Quotes about handful
page 70

David Lloyd George photo
David Lloyd George photo
Hendrik Verwoerd photo
Edward Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax photo
Annie Besant photo
Mike Tyson photo
David Cameron photo
Theresa May photo

“How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand? How do you keep a wave upon the sand?”

L. K. Samuels (1951) American writer

These words from The Sound of Music bring out the elusive nature of chaos. In life, most things cannot be captured for long. It is like trying to encapsulate time itself.
Source: In Defense of Chaos: The Chaology of Politics, Economics and Human Action, (2013), p. vii

John Calvin photo
Karl Dönitz photo
Paul von Hindenburg photo
Johann Most photo
Gustav Stresemann photo

“The question of Belgium must not be detached from the complex of the Western questions as a whole. Belgium is a most valuable pledge in our hands.”

Gustav Stresemann (1878–1929) German politician, statesman, and Nobel Peace Prize laureate

Speech in the Reichstag (27 February 1918), quoted in W. W. Coole (ed.), Thus Spake Germany (London: George Routledge & Sons, 1941), p. 210
1910s

Theodor Mommsen photo

“The system of administration was thoroughly remodelled. The Sullan proconsuls and propraetors had been in their provinces essentially sovereign and practically subject to no control; those of Caesar were the well-disciplined servants of a stern master, who from the very unity and life-tenure of his power sustained a more natural and more tolerable relation to the subjects than those numerous, annually changing, petty tyrants. The governorships were no doubt still distributed among the annually-retiring two consuls and sixteen praetors, but, as the Imperator directly nominated eight of the latter and the distribution of the provinces among the competitors depended solely on him, they were in reality bestowed by the Imperator. The functions also of the governors were practically restricted. His memory was matchless, and it was easy for him to carry on several occupations simultaneously with equal self-possession. Although a gentleman, a man of genius, and a monarch, he had still a heart. So long as he lived, he cherished the purest veneration for his worthy mother Aurelia… to his daughter Julia he devoted an honourable affection, which was not without reflex influence even on political affairs. With the ablest and most excellent men of his time, of high and of humbler rank, he maintained noble relations of mutual fidelity… As he himself never abandoned any of his partisans… but adhered to his friends--and that not merely from calculation--through good and bad times without wavering, several of these, such as Aulus Hirtius and Gaius Matius, gave, even after his death, noble testimonies of their attachment to him. The superintendence of the administration of justice and the administrative control of the communities remained in their hands; but their command was paralyzed by the new supreme command in Rome and its adjutants associated with the governor, and the raising of the taxes was probably even now committed in the provinces substantially to imperial officials, so that the governor was thenceforward surrounded with an auxiliary staff which was absolutely dependent on the Imperator in virtue either of the laws of the military hierarchy or of the still stricter laws of domestic discipline. While hitherto the proconsul and his quaestor had appeared as if they were members of a gang of robbers despatched to levy contributions, the magistrates of Caesar were present to protect the weak against the strong; and, instead of the previous worse than useless control of the equestrian or senatorian tribunals, they had to answer for themselves at the bar of a just and unyielding monarch. The law as to exactions, the enactments of which Caesar had already in his first consulate made more stringent, was applied by him against the chief commandants in the provinces with an inexorable severity going even beyond its letter; and the tax-officers, if indeed they ventured to indulge in an injustice, atoned for it to their master, as slaves and freedmen according to the cruel domestic law of that time were wont to atone.”

