Quotes about goodness

page 9

“He had been through a good deal in the course of the Great Quest — he had seen beautiful things and horrible things — but up until now he had not known that one and the same creature can be both, that beauty can be terrifying.”

“You know how you finish a bag of chips and you hate yourself? You know you’ve done nothing good for yourself. That’s the same feeling, and you know it is, after some digital binge. You feel wasted and hollow and diminished.”

“Investigation?" Isabelle laughed. "Now we're detectives? Maybe we should all have code names."
"Good idea," said Jace. "I shall be Baron Hotschaft Von Hugenstein.”

“It is much easier to make good men wise, than to make bad men good.”

“Stephanie had no problem doing what she
was told, just so long as she was given a good reason why she
should.”

“I detect
More good than evil in humanity.
Love lights more fires than hate extinguishes,
And men grow better as the world grows old.”

“Nature is not primarily functional. It is primarily beautiful. Stop for a moment and let that sink in. We’re so used to evaluating everything (and everyone) by their usefulness that this thought will take a minute or two to begin to dawn on us. Nature is not primarily functional. It is primarily beautiful. Which is to say, beauty is in and of itself a great and glorious good, something we need in large and daily doses.”

“Never let the truth get in the way of a good story.”

“Bursar?"
"Yes, Archchancellor?"
"You ain't a member of some secret society or somethin', are you?"
"Me? No, Archchancellor."
"Then it'd be a damn good idea to take your underpants off your head.”

“good girls go to heaven and bad girls go everywhere”

“Goodness is about what you do. Not who you pray to.”

“It is better to be beautiful then to be good, but it is better to be good then to be ugly.”

“The way to get rid of darkness is with light; the way to overcome cold is with heat; the way to overcome the negative thought is to substitute the good thought. Affirm the good, and the bad will vanish."

- The power of your subconcious mind”

“If you ever wonder whether or not someone is too good for you, I'd advise going through their trash. Really. No one looks superior after that.”

“Too much of anything is bad, but too much good whiskey is barely enough.”

“That was the tragedy. Not that one man had the courage to be evil. But that millions had not the courage to be good.”

“Most things will be okay eventually, but not everything will be. Sometimes you'll put up a good fight and lose. Sometimes you'll hold on really hard and realize there is no choice but to let go. Acceptance is a small, quiet room.”

“Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.”

“Everybody's got the seam of goodness in them, Kit," said Grandpa. "Just a matter of whether it can be found and brought out into the light.”

“It is not enough to have a good mind. The main thing is to use it well.”

“Evil prevails when good people do nothing.”

“Good judgement is the result of experience and experience the result of bad judgement.”

“As soon as you concern yourself with the "good" and "bad" of your fellows, you create an opening in your heart for maliciousness to enter. Testing, competing with, and criticizing others weakens and defeats you.”

“And yet women-good women--frightened me because they eventually wanted your soul, and what was left of mine, I wanted to keep.”

“The bad part is life continues. The good part is that the pain goes away.”

“Self-respect. It would make me lovable. And it's the secret to good sex.”

“Life is never fair, and perhaps it is a good thing for most of us that it is not.”

“I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there. Perhaps it seemed to me that I had several more lives to live, and could not spare any more time for that one.”

“The longer the trial to which God subjects you, the greater the goodness in comforting you during the time of the trial and in the exaltation after the combat.”

“Nanny's philosophy of life was to do what seemed like a good idea at the time, and do it as hard as possible. It had never let her down.”

“You cannot be the good all the time — sometimes it is necessary to get angry.
[Vincent Van Gogh]”

“Good health is the best weapon against religion. Healthy bodies and healthy minds have never been shaken by religious fears.”

“I see evil when I look in my shaving mirror. It is, philosophically, present everywhere in the universe in order, apparently, to highlight the existence of good. I think there is more to this theory, but I tend to burst out laughing at this point.”

“Make as much racket as you like people. Noise is life and an excess of noise is a sign that life is good. There will be time for us all to be quiet when we are safely dead.”

“do you think it is
better to be clever than to be good?”
“Good for what?” asked the Doctor. “You are good for
nothing unless you are clever.”

“Most of us have the good or bad fortune of seeing our lives fall apart so slowly we barely notice.”

“I am as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best.”

“You are an explorer, and you represent our species, and the greatest good you can do is to bring back a new idea, because our world is endangered by the absence of good ideas. Our world is in crisis because of the absence of consciousness.”

“Never be entirely idle; but either be reading, or writing, or praying, or meditating, or endeavoring something for the public good.”

“Love Jo all your days, if you choose, but don't let it spoil you, for it's wicked to throw away so many good gifts because you can't have the one you want.”

“Am going to cross Pacific on a wooden raft to support a theory that the South Sea islands were peopled from Peru. Will you come? I guarantee nothing but a free trip to Peru and the South Sea islands and back, but you will find good use for your technical abilities on the voyage. Reply at once.'

Next day the following telegram arrived from Torstein:

COMING. TORSTEIN.”

“As you go through life's rich tapestry, you realize that most people you meet aren't fit to shine your shoes. It's a sad fact, but it's true. A good friend is someone who'd hide you if you were on the run for murder. How many of them do you know?”

“One kind of good book should leave you asking: how did the author know that about me?”

“My cat is not insane, she's just a really good actress.”

“There is no greatness where there is not simplicity, goodness, and truth.”

“Mindfulness should guide all your actions and your spiritual endeavors. Whatever you do, always apply three essential points: undertake the action with the intention of doing so for the good of all beings; execute it with perfect concentration, free of attachment to concepts of subject, object, and action; and, finally, dedicate the merit you have created to the enlightenment of all beings.”

