Quotes about making
page 9

“It (Islam) was the first religion that preached and practiced democracy; for, in the mosque, when the call for prayer is sounded and worshippers are gathered together, the democracy of Islam is embodied five times a day when the peasant and king kneel side by side and proclaim: ‘God Alone is Great’… I have been struck over and over again by this indivisible unity of Islam that makes man instinctively a brother.”

Sarojini Naidu (1879–1949) Indian politician, governor of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh from 1947 to 1949

[The Ideals of Islam, 13 February 2014, Madras, 1918, p. 167]

God, Religion, Democracy, Time

“If someone listens to our music, and it makes them creative, that makes me happier than anything. But with our music, we try to teach the masses of fans that not everything is as it seems.”

Marilyn Manson (1969) American rock musician and actor

As quoted in Huh (10 October 1996).
1990s

Music

“If you want to make peace, you don't talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies.”

Moshe Dayan (1915–1981) Israeli military leader and politician

As quoted in Newsweek (17 October 1977)

Peace, Peaceful

“A man might say, "The things that are in the world are what God has made…. Why should I not love what God has made?"…Suppose, my brethren, a man should make for his betrothed a ring, and she should prefer the ring given her to the betrothed who made it for her, would not her heart be convicted of infidelity?… God has given you all these things: therefore, love him who made them.”

Aurelius Augustinus (354–430) early Christian theologian and philosopher

Second Homily, as translated by John Burnaby (1955), pp. 275-276
Ten Homilies on the First Epistle of John (414)

Love, God, World, Heart

“I've got no time to look back, I've got no time to see
The pieces of my heart that have been ripped away from me.
And if the feeling starts to coming, I've learned to stop 'em fast
Because I don't know, if I let 'em go, they might not wanna pass.
And there's just so many people trying to get me on the phone
And there's bills to pay, and songs to play
And a house to make a home.
I guess I'm older now and I've got no time to cry.”

Iris DeMent (1961) American singer and songwriter

No Time to Cry
Song lyrics, My Life (1994)

People, Feeling, Home, Learning

“Control over the use of one's ideas really constitutes control over other people's lives; and it is usually used to make their lives more difficult.”

Richard Stallman (1953) American software freedom activist, short story writer and computer programmer, founder of the GNU project

1980s, GNU Manifesto (1985)

People, Idea

“In any country there must be people who have to die. They are the sacrifices any nation has to make to achieve law and order.”

Idi Amin (1925–2003) third president of Uganda

Quoted in Morrow's International Dictionary of Contemporary Quotations, 1982, Jonathon Green.
Attributed

People, Law, Country

“All around us there are other women, seemingly not hurt, making small talk, acting normal, which means happy, not discontent, certainly not devastated. Girls are still being socialised not to identify with - feel empathy for - other females: she got hurt because she did x, y, z - I didn’t, so I didn’t get hurt; she’s at fault, I’m not; the punishment fits her crime; blame her, exonerate him. This continuing, culturally applauded socialisation of women not to empathize with other women is a malignant part of the culture of men, dead white ones or not. Women are perceived to be appalling failures when we are sad. Women are pathetic when we are angry. Women are ridiculous when we are militant. Women are unpleasant when we are bitter, no matter what the cause. Women are deranged when women want justice. Women are man-haters when women want accountability and respect from men. Women are trash when women let men do what men want Women are shrews or puritans when we do not.”

Andrea Dworkin (1946–2005) Feminist writer

‘Suffering and Speech’ in Catherine A MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin (eds) In Harm’s Way: The Pornography Civil Rights Hearings.

Women, Men, Happiness, Sadness

“Unless we make revolutionary reforms, some day — in some unknown serra — some unknown Fidel Castro will rise up in Brazil.”

Jânio Quadros (1917–1992) Brazilian politician

To his cabinet
"One Man's Cup of Coffee," Time Magazine profile (June 30, 1961)

“As soon as a true thought has entered our mind, it gives a light which makes us see a crowd of other objects which we have never perceived before.”

