Quotes about good
page 10

Variant: I drank because I wanted to drown my sorrows. But now the damned things have learned to swim, and now decency and good behavior weary me.

“Memories, you see, hurt. The good ones most of all.”
Source: Tell No One


Part III, Ch. VIII, 7, p. 223 https://archive.org/stream/basisofmorality00schoiala#page/223/mode/2up
On the Basis of Morality (1840)
Source: The Basis of Morality

“A woman has got to love a bad man once or twice in her life, to be thankful for a good one.”

“Those who don't read good books have no advantage over those who can't.”
Variant: The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.

November 10, 1963
This was said before Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam and as he himself stated, before he truly understood Islam.
Malcolm X Speaks (1965)

“Intelligence is not to make no mistakes, but quickly to see how to make them good.”


“As we expand our knowledge of good books, we shrink the circle of men whose company we appreciate.”

1951 - 1968, The Creative Act', 1957
Context: I want to clarify our understanding of the word 'art' – to be sure, without an attempt to a definition. What I have in mind is that art may be bad, good or indifferent, but, whatever adjective is used, we must call it art, and bad art is still art in the same way as a bad emotion is still an emotion.
Therefore, when I refer to 'art coefficient', it will be understood that I refer not only to great art, but I am trying to describe the subjective mechanism which produces art in a raw state – 'à l'état brute' – bad, good or indifferent.

“Marconi is a good fellow. Let him continue. He is using seventeen of my patents.”
On being informed that Marconi was transmitting wireless messages across the Atlantic Ocean, as quoted in "Who Invented Radio?" at PBS.org http://www.pbs.org/tesla/ll/ll_whoradio.html, and in Tesla : The Modern Sorcerer (1999) by Daniel Blair Stewart, p. 371
“It's good to do uncomfortable things. It's weight training for life.”
Source: Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith

Source: Horns

“I think perhaps education doesn’t do us much good unless it is mixed with sweat.”
Source: Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance

" A solution for the Middle East http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=27171," WorldNetDaily (April 11, 2002)
2000s

Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar, Ch. LIX
Following the Equator (1897)

This is from a set of maxims which Washington copied out in his own hand as a school-boy: "Rules of Civility and Decent Behaviour in Company and Conversation http://gwpapers.virginia.edu/documents/the-rules-of-civility/" Rule # 56 written out by Washington ca. 1744:
: These maxims originated in the late sixteenth century in France and were popularly circulated during Washington's time. Washington wrote out a copy of the 110 Rules in his school book when he was about sixteen-years old... During the days before mere hero worship had given place to understanding and comprehension of the fineness of Washington's character, of his powerful influence among men, and of the epoch-making nature of the issues he so largely shaped, it was assumed that Washington himself composed the maxims, or at least that he compiled them. It is a satisfaction to find that his consideration for others, his respect for and deference to those deserving such treatment, his care of his own body and tongue, and even his reverence for his Maker, all were early inculcated in him by precepts which were the common practice in decent society the world over. These very maxims had been in use in France for a century and a half, and in England for a century, before they were set as a task for the schoolboy Washington.
:* Charles Moore in his Introduction to George Washington's Rules of Civility and Decent Behaviour in Company and Conversation (1926) http://gwpapers.virginia.edu/documents/civility/index.html, edited by Charles Moore, xi-xv
Misattributed

Into The Universe with Stephen Hawking (2010)

“Would I serve you or (Prince) Jon stolen goods? he asked. "No, don't answer me.”

“I want to be good. I can't bear the idea of my soul being hideous.”

“If one plays good music, people don't listen, and if one plays bad music people don't talk.”
Algernon, Act I.
Source: The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)
Context: Of course the music is a great difficulty. You see, if one plays good music, people don't listen, and if one plays bad music people don't talk.

“When goods do not cross borders, soldiers will.”
note: Probably coined by Otto T. Mallery (1881-1956) in his 1943 book Economic Union and Durable Peace (he doesn't attribute it to Bastiat, although Bastiat has written similar ideas)
Source: Ref: en.wikiquote.org - Frédéric Bastiat / Misattributed
https://oll.libertyfund.org/pages/did-bastiat-say-when-goods-don-t-cross-borders-soldiers-will note: Misattributed
“Something must be wrong with me to stop a good girl-on-girl fight”

That which is seen and that which is not seen (Ce qu'on voit et ce qu'on ne voit pas, 1850), the Introduction.
Context: In the department of economy, an act, a habit, an institution, a law, gives birth not only to an effect, but to a series of effects. Of these effects, the first only is immediate; it manifests itself simultaneously with its cause — it is seen. The others unfold in succession — they are not seen: it is well for us, if they are foreseen. Between a good and a bad economist this constitutes the whole difference: the one takes account only of the visible effect; the other takes account of both the effects which are seen and those which it is necessary to foresee. Now this difference is enormous, for it almost always happens that when the immediate consequence is favourable, the ultimate consequences are fatal, and the converse. Hence it follows that the bad economist pursues a small present good, which will be followed by a great evil to come, while the true economist pursues a great good to come, at the risk of a small present evil.

“Anything that feels good couldn't possibly be bad.”

“Having sex is like bridge. If you don't have a good partner, you'd better have a good hand.”

"Pirx's Tale" in More Tales of Pirx The Pilot (1983)
Context: Oh, I read good books, too, but only Earthside. Why that is, I don't really know. Never stopped to analyze it. Good books tell the truth, even when they're about things that never have been and never will be. They're truthful in a different way. When they talk about outer space, they make you feel the silence, so unlike the Earthly kind — and the lifelessness. Whatever the adventures, the message is always the same: humans will never feel at home out there.

1960s
Source: Introduction to 1961 edition of Sceptical Essays (1961)
Context: The opinions that are held with passion are always those for which no good ground exists; indeed the passion is the measure of the holder’s lack of rational conviction. Opinions in politics and religion are almost always held passionately.


“I give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it.”
Variant: She generally gave herself very good advice, (though she very seldom followed it).
Source: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass
Source: Arthur

“The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge.”
1920s, What I Believe (1925)
Source: Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Value

Chicago, IL http://www.trsite.org/content/pages/speaking-loudly (17 June 1912)
1910s
“There is only one good definition of God: the freedom that allows other freedoms to exist.”
Source: The French Lieutenant's Woman (1969), Ch. 13, p. 99

“You're so good looking I can barely keep my eyes on the meter.”
Source: Manhattan

Source: The Spiritual Life (1947), p. 164
Context: Anyone who proposes to do good must not expect people to roll stones out of his way, but must accept his lot calmly if they even roll a few more upon it. A strength which becomes clearer and stronger through its experience of such obstacles is the only strength that can conquer them. Resistance is only a waste of strength.

Source: Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

“Thank goodness I was never sent to school; it would have rubbed off some of the originality.”

“Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work.”
Letter to an Unidentified Person (1908)

“If one good deed in all my life I did,
I do repent it from my very soul.”

“Pain means you're alive. Pain is good. Pain is life.”
Source: Blood of My Blood