“I am alive, he says to himself, I am alive! And life energy surges hotly through him, and delight, and appetite. How good to be in a body - even this old beat-up carcass - that still has warm blood and live semen and rich marrow and wholesome flesh!”

“What amazes me is that most days feel useless. I don't seem to accomplish anything-just a few pages, most of which don't seem very good. Yet, when I put all those wasted days together, I somehow end up with a book of which I'm very proud.”

“Many a man fails to become a thinker only because his memory is too good.”

“Ultimately evil is done not so much by evil people, but by good people who do not know themselves and who do not probe deeply.”

“Many of us lead family lives. At most, the members of a family stay together for the duration of a lifetime, often much less. While that fleeting moment of being together still lasts, we should try to remain in perfect harmony with each other, while observing the Dharma as much as possible. Night and day, let us turn our minds toward goodness, love, and compassion.”

“In regard to this Great Book, I have but to say, it is the best gift God has given to man. All the good the Saviour gave to the world was communicated through this book.”

“Where I come from," said Archie, "a bloke likes to get to know a girl before he marries her."
"Where you come from it is customary to boil vegetables until they fall apart. This does not mean," said Samad tersely, "that it is a good idea.”

“All credibility, all good conscience, all evidence of truth come only from the senses.”

“Our body begins to destroy itself from the moment it is born. We are fragile. We’re creatures of passage. All that is left of us are our actions, the good or the evil we do to our fellow humans”

“Yes, if you happen to be interested in philosophy and good at it, but not otherwise – but so does bricklaying. Anything you're good at contributes to happiness.”

“What is not good for the swarm is not good for the bee.”

“You don’t always win your battles, but it’s good to know you fought”

“All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff.”

“I am sick to death of cleverness. Everybody is clever nowadays. You can’t go anywhere without meeting clever people. The thing has become an absolute public nuisance. I wish to goodness we had a few fools left.”

“Work on a good piece of writing proceeds on three levels: a musical one, where it is composed; an architectural one, where it is constructed; and finally, a textile one, where it is woven.”

“There are several good protections against temptations, but the surest is cowardice.”

“Intellect is a part of a good faith. Intellect is the light, the heart is the direction.”

“I choose my friends for their good looks, my acquaintances for their good characters, and my enemies for their good intellects.”

“Having kids — the responsibility of rearing good, kind, ethical, responsible human beings — is the biggest job anyone can embark on”

“Thou, O God, dost sell us all good things at the price of labour.”

“Original, in French: La bonne cuisine est la base du véritable bonheur.

English: Good food is the foundation of genuine happiness.”

“A good writer is basically a story teller, not a scholar or a redeemer of mankind.”

“You must let what happens happen. Everything must be equal in your eyes, good and evil, beautiful and ugly, foolish and wise.”

“Good fiction’s job is to comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.”

“It is good to be solitary, for solitude is difficult; that something is difficult must be a reason the more for us to do it.”

“Goodness can be found sometimes in the middle of hell.”

“The thinking man must … oppose all cruel customs no matter how deeply rooted in tradition and surrounded by a halo. True manhood is too precious a spiritual good for us to surrender any part of it to thoughtlessness.”

“And when you're alone there's a very good chance
you'll meet things that scare you right out of your pants
There are some, down the road between hither and yon,
that can scare you so much you won't want to go on.”

“Usually I'm remarkably good natured. Try me on a day that doesn't end in y.”

“Travelling, one accepts everything; indignation stays at home. One looks, one listens, one is roused to enthusiasm by the most dreadful things because they are new. Good travellers are heartless.”

“If books are not good company, where shall I find it?”

“Hester, in the dark conclusion of Hawthorne's brooding novel, reassumes the Puritan mantle…. Hawthorne thus captures the catch-22 of feminism: the very woman who is able to envision a new order of living is, by the same token, unable, since the passion that enables her also adulterates her in the eyes of the Puritans. Released from goodness, she is imprisoned in badness, within the framework of the puritanical order. But her mind is free to question the order.”

“It’s not the good that die young, it’s the lucky.”

“To encourage literature and the arts is a duty which every good citizen owes to his country.”

“So often, a visit to a bookshop has cheered me, and reminded me that there are good things in the world.”

“It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.”

“The world is right because I feel good.
p. 83, Awareness, copyright 1990”

“The demands of Jesus are difficult because they require us to do something extraordinary. At the same time He asks us to regard these [acts of goodness] as something usual, ordinary.”

“I believe most people are essentially good. I know that I am. It's you I'm not entirely sure of.”

“How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world.”

“A mistake made with good in your heart is still a mistake, but it is one for which you must forgive yourself.”

“I'll never wake up in a good mood again.
I'm tired of these stinky boots”

“Laughter is good for you. Nine out of ten stand-up comedians recommend laughter in the face of intense stupidity.”

“The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists. That is why they invented Hell.”

“There's a monster in our wood. She'll get you if you're not good. Drag you under leaves and sticks. Punish you for all your tricks. Anest of hair and gnawed bone. You are never, ever coming… home.”

“Bringing people into the here-and-now. The real universe. That's the present moment. The past is no good to us. The future is full of anxiety. Only the present is real--the here-and-now. Seize the day.”

“No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar”

“I get it,' said the prisoner. 'Good Cop, Bad Cop, eh?'
If you like.' said Vimes. 'But we're a bit short staffed here, so if I give you a cigarette would you mind kicking yourself in the teeth?”

“Nobody looks good with brown lipstick on.”

“A good leader is someone who knows what he's bad at, and hires someone who's good at it to take care of it for him.”

“The great enemy of the life of faith in God is not sin, but the good which is not good enough. The good is always the enemy of the best.”

“I myself am made entirely of flaws, stitched together with good intentions.”

“They lie deadly that tell you have good faces.”