François-René de Chateaubriand (1768–1848) French writer, politician, diplomat and historian

Aussitôt qu'une pensée vraie est entrée dans notre esprit, elle jette une lumière qui nous fait voir une foule d'autres objets que nous n'apercevions pas auparavant.
As quoted in A Dictionary of Thoughts: Being a Cyclopedia of Laconic Quotations from the Best Authors of the World, both Ancient and Modern (1908) by Tyron Edwards.

Light

“There is only one way to make money at writing, and that is to marry a publisher's daughter.”

George Orwell book Down and Out in Paris and London

Source: Down and out in Paris and London (1933), Ch. 4; a record of a remark by Orwell's fellow tramp Boris

Money, Way, Daughters

“Bourgeois scientists make sure that their theories are not dangerous to God or Capital.”

Georgi Plekhanov (1856–1918) Russian revolutionary

The Faber Book of Aphorisms, W. H. Auden and Louis Kronenberger (ed.), p. 261.
Attributed

God

“It is not lack of self-restraint but care for others which makes me dine in Lent before the hour of evening.”

Charlemagne (748–814) King of the Franks, King of Italy, and Holy Roman Emperor

Quoted in Notker's The Deeds of Charlemagne (translated 2008 by David Ganz)

“That’s what I wanted to do. You know, 2 hours. It’s like long-distance running or playing in a football game when you totally run out of steam and the moves you make after you run out of steam, because you’re totally unselfconscious, you’re not even thinking about the mechanics anymore. The moves you make then are incredible.”

Jeff Buckley (1966–1997) American singer, guitarist and songwriter

From Grace EPK (Electronic Press Kit)

Game, Thinking, Football

“A God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice, and invented hell — mouths mercy, and invented hell — mouths Golden Rules and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people, and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites his poor abused slave to worship him!”

Mark Twain book The Mysterious Stranger

The Mysterious Stranger (1916)

Life, God, Happiness, Children

“No need to repeat the blasphemous comments which everyone who had known Gran'pa Comstock made on that last sentence. But it is worth pointing out that the chunk of granite on which it was inscribed weighed close on five tons and was quite certainly put there with the intention, though not the conscious intention, of making sure that Gran'pa Comstock shouldn't get up from underneath it. If you want to know what a dead man's relatives really think of him, a good rough test is the weight of his tombstone.”

George Orwell book Keep the Aspidistra Flying

Source: Keep the Aspidistra Flying (1936), Ch. 3

Thinking, Dead

“If we judge from Islamic history, there is much to encourage us. For century after century, the Arabs, the Persians, the Turks and many other Islamic societies achieved powerful leadership roles in the world — not only politically and economically but also intellectually… The fundamental reason for the pre-eminence of Islamic civilizations lay neither in accidents of history nor in acts of war, but rather in their ability to discover new knowledge, to make it their own, and to build constructively upon it. They became the Knowledge Societies of their time.”

Aga Khan IV (1936) 49th and current Imam of Nizari Ismailism

Address by His Highness the Aga Khan to the 2006 Convocation of the Aga Khan University, Karachi, Pakistan (2 December 2006)]

War, World, History, Knowledge

“Dismissing poetry is dismissing the glory of the imagination. Teaching English to adolescents for twenty years gives me the authority to say, "Kill the imagination and you kill the soul. Kill the soul and you're left with a listless, apathetic creature who can become hopeless or brutal or both. Kill the metaphor and you kill desire; the image magnetizes the movement of the energy." I will make this clear as I speak. The tax money that is being withdrawn from arts programs in schools will be spent on prisons.”

Marion Woodman (1928–2018) Canadian writer

Source: Bone: Dying into Life (2000), p. 165

Money, School, Art, Soul

“With such confusions, don't it make you wanna scream?
Your bash abusing victimize within the scheme,
You try to cope with every lie they scrutinize,
Oh, brother, please have mercy,
'Cause I just can't take it!”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

HIStory: Past, Present & Future, Book I (1995)

Lie

“Tell me, why do you have to go and make things so complicated? I see the way you're acting like you're somebody else; get's me frustrated. Life's like this: You fall and you crawl and you break and you take what you get and you turn it into. Honestly, you promised me I'm never going to find you faking. No, no! No!”