Theodor Mommsen (1817–1903) German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician, archaeologist and writer

Vol. 4, pt. 2, translated by W.P.Dickson
The History of Rome - Volume 4: Part 2

Hannah Arendt photo
Stanley Baldwin photo
Friedrich Hayek photo
Baruch Spinoza photo
Baruch Spinoza photo

“From this point we glance back to the alleged atheism of Spinoza. The charge will be seen to be unfounded if we remember that his system, instead of denying God, rather recognises that he alone really is. Nor can it be maintained that the God of Spinoza, although he is described as alone true, is not the true God, and therefore as good as no God. If that were a just charge, it would only prove that all other systems, where speculation has not gone beyond a subordinate stage of the idea — that the Jews and Mohammedans who know God only as the Lord — and that even the many Christians for whom God is merely the most high, unknowable, and transcendent being, are as much atheists as Spinoza. The so-called atheism of Spinoza is merely an exaggeration of the fact that he defrauds the principle of difference or finitude of its due. Hence his system, as it holds that there is properly speaking no world, at any rate that the world has no positive being, should rather be styled Acosmism. These considerations will also show what is to be said of the charge of Pantheism. If Pantheism means, as it often does, the doctrine which takes finite things in their finitude and in the complex of them to be God, we must acquit the system of Spinoza of the crime of Pantheism. For in that system, finite things and the world as a whole are denied all truth. On the other hand, the philosophy which is Acosmism is for that reason certainly pantheistic.”

Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677) Dutch philosopher

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences: The Logic
G - L, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

Baruch Spinoza photo
Baruch Spinoza photo
Paul D. Miller (academic) photo
Fyodor Dostoyevsky photo
Keiji Nishitani photo
Marcus Tullius Cicero photo
Johann Gottlieb Fichte photo
Johann Gottlieb Fichte photo
Johann Gottlieb Fichte photo
Johann Gottlieb Fichte photo
Edward Bellamy photo
Ernst, Baron von Feuchtersleben photo
Eoin Colfer photo
Gautama Buddha photo
Eric Garcetti photo

“There are two rules in politics. They say never ever be pictured with a drink in your hand, and never swear. But this is a big fucking day. Way to go, guys.”

Eric Garcetti (1971) American politician

quoted by Josh Feldmen of Mediaite https://www.mediaite.com/tv/this-is-a-big-fcking-day-l-a-mayor-proudly-drops-f-bomb/ (June 16, 2014)
2014, Los Angeles Kings Stanley Cup celebration

Pandit Lekh Ram photo
Nakayama Miki photo

“Oh, I am so glad to see you have come. God the Parent lent a hand to bring you home. You had a hard time, slipping at many places. However, you were joyful. Sah, sah, God the Parent accepts fully, fully. Whatever you ask, it is accepted. God protects you. Enjoy it, enjoy it, enjoy it!”

Nakayama Miki (1798–1887) Founder of Tenrikyo

So saying, Oyasama grasped Rin’s cold hands with both Her own. It was something more than warming them over the brazier. Rin was moved with gratitude and awe at the inexpressible warmth of Oyasama.
Anecdotes of Oyasama, Foundress of Tenrikyo, from Anecdote 44, "A Snowy Day," p. 39.
Nakayama's exchange with Masui Rin, upon her arrival at the Nakayama residence during a stormy day.
Anecdotes of Oyasama

Shankar Dayal Sharma photo
Shankar Dayal Sharma photo

“As a constitutional expert, and a jurist he got unequivocal recognition from the Congress and non-Congress parties. They believed that the letter and spirit of the Constitution was safe in his hands…He was a spiritualist to the core.”

Shankar Dayal Sharma (1918–1999) Indian politician

Source: Commissions and Omissions by Indian Presidents and Their Conflicts with the Prime Ministers Under the Constitution: 1977-2001, P.201.

Zail Singh photo

“He claimed that even when he was the Union home minister, Indira Gandhi had been hesitant to discuss Punjab affairs with him and had given a free hand to Chief Minister Darbara Singh. The two had always been at daggers drawn.”

Zail Singh (1916–1994) Indian politician and former President of India

Presidential Years:Zail Singh's posthumous defence of his controversial tenure

K. R. Narayanan photo

“MY husband and I were on a train journey and at a wayside station I asked him to get me a cup of tea. When he returned, just as the train was steaming out, I saw him standing at the door of the compartment, teacup in one hand, trying busily to get rid of his w:Flip-flops}chappal. `What are you doing?”

