Quotes about intention
page 3

“I believe that in judging our actions we are more severe than professional judges. We judge not only our actions, but our thoughts, our intentions, our secret curses, our hidden hate.”

Anaïs Nin book A Spy in the House of Love

Variant: We are more severe judges of our own acts... We judge our thoughts, our intents, our secret curses, our secret hates, not only our acts.
Source: A Spy in the House of Love

Hate, Secret

“I believe the choice to be excellent begins with aligning your thoughts and words with the intention to require more from yourself.”

Oprah Winfrey (1954) American businesswoman, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist

“I will meet you on the nape of your neck one day, on the surface of intention, word becoming act.
We will breathe into each other the high mountain tales, where the snows come from, where the waters begin.”
-In the yellow time of pollen”

Luke Davies (1962) Australian writer

Mountain, Water, Time

“Jem" I have an assignmation in Soho this evening with a certain attractive someone.

Tessa: Goodness. If you keep seeing Six-Fingered Nigel like this, he'll expect you to declare your intentions.
Jem choked on his tea.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Angel

Source: Clockwork Angel

Tea

“… intentions, good or bad, are not enough. There's luck or fate or something else that takes over…”

John Steinbeck book The Winter of Our Discontent

Source: The Winter of Our Discontent

Fate

“Read the heart and not the letter for the pen cannot draw near the good intent.”

Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564) Italian sculptor, painter, architect and poet

Reading, Heart, Drawing

“Intent is guilt. Failure to successfully carry out the intent does not absolve the guilt.”

Terry Goodkind book Temple of the Winds

Source: Temple of the Winds

Failure

“Wishes cannot be summoned up or kept away at will. They come from deeper within us than good or bad intentions. And they spring up unannounced.”

Michael Ende book The Neverending Story

Source: The Neverending Story

Spring

“This must be part of Mother Nature's master plan—making these boys so irresistibly cute, in such a naughty way, that the purity of their intentions becomes irrelevant.”

Rachel Cohn (1968) American writer

Source: Dash & Lily's Book of Dares

Way, Boy, Nature, Parting

“So do boys and men announce their intentions. They cover you like a sarcophagus lid. And call it love.”

Jeffrey Eugenides book Middlesex

Source: Middlesex

Love, Men, Boy

“It wasn't good, he wasn't good, he did not have good intentions. I stood there, and he stood there. He breathed out the bitter air that makes women doubt everything, and I breathed it in, as I had always done.”

Miranda July (1974) American performance artist, musician and writer

Source: No One Belongs Here More Than You

Women

“And yet it disturbs me to learn I have hurt someone unintentionally. I want all my hurts to be intentional.”

Margaret Atwood book Cat's Eye

Source: Cat's Eye

Learning, Hurt

“Anyone who says he knows God's intention is showing a lot of very human ego.”

Michael Crichton book Next

Source: Next

God

“He looked at me intently, from what seemed behind the veil of a grave experience. Then slowly and prophetically, he said the scariest thing I'd ever heard: "Because the answer to a heartfelt question, Jack, will always break your heart.”

Thomas H. Cook (1947) American writer

Source: Master of the Delta

Question, Heart

“It's not intentions that matter. It's actions. We are what we do and say, not what we intend to.”

Kristin Hannah (1960) American writer

“You don’t make art out of good intentions.”

Gustave Flaubert (1821–1880) French writer (1821–1880)

Art

“All broken hearts are circumstantial. Every lovelorn jerk is the victim of bad timing, good intentions, and someone else’s poor decision making.”

Joshua Ferris Then We Came to the End

Source: Then We Came to the End

Jerk, Decision, Time, Heart

“I may have had good reasons. I may have had the best of intentions.
But intentions aren’t enough, no matter how good they are. Intentions can lead you to a place where you’re able to make a choice.
It’s the choice that counts.”

Jim Butcher book Ghost Story

Source: Ghost Story

“Men are like that sometimes - if they meet someone and fall in love, it's real, no matter how fast it happened. But if someone falls for a woman they happen to care about, all they do is question the man's intentions.”

Nicholas Sparks book Nights in Rodanthe

Source: Nights in Rodanthe

Love, Men, Question

“You told me once that we shall be judged by our intentions, not by our accomplishments. I thought it a grand remark. But we must intend to accomplish - not sit intending on a chair.”

E.M. Forster book Where Angels Fear to Tread

Source: Where Angels Fear to Tread

“Women’s liberation has often been portrayed as a movement intent on encroaching upon or taking power and privilege away from men, as though in some dismal zero-sum game, only one gender at a time could be free and powerful.”

Rebecca Solnit book Men Explain Things To Me

Source: Men Explain Things to Me

Women, Men, Game, Time

“There is always a gap between intention and action..”

Paulo Coelho (1947) Brazilian lyricist and novelist

“I like flaws and feel more comfortable around people who have them. I myself am made entirely of flaws, stitched together with good intentions.”

Augusten Burroughs (1965) American writer

Source: Magical Thinking: True Stories

People, Feeling

“Bad decisions made with good intentions, are still bad decisions.”

James C. Collins (1958) American business consultant and writer

Source: How The Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In

Decision

“I warn you all, hatred is finding fertile soil within me. And in your compassion, in your every good intention, you nurture it.”

Steven Erikson book Memories of Ice

Source: Memories of Ice

“Intention without discipline is useless.”

Caroline Myss (1952) author from the United States

Source: Entering the Castle: An Inner Path to God and Your Soul

“Wizard's Second Rule
The greatest harm can result from the best intentions.”

Terry Goodkind book Stone of Tears

Source: Stone of Tears

“I don't-" I shake my head. (…)
"What? What were you going to say?" This is another trick of shrinks. They never let you stop in midthought. If you open your mouth, they want to know exactly what you had the intention of saying.”

Ned Vizzini book It's Kind of a Funny Story

Source: It's Kind of a Funny Story

“Love, if you love me,
lie next to me.
Be for me, like rain,
the getting out

of the tiredness, the fatuousness, the semi-
lust of intentional indifference.
Be wet
with a decent happiness.”

Robert Creeley (1926–2005) American poet

Love, Lie, Indifference, Happiness

“Thinking very often resembles napping, but the intent is different. --Stephanie Plum”

Janet Evanovich book Seven Up

Source: Seven Up

Thinking

“You're one third bad intentions, one third pure avarice, and one eighth sawdust. What's left, I'll credit, must be brains.”

Scott Lynch The Lies of Locke Lamora

Source: The Lies of Locke Lamora

“The Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions”

Daniel Webster (1782–1852) Leading American senator and statesman. January 18, 1782 – October 24, 1852. Served as the Secretary of Sta…

People

“It was not my intention to collapse; no, I would die standing.”

Knut Hamsun book Hunger

Source: Hunger

“I continue to dream and pray about a revival of holiness in our day that moves forth in mission and creates authentic community in which each person can be unleashed through the empowerment of the Spirit to fulfill God's creational intentions.”

John Wesley (1703–1791) Christian theologian

Source: How To Pray: The Best of John Wesley on Prayer

God, Dreams, Communication, Personality

“There are no bad words. Bad thoughts. Bad intentions, and wooooords.”

George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian

Class Clown (1972)
Context: There are four hundred thousand words in the English language, and there are seven you can't say on television. What a ratio that is: 399,993 to 7. They must really be bad; they'd have to be outrageous to be separated from a group that large! "All of you over here, you seven? BAD WORDS." That's what they told us they were, remember? "That's a bad word!" …No bad words; bad thoughts, bad intentions... and words. You know the seven, don't you, that you can't say on television? Shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker, and tits. Those are the heavy seven. Those are the ones that will infect your soul, curve your spine, and keep the country from winning the war.

“If I have not read a book before, it is, to all intents and purposes, new to me, whether it was printed yesterday or three hundred years ago.”

William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English writer

"On Reading New Books" (1825)
Men and Manners: Sketches and Essays (1852)

Books, Reading

“It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations. Bartlett's Familiar Quotations is an admirable work, and I studied it intently. The quotations when engraved upon the memory give you good thoughts. They also make you anxious to read the authors and look for more.”

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

Source: My Early Life: A Roving Commission (1930), Chapter 9 (Education At Bangalore).

Books, Study, Memory, Reading

“When there's nothing to do, you do nothing slowly and intently.”

Haruki Murakami book Dance Dance Dance

Source: Dance Dance Dance

“The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seemed filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster”

Elizabeth Bishop (1911–1979) American poet

Source: The Complete Poems 1927-1979

Art, Loss

“The witchlight made his skin paler, his eyes more intently blue. They were the color of the water in the North Atlantic, where the ice drifted on its blue-black surface like the snow clinging to the dark glass pane of a window.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Angel

Source: Clockwork Angel

Color, Water

“If we all were judged according to the consequences
Of all our words and deeds, beyond the intention
And beyond our limited understanding
Of ourselves and others, we should all be condemned.”

T.S. Eliot (1888–1965) 20th century English author

Understanding

“Goodness," Tessa said to the back of his head. "If you keep seeing Six-Fingered Nigel like this, he'll expect you to declare your intentions.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Angel

Source: Clockwork Angel

“You can have the best intentions, but the moment there’s a hairline crack, it is only a matter of time before you go to pieces.”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

Source: Leaving Time

Time

“Nick! Wait!” – Kyrian
‘Wait, my gluteus maximus. Vampire was shy of a few quarts of blood if he thought Nick had any intention of not going Casper on him.’ – Nick”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Invincible

Waiting

“Remember, people will judge you by your actions not your intentions. You may have a heart of gold but so does a hard-boiled egg.”

Maya Angelou (1928–2014) American author and poet

People, Heart

“Let me assure you that my intent is not to offend or merely be provocative. I'm simply worried.”

Sam Harris (1967) American author, philosopher and neuroscientist

“Meditation is the only intentional, systematic human activity which at bottom is about not trying to improve yourself or get anywhere else, but simply to realize where you already are.”

Jon Kabat-Zinn (1944) American academic

Source: Wherever You Go, There You Are

“The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.”

Ben Jonson (1572–1637) English writer

Hell

“She would tell him what she wanted in her life--her hopes and dreams for the future--and he would listen intently and then promise to make it all come true. And the way he said it made her believe him, and she knew how much he meant to her.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Notebook

Source: The Notebook

Life, Dreams, Hope, Way

“He was impregnably armored by his good intentions and his ignorance.”

Graham Greene book The Quiet American

Source: The Quiet American

“Don't ever trust men with good intentions. They'll always disappoint you."
Leo”

Lisa Kleypas (1964) American writer

Source: Tempt Me at Twilight

Men, Disappointment

“My character is self-important, poorly informed, well-intentioned, but an idiot… So we said, "Let's give him a promotion."”

Stephen Colbert (1964) American political satirist, writer, comedian, television host, and actor

"Colbert spoofs cable news on Daily Show spinoff" Associated Press report (31 October 2005)

“Martin is your best friend, isn't he?' a sweet and well-intentioned girl once said when both of us were present: it was the only time I ever felt awkward about this precious idea, which seemed somehow to risk diminishment if it were uttered aloud.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

Source: Hitch-22: A Memoir

Girl, Idea, Time

“It certainly was not my intention to make you suffer, yet i have done so; obviously it never will be my intention to make you suffer, yet I shall always do so.”

Franz Kafka book Letters to Felice

Source: Letters to Felice‎

Suffering

“Sometimes serendipity is just intention unmasked.”

Elizabeth Berg (1948) American novelist

Source: The Year of Pleasures

“The primary thing when you take a sword in your hands is your intention to cut the enemy, whatever the means. Whenever you parry, hit, spring, strike or touch the enemy's cutting sword, you must cut the enemy in the same movement. It is essential to attain this. If you think only of hitting, springing, striking or touching the enemy, you will not be able actually to cut him.”

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

Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Water Book

Spring, Thinking

“Evidently, Ted had walked down the block from his own house and entered with the intention of fixing something. Now Ted was broken, too, and beyond repair.”

Dean Koontz book Watchers

Part 1, Chapter 7.7; about the death of Travis's landlord, Ted Hockney
Watchers (1987)

Housing

“I know that I disagree with many other UML experts, but there is no magic about UML. If you can generate code from a model, then it is programming language. And UML is not a well-designed programming language.
The most important reason is that it lacks a well-defined point of view, partly by intent and partly because of the tyranny of the OMG standardization process that tries to provide everything to everybody. It doesn't have a well-defined underlying set of assumptions about memory, storage, concurrency, or almost anything else. How can you program in such a language?
The fact is that UML and other modelling language are not meant to be executable. The point of models is that they are imprecise and ambiguous. This drove many theoreticians crazy so they tried to make UML "precise", but models are imprecise for a reason: we leave out things that have a small effect so we can concentrate on the things that have big or global effects. That's how it works in physics models: you model the big effect (such as the gravitation from the sun) and then you treat the smaller effects as perturbation to the basic model (such as the effects of the planets on each other). If you tried to solve the entire set of equations directly in full detail, you couldn't do anything.”

James Rumbaugh (1947) Computer scientist, software engineer

James Rumbaugh in Federico Biancuzzi and Shane Warden eds. (2009) Masterminds of Programming. p. 339; cited in " Quote by James Rumbaugh http://www.ptidej.net/course/cse3009/winter13/resources/james" on ptidej.net. Last updated 2013-04-09 by guehene; Rumbaugh is responding to the question: "What do you think of using UML to generate implementation code?"

Memory, Sun

“I think sometimes we can disagree with the facts … But our intention is never to lie to you.”

Sean Spicer (1971) American political strategist and former White House Press Secretary and Communications Director for President…

Sean Spicer says the White House will be honest, but can disagree with the facts http://www.news.com.au/world/north-america/press-secretary-sean-spicer-says-the-white-house-will-be-honest/news-story/f229fdf7dcc781ec6438cc51031e266f (January 24, 2017)

Lie, Thinking

“The artist may rightly venture the opinion that he does not convey ideas, does not preach, nor that he intents to convert people by using mass communication techniques... Better than handing out all kinds of wise advice, he could show life itself; he could awake forces lying dormant in everybody, he could launch an invitation to create direct and personal experiences.”

Antoni Tàpies (1923–2012) Catalan painter, sculptor and art theorist

Source: undated quotes, Tàpies, Werke auf Papier 1943 – 2003,' (2004), p. 30.

Life, People, Communication, Lying

“Machiavelli is not concerned with how men do live merely in order to describe it; his intention is rather, on the basis of knowledge of how men do live, to teach princes how they ought to rule and even how they ought to live.”

Leo Strauss (1899–1973) Classical philosophy specialist and father of neoconservativism

"Niccolo Machiavelli" (1987)

Men, Knowledge

“no grand intention
no pain to mention
just too many days that fade to blue
and look how it came out perfect
for better would have been for worse if
I’d have been the one to settle down that walk with you”

Alicia Witt (1975) American actress

Consolation Prize
Lyrics, Revisionary History (2015)

Pain, Perfection

“I have the intention to dedicate Le Gibet to you. It is not because I think you merit a rope to hang yourself, but because it is the least difficult of the three pieces.”

Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) French composer

Ravel to pianist Jean Marnold about Le Gibet from Gaspard de la Nuit

Thinking

“We live in a universe that is always happy to give you whatever your intent-based reality demands.”

Steve Maraboli (1975)

Source: Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010), p. 116

Reality, Universe, Happiness

“The proposition has… been laid down in the most general terms, "All evils are negations." Thus for man death is evil; death is his non-existence. Illness, poverty, and ignorance are evils for man; all these are privations of properties…. The destruction of other things is likewise nothing but the absence of their form. After these propositions, it must be admitted as a fact that it cannot be said of God that He directly creates evil, or He has the direct intention to produce evil; this is impossible. His works are all perfectly good. He only produces existence, and all existence is good; whilst evils are of a negative character, and cannot be acted upon.”

Maimónides book The Guide for the Perplexed

Source: Guide for the Perplexed (c. 1190), Part III, Ch.10

Death, God, Evil

“Monsieur, mon cousin,

I have seen the letters you have sent me by Buckingham herald, whereby I understand that you want my friendship in good form and manner, which contents me well enough; for I have no intention of breaking such truces as have previously been concluded between the late King of most noble memory, my brother, and you for as long as they still have to run. Nevertheless, the merchants of this my kingdom of England, seeing the great provocation your subjects have given them in seizing ships and merchandise and other goods, are fearful of venturing to go to Bordeaux and other places under your rule until they are assured by you that they can surely and safely carry on trade in all the places subject to your sway, according to the rights established by the aforesaid truces. Therefore, in order that my subjects and merchants may not find themselves deceived as a result of this present ambiguous situation, I pray you that by my servant this bearer, one of the grooms of my stable, you will let me know in writing your full intentions, at the same time informing me if there is anything I can do for you in order that I may do it with a good heart. And farewell to you, Monsieur mon cousin.”

Richard III of England (1452–1485) English monarch

Letter sent, as King of England, 18 August, 1483, to Louis XI of France. Reprinted in Richard the Third (1956) http://books.google.com/books?id=dNm0JgAACAAJ&dq=Paul+Murray+Kendall+Richard+the+Third&ei=TZHDR8zXKZKIiQHf2NCpCA

Friendship, Fear, Understanding, Memory

“In one experience I remember vividly, there was a rich range of shades. It must have been late 1941 or early 1942. Jews were required to wear the Star of David and to obey a 6 p. m. curfew. I had gone to play with a Christian friend and had stayed too late. I turned my brown sweater inside out to walk the few blocks home. As I was walking down an empty street, I saw a German soldier approaching. He was wearing the black uniform that I had been told to fear more than others - the one worn by specially recruited SS soldiers. As I came closer to him, trying to walk fast, I noticed that he was looking at me intently. Then he beckoned me over, picked me up, and hugged me. I was terrified that he would notice the star inside my sweater. He was speaking to me with great emotion, in German. When he put me down, he opened his wallet, showed me a picture of a boy, and gave me some money. I went home more certain than ever that my mother was right: people were endlessly complicated and interesting.”

Daniel Kahneman (1934) Israeli-American psychologist

Nobel Prize Autobiographical Information http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economic-sciences/laureates/2002/kahneman-bio.html (2002).

Money, People, Fear, Home

“The concepts 'system', 'apparatus', 'environment', immediately imply an artificial division of the world, and an intention to neglect, or take only schematic account of, the interaction across the split. The notions of 'microscopic' and 'macroscopic' defy precise definition. So also do the notions of 'reversible' and 'irreversible'. Einstein said that it is theory which decides what is 'observable'. I think he was right - 'observation' is a complicated and theory-laden business. Then that notion should not appear in the formulation of fundamental theory. Information? Whose information? Information about what? On this list of bad words from good books, the worst of all is 'measurement.”

John S. Bell (1928–1990) Northern Irish physicist

It must have a section to itself.
Against 'measurement' (1990)

Books, World, Business, Thinking

“It bodes well for the future that young people are thinking so intently about political issues.”

Jo Cox (1974–2016) UK politician

On a return visit to their former school, Heckmondwike Grammar School — Emmerdale actress Tracy Brabin and Labour politician Jo Cox return to Heckmondwike Grammar School http://www.examiner.co.uk/news/local-news/emmerdale-actress-tracy-brabin-labour-7818688 (23 September 2014)

People, Thinking, Future

“The Intention and the End of Monarchy, is the Glory of the Citizens, of the State, and of the Sovereign.
But, from this Glory, a Sense of Liberty arises in a People governed by a Monarch; which may produce in these States as much Energy in transacting the most important Affairs, and may contribute as much to the Happiness of the Subjects, as even Liberty itself….”

Catherine the Great (1729–1796) Empress of Russia

Proposals for a New Law Code (1768)

People, Sense, Happiness

“The start of a film is like a gateway, a formal entrance-point. The first three minutes of a film make great demands on an audience's patience and credulity. A great deal has to be learnt very rapidly about place and attitude, character and intent and ambition.”

Peter Greenaway (1942) British film director

Watching Water

Patience

“For there have been some people, otherwise good and holy, who saw that intemperance and luxury time and again drive man to throw off all restraints unless he is curbed by the utmost severity. And in their desire to correct such a pernicious evil they have adopted the only method which they saw fit, namely to permit earthly blessings only insofar as they were an absolute necessity. This advice showed the best of intentions but was far too rigid. For they committed the very dangerous error of imposing on the consequence of others stricter rules than those laid down in the Word of the Lord. By restricting people within the demands of necessity, they meant abstinence from everything possible. On the other hand, there are many nowadays who seek a pretext to excuse intemperance in the use of the external things, and who desire to indulge the lusts of the flesh. Such people take for granted that liberty should not be restricted by any limitations at all; but to this we can never agree. We must grant, indeed, that it is not right or possible to bind the consciences of others with hard and fast rules.”

John Calvin (1509–1564) French Protestant reformer

Page 85.
Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life (1551)

People, Error, Evil, Time

“Ever since the Reformation, there's a sense in which the road to atheism was paved not with science, but with religious intentions.”

Jonathan Miller (1934–2019) British theatre director (born 1934)

Episode two: "Noughts and Crosses".
Atheism: A Rough History of Disbelief (2004)

Sense, Science

“By virtue of its innermost intention, and like all questions about language, structuralism escapes the classical history of ideas which already supposes structuralism’s possibility, for the latter naively belongs to the province of language and propounds itself within it. Nevertheless, by virtue of an irreducible region of irreflection and spontaneity within it, by virtue of the essential shadow of the undeclared, the structuralist phenomenon will deserve examination by the historian of ideas. For better or for worse. Everything within this phenomenon that does not in itself transparently belong to the question of the sign will merit this scrutiny; as will everything within it that is methodologically effective, thereby possessing the kind of infallibil-ity now ascribed to sleepwalkers and formerly attributed to instinct, which was said to be as certain as it was blind.”

Jacques Derrida book Writing and Difference

Force and Signification
Writing and Difference (1978)

History, Idea, Question

“Third World elections provide an excellent testing ground for a propaganda model. Some elections are held in friendly client states to legitimize their rulers and regimes, whereas others are held in disfavored or enemy countries to legitimize their political systems. […] the United States organized what have been called “demonstration elections” in its client states, defined as those whose primary function is to convince the home population that the intervention is well intentioned, that the populace of the invaded and occupied country welcomes the intrusion, and that they are being given democratic choice. The elections in El Salvador in 1982 and 1984 were true demonstration elections, and those held in Guatemala in 1984-85 were strongly supported by the United States for image-enhancing purposes. The elections held in Nicaragua in 1984, by contrast, was intended to legitimize a government that the Reagan administration was striving to destabilize and overthrow. The U. S. government therefore went to great pains to cast the Nicaraguan election in an unfavorable light.”

Edward S. Herman book Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media

Source: Manufacturing Consent, with Noam Chomsky, 1988, pp. 87-88.

Pain, World, Home, Support

“Obviously, the intention was not to go back to images traditionally valued as worthy or holy images and shapes, but exactly the opposite; its main purpose had to be, to realise as sacred art anything which so far had been regarded as of little value and pitiful.”

Antoni Tàpies (1923–2012) Catalan painter, sculptor and art theorist

quote from 1988
1981 - 1990
Source: Tàpies, Werke auf Papier 1943 – 2003, Achim Sommer, Kunsthalle Emden, Altana 2004, p. 38

Art, Quotes

“The Amir al-Mu'minin, Abu Hafs 'Umar ibn al-Khattab said, "I heard the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, say, "Actions only go by intentions. Everyone gets what they intend. Anyone, therefore, who emigrates to Allah and His Messenger, his emigration is indeed to Allah and His Messenger. But anyone who emigrates to gain something of this world or to marry a woman, his emigration is to that to which he emigrated."”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Riyadh-as-Saliheen by Imam Al-Nawawi, volume 1, hadith number 1
Sunni Hadith

World, Peace

“By working consistently and turned to among citizens, hence in a short of time surely achieved the intention that we meant for. For instance, a bridge would not be able to be made by only a person to cross the river, unless with cooperation of the people. If you are able to do that, you will become a citizen that will do service to the nation and race.”

Abdul Halim of Kedah (1927–2017) King of Malaysia

Speech in front of students at a public school in Bandar Baharu http://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/newspapers/Digitised/Article/beritaharian19581206-1.2.96.6?ST=1&AT=filter&K=abdul+halim&KA=abdul+halim&DF=&DT=&AO=false&NPT=&L=&CTA=&NID=&CT=&WC=&YR=1958&P=2&Display=0&filterS=0&QT=abdul,halim&oref=article 6/12/1958

People, Time, Personality

“There’s no future for me. All my life I’ve been stuck in a rigged game. The dice are loaded and I was declared a loser before I even began to play. These are not just words! What choice was I ever given? Only this one, right here, right now. I can swallow defeat meekly or I can throw the board up in the air and smash all the pieces. Well, I’ve been screwed from Day One—I have no intention whatsoever of being a good sport!”

Michael Swanwick book The Iron Dragon's Daughter

Source: The Iron Dragon's Daughter (1993), Chapter 22 (p. 399)

Life, Game, Sport, Future

“The danger in trying to do good is that the mind comes to confuse the intent of goodness with the act of doing things well.”

Ursula K. Le Guin (1929–2018) American writer

“The Finder” (p. 85)
Earthsea Books, Tales from Earthsea (2001)

“In 1915 Sophie Taeuber and I carried out our first works in the simplest forms, using painting, embroidery and pasted paper [without using oil colors to avoid any reference with usual painting]. These were probably the first manifestations of their kind, pictures that were their own reality, without meaning or cerebral intention. We rejected everything in the nature of a copy or a description, in order to give free flow to what was elemental and spontaneous.”

Hans Arp (1886–1966) Alsatian, sculptor, painter, poet and abstract artist

on creating art without using oil colors to avoid any reference with usual painting, in The Art of Jean Arp, Herbert Read, Abrams, New York 1968, p. p. 34, 38
1960s

Color, Nature, Reality, Past

“I have known some horses and a good many more pigs who I believe harbored evil intent in their hearts. I will go further and say all cats are wicked, though often useful. Who has not seen Satan in their sly faces?”

Charles Portis book True Grit

Source: True Grit (1968), Chapter 3, p. 29 : thoughts of 'Mattie Ross'

Cats, Evil, Heart, Horse

“He looked at the machine, its cabinets all standing open; it should be destroyed, he thought. But he had no idea how to do it, nor any will to try. Destruction was not his line; and a machine is more blameless, more sinless even than any animal. It has no intentions whatsoever but our own.”

Ursula K. Le Guin book The Lathe of Heaven

Source: The Lathe of Heaven (1971), Chapter 10 (Orr)

Idea, Animals

“Sweet stream that winds through yonder glade,
Apt emblem of a virtuous maid
Silent and chaste she steals along,
Far from the world's gay busy throng:
With gentle yet prevailing force,
Intent upon her destined course;
Graceful and useful all she does,
Blessing and blest where'er she goes;
Pure-bosom'd as that watery glass,
And Heaven reflected in her face.”

William Cowper (1731–1800) (1731–1800) English poet and hymnodist

"To a Young Lady" (1782).

World, Business

“If our binoculars search for our partner’s best intent, it will usually be found.”

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

Source: Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000), p. 32.

“It is apparently vital that we should be in the dark about ourselves — not to be clear about our intentions, fears, and hopes. There is a stubborn effort in us to set up a compact screen between consciousness and the self.”

Eric Hoffer (1898–1983) American philosopher

Entry (1956)
Eric Hoffer and the Art of the Notebook (2005)

Fear, Hope, Effort

“The abstracts are the opposite to work on. That process is more like walking, step by step, without an intention, until you discover where you are going. When I paint a landscape from a photograph or an image like this one, I can see the end point before I start, although in fact it always turns out slightly different than I imagined. What I have is not facility, because this really doesn't take skill. I have an eye. I couldn't make a drawing of you sitting here right now. I would love to have that ability, in the same way that I would love to play the piano. Virtuosity is a precondition for pianists, but in addition you have to be good. These are not the same thing.”

Gerhard Richter (1932) German visual artist, born 1932

after 2000, Gerhard Richter: An Artist Beyond Isms' (2002)

Love, Way, Imagination, Drawing

“The intention was really to do something dignified, something that is honest and reflects the work that this Organization does. And it is with that spirit that the producers and the directors approached their work, and I hope you will all agree they have done that.”

Kofi Annan (1938–2018) 7th Secretary-General of the United Nations

On the film The Interpreter, from "Secretary-General's press encounter" (19 April 2005) http://www.un.org/apps/sg/offthecuff.asp?nid=719

Hope

“By labor and intent study (which I take to be my portion in this life), joined with the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps leave something so written to after-times, as they should not willingly let it die.”

John Milton (1608–1674) English epic poet

The Reason of Church Government (1641), Book II, Introduction

Life, Nature, Study, Strong

“I may live in Peking rather than Phnom Penh, but I'm still the same old Sihanouk. A little original, or bizarre if you prefer. A little misunderstood, or incomprehensible if you prefer. But his convictions are intact and his personality's unaltered. For instance, I haven't become a communist: I continue to define myself as pink rather than red. I've not sewn my mouth shut: I continue to shout what I think about everything and everyone, without thinking of the consequences. And I've no intention of ending up as an exiled playboy.”

Norodom Sihanouk (1922–2012) Cambodian King

Said during his exile in Peking, as quoted by Oriana Fallaci (June 1973), Intervista con la Storia (sixth edition, 2011). page 103.
Interviews

Thinking, Personality

“The Sultan left Banarasi [Cuttack] with the intention of pursuing the Rai of Jajnagar, who had fled to an island in the river News was then brought that in the jangal were seven elephants, and one old she-elephant, which was very fierce. The Sultan resolved upon endeavouring to capture these elephants before continuing the pursuit of the Rai…. After the hunt was over, the Sultan directed his attention to the Rai of Jajnagar, and entering the palace where he dwelt he found many fine buildings. It is reported that inside the Rais fort, there was a stone idol which the infidels called Jagannath, and to which they paid their devotions. Sultan Firoz, in emulation of Mahmud Subuktigin, having rooted up the idol, carried it away to Delhi where he placed it in an ignominious position.”

Firuz Shah Tughlaq (1309–1388) Tughluq sultan

Puri (Orissa) .Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, 8 Volumes, Allahabad Reprint, 1964. Elliot and Dowson. Vol. III, p. 313 ff

“One thing at least is clear—that no one believes in our good intentions. We are often told to secure ourselves by their affections, not by force. Our great-grand children may be privileged to do it, but not we.”

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) British politician

Source: Letter to Lord Northbrook (28 May 1874) on British rule in India, quoted in S. Gopal, British Policy in India, 1858-1905 (Cambridge University Press, 1965), p. 65

Children

“I've been vegan for two years and vegetarian for 20 years. I used to be a dancer, and so health and vitality have always been important to me. I wouldn't say it took any one big event, vegetarianism just always made sense to me. [What farmed animals] endure is just terrible. It's horrible … Vegan food is soul food in its truest form. Soul food means to feed the soul. And, to me, your soul is your intent. If your intent is pure, you are pure.”

Erykah Badu (1971) American neo-soul singer

"Erykah Badu" http://vegnews.com/articles/page.do?catId=7&pageId=30, interview with VegNews (6 October 2008).

Health, Food, Soul, Sense

“The test of every act of creativity: Does it help you to enthusiastically, passionately, whole-heartedly and gratefully Embrace all your life? This, I believe, is the basic purpose of all the arts—and thus should be the basic Intention of every artist.”