Avril Lavigne (1984) Canadian singer-songwriter and actress

"Complicated"
Let Go (2002)

Life, Way

“Until you dig a hole, you plant a tree, you water it and make it survive, you haven't done a thing. You are just talking.”

Wangari Maathai (1940–2011) Kenyan environmental and political activist

Speech at Goldman Awards, San Francisco (24 April 2006)

Tree, Water

“The NSA has the greatest surveillance capabilities that we've ever seen in history. Now, what they will argue, is that they don't use this for nefarious purposes against American citizens. In some ways, that's true but the real problem is that they're using these capabilities to make us vulnerable to them and then saying, 'well I have a gun pointed at your head. I'm not going to pull the trigger. Trust me.”

Edward Snowden (1983) American whistleblower and former National Security Agency contractor

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Government Surveillance (HBO) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEVlyP4_11M&feature=youtu.be&t=1048, 2016

Way, History, Problem

“Everything makes sense a bit at a time. But when you try to think of it all at once, it comes out wrong.”

Terry Pratchett book Only You Can Save Mankind

Only You Can Save Mankind (1992)

Thinking, Sense, Time

“As a nation-state, Iran has no problems with anybody. As a vehicle for the Khomeinist ideology it has problems with everybody, starting with the Iranian people. The Khomeinist regime makes no secret of its intense hatred for Iranian culture, which it claims has roots in “the age of ignorance” (jahiliyyah). To admire this regime because of Iranian culture is like admiring Hitler for Goethe and Beethoven and praising Stalin for Pushkin and Tchaikovsky. This regime has executed tens of thousands of Iranians, driven almost 6 million into exile, and deprived the nation of its basic freedoms. It has also killed more Americans, often through surrogates, than al Qaeda did on 9/11. Not a single day has passed without this regime holding some American hostages. Iran as a nation is a solid friend of America. Iran as a vehicle for the Khomeinist revolution is an eternal enemy of “The Great Satan.” The only realistic strategy for the United States would be to help it stop being the Islamic Republic and become Iran again. President Obama’s policy, however, points in the opposite direction. He has made it harder for the Iranian people to regain their human rights.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

What US leaders have never understood about Iran http://nypost.com/2015/07/19/what-us-leaders-have-never-understood-about-iran/, New York Post (July 19, 2015). New York Post

People, Secret, Age, Problem

“I only hope that people enjoy viewing the film I’ve enjoyed making. I don’t know whether the film we’ve made is commercial or not, whether it’s good or not, but I do know that we’ve made it honestly and that we've enjoyed making it. I just hope it has turned out to be the film we had set out to make.”

Shahrukh Khan (1965) Indian actor, producer and television personality

From interview with Komal Nahta

People, Hope

“How can you know if you are in the truth? The criterion is simple enough: if others make a vacuum around you, there is not a doubt in the world that you are closer to the essential than they are.”

Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist

Drawn and Quartered (1983)

Truth, World

“[A] world in which it is wrong to murder an individual civilian and right to drop a thousand tons of high explosive on a residential area does sometimes make me wonder whether this earth of ours is not a loony bin made use of by some other planet.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

As I Please (1943–1947)

World

“To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Sometimes attributed to Lincoln since a 1950 speech of Douglas MacArthur citing him as its author, this is actually from a poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
Misattributed

Men, Silence

“I am a completely carefree person. I don’t care a damn what people think. But the rumours affect the people I know. I remember a newspaper publishing something like that once when I was actually in hospital, suffering from a kidney stone. I was shooting with a drip in my arm, but nobody bothered about that. That’s another reason I am now putting the people who love me and really care for me first, instead of satisfying the media and the fans. Success is not just measured by what people think about you, but rather by what you feel. At the end of the day, if I am going to work really hard and feel empty inside, it doesn’t make sense to me.”