K. R. Narayanan (1920–2005) 9th Vice President and the 10th President of India

I asked. "Oh, nothing. I accidentally dropped one of the pair at the platform... I can't get it back... What is the use of my keeping one when the man who finds the first will need both?
His wife Usha Narayanan
A remarkable life-story

Neelam Sanjiva Reddy photo
Christian Dior photo
Bowe Bergdahl photo

“But if you are a conceited brown-nosing shit-bag, you will be allowed to do what ever you want, and you will be handed your higher rank.”

Bowe Bergdahl (1986) American soldier captured by the Taliban in 2009 and released in 2014 as part of a prisoner swap

Last e-mail to parents (2009)

Jayachamarajendra Wadiyar photo
Victor Villaseñor photo
Verghese Kurien photo
Mahadev Govind Ranade photo
Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV photo

“His Highness with the shining examples of his two illustrious parents before him had shown the same earnest devotion to duty and given the same unfailing support to his ministers as had been received at the hands of His Highness* father and his mother.”

Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV (1884–1940) King of Mysore

Said by the Dewan. Modern_Mysore, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Open University, 26 November 2013, archive.org, 201 http://archive.org/stream/modernmysore035292mbp/modernmysore035292mbp_djvu.txt,
From Modern Mysore

Richard K. Morgan photo

“The personal, as everyone’s so fucking fond of saying, is political. So if some idiot politician, some power player, tries to execute policies that harm you or those you care about, take it personally. Get angry. The Machinery of Justice will not serve you here—it is slow and cold, and it is theirs, hardware and soft-. Only the little people suffer at the hands of Justice; the creatures of power slide out from under with a wink and a grin. If you want justice, you will have to claw it from them. Make it personal. Do as much damage as you can. Get your message across. That way you stand a far better chance of being taken seriously next time. Of being considered dangerous. And make no mistake about this: being taken seriously, being considered dangerous, marks the difference—the only difference in their eyes—between players and little people. Players they will make deals with. Little people they liquidate. And time and again they cream your liquidation, your displacement, your torture and brutal execution with the ultimate insult that it’s just business, it’s politics, it’s the way of the world, it’s a tough life, and that it’s nothing personal. Well, fuck them. Make it personal.”

Source: Altered Carbon (2002), Chapter 15 (pp. 184-185, quoting the fictional work Things I Should Have Learned by Now, Volume II, written by story character Quellcrist Falconer)

Clinton Edgar Woods photo
Julie Taymor photo
Catherine of Aragon photo

“Did I not tell you that whenever you argue with the Queen she is sure to have the upper hand?! I see that one fine morning you will succumb to her reasoning and cast me off!”

Catherine of Aragon (1485–1536) first wife of Henry VIII of England (1485–1536)

Anne Boleyn — quoted in Alison Weir (1991). The Six Wives of Henry VIII. ISBN 0802136834, p. 213.

“When you put the ball in his hands there is no telling what is going to happen - sometimes I am just amazed watching what he can do even though I am playing on the same field he is.”

Javon Ringer (1987) All-American college football player, professional football player, running back

MSU WR Mark Dell, quoted here http://www.ncaa.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/092108acj.html

“Although I am not averse to wasting a few hours playing computer games, I have never tried my hand at Doom.”

James Berardinelli (1967) American film critic

Judging by sales figures and testimonials, playing the game has to be an infinitely preferable experience to watching this pathetic excuse for a movie.
Review http://www.reelviews.net/php_review_template.php?identifier=928 of Doom (2005).
One-star reviews

“Old intelligence hands still remember this good-natured and wise man.”

