from any question of psychology, the physical facilities provided for blacks were not as good as those provided for whites. That had been demonstrated in a long series of cases... The Court's realistic choice, therefore, was either to abandon the quest for equality by allowing segregation or to forbid segregation in order to achieve equality. There was no third choice. Either choice would violate one aspect of the original understanding, but there was no possibility of avoiding that. Since equality and segregation were mutually inconsistent, though the ratifiers did not understand that, both could not be honored. When that is seen, it is obvious the Court must choose equality and prohibit state-imposed segregation. The purpose that brought the fourteenth amendment into being was equality before the law, and equality, not separation, was written into the law.”

Robert Bork (1927–2012) American legal scholar

The Tempting of America (1990), page 82; on Brown v. Board of Education.

Law, Understanding, Question, Decision

“Some men are born committed to action: they do not have a choice, they have been thrown on a path, at the end of that path, an act awaits them, their act.”

Jean Paul Sartre The Flies

Act 1
The Flies (1943)

Men

“You have no choice but to operate in a world shaped by globalization and the information revolution. There are two options: adapt or die.”

Andrew S. Grove (1936–2016) Hungarian-born American businessman, engineer, and author

1995, p. 229; As cited in: Jay W. Rojews (2004) International Perspectives on Workforce Education and Development. p. xi
1980s - 1990s, High Output Management (1983)

World

“Our choice of partners is one of the clearest statements about our choice of values.”

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

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 341.

“We go forward with complete confidence in the eventual triumph of freedom. Not because history runs on the wheels of inevitability; it is human choices that move events. Not because we consider ourselves a chosen nation; God moves and chooses as he wills. We have confidence because freedom is the permanent hope of mankind, the hunger in dark places, the longing of the soul. When our Founders declared a new order of the ages, when soldiers died in wave upon wave for a union based on liberty, when citizens marched in peaceful outrage under the banner "Freedom Now"”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

they were acting on an ancient hope that is meant to be fulfilled.
2000s, 2005, Second Inaugural Address (January 2005)

Hunger, God, Age, Peace

“He didn't want to come, Dweller. He didn't want to get involved. It should have been me who died.' 'Of course he wanted to come. Why else was he here? You didn't force him, Draig. He came because you were his brother and he loved you. He could have left at any time once the pursuit began. He made his own choices. Just as you did. Just as I knew you would.”

David Gemmell book Stormrider

Source: Rigante series, Stormrider, Ch. 6

Love, Time

“This is our turn at the wheel, and history will judge us based on how we handle it. Decline is a choice, but so is liberty.”

Dinesh D'Souza (1961) Indian-American political commentator, filmmaker, author

Source: Books, America: Imagine a World without Her (2014), Ch. 16

History

“Recent organizational approaches to control (e. g., Ouchi 1979) suggest two underlying control strategies. On the one hand, control can be accomplished through performance evaluation. Performance evaluation refers to the cybernetic process of monitoring and rewarding performance. This strategy emphasizes the information aspects of control. Namely, to what degree can the various aspects of performance be assessed? Alternatively, control can be achieved by minimizing the divergence of preferences among organizational members. That is, members cooperate in the achievement of organizational goals because the members understand and have internalized these goals. This strategy emphasizes people policies such as selection, training, and socialization.
The two control strategies are interrelated. An organization can tolerate a work force with highly diverse goals if a precise evaluation system exists. In contrast, a lack of precision in performance evaluation can be tolerated when goal incompatibility is minor (Ouchi 1979). The choice between the two is driven by the ease of performance evaluation”

Kathleen M. Eisenhardt American economist

Source: "Control: Organizational and economic approaches," 1985, p. 135

People, Understanding, Training

“[Islamic terrorism] is different from all other forms of terrorism in at least three important respects. First, it rejects all the contemporary ideologies in their various forms; it sees itself as the total outsider with no option but to take control or to fall, gun in hand. It cannot even enter into talks with other terrorist movements which may, in some specific cases at least, share its tactical objectives. Considering itself as an expression of Islamic revival - which must, by definition, lead to the conquest of the entire globe by the True Faith - it bases all its actions on the dictum that the end justifies the means… The second characteristic that distinguishes the Islamic version from other forms of terrorism is that it is clearly conceived and conducted as a form of Holy War which can only end when total victory has been achieved. The term 'low-intensity warfare' has often been used to describe terrorism, but it applies more specifically to the Islamic kind, which does not seek negotiations, give-and-take, the securing of specific concessions or even the mere seizure of political power within a certain number of countries… The third specific characteristic of Islamic terrorism is that it forms the basis of a whole theory of both individual conduct and of state policy. To kill the enemies of Allah and to offer the infidels the choice between converting to Islam or being put to death is the duty of every individual believer as well as the supreme - if not the sole - task of the Islamic state.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

Holy Terror: The inside story of Islamic terrorism (1987)

Death, War, Faith, Victory

“We must make our choice. We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both.”

Louis Brandeis (1856–1941) American Supreme Court Justice

As quoted by Raymond Lonergan in Mr. Justice Brandeis, Great American (1941), p. 42.
Extra-judicial writings

Democracy, Wealth

“Militant feminists are pro-choice because it's their ultimate avenue of power over men. And believe me, to them it is a question of power. It is their attempt to impose their will on the rest of society, particularly on men.”

Rush Limbaugh (1951) U.S. radio talk show host, Commentator, author, and television personality

[The Way Things Ought to Be, Pocket Books, October 1992, 52, 978-0671751456, 92028659, 26397008, 1724938M]

Men, Question

“What this book is about is a kind of analysis that is characteristic of a large part of the social sciences, especially the more theoretical part. That kind of analysis explores the relation between the behavior of individuals who compromise some social aggregate, and the characteristics of the aggregate.These situations, in which people's behavior or people's choices depend on the behavior or choices of other people, are the ones that usually don't permit any simple summation or extrapolation of the aggregates. To make that connection we usually have to look at the system of interaction between individuals and their environment, that is, between individuals and other individuals or between individuals and the collectivity.”

Thomas C. Schelling (1921–2016) American economist

Micromotives and Microbehavior (1978).

People, Books, Behavior, Science

“Libertarians see the individual as the basic unit of social analysis. Only individuals make choices and are responsible for their actions. Libertarian thought emphasizes the dignity of each individual, which entails both rights and responsibility. The progressive extension of dignity to more people — to women, to people of different religions and different races — is one of the great libertarian triumphs of the Western world.”

David Boaz (1953) libertarian, author and editor

"Key Concepts of Libertarianism" (1 January 1999) http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=5758

Women, People, World, Religion

“On the other hand, we denounce with righteous indignation and dislike men who are so beguiled and demoralized by the charms of pleasure of the moment, so blinded by desire, that they cannot foresee the pain and trouble that are bound to ensue; and equal blame belongs to those who fail in their duty through weakness of will, which is the same as saying through shrinking from toil and pain. These cases are perfectly simple and easy to distinguish. In a free hour, when our power of choice is untrammeled and when nothing prevents our being able to do what we like best, every pleasure is to be welcomed and every pain avoided. But in certain circumstances and owing to the claims of duty or the obligations of business it will frequently occur that pleasures have to be repudiated and annoyances accepted. The wise man therefore always holds in these matters to this principle of selection: he rejects pleasures to secure other greater pleasures, or else he endures pains to avoid worse pains.”
At vero eos et accusamus et iusto odio dignissimos ducimus, qui blanditiis praesentium voluptatum deleniti atque corrupti, quos dolores et quas molestias excepturi sint, obcaecati cupiditate non provident, similique sunt in culpa, qui officia deserunt mollitia animi, id est laborum et dolorum fuga. et harum quidem rerum facilis est et expedita distinctio. nam libero tempore, cum soluta nobis est eligendi optio, cumque nihil impedit, quo minus id, quod maxime placeat, facere possimus, omnis voluptas assumenda est, omnis dolor repellendus. temporibus autem quibusdam et aut officiis debitis aut rerum necessitatibus saepe eveniet, ut et voluptates repudiandae sint et molestiae non recusandae. itaque earum rerum hic tenetur a sapiente delectus, ut aut reiciendis voluptatibus maiores alias consequatur aut perferendis doloribus asperiores repellat.

Marcus Tullius Cicero (-106–-43 BC) Roman philosopher and statesman

De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum (The Ends of Good and Evil), Book I, section 33; Translation by H. Rackham (1914)

Men, Pain, Pleasure, Business

“In end, this free goodwill and simple meaning of the Canarians wrought such tenderness in my father's heart that he could not abstain from shedding tears, and wept most profusely; then, by choice words very congruously adapted, strove in what he could to diminish the estimation of the good offices which he had done them, saying, that any courtesy he had conferred upon them was not worth a rush, and what favour soever he had showed them he was bound to do it.”

Francois Rabelais book Gargantua and Pantagruel

Source: Gargantua and Pantagruel (1532–1564), Gargantua (1534), Chapter 50 : Gargantua's speech to the vanquished -->

Tear, Heart

“We often hear, “Rape is rape, right?” No. A stranger forcing himself on a woman at knife point is different from a man and woman having sex while drunk and having regrets the morning. What is different? When a woman agrees to a date, she does not make a choice to be sexual, but she does make a choice to explore sexual possibilities. The woman makes no such choice with a stranger or an acquaintance.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part III: Government as substitute husband, p. 315.

Sex

““You are a most vexing young woman, you know.” But his face bore a slight, whimsical smile.
“I know,” she replied, feeling her own mouth curve into a matching expression.
He blew out a breath. “As your brother, I could forbid you to go. But you and I both know that, even if I did so, you would do whatever you wish regardless. I suppose I have no choice but to accede to your request.””

David D. Levine (1961) science fiction writer

Source: Arabella and the Battle of Venus (2017), Chapter 2, “No Time to Lose” (p. 28)

Smile, Feeling

“This is an ironic choice for a president-elect who has promised to change Washington, make politics more civil and govern from the center.”

Rahm Emanuel (1959) politician, investment banker, White House Chief of Staff

House Minority Leader John Boehner on Obama's hiring Emanuel as White House Chief of Staff, as quoted in San Francisco Chronicle http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/11/06/MN6C13VKH5.DTL&type=politics. <br class="br">About

Change

“There are still people who discuss industrialization as… an alternative to agricultural improvement… this approach is without meaning in the West Indian Islands. There is no choice… between industry and agriculture. The islands need as large agriculture as possible… It is not … that agriculture cannot continue to develop if industry is developed … the opposite is true: agriculture cannot… yield a reasonable standard of living unless new jobs are created off the land”

W. Arthur Lewis (1915–1991) Saint Lucain economist

Lewis (1950; 831-2) as cited in: Mark Figueroa. "Rethinking Caribbean agriculture, re-evaluating Arthur Lewis misunderstood perspective." (2008).

People

“I gambled and I lost. I failed in securing my options for this choice for myself, but I succeeded in verifying the Dark Age is still with us.”

Jack Kevorkian (1928–2011) American pathologist, euthanasia activist

Quoted in "Between the dying and the dead: Dr. Jack Kevorkian's life and the battle to Legalize Euthanasia"‎ - Page 247 - by Neal Nicol, Harry Wylie - 2006
2000s, 2006

Age

“There was no time for scholarly details, and, besides, I have always believed that a man can fairly be judged by the standards and taste of his choices in matters of high-level plagiarism.”

Hunter S. Thompson (1937–2005) American journalist and author

"Prisoner of Denver", in Vanity Fair (June 2004) https://archive.is/20130628091446/www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-6240592_ITM <br class="br">2000s

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