John Diamond (doctor) (1934) Australian doctor

Source: A Few Words on Art (Just a Few) (2010), p. 2

Life, Art, Passion, Help

“…my commitment to Israel is because I am an active citizen. Although its neighbors have wanted to destroy Israel, they have defended democracy. Israel has only led defensive wars, Arafat has only gone to attack. They are murdering women and children in order to spread fear and terror. When Israel accidentally kills, it is not the intention to harm civilians like Arafat does.”

Carl I. Hagen (1944) Norwegian politician

Speech at a meeting in the independent Christian organisation Levende Ord in 2004, published in Dagbladet (14 July 2004) http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2004/07/14/403017.html

Women, War, Children, Fear

“I venture to think that in future the Czechoslovak State cannot be maintained as an independent entity. You will find that in a period of time which may be measured by years, but may be measured only by months, Czechoslovakia will be engulfed in the Nazi régime. … It is the most grievous consequence which we have yet experienced of what we have done and of what we have left undone in the last five years—five years of futile good intention, five years of eager search for the line of least resistance, five years of uninterrupted retreat of British power, five years of neglect of our air defences.”

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

Speech https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1938/oct/05/policy-of-his-majestys-government#column_366 in the House of Commons (5 October 1938) against the Munich Agreement <br class="br">The 1930s

Search, Thinking, Time, Future

“Solidarity is not a matter of sentiment but a fact, cold and impassive as the granite foundations of a skyscraper. If the basic elements, identity of interest, clarity of vision, honesty of intent, and oneness of purpose, or any of these is lacking, all sentimental pleas for solidarity, and all other efforts to achieve it will be barren of results.”

Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) American labor and political leader

"A Plea for Solidarity," The International Socialist Review VOL XIV No. 9 (March 1914) https://books.google.com/books?id=olFIAAAAYAAJ&lpg=PA534&ots=GTTSOWeGxG&dq=eugene%20v.%20debs%20%22a%20plea%20for%20solidarity&pg=PA534#v=onepage&q&f=false

Effort

“The fundamental thesis of ordinary conventionalism, represented for instance by Poincare, states that there are problems which cannot be solved by appeal to experience unless one introduces a certain convention, since only such a convention, together with experimental data, makes it possible to solve the problem in question. The judgements which combine to make up such a solution are thus not forced on us by empirical data alone, but their adoption depends partly on our recognition, since the said convention which co-determines the solution of the problem can be arbitrarily changed by us so that as a result we obtain different judgements.
In the present paper it is my intention to make that thesis of ordinary conventionalism more general and more radical. Namely, we want to formulate and to prove the theorem that not only some, but all the judgements which we accept and which combine to make up our image of the world are not univocally determined by empirical data, but depend on the choice of the conceptual apparatus by means of which we make mappings of those empirical data. We can, however, choose this or that conceptual apparatus, which will change our whole image of the world.”

Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz (1890–1963) Philosopher, logician

Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz, "Das Weltbild und die Begriffsapparatur", in Erkenntnis, 1934, Vol. 4, p. 259; as cited in: Schaff (1962;81-82)

World, Question, Problem, Change

“Many of the words and numbers bandied by Obama and his administration may reflect an honest belief that the world is whatever well-intentioned people like them say about it. So, Obama's critics should reconsider their assumption that he is cynical. It is his sincerity that is scary.”

George Will (1941) American newspaper columnist, journalist, and author

Column, February 7, 2014, "President Obama's Magic Words and Numbers" http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/george-will-president-obamas-magic-words-and-numbers/2014/02/07/220fbc04-8f76-11e3-84e1-27626c5ef5fb_story.html at washingtonpost.com. <br class="br">2010s

People, World, Sincerity

“The playing of Soviet pianists of the younger generation differed significantly from the composer’s performing style, as discussed above. (Here I am referring to the generation of Richter and Gilels or younger, as opposed to Prokofiev’s coevals such as Neuhaus and Samuil Feinberg, who also had Prokofiev’s works in their repertoires.) Since we know that Prokofiev appreciated their playing, does it mean that he accepted their approach? Should we regard the new generation’s playing as a distortion of the composer’s intentions or as a natural evolution of interpretive style?
I believe that Prokofiev, having been exposed to the new performing style of the Soviet pianists, accepted at least some of its qualities. We can mention assertive muscular playing, open expressivity, and a gripping commitment to the music among those traits that brought recognition to Soviet pianists and assured their success in the international arena. These characteristics were concordant with the evolving compositional style of Prokofiev, whose later works became both more virile (often heroic) and expressive in a warmer and more open way.”

Boris Berman (1948) Russian/American musician

Prokofiev’s piano sonatas : a guide for the listener and the performer (2008), Prokofiev the pianist

Music, Way, Nature, Success

Quotes about intention page 3

Quotes about intention
page 3