Ivan Agayants (1911–1968) KGB officer

Vadim Kirpichenko

Günther Pancke photo
Sepp Dietrich photo
Joachim von Ribbentrop photo
Dmitri Shostakovich photo
Jonathan Safran Foer photo
Thomas Merton photo

“This new language of prayer has to come out of something which transcends all our traditions, and comes out of the immediacy of love. We have to part now, aware of the love that unites us, the love that unites us in spite of real differences, real emotional friction… The things on the surface are nothing, what is deep is the Real. We are creatures of Love. Let us therefore join hands, as we did before, and I will try to say something that comes out of the depths of our hearts. I ask you to concentrate on the love that is in you, that is in us all. I have no idea what I am going to say. I am going to be silent a minute, and then I will say something…”

Thomas Merton (1915–1968) Priest and author

'O God, we are one with You. You have made us one with You. You have taught us that if we are open to one another, You dwell in us. Help us to preserve this openness and to fight for it with all our hearts. Help us to realize that there can be no understanding where there is mutual rejection. O God, in accepting one another wholeheartedly, fully, completely, we accept You, and we thank You, and we adore You, and we love You with our whole being, because our being is Your being, our spirit is rooted in Your spirit. Fill us then with love, and let us be bound together with love as we go our diverse ways, united in this one spirit which makes You present in the world, and which makes You witness to the ultimate reality that is love. Love has overcome. Love is victorious. Amen.'
Closing statements and prayer from an informal address delivered in Calcutta, India (October 1968), from The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton (1975); quoted in Thomas Merton, Spiritual Master : The Essential Writings (1992), p. 237.

Fernand Léger photo

“They are not like the – patron’s hands or the – blessing hands of the curate – They resemble their tools, mountains, tree trunks... The time is approaching when machines will – work FOR them – Then he will have hands like his boss – WHY NOT?”

Fernand Léger (1881–1955) French painter

He's on the way – HIS LIFE begins TODAY [written text in his painting 'Les mains – hommage a Majakovski', 1951 - [ Vladimir Mayakovsky was a Russian Futurist poet].
Quotes of Fernand Leger, 1950's
Source: Fernand Léger – The Later Years -, catalogue ed. Nicolas Serota, published by the Trustees of the Whitechapel Art gallery, London, Prestel Verlag, 1988, p. 68

Ted Ginn, Jr. photo

“Here is guy who came to us as a return specialist and defensive back and has developed into a very good receiver. Has always had great hands and he has become a very good route runner. With his speed, he is a threat to score anytime he touches the ball.”

Ted Ginn, Jr. (1985) American football wide receiver, kick returner

Jim Tressel, [Ted Ginn for the Heisman Trophy, Ohio State University Department of Athletics, 2006, http://ohiostatebuckeyes.cstv.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/osu-m-footbl-ginn-quotes.html, 2006-10-30]
About Ginn

Fernando Alonso photo

“He is a driver with talent, ability and maturity, he manages to finish all his races. My record is going to be in good hands.”

Fernando Alonso (1981) Spanish racing driver

Emerson Fittipaldi, after Alonso took his record as Formula One's youngest champion. http://www.theage.com.au/news/motorsport/former-recordholder-hails-alonso/2005/09/26/1127586768600.html

Russell Brand photo
Marcel Duchamp photo
Bret Easton Ellis photo
Jerome K. Jerome photo

“But if we look a little deeper we shall find there is a pathetic, one might almost say a tragic, side to the picture. A shy man means a lonely man—a man cut off from all companionship, all sociability. He moves about the world, but does not mix with it. Between him and his fellow-men there runs ever an impassable barrier—a strong, invisible wall that, trying in vain to scale, he but bruises himself against. He sees the pleasant faces and hears the pleasant voices on the other side, but he cannot stretch his hand across to grasp another hand. He stands watching the merry groups, and he longs to speak and to claim kindred with them. But they pass him by, chatting gayly to one another, and he cannot stay them. He tries to reach them, but his prison walls move with him and hem him in on every side. In the busy street, in the crowded room, in the grind of work, in the whirl of pleasure, amid the many or amid the few—wherever men congregate together, wherever the music of human speech is heard and human thought is flashed from human eyes, there, shunned and solitary, the shy man, like a leper, stands apart. His soul is full of love and longing, but the world knows it not. The iron mask of shyness is riveted before his face, and the man beneath is never seen. Genial words and hearty greetings are ever rising to his lips, but they die away in unheard whispers behind the steel clamps. His heart aches for the weary brother, but his sympathy is dumb. Contempt and indignation against wrong choke up his throat, and finding no safety-valve whence in passionate utterance they may burst forth, they only turn in again and harm him. All the hate and scorn and love of a deep nature such as the shy man is ever cursed by fester and corrupt within, instead of spending themselves abroad, and sour him into a misanthrope and cynic.”

Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow (1886)

James Frazer photo
Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston photo
Ptolemy photo
Dylan Moran photo
Howard Carter photo

“With trembling hands, I made a tiny breach in the upper left hand corner… widening the hole a little, I inserted the candle and peered in… at first I could see nothing, the hot air escaping from the chamber causing the candle to flicker. Presently, details of the room emerged slowly from the mist, strange animals, statues and gold – everywhere the glint of gold.”

Howard Carter (1874–1939) British egyptologist

For the moment – an eternity it must have seemed to the others standing by – I was struck dumb with amazement, and when Lord Carnarvon, unable to stand in suspense any longer, inquired anxiously "Can you see anything?", it was all I could do to get out the words "Yes, wonderful things".
Tutankhamen and the Glint of Gold http://www.fathom.com/feature/190166/index.html
Diary, 26 November 1922.

Samuel Alito photo
John Barrymore photo
Barry Humphries photo
Woodrow Wilson photo

“I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated governments in the civilized world: no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

Attributed in Shadow Kings (2005) by Mark Hill, p. 91; This and similar remarks are presented on the internet and elsewhere as an expression of regret for creating the Federal Reserve. The quotation appears to be fabricated from out-of-context remarks Wilson made on separate occasions:

I have ruined my country.

Attributed by Curtis Dall in FDR: My Exploited Father-in-Law, regarding Wilson's break with Edward M. House: "Wilson … evidenced similar remorse as he approached his end. Finally he said, 'I am a most unhappy man. Unwittingly I have ruined my country.'"

A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit.…

"Monopoly, Or Opportunity?" (1912), criticizing the credit situation before the Federal Reserve was created, in The New Freedom (1913), p. 185

We have come to be one of the worst ruled… Governments….

"Benevolence, Or Justice?" (1912), also in The New Freedom (1913), p. 201

The quotation has been analyzed in Andrew Leonard (2007-12-21), " The Unhappiness of Woodrow Wilson https://www.salon.com/2007/12/21/woodrow_wilson_federal_reserve/" Salon:

I can tell you categorically that this is not a statement of regret for having created the Federal Reserve. Wilson never had any regrets for having done that. It was an accomplishment in which he took great pride.

John M. Cooper, professor of history and author of several books on Wilson, as quoted by Andrew Leonard
Misattributed

Miyamoto Musashi photo

“Generally, I dislike fixedness in both long swords and hands. Fixedness means a dead hand. Pliability is a living hand. You must bear this in mind.”

Miyamoto Musashi (1584–1645) Japanese martial artist, writer, artist

Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Water Book

Anthony Burgess photo
Anthony Burgess photo

“East? They wouldn’t know the bloody East if they saw it. Not if you was to hand it to them on a plate would they know it was the East. That’s where the East is, there.”

Anthony Burgess (1917–1993) English writer

He waved his hand wildly into the black night. 'Out there, west. You wasn’t there, so you wouldn’t know. Now I was. Palestine Police from the end of the war till we packed up. That was the East. You was in India, and that’s not the East any more than this is. So you know nothing about it either. So you needn’t be talking.'
Fiction, Time for a Tiger (1956)

Harlan Ellison photo
Khalil Gibran photo

“My face and your faces shall not be masked; our hand shall hold neither sword nor sceptre, and our subjects shall love us in peace and shall not be in fear of us.”

Thus spoke Jesus, and unto all the kingdoms of the earth I was blinded, and unto all the cities of walls and towers; and it was in my heart to follow the Master to His kingdom.
James The Son Of Zebedee: On The Kingdoms Of The World
Jesus, The Son of Man (1928)

Joseph Campbell photo
Neal Stephenson photo
Julio Cortázar photo
Jane Austen photo
Jane Austen photo
John Stuart Mill photo
John Stuart Mill photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo