Quotes about leave
page 35

“When I remember my family, I always remember their backs. They were always indignantly leaving places. That’s the way I remember them, heading for an exit.”

John Cheever (1912–1982) American novelist and short story writer

Quoted by Susan Cheever, Home before Dark Houghton Mifflin (1984).

Family, Way

“Our jobs are fleeing the country. They're going to Mexico. They're going to many other countries. You look at what China is doing to our country in terms of making our product. They're devaluing their currency, and there's nobody in our government to fight them. And we have a very good fight. And we have a winning fight. Because they're using our country as a piggy bank to rebuild China, and many other countries are doing the same thing. … We have to stop our jobs from being stolen from us. We have to stop our companies from leaving the United States and, with it, firing all of their people. … We cannot let it happen. Under my plan, I'll be reducing taxes tremendously, from 35 percent to 15 percent for companies, small and big businesses. That's going to be a job creator like we haven't seen since Ronald Reagan. It's going to be a beautiful thing to watch. Companies will come. They will build. They will expand. New companies will start. And I look very, very much forward to doing it. We have to renegotiate our trade deals, and we have to stop these countries from stealing our companies and our jobs.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, September, First presidential debate (September 26, 2016)

People, Beauty, Business, Fight

“The small and imperfect mixture of representative government in England, impeded as it is by other branches, aristocratical and hereditary, shows yet the power of the representative principle towards improving the condition of man. With us, all the branches of the government are elective by the people themselves, except the judiciary, of whose science and qualifications they are not competent judges. Yet, even in that department, we call in a jury of the people to decide all controverted matters of fact, because to that investigation they are entirely competent, leaving thus as little as possible, merely the law of the case, to the decision of the judges. And true it is that the people, especially when moderately instructed, are the only safe, because the only honest, depositories of the public rights, and should therefore be introduced into the administration of them in every function to which they are sufficient; they will err sometimes and accidentally, but never designedly, and with a systematic and persevering purpose of overthrowing the free principles of the government. Hereditary bodies, on the contrary, always existing, always on the watch for their own aggrandizement, profit of every opportunity of advancing the privileges of their order, and encroaching on the rights of the people.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

1820s, Letter to A. Coray (1823)

People, Law, Decision, Science

“A day like today is not a day for, sort of, soundbites, really - we can leave those at home - but I feel the hand of history upon our shoulders, I really do.”

Tony Blair (1953) former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Julia Langdon, "The gloves are off in the Speaker's corner", Herald (Glasgow), 9 April 1998, p. 21.
Statement to the press on arriving at Hillsborough Castle for the Northern Ireland talks, 7 April 1998.
1990s

Feeling, Home, History

“Leaving behind son and wife, and father and mother, and wealth and grain, and relatives, and sensual pleasures to the limit, one should wander solitary as a rhinoceros horn.
'This is an attachment; here there is little happiness, and little satisfaction; here there is very much misery; this is a hook.' Knowing this, a thoughtful man should wander solitary as a rhinoceros horn.
Having torn one's fetters asunder, like a fish breaking a net in the water, not returning, like a fire not going back to what is already burned, one should wander solitary as a rhinoceros horn.”

Gautama Buddha (-563–-483 BC) philosopher, reformer and the founder of Buddhism

§ 60-62
Source: Pali Canon, Sutta Pitaka, Khuddaka Nikaya (Minor Collection), (Suttas falling down)

Happiness, Pleasure, Fish, Water

“Purity" of and in art — any art, including music and dance — is an illusory notion, of course. It may be remotely conceivable or imaginable, but it can't be realized because it can't be recognized any more than a "pure" human being or a "pure" (or, for that matter, gratuitous) act can be. All the same, for Western art in its Modernist phase "purity" has been a useful idea and ideal, with a kind of logic to it that has worked, and still works, to generate aesthetic value and maintain aesthetic standards as nothing else in our specializing culture has over the last hundred-odd years.But this logic has also worked to exclude the decorative — the decorative insofar as it functions solely as decoration. It's as though aesthetic value, quality, could be preserved only by concentrating on "absolute" or "autonomous" art: thus on visual art — including even architecture — that held and moved and stirred the beholder as sheer decoration could not. Decoration is asked to be "merely" pleasing, "merely" embellishing, and the "functional" logic of Modernism leaves no room, apparently, for such "mereness.”

Clement Greenberg (1909–1994) American writer and artist

This is part of the pity of Modernism, one of the sacrifices it enjoins.... "Detached Observations" http://www.sharecom.ca/greenberg/detached.html, Arts Magazine (December 1976) 1970s

Art, Music, Imagination, Idea

“Suffering, sad "female humanity!" What are these feelings which they are taught to consider as disgraceful, to deny to themselves? What form do the Chinese feet assume when denied their proper development? If the young girls of the "higher classes," who never commit a false step, whose justly earned reputations were never sullied even by the stain which the fruit of mere "knowledge of good and evil" leaves behind, were to speak, and say what are their thoughts employed upon, their thoughts, which alone are free, what would they say?”

Florence Nightingale (1820–1910) English social reformer and statistician, and the founder of modern nursing

Cassandra (1860)

Sadness, Feeling, Girl, Knowledge

“To evaluate the greatness of the late director of the Philippine Library and Museum is utterly impossible. An accomplished musician, the foremost scholar in the land, a collector of the first rank, at home among the great masters of foreign tongues, Epifanio de los Santos leaves behind him a record of service and achievement that would be difficult to equal.”

Epifanio de los Santos (1871–1928) Filipino politician

R. McCulloch Dick ( Editor, The Philippine Free Press).
BALIW

Home

“If I love you—
I never behave like a climbing trumpet vine
Using your high branches to show myself off;
If I love you—
I never mimic infatuated little birds
Repeating monotonous songs into the shadows,
Nor do I look at all like a wellspring
Sending out its cooling consolation all year round,
Or just another perilous crag
Augmenting your height, setting off your prestige.
Nor like the sunlight
Or even spring rain.
No, these are not enough.
I would be a kapok tree by your side
Standing with you—
both of us shaped like trees.
Our roots hold hands underground,
Our leaves touch in the clouds.
As a gust of wind passes by
We salute each other
And not a soul
Understands our language.
You have your bronze boughs and iron trunk
Like knives and swords,
Also like halberds;
I have my red flowers
Like heavy sighs,
Also like heroic torches.
We share cold waves, storms and thunderbolts;
Together we savor fog, haze and rainbows.
We seem to always live apart,
But actually depend upon each other forever.
This has to be called extraordinary love.
Faith resides in it:
Love—
I love not only your sublime body
But the space you occupy,
The land beneath your feet.”

Shu Ting (1952) Chinese writer

"To the Oak Tree" [ 致橡树 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APZjf9K6KX0, Zhi xiangshu] (27 March 1977), in The Red Azalea: Chinese Poetry Since the Cultural Revolution, ed. Edward Morin, trans. Fang Dai and Dennis Ding (University of Hawaii Press, 1990), ISBN 978-0824813208, pp. 102–103.

Love, Faith, Soul, Spring

“If you are not already dead, forgive. Rancor is heavy, it is worldly; leave it on earth: die light.”

Jean Paul Sartre book The Devil and the Good Lord

Act 1
The Devil and the Good Lord (1951)

Forgiveness, Light, Dead

“The cities in which we live in are schools of death, because they are dishuman. Each one of them has become a den of noise and of stench, for each of one has became a chaos of buildings, in which we ammass ourselves in millions, losing our life’s reasons. Unfortunates without escape, we feel to have put ourselves, willing or not, in the labyrinth of the absurd, from which we will leave only when we will die, for our destiny is to continue to multiply ourselves, only to die in great numbers. At every turn of the wheel, the cities in which we live in advance slowly one against the other, desiring only to confuse with each other: it’s a run towards the absolute chaos, in the noise and in the stench. At every turn of the wheel the price of the grounds go up, and in the labyrinth which devours the free space the revenue of the investiments builds up, day after day, hundreds of walls. It’s necessary that money give revenues and that the cities in which we live in advance, so it’s right that the houses double their height at every generation, even if the water is missing half of the days. The builders only desire to escape the destiny that they prepare for us, moving towards the countryside.”

Albert Caraco (1919–1971) French-Uruguayan philosopher

Translation from: Albert Carao (1919-1917) http://illusioncity.net/albert-caraco/ at illusioncity.net by Snake June 17, 2012 Ma confession (1975)

Life, Death, Money, School

“I have a habit of leaving places at the wrong time, just when something big may have happened for me.”

Nico (1938–1988) German musician, model and actress, one of Warhol's superstars

As quoted in Up-tight: the Velvet Underground story (2002) by Victor Bockris and Gerard Malanga.

Time

“Yet, so strong is the hold which the insidious evil of Communism secures upon its disciples, that I could still say to someone at that time: "I know that I am leaving the winning side for the losing side, but it is better to die on the losing side than to live under Communism."”

Whittaker Chambers Witness

Source: Witness (1952), p. 25

Communication, Strong, Evil, Time

“There are three things that they could conceivably do… They could replace me immediately and have somebody else play Dillon. I’m okay with that because I think Dillon needs a reboot. It would be interesting to see somebody else’s take on him. Two, they could kill him, which I would hope they wouldn’t do, just because I would like the opportunity to maybe come back. Depending how they did that, I’d have to go back and shoot that. It would give me a chance to say goodbye and the opportunity to try to pull it together and act well one last time. That would be really profound for me. Or three, they’d have Dillon leave town. I would be wholly and entirely complimented if the door stayed open. I know that’s a lot to ask of them and the door can’t stay open for long. That’s just the rules of the game.”

Scott Clifton (1984) American television actor, musician, internet personality.

Responding to the end of his contract with General Hospital and the fate of his role, Dillon Quartermaine, as quoted in "Going Going... Gone" by Rosemary A. Rossi, for ABC Soaps in Depth.

Hope, Game, Thinking, Chance

“Sigh then, or frown, but leave (as in despair)
Motive and end and moral in the air;
Nice contradiction between fact and fact
Will make the whole read human and exact.”

Robert Graves (1895–1985) English poet and novelist

"The Devil’s Advice to Story-tellers," lines 19–22, from Collected Poems 1938 (1938).
Poems

Motivation, Reading, Despair

“On this day by God's grace I resolved to give up all beauty until I had His leave for it.”

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889) English poet

Journal entry (6 November 1865), as reported in In Extremity: A Study of Gerard Manley Hopkins (1978) by John Robinson, p. 1

God, Beauty

“Although we must leave you,
Fair Castle of Mey,
We shall never forget,
Nor will never repay,
A meal of such splendour,
Repast of such zest,
It will take us to Sunday,
Just to digest.
To leafy Balmoral,
We are now on our way,
But our hearts will remain
At the Castle of Mey.
With your gardens and ranges,
And all your good cheer,
We will be back again soon
So roll on next year.”

Isabel II do Reino Unido (1926–2022) queen of the UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, and head of the Commonwealth of Nations

Ode to the Castle of Mey, recorded in the visitors' book at the Castle of Mey, in Caithness, during a visit to the Queen Mother, 1993. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/3049709.stm

Way, Heart, Forgetting

“Call me a nerd if you like, but I do find it hard to leave home without my laptop and a good book.”

Moby (1965) Activist, American musician, DJ and photographer

As quoted in "I lost my heart in... New York", in The Guardian (13 May 2005) http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2005/may/14/lostmyheart.guardiansaturdaytravelsection

Books, Home

“In fact, an information theory that leaves out the issue of noise turns out to have no content.”

Hans Christian von Baeyer (1938) American physicist

Source: Information, The New Language of Science (2003), Chapter 13, Electric Information, From Morse to Shannon, p. 121

“Before explaining these methods let us recall exactly the conditions of the problem which we are attempting to solve. Our purpose is to be able to measure the intellectual capacity of a child who is brought to us in order to know whether he is normal or retarded. We should therefore, study his condition at the time and that only. We have nothing to do either with his past history or with his future; consequently we shall neglect his etiology, and we shall make no attempt to distinguish between acquired and congenital idiocy; for a stronger reason we shall set aside all consideration of pathological anatomy which might explain his intellectual deficiency. So much for his past. As to that which concerns his future, we shall exercise the same abstinence; we do not attempt to establish or prepare a prognosis and we leave unanswered the question of whether this retardation is curable, or even improvable. We shall limit ourselves to ascertaining the truth in regard to his present mental state.”

Alfred Binet (1857–1911) French psychologist and inventor of the first usable intelligence test

Source: The development of intelligence in children, 1916, p. 37 : lead paragraph of "New Methods for the Diagnosis of the Intellectual Level of Subnormals"

Truth, Exercises, History, Question

““It happened that Mahmud had long been planning an expedition into Bhardana, and Gujarat, to destroy the idol temple of Somnat, a place of great sanctity to all Hindus. So as soon as he had returned to Ghazni from his Khurasan business, he issued a farman to the General of the army, ordering him to leave a confidential officer in charge of the fort of Kabuliz, and himself to join the court with his son Salar Mas‘ud…
“It is related in the Tarikh-i Mahmudi that the Sultan shortly after reached Ghazni, and laid down the image of Somnat at the threshold of the Mosque of Ghazni, so that the Musulmans might tread upon the breast of the idol on their way to and from their devotions. As soon as the unbelievers heard of this, they sent an embassy to Khwaja Hasan Maimandi, stating that the idol was of stone and useless to the Musulmans, and offered to give twice its weight in gold as a ransom, if it might be returned to them. Khwaja Hasan Maimandi represented to the Sultan that the unbelievers had offered twice the weight of the idol in gold, and had agreed to be subject to him. He added, that the best policy would be to take the gold and restore the image, thereby attaching die people to his Government. The Sultan yielded to the advice of the Khwaja, and the unbelievers paid the gold into the treasury.
“One day, when the Sultan was seated on his throne, the ambassadors of the unbelievers came, and humbly petitioned thus: ‘Oh, Lord of the world! we have paid the gold to your Government in ransom, but have not yet received our purchase, the idol Somnat.’ The Sultan was wroth at their words, and, falling into reflection, broke up the assembly and retired, with his dear Salar Mas‘ud, into his private apartments. He then asked his opinion as to whether the image ought to be restored, or not? Salar Mas‘ud, who was perfect in goodness, said quickly, ‘In the day of the resurrection, when the Almighty shall call for Ãzar, the idol-destroyer, and Mahmud, the idol-seller, Sire! what will you say?’ This speech deeply affected the Sultan, he was full of grief, and answered, ‘I have given my word; it will be a breach of promise.’ Salar Mas‘ud begged him to make over the idol to him, and tell the unbelievers to get it from him. The Sultan agreed; and Salar Mas‘ud took it to his house, and, breaking off its nose and ears, ground them to powder.
“When Khwaja Hasan introduced the unbelievers, and asked the Sultan to give orders to restore the image to them, his majesty replied that Salar Mas‘ud had carried it off to his house, and that he might send them to get it from him. Khwaja Hasan, bowing his head, repeated these words in Arabic, ‘No easy matter is it to recover anything which has fallen into the hands of a lion.’ He then told the unbelievers that the idol was with Salar Mas‘ud, and that they were at liberty to go and fetch it. So they went to Mas‘ud’s door and demanded their god.
“That prince commanded Malik Nekbakht to treat them courteously, and make them be seated; then to mix the dust of the nose and ears of the idol with sandal and the lime eaten with betel-nut, and present it to them. The unbelievers were delighted, and smeared themselves with sandal, and ate the betel-leaf. After a while they asked for the idol, when Salar Mas‘ud said he had given it to them. They inquired, with astonishment, what he meant by saying that they had received the idol? And Malik Nekbakht explained that it was mixed with the sandal and betel-lime. Some began to vomit, while others went weeping and lamenting to Khwaja Hasan Maimandi and told him what had occurred…”
“Afterwards the image of Somnat was divided into four parts, as is described in the Tawarikh-i-Mahmudi. Mahmud’s first exploit is said to have been conquering the Hindu rebels, destroying the forts and the idol temples of the Rai Ajipal (Jaipal), and subduing the country of India. His second, the expedition into Harradawa and Guzerat, the carrying off the idol of Somnat, and dividing it into four pieces, one of which he is reported to have placed on the threshold of the Imperial Palace, while he sent two others to Mecca and Medina respectively. Both these exploits were performed at the suggestion, and by the advice, of the General and Salar Mas‘ud; but India was conquered by the efforts of Salar Mas‘ud alone, and the idol of Somnat was broken in pieces by his sold advice, as has been related. Salar Sahu was Sultan of the army and General of the forces in Iran…”

Ghazi Saiyyad Salar Masud (1014) semi-legendary Muslim figure from India

Somnath (Gujarat), Mir‘at-i-Mas‘udi Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own historians, Vol. II. p. 524-547

God, People, World, Way

“The poverty of the incapable, the distresses that come upon the imprudent, the starvation of the idle, and those shoulderings aside of the weak by the strong, which leave so many "in shallows and in miseries," are the decrees of a large, far-seeing benevolence.”

Herbert Spencer book Social Statics

Pt. III, Ch. 25 : Poor-Laws
Social Statics (1851)

Strong

“Merely to critically attack religious beliefs is not sufficient. It leaves a vacuum. What are you for? We know what you're against, but what do you want to defend?”

Paul Kurtz (1925–2012) American professor of philosophy

A Bitter Rift Divides Atheists, NPR, 19th October 2009 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113889251

“But how do you get rid of a god? Is there any religion where they teach you that? How to get your god off your back if he gets too damned obnoxious? No. All you ever get is advice on how to bribe them to leave you alone for a few minutes.”

Glen Cook book She Is the Darkness

Source: She Is the Darkness (1997), Chapter 39 (p. 403)

God, Religion

“The majority of men … never turn their attention from the outside world to examine themselves. … They go through life drawn hither and thither by outside happenings, with scarcely any originality, or without any more control of their direction than have the leaves which are whirled about by the autumn wind.”

Jules Payot (1859–1940) French educationist

Source: The Education of the Will (1920), pp. 146-147

Life, Men, World, Autumn

“The bling-bling era was cute, but it's about to be done. I leave you full eclipse (of clips) like the moon blocking the sun.”

Immortal Technique (1978) American rapper and activist

Industrial Revolution
Albums, Revolutionary Vol. 2 (2003)

Sun

“Why won't the king of Denmark leave us our names? We have done nothing against him. We deserve no less respect than he does. My forefathers were kings of land and sea... Our skalds composed poetry and told stories in the language of King Óðinn himself, who came from Ásgarður when Europe still spoke the language of slaves.”

Halldór Laxness (1902–1998) Icelandic author

Snæfríður
Íslandsklukkan (Iceland's Bell) (1946), Part III: Fire in Copenhagen

Sea

“My beloved brothers and sisters. On the globe, several incidents have occurred that make it necessary for us to speak about them, and guide the Muslims in their regard… It's important for us to know that as Muslims, we don't understand what part of Islam these people [terrorists] are following. In fact, we don't even understand what Islam they are following, because Islam is a totally different religion from what these people are practicing… As frustrated as we might be because of what might be happening on Muslim lands, it does not give us the right to go out and hurt people who are not at all involved… If you have a problem with someone, you may report them to the authorities. And then it will handled by the courts. You will either get justice at the courts or sometimes maybe the courts may find someone that you believe is guilty, innocent. In that case, you leave it for the day of judgment, when Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will be judge. But you do not take it into your own hands, to say now because the court has found this person innocent, and according to me the person is guilty, "Let me harm them, let me kill them, let me hurt them, let me rob from them". That is absolutely incorrect and it is un-Islamic… Two wrongs do not make a right, remember this… If someone has murdered someone else, Subhan Allah, it does not give us the right to murder a third party altogether. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protect us, and may Allah grant us guidance and ease. It's important we understand this. The world is bleeding today, and people are blaming the Muslims! Because from amongst us, some are being brainwashed. Brainwashed by what? They do not understand verses of the Quran. They don't understand the Asbab al-Nuzul, or reasons of the revelation of the verses of the Quran. They don't understand how to extract rules and regulations from verses of the Quran. They read something, someone shows them something and next thing they are prepared to give up their lives. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala grant us an understanding. We should be giving up our lives striving to earn the pleasure of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala through obedience, through Salah. Look at Muhammad sallā llāhu 'alay-hi wa-sallam when he went to Ta'if, look at his example. They beat him up personally, physically, he was bleeding and the angels came to him to say "If you want, we can crush these people between the mountains". What did he say? He said "I am sent as a mercy. We don't want that to happen. If they don't accept, perhaps their children will accept."”

Ismail ibn Musa Menk (1975) Muslim cleric and Grand Mufti of Zimbabwe.

Patience, Sabr... And we think that the non-Muslims are our enemies – the minute we think that, automatically we will not be able to call them towards Islam. And they will get the wrong image of Islam. My brothers and sisters, Islam, it means peace, it stands for peace, it promotes peace, it teaches peace, and everything that you will achieve is peace. In this world peace, in the next peace, in your grave peace, with your children peace, in your environment peace. That is Islam. Anything that destroys that in any way is not Islam. Remember this. "Islam Condemns Terrorism - Powerful Reminder - Mufti Ismail Menk" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6O2anxz7CM, YouTube (2015) Lectures

Children, People, Pleasure, World

“I lay awake wondering how I could pray for faith to a God I could not believe in without faith. That seemed to leave me suspended between two questions. These logical puzzles were generated spontaneously within my mind. They didn’t come from my school or my family. Most of my neighborhood friends were Protestants who were not interested in theories about God, apart from the fact that of course he existed.
I bought the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church lock, stock, and barrel, apart from the God problem.”

Roger Ebert (1942–2013) American film critic, author, journalist, and TV presenter

Source: Life Itself : A Memoir (2011), Ch. 54 : How I Believe In God

God, School, Family, Faith

“How do I love thee?
Let me count the days.
If there are 50 ways to leave your lover
then there are 50 ways to be left.”

Sheri-D Wilson (1958) Canadian Spoken Word Poet

"Heart"
Goddess Gone Fishing for a Map of the Universe (2012)

Love, Way, Lovers

“A young cowboy named Billy Joe grew restless on the farm;
A boy filled with wanderlust who really meant no harm.
He changed his clothes and shined his boots;
And combed his dark hair down.
And his mother cried as he walked out.Don't take your guns to town son;
Leave your guns at home Bill.
Don't take your guns to town.”

Johnny Cash (1932–2003) American singer-songwriter

Don't Take Your Guns to Town
Song lyrics, The Fabulous Johnny Cash (1958)

Home, Boy, Change, Clothes

“I say legalize marijuana because we have a chance to leave this world a better place for our children. Marijuana legalization is job creation, tax dollars, something to rejuvenate our pathetic economy. This is a multibillion-dollar industry. This is about jobs; this is about economics; this is about freedom. This is about taking our country back.”

Jesse Ventura (1951) American politician and former professional wrestler

Jesse Ventura's Marijuana Manifesto (2016), Introduction

Children, World, Freedom, Chance

“From the physical point of view the characteristic state of the living organism is that of an open system. A system is closed if no material enters or leaves it; it is open if there is import and export and, therefore, change of the components. Living systems are open systems, maintaining themselves in exchange of materials with environment, and in continuous building up and breaking down of their components.”

Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901–1972) austrian biologist and philosopher

Von Bertalanffy (1950) " The Theory of Open Systems in Physics and Biology http://vhpark.hyperbody.nl/images/a/aa/Bertalanffy-The_Theory_of_Open_Systems_in_Physics_and_Biology.pdf" In: Science, January 13, 1950, Vol. 111. p. 23 1950s

Change

“All the decades of deceit and cruelty have now reached an end. Saddam Hussein and his sons must leave Iraq within 48 hours. Their refusal to do so will result in military conflict, commenced at a time of our choosing.”

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

Ultimatum to Iraq (17 March 2003) http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/mar/18/iraq.usa1 2000s, 2003

Time

“How beautiful, how buoyant, and glad is morning! The first sunshine on the leaves: the first wind, laden with the first breath of the flowers-that deep sigh with which they seem to waken from sleep; the first dew, untouched even by the light foot of the early hare; the first chirping of the rousing birds, as if eager to begin song and flight; all is redolent of the strength given by rest, and the joy of conscious life.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

Heath's book of Beauty, 1833 (1832)

Life, Beauty, Flowers, Bird

“But if the U. S. were to leave and abandon Iraq without establishing the grounds for a united and sovereign country, that would definitely be a second mistake.”

Vladimir Putin (1952) President of Russia, former Prime Minister

After saying the US shouldn't have gone into Iraq in the first place CBS News http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/05/07/60minutes/main693705.shtml (May 2005) 2000 - 2005

Country

“I looked and it was not the Magistrate whom I saw, it was Vasudeva, it was Narayana who was sitting there on the bench. I looked at the Prosecuting Counsel and it was not the Counsel for the prosecution that I saw; it was Sri Krishna who sat there, it was my Lover and Friend who sat there and smiled. "Now do you fear?" He said, "I am in all men and I overrule their actions and their words. My protection is still with you and you shall not fear. This case which is brought against you, leave it in my hand. It is not for you. It was not for the trial that I brought you here but for something else. The case itself is only a means for my work and nothing more."”

Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) Indian nationalist, freedom fighter, philosopher, yogi, guru and poet

The Uttarpara Address (1909)

Men, Fear, Smile, Lovers

“Get up in the morning and you like your tea milky,
You fumble for your glasses coz without 'em you cant see,
It's funny how I come round your house and I'm 20
and I still have to wear all the presents you sent me.
I walk into your kitchen everything's got a label,
you done your Christmas shopping and we're only in April.
And you wont leave the house unless your wearing your thermals,
you're covered all in cat hair and you're stinking like Strepsils,
Your heading down the Bowls Club,
have another orange squash.
Balls are rollin rollin rollin.
You can't walk right coz things aren't what they were,
your ankles are swollen swollen swollen.”

Lily Allen (1985) English singer, songwriter, actress, and television presenter

Nan You're A Window Shopper
Song lyrics, Alright, Still (2006)

Cats, Christmas, Tea, Housing

“What can he do who lacks the necessary work, if he comes to be unemployed? He has nothing but to let himself die of hunger. Then a few phrases of pity will thrown on his cadaver. That's what I decided to leave to others. I preferred to make myself a black-marketer, forger, thief, murderer and assassin. I could have begged: it's degrading and cowardly and even punished by your laws that make a crime of poverty. If all those in need, instead of waiting, took wherever there was enough to be taken and by any means whatever, the satisfied would perhaps understand quicker that there is danger in trying to consecrate the current social condition, where worry is permanent and life threatened at every instant.”

Ravachol (1859–1892) French anarchist

Que peut-il faire celui qui manque du nécessaire en travaillant, s'il vient à chômer ? Il n'a qu'à se laisser mourir de faim. Alors on jettera quelques paroles de pitié sur son cadavre. C'est ce que j'ai voulu laisser à d'autres. J'ai préféré me faire contrebandier, faux-monnayeur, voleur, meurtrier et assassin. J'aurais pu mendier : c'est dégradant et lâche et même puni par vos lois qui font un délit de la misère. Si tous les nécessiteux, au lieu d'attendre, prenaient où il y a et par n'importe quel moyen, les satisfaits comprendraient peut-être plus vite qu'il y a danger à vouloir consacrer l'état social actuel, où l'inquiétude est permanente et la vie menacée à chaque instant.
Trial statement

Life, Hunger, Law, Understanding

“Something stirs that once had life. It drops
Into the stream, a last act of faith.
Seedballs of sycamore, incautious leaves of willow,
These have outstayed their autumn, teasing death
Only so far, not yet beyond all patience.
Now they let go.”

Donald Davidson (1893–1968) American poet, essayist, critic and author

Aunt Maria and the Gourds

Life, Autumn

“How important, therefore, to learn before leaving England to move man through God by prayer alone.”

James Hudson Taylor A Retrospect

(J. Hudson Taylor. A Retrospect. Philadelphia: China Inland Mission, n.d., 15).

God, Learning

“[The Taoist priest] said to Chia Jui, "This mirror was made by the Goddess of Disillusionment and is designed to cure diseases resulting from impure thoughts and self-destructive habits. It is intended for youths such as you. But do not look into the right side. Use only the reverse side of the mirror. I shall be back for it in three days and congratulate you on your recovery." He went away, refusing to accept any money.
Chia Jui took the mirror and looked into the reverse side as the Taoist had directed. He threw it down in horror, for he saw a gruesome skeleton staring at him through its hollow eyes. He cursed the Taoist for playing such a crude joke upon him. Then he thought he would see what was on the right side. When he did so, he saw Phoenix standing there and beckoning to him. Chia Jui felt himself wafted into a mirror world, wherein he fulfilled his desire. He woke up from his trance and found the mirror lying wrong side up, revealing the horrible skeleton. He felt exhausted from the experience that the more deceptive side of the mirror gave him, but it was so delicious that he could not resist the temptation of looking into the right side again. Again he saw Phoenix beckoning to him and again he yielded to the temptation. This happened three or four times. When he was about to leave the mirror on his last visit, he was seized by two men and put in chains.
"Just a moment, officers," Chia Jui pleaded. "Let me take my mirror with me."”

Wang Chi-chen (1899–2001)

These were his last words.
Source: Dream of the Red Chamber (1958), pp. 89–90

Men, Money, Youth, World

“There were always people searching for the Unmaker, for some awful destructive power outside themselves. Poor fools, they always thought that Destruction was merely destruction, they were using it and when they were done with it, they’d set to building. But you don’t build on a foundation of destruction. That’s the dark secret of the Unmaker, Alvin thought. Once he sets you to tearing down, it’s hard to get back to building, hard to get your own self back. The digger wears out the ground and the spade. And once you let yourself be a tool in the Unmaker’s hand, he’ll wear you out, he’ll tear you down, he’ll dull you and hole you and all the time you’ll be thining you’re so sharp and fine and bright and whole, and you never go till he lets go of you, lets you drop and fall. What’s that clatter? Why, that was me. That was me, sounding like a wore-out tool. What you leaving me for? I still got use left in me?
But you don’t, not when the Unmaker’s got you.”

Orson Scott Card (1951) American science fiction novelist

Source: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Alvin Journeyman (1995), Chapter 14.

People, Secret, Fools, Search

“Pity for poverty, enthusiasm for equality and freedom, recognition of social injustice and a desire to remove it, is not socialism. Condemnation of wealth and respect for poverty, such as we find in Christianity and other religions, is not socialism. The communism of early times, as it was before the existence of private property, and as it has at all times and among all peoples been the elusive dream of some enthusiasts, is not socialism. The forcible equalization advocated by the followers of Baboeuf, the so-called equalitarians, is not socialism. In all these appearances there is lacking the real foundation of capitalist society with its class antagonisms. Modern socialism is the child of capitalist society and its class antagonisms. Without these it could not be. Socialism and ethics are two separate things. This fact must be kept in mind. Whoever conceives of socialism in the sense of a sentimental philanthropic striving after human equality, with no idea of the existence of capitalist society, is no socialist in the sense of the class struggle, without which modern socialism is unthinkable. Whoever has come to a full consciousness of the nature of capitalist society and the foundation of modern socialism, knows also that a socialist movement that leaves the basis of the class struggle may be anything else, but it is not socialism.”

Wilhelm Liebknecht (1826–1900) German socialist politician

No Compromise – No Political Trading (1899)

People, Religion, Dreams, Communication

“An audience member: Question is for GG. Sir, if a woman is at your concert and chooses to leave through an exit door because she didn't realize she may be getting raped are you gonna let her leave or are you gonna rape her?”

GG Allin (1956–1993) American singer-songwriter

On The Jerry Springer Show

Question

“"The environment has to be balanced against the economy." This quote portrays environmental concerns as a luxury, views measures to solve environmental problems as incurring a net cost, and considers leaving environmental problems unsolved to be a money-saving device. This one-liner puts the truth exactly backwards. Environmental messes cost us huge sums of money both in the short run and in the long run; cleaning up or preventing those messes saves us huge sums in the long run, and often in the short run as well. In caring for the health of our surroundings, just as of our bodies, it is cheaper and preferable to avoid getting sick than to try to cure illnesses after they have developed.”

Jared Diamond book Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed

Source: Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (2005), Chapter "The world as a polder: what does it all mean to us today?", section "One-liner objections" (Penguin Books, 2011, page 503, .

Money, Health, Truth, Quotes

“Chorus [leader]: Come now, ye men, in nature darkling, like to the race of leaves, of little might, figures of clay, shadowy feeble tribes, wingless creatures of a day, miserable mortals, dream-like men.”

Aristophanés The Birds

tr. Hickie 1853, vol. 1, p. 338 http://books.google.com/books?id=Cm4NAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA338 Birds (414 BC)

Men, Dreams, Nature

“Bad dreams in the night.
They told me I was going to lose the fight,
Leave behind my wuthering, wuthering
Wuthering Heights.”

Kate Bush (1958) British recording artist; singer, songwriter, musician and record producer

Song lyrics, The Kick Inside (1978)

Dreams, Fight, Night

“History shows that whenever an emergency arises, our national spirit is most emphatically manifested to advance the prestige and fortune of the nation. It is incumbent upon us to leave no stone unturned in order to promote loyalty and bravery on the home front as well, and to replenish and demonstrate our nation's powers, for which are required the inculcation of the spirit of reverence for deities and respect for ancestors, the renovation of national education and the of the people's physical strength.”

Mitsumasa Yonai (1880–1948) Prime Minister of Japan

alternate version: History shows that, whenever an emergency arises, our national spirit is manifested most emphatically to advance the prestige and bring about the prosperity of the nation. Nor must we be negligent in any way in promoting a loyal and heroic spirit among the home-front population so that national strength may be augmented and given full play. For this purpose, such measures as the fostering of the spirit of piety and of honouring ancestors, the renovation of national education and the improvement of the people's physical strength.
Quoted in Nihon Gaiji Kyokai, Tokyo Gazette, p. 343. Also quoted in Daniel Clarence Holtom, Modern Japan and Shinto Nationalism (1963), p. 19.

People, Education, Home, History

“I find, by your Excellency's letter to General Sullivan, that you expect the enemy are going to evacuate New York, and that it is probable they are coming eastward. I can hardly think they mean to make an attempt upon Boston, notwithstanding the object is important; and, unless they attack Boston, there is no other object worthy their attention in New England. I am rather inclined to think they mean to leave the United States altogether. What they hold here now, they hold at a great risk and expense. But, suppose they actually intend to quit the Continent, they will endeavour to mislead our attention, and that of our allies, until they can get clear of the coast. The Admiral is fortifying for the security of his fleet; but I am told his batteries are all open in the rear, which will be but a poor security against a land force. General Heath thinks there ought to be some Continental troops sent here : but the Council will not turn out the militia; they are so confident the enemy are not coming here. If your Excellency thinks the enemy really design an attack upon Boston, it may not be useless for you to write your opinion to the Council Board, for I suspect they think the General here has taken the alarm without sufficient reasons. The fortifications round this place are very incomplete, and little or nothing doing upon them. I have given General Heath my opinion what parts to take possession of, if the enemy should attempt the place before the Continental army gets up. From four to five hundred troops have arrived at Halifax; their collective strength will make a formidable army.”

Nathanael Greene (1742–1786) American general in the American Revolutionary War

Letter to George Washington (September 1778)

Confidence, Thinking, Parting

“Giraffes do use their long necks to browse leaves, at the tops of acacia trees - but such current function, no matter how vital, does not prove that the neck originally evolved for this purpose. The neck may have first lengthened in context of a different use, and then been coopted for better dining when giraffes moved into the open plains. Or the neck may have evolved to perform several functions at once. We cannot learn the reasons for historical origin simply by listing current uses.”

Stephen Jay Gould book Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms

"The Tallest Tale", p. 317
Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms (1998)

Tree, Learning

“Breakaway, the breeze is sighin'
Breakaway, the time is flyin'
So, I'm gonna pack a bag and get my coat
Lock my door and leave a note
Take a train or take a boat
Well, I'm gonna breakaway.”

Tom Springfield (1934) English musician, songwriter and record producer

Song Breakaway.

Time, Training

“He saw a tree in a backyard, its branches tortured among electric wires and clotheslines, its leaves dry and shriveled before they were fully out. Low in the sky, dark clouds heralded the storm.”

Gabrielle Roy book The Tin Flute

Source: The Tin Flute (1945), P. 383.

Tree

“It is the basics that are most important. Never leave this foundation. From this, an incredible depth is to be found - an ongoing revelation of the truth of existence.”

Adyashanti (1962) Spiritual teacher

The Basic Teachings - Part 2: Application of the Teaching (2009)

Truth

“He who is infatuated with Man leaves persons out of account so far as that infatuation extends, and floats in an ideal, sacred interest. Man, you see, is not a person, but an ideal, a spook.”

Max Stirner book The Ego and Its Own

Dover 2005, p. 79
The Ego and Its Own (1845)

Personality

“…“progress”, in poetry at least, comes not so much from digesting the last age as from rejecting it altogether (or, rather, from eating a little and leaving a lot), and…the world’s dialectic is a sort of neo-Hegelian one in which one progresses not by resolving contradictions but by ignoring them.”

Randall Jarrell (1914–1965) poet, critic, novelist, essayist

“From That Island”, p. 30
Kipling, Auden & Co: Essays and Reviews 1935-1964 (1980)

Age, World

“Nature is like parting a curtain, you go into it. I want to draw a certain response like this.... that quality of response from people when they leave themselves behind, often experienced in nature, an experience of simple joy... My paintings are about merging, about formlessness... A world without objects, without interruption.”

Agnes Martin (1912–2004) American artist

Ann Wilson, from her talks in the Summer of 1972 at Agnes Martin's home in Mexico - an unpublished document; as quoted in Agnes Martin: Her Life and Art, Chapter 7 - 'Departures', Nancy Princenthal; Thames and Hudson, New York, p. 195-196
Wilson's visit to Cuba in Mexico was to work towards the publication accompanying Martin's exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia in 1973, curated by Suzanne Delehanty
1970's

People, World, Nature, Joy

“The different pieces of evidence did not constitute so many neutral elements, until such time as they could be gathered together into a single body of evidence that would bring the final certainty of guilt. Each piece of evidence aroused a particular degree of abomination. Guilt did not begin when all the evidence was gathered together; piece by piece, it was constituted by each of the elements that made it possible to recognize a guilty person. Thus a semi-proof did not leave the suspect innocent until such time as it was completed; it made him semi-guilty; slight evidence of a serious crime marked someone as slightly criminal. In short, penal demonstration did not obey a dualistic system: true or false; but a principle of continuous gradation; a degree reached in the demonstration already formed a degree of guilt and consequently involved a degree of punishment.”

Michel Foucault book Discipline and Punish

Source: Discipline and Punish (1977), Chapter One, The body of the condemned, pp.23

Time, Personality, Falseness

“Ladies and gentlemen, it is with no ordinary feelings, I assure you, that I rise on this occasion to thank you for the very flattering manner in which you have received the last toast, and for the good wishes expressed therein. I cannot look around me, and see this vast assemblage of my friends and workpeople, without being moved. I feel gratified at this day's proceedings; I also feel greatly honoured by the presence of the nobleman at my side. I am more than all delighted at the presence of this vast assemblage of my workpeople. Perhaps it may be permitted me to remark that ten or twelve years ago I was looking forward to this day (on which I complete my his fiftieth year) as the period when I hoped to retire from business and enjoy myself in agricultural pursuits, which would be quite congenial to my mind and inclination. As the time drew near, looking at my large family (five of them being sons) I reversed that decision, and resolved to proceed a little longer and remain at the head of the firm. Having thus determined, I at once made up my mind to leave Bradford. I did not like to be a party to increasing that already overcrowded borough, but I looked around for a site suitable for a large manufacturing establishment, and I fixed upon this, as offering every capability for a first rate manufacturing and commercial establishment. It is also, from the beauty of its situation, and the salubrity of the air, a most desirable place for the erection of dwellings. Far be it from me to do anything to pollute the air or the water of the district. I shall do my utmost to avoid these evils, and I have no doubt of being successful. I hope to draw around me a population that will enjoy the beauties of this neighbourhood—a population of well paid, contented, happy operatives. I have given instructions to my architects (who are competent to carry them out) that nothing shall be spared to render the dwellings of the operatives a pattern to the country, and if my life is spared by Divine Providence, I hope to see satisfaction, contentment, and happiness around me.”

Titus Salt (1803–1876) English industrialist and philanthropist

The speech he made to the 3,500 guests (including his workers) at the banquet on 1853-09-20, which he held to celebrate both his fiftieth birthday and the opening of his new factory at Saltaire. [Inauguration of the works at Saltaire, The Bradford Observer, 1853-09-22, 8, http://find.galegroup.com/bncn/retrieve.do?sgHitCountType=None&orientation=&scale=0.33&sort=DateAscend&docLevel=FASCIMILE&prodId=BNCN&tabID=T012&subjectParam=Locale%2528en%252C%252C%2529%253ALQE%253D%2528jn%252CNone%252C17%2529Bradford%2BObserver%253AAnd%253ALQE%253D%2528da%252CNone%252C10%252909%252F22%252F1853%2524&resultListType=RESULT_LIST&searchId=R2&searchType=BasicSearchForm&currentPosition=11&qrySerId=Locale%28en%2C%2C%29%3ALQE%3D%28jn%2CNone%2C17%29Bradford+Observer%3AAnd%3ALQE%3D%28da%2CNone%2C10%2909%2F22%2F1853%24&subjectAction=DISPLAY_SUBJECTS&retrieveFormat=MULTIPAGE_DOCUMENT&enlarge=&bucketSubId=&inPS=true&userGroupName=brad&hilite=y&docPage=article&nav=prev&sgCurrentPosition=0&docId=R3207957429, 2012-06-07 (subscription site)]
A slightly edited version (in the third person) appears in [Holroyd, Abraham, 1873, 2000, Saltaire and its Founder, Piroisms Press, ISBN 0-9538601-0-8, 14-15]

Life, Happiness, Family, Beauty

“As I came into the Quarter-master's department with reluctance, so I shall leave it with pleasure. Your influence brought me in, and the want of your approbation will induce me to go out. I am very sensible of many deficiens, but this is not so justly chargeable to my intentions, as to the difficult circumstances attending the business. It is almost impossible to get good men for the con ducting all parts of so complex a business. It may, therefore, naturally be expected that many things will wear an unfavorable complexion; but, let who will undertake the business, they will find it very difficult, not to say impossible, to regulate it in such a manner as not to leave a door open for censure, and furnish a handle for reproach.”

Nathanael Greene (1742–1786) American general in the American Revolutionary War

Letter to George Washington (July 1778)

Men, Pleasure, Business, Nature

“Science Digest asked me to see the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind and write an article for them on the science it contained. I saw the picture and was appalled. I remained appalled even after a doctor’s examination had assured me that no internal organs had been shaken loose by its ridiculous soundwaves. (If you can’t be good, be loud, some say, and Close Encounters was very loud.) … Hollywood must deal with large audiences, most of whom are utterly unfamiliar with good science fiction. It has to bend to them, meet them at least half-way. Fully appreciating that, I could enjoy Planet of the Apes and Star Wars. Star Wars was entertainment for the masses and did not try to be anything more. Leave your sophistication at the door, get into the spirit, and you can have a fun ride. … Seeing a rotten picture for the special effects is like eating a tough steak for the smothered onions, or reading a bad book for the dirty parts. Optical wizardry is something a movie can do that a book can’t but it is no substitute for a story, for logic, for meaning. It is ornamentation, not substance. In fact, whenever a science fiction picture is praised overeffusively for its special effects, I know it’s a bad picture. Is that all they can find to talk about?”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

"Editorial: The Reluctant Critic", in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, Vol. 2, Issue 6, (12 November 1978) https://archive.org/stream/Asimovs_v02n06_1978-11-12/ General sources

War, Books, Way, Star

“But these things are often unknown to the world; for there is much pain that is quite noiseless; and vibrations that make human agonies are often a mere whisper in the roar of hurrying existence. There are glances of hatred that stab and raise no cry of murder; robberies that leave man or woman for ever beggared of peace and joy, yet kept secret by the sufferer – committed to no sound except that of low moans in the night, seen in no writing except that made on the face by the slow months of suppressed anguish and early morning tears. Many an inherited sorrow that has marred a life has been breathed in no human ear.”

George Eliot book Felix Holt, the Radical

Introductory chapter (at page 11-12 – page numbers per the 'Wordsworth Classics' edition 1997.)
Felix Holt, the Radical (1866)

Life, Pain, Secret, World

“To ignore social costs because they require an evaluation by society… and to leave social losses out of account because they are 'external' and 'non-economic' in character, would be equivalent to attributing no or ‘zero’ value to all social damages which is no less arbitrary and subjective a judgement than any positive or negative evaluation of social costs.”

Karl William Kapp (1910–1976) American economist

Source: Social Costs of Business Enterprise, 1963, p. 12. Cited in: M. Rangone & S. Solari (2012) "Southern European capitalism and the social costs of business enterprise". in: Studi e Note di Economia, Anno XVII, n. 1-2012, pp. 3-28

Loss

“I shut my eyes and clenched my hands behind me and saw, in lightning flashes, myself doing ferocious things, like pushing him down an endless flight of stairs, or dropping him without warning into a bottomless well, or stringing him up to a stout beam and leaving him to dangle, or — or other things of the sort; no guns, no knives, no baseball bats, nothing to cause outright bloodshed, just silent, grim, sudden murder by hand was my intention. All this was far beyond my bodily powers of course, and I like to believe beyond my criminal powers too. For I woke when we struck the searing hot light of the August morning as if I had come out of a nightmare, horrified at my own thoughts and feeling as if I had got some incurable wound to my very humanity — as indeed I had. However inflicted, a wound there was, with painful scar tissue, left upon my living self by that appalling event. My conscience stirs as if, in my impulse to do violence to my enemy, I had assisted at his crime.”

Katherine Anne Porter (1890–1980) American journalist, essayist, short story writer, novelist, and political activist

The Never-Ending Wrong (1977)

Pain, Feeling, Light

“It is also a fact that people who are isolated and alienated in their neighborhoods as a result of the large number of neighbors who do not speak Norwegian, who do not follow the Norwegian customs, norms and way of life, could have psychosomatic disorders that can lead to both sickness leave and need for medical help.”

Carl I. Hagen (1944) Norwegian politician

Comment on the basis of the so-called immigrant account by MP Øystein Hedstrøm, election campaign in 1995, reproduced in the book Kong Carl (p. 267).

Life, People, Way, Help

“Centuries ago, sailors on long voyages used to leave a pair of pigs on every deserted island. Or they'd leave a pair of goats. Either way, on any future visit, the island would be a source of meat. These islands, they were pristine. These were home to breeds of birds with no natural predators. Breeds of birds that lived nowhere else on earth. The plants there, without enemies they evolved without thorns or poisons. Without predators and enemies, these islands, they were paradise. The sailors, the next time they visited these islands, the only things still there would be herds of goats or pigs. …. Does this remind you of anything? Maybe the ol' Adam and Eve story? …. You ever wonder when God's coming back with a lot of barbecue sauce?”

Chuck Palahniuk book Lullaby

Source: Lullaby (2002), Chapter 23

God, Way, Home, Nature

“A god that created the world and then walked off the site leaving it to its own devices is not a fit object of worship, nor a source of moral authority.”

Simon Blackburn (1944) British academic philosopher

Source: Think (1999), Chapter Five, God, p. 169

God, World

“It would be obviously unfair to describe the Chinese people as wanting in humour simply because they are tickled by jests which leave us comparatively unmoved. Few of our own most amusing stories will stand conversion into Chinese terms.”

Herbert Giles book A History of Chinese Literature

"Wit and Humour", p. 430
A History of Chinese Literature (1901)

People

“PROUN alters the conventional forms of the arts and leaves behind the image of the petty individualist, who locked himself in his office and hid seated before a drawing easel, starting one picture and finishing another.
The future life — this is the reinforced concrete slab for the communist foundation of the nations of the entire world. With the aid of the PROUN one can build a unified city-commune on that foundation, intended for the life of all mankind.”

El Lissitsky (1890–1941) Soviet artist, designer, photographer, teacher, typographer and architect

1915 - 1925, Theses on the 'PROUN': from painting to architecture' (1920)

Life, World, Art, Communication

“The man who tells the tale if he has a tale worth telling will know exactly what he is about and this business of the artist as a sort of starry-eyed inspired creature, dancing along, with his feet two or three feet above the surface of the earth, not really knowing what sort of prints he's leaving behind him, is nothing like the truth.”

William Golding (1911–1993) British novelist, poet, playwright and Nobel Prize for Literature laureate

Interview with Frank Kermode, BBC Third Programme (28 April 1959)

Truth, Business, Dance

“Let the mind of man be blind to coming doom; he fears, but leave him hope.”
Sit caeca futuri mens hominum fati; liceat sperare timenti.

Marcus Annaeus Lucanus book Pharsalia

Book II, line 14 (tr. J. D. Duff).
Pharsalia

Fear, Hope

“I saw every performance Nijinsky danced in New York, and I see every baseball game I can get to. You watch a good second baseman digging for a badly thrown ball without letting his foot leave base and it's the same beautiful impossibility as a good pas de deux in Swan Lake.”

Rex Stout (1886–1975) American writer

Life, "Author Rex Stout vs. the F.B.I."

Beauty, Game, Dance

“This reminds one of the story of two eminent surgeons who were leaving the operation room, and one turned to the other and said, 'That was a close one, one inch either way and I would have been out of my speciality.”

Peter de Noronha (1897–1970) Indian businessman

The Pageant of Life (1964), On Doctors

Way

“I am tired of the warmakers making war with our children. I am tired of our tired troops being sent over to do the dirty work for mob bosses who are going to squeeze the life out of Iraq and not leave until every asset and every natural resource has been raped from the country. I am tired of seeing Iraqis burying their loved ones and hearing the reverberating screams of mothers all over our country who are being destroyed for the benefit of a very few.”

Cindy Sheehan (1957) American antiwar activist

Blog entry http://cindy-sheehan.org/2007/01/15/insanity-surge/, January 15, 2007 2007

Love, Life, War, Children

“The hardest strokes of heaven fall in history upon those who imagine that they can control things in a sovereign manner, as though they were kings of the earth, playing Providence not only for themselves but for the far future—reaching out into the future with the wrong kind of far-sightedness, and gambling on a lot of risky calculations in which there must never be a single mistake. And it is a defect in such enthusiasts that they seem unwilling to leave anything to Providence, unwilling even to leave the future flexible, as one must do; and they forget that in any case, for all we know, our successors may decide to switch ideals and look for a different utopia before any of our long shots have reached their objective, or any of our long-range projects have had fulfillment. It is agreeable to all the processes of history, therefore, that each of us should rather do the good that is straight under our noses. Those people work more wisely who seek to achieve good in their own small corner of the world and then leave the leaven to leaven the whole lump, than those who are for ever thinking that life is vain unless one can act through the central government, carry legislation, achieve political power and do big things.”

Herbert Butterfield (1900–1979) British historian

Christianity and History (1949), p. 104.

Life, People, World, Imagination

“I'm not as klutzy as I used to be… I've had visual therapy and all kinds of things to help, but I still wrap my purse around chair legs when I stand up to leave. I do ridiculous things on camera because I do them in my life all the time.”

Shelley Long (1949) actress

Quoted in "Funny Ladies: The Best Humor from America's Funniest Women", p. 7 http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=KOVGUVYj2XUC&pg=PA7&dq=%22I'm+not+as+klutzy+as+I+used+to+be%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Jfz6Tt78KpSm8gPfwpXeCA&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22I'm%20not%20as%20klutzy%20as%20I%20used%20to%20be%22&f=false

Life, Time, Help

“The great in Evil, and the great in [Goodness|Good]]—both leave an immortal residue.”

Michael Shea book Nifft the Lean

Part 3, Chapter 12 (p. 181)
Nifft the Lean (1982)

Evil

“What's so good about goodbye?
All it does is make you cry.
Well, if leaving causes grieving,
And depart can break you heart,

Tell me (what's so good about it)
I could have done without it.
What's so good about goodbye?”

Smokey Robinson (1940) American R&B singer-songwriter and record producer

What's So Good About Goodbye (1961)
Song lyrics, With The Miracles

Heart, Cry

“Don Donald was clearly accustomed to addressing people whose only way of responding was to nod worshipfully and take notes. He did not, in other words, leave a lot of breaks in his testimony to allow for discussion. For the moment, that was fine, since it made it easier for Richard to drink.”

Neal Stephenson book Reamde

Day 2
Reamde (2011), Part I: Nine Dragons

People, Way, Drink

“I have impressed upon you my preoccupation with earning money so as to have a secure existence over there. That's the way it have to be… I am very happy to hear that you [ Walter Pach ] sold these canvasses for me and thank you very sincerely for your friendship. But I am afraid of getting to the stage of needing to sell canvases, In a word, of being a painter for a living. – So I'll be leaving probably on the 22nd or rather 29th May [1915], if the police authorities allow me to take the steamer.”

Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968) French painter and sculptor

Quote in Duchamp's letter to Walter Pach, Paris 27 April 1915; as quoted in The Duchamp Book, ed. Gavin Parkinson, Tate Publishing, London 2008 p. 157
1915 - 1925

Money, Friendship, Happiness, Way

“While you’re playing cards with a regular guy or having a bite to eat with him, he seems a peaceable, good-humoured and not entirely dense person. But just begin a conversation with him about something inedible, politics or science, for instance, and he ends up in a deadend or starts in on such an obtuse and base philosophy that you can only wave your hand and leave.”

Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) Russian dramatist, author and physician

Ionych (1898)

Guy, Science, Personality

“With his superior knowledge the entity must leave hands off. His, the entity’s, only hope is to allow the personality complete independence, for it is the personality who understands more clearly than he the conditions of the particular plane upon which he existence happens. There is here no puppet, and there is no hand that moves the strings. If there were you see, you would indeed have a much more perfect world, but you would not have that one built-in prerequisite: complete as possible existence within all facets, and manipulation within all facets, of a given plane.”

Jane Roberts (1929–1984) American Writer

Session 95, Page 63
The Early Sessions: Sessions 1-42, 1997, The Early Sessions: Book 3

World, Hope, Understanding, Knowledge

“A special button transfers him immediately to the first page of the index. Any given book of his library can thus be called up and consulted with far greater facility than if it were taken from a shelf. As he has several projection positions, he can leave one item in position while he calls up another.”

Vannevar Bush book As We May Think

As We May Think (1945)

Books

“We are alike in many ways, you and I. There is a darkness in us. Darkness, pain, death. They radiate from us. If ever you love a woman, Rand, leave her and let her find another. It will be the best gift you can give her.”

Robert Jordan (1948–2007) American writer

al'Lan Mandragoran to Rand al'Thor
(15 October 1993)

Love, Death, Pain, Way

“Temple, who was driving, suddenly faltered and wept. “I’ve read that libraries are where immortality lies.... I don’t want my thoughts to die with me.... I want to have done something.... I’m not interested in power, or piles of money. I want to leave something behind. I want to make a positive contribution—know that my life has meaning. Right now, I’m talking about things at the very core of my existence.” I was stunned. As I stepped out of the car to say goodbye, I said, “I’m going to hug you. I hope you don’t mind.””

Oliver Sacks (1933–2015) British neurologist and writer

I hugged her—and (I think) she hugged me back.
An Anthropologist On Mars, The New Yorker, 27 December 1993

Life, Money, Hope, Cars

“One of the most dangerous words is 'extremist'. A person who commits acts of violence is not an 'extremist'; he is a criminal. If he commits those acts of violence with the object of detaching part of the territory of the United Kingdom and attaching it to a foreign country, he is an enemy under arms. There is the world of difference between a citizen who commits a crime, in the belief, however mistaken, that he is thereby helping to preserve the integrity of his country and his right to remain a subject of his sovereign, and a person, be he citizen or alien, who commits a crime with the intention of destroying that integrity and rendering impossible that allegiance. The former breaches the peace; the latter is executing an act of war. The use of the word 'extremist' of either or both conveys a dangerous untruth: it implies that both hold acceptable opinions and seek permissible ends, only that they carry them to 'extremes'. Not so: the one is a lawbreaker; the other is an enemy.

The same purpose, that of rendering friend and foe indistinguishable, is achieved by references to the 'impartiality' of the British troops and to their function as 'keeping the peace'. The British forces are in Northern Ireland because an avowed enemy is using force of arms to break down lawful authority in the province and thereby seize control. The army cannot be 'impartial' towards an enemy, nor between the aggressor and the aggressed: they are not glorified policemen, restraining two sets of citizens who might otherwise do one another harm, and duty bound to show no 'partiality' towards one lawbreaker rather than another. They are engaged in defeating an armed attack upon the state. Once again, the terminology is designed to obliterate the vital difference between friend and enemy, loyal and disloyal.

Then there are the 'no-go' areas which have existed for the past eighteen months. It would be incredible, if it had not actually happened, that for a year and a half there should be areas in the United Kingdom where the Queen's writ does not run and where the citizen is protected, if protected at all, by persons and powers unknown to the law. If these areas were described as what they are—namely, pockets of territory occupied by the enemy, as surely as if they had been captured and held by parachute troops—then perhaps it would be realised how preposterous is the situation. In fact the policy of refraining from the re-establishment of civil government in these areas is as wise as it would be to leave enemy posts undisturbed behind one's lines.”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

Speech to the South Buckinghamshire Conservative Women's Annual Luncheon in Beaconsfield (19 March 1971), from Reflections of a Statesman. The Writings and Speeches of Enoch Powell (London: Bellew, 1991), pp. 487-488.
1970s

War, World, Peace, Law

“You will be home before the leaves fall from the trees.”

Wilhelm II, German Emperor (1859–1941) German Emperor and King of Prussia

Addressing German soldiers departing for the front in WWI (August 1914), as quoted in The Chanak Affair (1969) by David Walder, p. 21
1910s
Variant: You men will be home when the leaves fall.

Home, Tree

“With a smile of joy and gladness, with a look of exultation, as of one who in a vision what is to be, but it is not, stood and waited Hiawatha. Toward the sun his hands were lifted both the palms spread out toward it and, between departed fingers, felt the sunshine on his features. Flecked with light his naked shoulders, as it falls and flecks an oak-tree through the rifted leaves and branches.”

Mike Oldfield (1953) English musician, multi-instrumentalist

Song lyrics, Incantations (1978)

Smile, Tree, Light, Waiting

“I am the kind of guy who believes that films are supposed to be entertainment. I do not subscribe much to movies that leave you with a lingering feeling, make you feel angry or depressed. I am not yet ready to make films like that. I have grown up with films that are entertaining. Since I am such a huge fan of entertainment, I believe that the films that I do should also be entertaining, people can talk about it for three days and forget about it.”

R. Madhavan (1970) Indian actor

Interview, "Sify Movies", 30 Aug 2005 http://www.sify.com/movies/bollywood/interview.php?id=13928252&cid=2398

People, Guy, Feeling, Forgetting

“Maybe he is the Mark Twain of the late twentieth century. Time will sort the bastard out and I leave it to others more qualified than me to assess and appraise his monumental literary legacy.”

Ralph Steadman book The Joke's Over

Introduction, p. 3
The Joke's Over (2006)

Time

“Oh well dreams can come true
if you know inside you really want them to
or you can sit you can wait
you can leave your fate in someone elses hands.”

James Morrison (1984) English singer-songwriter and guitarist

If The Rain Must Fall
Song lyrics, Undiscovered (James Morrison album) (2006)

Fate, Dreams, Waiting

“Well, that's it. Two days ago I was a law student. Today I'm an untitled nobody. Thanks, Jim, for the intercession on my behalf. Don't let up. And brother, I'm really praying for you too as you're making preparation to leave. I only wish I were going with you.”

Ed McCully (1927–1956) American Christian missionary

Letter to Jim Elliot during his time as a law student and working as a hotel night clerk (22 September 1950) http://toeverytribeblog.com/2010/09/whats-with-the-name-of-this-blog.

Law