Sukirti Kandpal (1987) Indian actress

Sukirti on rumours and success http://www.bollywoodlife.com/news-gossip/sukirti-kandpal-i-dont-care-a-damn-what-people-think/

Love, People, Feeling, Thinking

“A woman can forgive a man for the harm he does her,” he said, “but she can never forgive him for the sacrifices he makes on her account.”

W. Somerset Maugham book The Moon and Sixpence

Source: The Moon and Sixpence (1919), Ch. 41, p. 142

Forgiveness

“Make yourself known as a philosopher, that is a free man.”

Apollonius of Tyana (15–100) Ancient Greek philosopher

Epp. Apoll. 28
Letters

“The Nazis made me afraid to be a Jew, and the Israelis make me ashamed to be a Jew.”

Israel Shahak (1933–2001) Israeli academic

“But Fascism is also a political and economic system. Why, then, cannot we have a clear and generally accepted definition of it? Alas! we shall not get one—not yet, anyway. To say why would take too long, but basically it is because it is impossible to define Fascism satisfactorily without making admissions which neither the Fascists themselves, nor the Conservatives, nor Socialists of any colour, are willing to make. All one can do for the moment is to use the word with a certain amount of circumspection and not, as is usually done, degrade it to the level of a swearword.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

"As I Please," Tribune (24 March 1944) http://alexpeak.com/twr/wif/ "As I Please" (1943–1947)

“In shallow men the fish of little thoughts cause much commotion. In oceanic minds the whales of inspiration make hardly a ruffle.”

Yukteswar Giri (1855–1936) Indian yogi and guru

Autobiography of a Yogi (1946)

Men, Fish

“If the development by the enemy as well as by us of thermonuclear weapons could have been averted, I think we would be in a somewhat safer world today than we are…I do not think we want to argue technical questions here, and I do not think it is very meaningful for me to speculate as to how we would have responded had the technical picture at that time been more as it was later.
However, it is my judgment in these things that when you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb. I do not think anybody opposed making it; there were some debates about what to do with it after it was made. I cannot very well imagine if we had known in late 1949 what we got to know by early 1951 that the tone of our report would have been the same.”

Robert Oppenheimer (1904–1967) American theoretical physicist and professor of physics

Oppenheimer testifying in his defense in his 1954 security hearings, discussing the American reaction to the first successful Russian test of an atomic bomb and the debate whether to develop the "super" hydrogen bombs with vastly higher explosive power; from volume II of the Oppenheimer hearing transcripts http://www.osti.gov/includes/opennet/includes/Oppenheimer%20hearings/Vol%20II%20Oppenheimer.pdf, pg 95/266 (emphasis added)

World, Way, Imagination, Question

“I knew I wanted to wrestle when I was little kid. It took hold in me, captured my imagination. … I’m bigger now than I was eating meat. My lifts in the gym are better. I’m in better shape. … I’m healthier than everybody else. All the omega-3s make me smarter. … I’m pretty much friendly and compassionate to everybody. But not to people in the ring.”

Daniel Bryan (1981) American professional wrestler

"Meatless Monday: WWE Superstar Daniel Bryan Stomps On Meat" by Ellen Kanner, HuffPost (16 April 2012) https://www.huffingtonpost.com/ellen-kanner/meatless-monday-wwe-super_b_1424303.html.

People, Imagination

“Reality contains not only evidence, but also the means (such as our minds, and our artefacts) of understanding it. There are mathematical symbols in physical reality. The fact that it is we who put them there does not make them any less physical.”

David Deutsch book The Fabric of Reality

Source: The Fabric of Reality (1997), Ch.3

Mathematics, Understanding, Reality

“If I had to make a list of six books which were to be preserved when all others were destroyed, I would certainly put Gulliver's Travels among them.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

"Politics vs. Literature: An Examination of Gulliver's Travels" (1946)

Books, Travel

“We know a history so that we can learn from it. We learn our history because we understand the sacrifices that were made before, so that when we make sacrifices we understand we're doing it on behalf of future generations. There’s a proverb that says, “We have not inherited this land from our forebears, we have borrowed it from our children.” In other words, we study the past so it can guide us into the future, and inspire us to do better.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2015, Remarks to the Kenyan People (July 2015)

Children, History, Understanding, Study

“It is not worth my while to manufacture in three countries only; but I can find it very worthwhile to make it for the whole world.”

James Watt (1736–1819) British engineer

Attributed to James Watt in: Joel Mokyr, The lever of riches: Technological creativity and economic progress. Oxford University Press, 1992. p, 245

World, Country

“If Germany, my beloved fatherland, of whom you know I am proud, will not accept me, then must I, in the name of God, again make France or England richer by one capable German; — and to the shame of the German nation.”

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) Austrian Romantic composer

"Will mich Deutschland, mein geliebtes Vaterland, worauf ich (wie Sie wissen) stolz bin, nicht aufnehmen, so muß in Gottes Namen Frankreich oder England wieder um einen geschickten Deutschen mehr reich werden,- und das zur Schande der deutschen Nation."
Letter to Leopold Mozart (Vienna, 17 August 1782), from Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words by Friedrich Kerst, trans. Henry Edward Krehbiel (1906).

God

“I want you to still write a lot of stories so I get excited when I see them, Because I want to see who is making up the best story and when I'm tired of it I will let you know where I will go.”

Zlatan Ibrahimović (1981) Swedish association football player

Talking about rumours where will he go http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2016/06/01/zlatan-ibrahimovic-keeps-man-utd-guessing-by-saying-he-is-excite/ Attributed

“No one says in the morning: A day is soon past, let us wait for the night. On the contrary, in the evening we consider what we shall do the next day. We should be very sorry to spend even one day at the mercy of time and bores. … Who can be certain of spending an hour without being bored, if he takes no care to fill even that short period according to his pleasure. Yet what we cannot be certain of for an hour, we sometimes feel assured of for life, and say: “If death is the end of everything, why give ourselves so much trouble? We are extremely foolish to make such a pother about the future”—that is to say, we are extremely foolish not to entrust our destinies to chance, and to provide for the interval which lies between us and death.”

Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715–1747) French writer, a moralist

Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), p. 173.

Life, Death, Pleasure, Feeling

“I would hate to be accused of having got through life just by luck - I think you do create your own destiny. My mum and Dad believe in fate. I see coincidences but not a predestined pattern. If it's just about fate, then you become complacent and expect things to come your way. I like being challenged. Even when you're doing really intense, dramatic scenes that take so much out of you it's still really fun and energizing. Acting makes you feel so alive.”

Daniel Radcliffe (1989) English actor

The Guardian - October 11, 2006 http://www.danradcliffe.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=23&Itemid=28

Life, Hate, Fate, Way

“I'm not concerned with body building; I'm just trying to make people normal human beings.”

Joseph Pilates (1883–1967) German inventor of pilates

People

“I stand at the seashore, alone, and start to think.
There are the rushing waves
mountains of molecules
each stupidly minding its own business
trillions apart
yet forming white surf in unison.Ages on ages
before any eyes could see
year after year
thunderously pounding the shore as now.
For whom, for what?
On a dead planet
with no life to entertain.Never at rest
tortured by energy
wasted prodigiously by the sun
poured into space.
A mite makes the sea roar. Deep in the sea
all molecules repeat
the patterns of one another
till complex new ones are formed.
They make others like themselves
and a new dance starts.Growing in size and complexity
living things
masses of atoms
DNA, protein
dancing a pattern ever more intricate.Out of the cradle
onto dry land
here it is
standing:
atoms with consciousness;
matter with curiosity.Stands at the sea,
wonders at wondering: I
a universe of atoms
an atom in the universe.”

Richard Feynman (1918–1988) American theoretical physicist

The Value of Science (1955)

Life, Age, Mountain, Business

“Sex and sleep alone make me conscious that I am mortal.”

Alexander the Great (-356–-323 BC) King of Macedon

As quoted in Alexander the Great (1973) by Robin Lane Fox
Unsourced variant : Only sex and sleep make me conscious that I am mortal.

Sex, Sleep

“Let me make this clear: Ren & Stimpy really is a children's show. It was made for kids. I'm not putting anything in there that I don't think a kid can watch, or should watch. It's completely a kid's show.”

John Kricfalusi (1955) Canadian animator

Dixon, Collected Interviews, 92

Children, Thinking

“Stand up, be bold, be strong. Take the whole responsibility on your own shoulders, and know that you are the creator of your own destiny. All the strength and succor you want is within yourself. Therefore make your own future.”

Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902) Indian Hindu monk and phylosopher

Pearls of Wisdom

Strong, Future

“I have not said anything about politics today. I don't propose to say anything about politics. You have a right to elect whom you please; vote for the man you think best, and I think, when that is done, that you and I are freemen. Do as you consider right and honest in electing men for office. I did not come here to make you a long speech, although invited to do so by you. I am not much of a speaker, and my business prevented me from preparing myself. I came to meet you as friends, and welcome you to the white people. I want you to come nearer to us. When I can serve you I will do so. We have but one flag, one country; let us stand together. We may differ in color, but not in sentiment. Use your best judgement in selecting men for office and vote as you think right.”

Nathan Bedford Forrest (1821–1877) Confederate Army general

1870s, Speech before the Pole-Bearers Association (1875)

Men, People, Color, Business

“When things don't go your way—or, rather, what you don't think of as your way—there can be a variety of opportunities that may not be obvious in the moment but that through hard work, preparation, and persistence can present themselves over time and make you better.”

Tom Brady (1977) American football quarterback

The TB12 Method (Simon & Schuster, 2017), p. 10 https://books.google.it/books?id=tkk1DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA10.

Way, Thinking, Time

“To ravage, to slaughter, to usurp under false titles, they call empire; and where they make a desert, they call it peace.”
Auferre, trucidare, rapere, falsis nominibus imperium; atque, ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.

Tacitus book Agricola

Close of chapter 30 http://la.wikisource.org/wiki/De_vita_et_moribus_Iulii_Agricolae_%28Agricola%29#XXX, Oxford Revised Translation Variant translations: They plunder, they slaughter, and they steal: this they falsely name Empire, and where they make a wasteland, they call it peace. Loeb Classical Library edition To plunder, butcher, steal, these things they misname empire: they make a desolation and they call it peace. As translated by William Peterson More colloquially: They rob, kill and plunder all under the deceiving name of Roman Rule. They make a desert and call it peace. This is a speech by the Caledonian chieftain Calgacus addressing assembled warriors about Rome's insatiable appetite for conquest and plunder. The chieftain's sentiment can be contrasted to "peace given to the world" which was frequently inscribed on Roman medals. The last part solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant (they make a desert, and call it peace) is often quoted alone. Lord Byron for instance uses the phrase (in English) as follows, Agricola (98)

Peace, Falseness

“You will never find time for anything. If you want time, you must make it.”

Charles Buxton (1823–1871) English brewer, philanthropist, writer and politician

Source: Notes of Thought (1883), p. 158

Time, Powerful, Back To Work

“Religionists have kept their followers in line by suppressing their egos. By making their followers feel inferior, the awesomeness of their god is insured. Satanism encourages its members to develop a good strong ego because it gives them the self-respect necessary for a vital existence in this life. If a person has been vital throughout his life and has fought to the end for his earthly existence, it is this ego which will refuse to die, even after the expiration of the flesh which housed it. Young children are to be admired for their driving enthusiasm for life. This is exemplified by the small child who refuses to go to bed when there is something exciting going on, and when once put to bed, will sneak down the stairs to peek through the curtain and watch. It is this child-like vitality that will allow the Satanist to peek through the curtain of darkness and death and remain earthbound.”

Anton LaVey book The Satanic Bible

The Satanic Bible (1969)

Life, Death, God, Children

“If human beings are able to take a fresh look at themselves as well as the universe and change their rigid mentalities, humankind will make a leap forward.”

Li Hongzhi (1951) Chinese religious leader and dissident

Zhuan Falun http://www.falundafa.org/book/eng/zflus.html

Universe, Change

“There is a word very commonly used these days: "anti-communism." It's a very stupid word, badly put together. It makes it appear as though communism were something original, something basic, something fundamental. Therefore, it is taken as the point of departure, and anti-communism is defined in relation to communism. Here is why I say that this word was poorly selected, that it was put together by people who do not understand etymology: the primary, the eternal concept is humanity. And communism is anti-humanity. Whoever says "anti-communism" is saying, in effect, anti-anti-humanity. A poor construction. So we should say: that which is against communism is for humanity. Not to accept, to reject this inhuman Communist ideology is simply to be a human being. It isn't being a member of a party.”

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918–2008) Russian writer

Speech in Washington D.C., June 30, 1975; Solzhenitsyn: The Voice of Freedom http://www.archive.org/details/SolzhenitsynTheVoiceOfFreedom, p. 30.

People, Stupidity, Communication, Departure

“Be kind to each other in your homes. Be kind to those who surround you. I prefer that you make mistakes in kindness rather than that you work miracles in unkindness. Often just for one word, one look, one quick action, and darkness fills the heart of the one we love.”

Matka Tereza (1910–1997) Roman Catholic saint of Albanian origin

Quoted in: Charlotte Gray. Mother Teresa: Her Mission to Serve God by Caring for the Poor. G. Stevens, (1988), p. 53
1980s

Love, Home, Heart

“Every day we started fighting. Every night we fell in love. No one else could make me sadder. But no one else could lift me high above.”

Alexander Rybak (1986) Norwegian singer, actor, violinist, composer, pianist

"Fairytale" (2009).

Love, Fight, Night

“Here's a song I made up while I was watching Xena the Warrior Princess with the sound off. It's a fact. I had a secret crush on Xena. It was a secret to me too. I wouldn't admit it. She's pretty fuckin' tough. She has a good yell… she kills the stupid gladiators with the log-trap. Release the log-trap! She releases the log-trap and they all get… crushed. They'd all wanna be with her if they could, but unfortunately they're not on her side. It's a lot better with the sound off. Really, it is. And the song didn't have anything to do with Xena… but… I was about half a bottle through Jameson's… if that makes any sense.”

Elliott Smith (1969–2003) American singer-songwriter

before playing "Between the Bars" at a concert in 1996. http://www.archive.org/details/esmith2006-09-25..flacf.

Secret, Stupidity, Sense, Princess

“Swords flashed like lightning amid the blackness of clouds, and fountains of blood flowed like the fall of setting stars. The friends of God defeated their obstinate opponents, and quickly put them to a complete rout. Noon had not arrived when the Musulmans had wreaked their vengeance on the infidel enemies of Allah, killing 15,000 of them, spreading them like a carpet over the ground, and making them food for beasts and birds of prey… The enemy of God, Jaipal, and his children and grandchildren,… were taken prisoners, and being strongly bound with ropes, were carried before the Sultan, like as evildoers, on whose faces the fumes of infidelity are evident, who are covered with the vapours of misfortune, will be bound and carried to Hell. Some had their arms forcibly tied behind their backs, some were seized by the cheek, some were driven by blows on the neck. The necklace was taken off the neck of Jaipal, - composed of large pearls and shining gems and rubies set in gold, of which the value was two hundred thousand dinars; and twice that value was obtained from necks of those of his relatives who were taken prisoners, or slain, and had become the food of the mouths of hyenas and vultures. Allah also bestowed upon his friends such an amount of booty as was beyond all bounds and all calculation, including five hundred thousand slaves, beautiful men and women. The Sultan returned with his followers to his camp, having plundered immensely, by Allah's aid, having obtained the victory, and thankful to Allah… This splendid and celebrated action took place on Thursday, the 8th of Muharram, 392 H., 27th November, 1001 AD.”

Mahmud of Ghazni (971–1030) Sultan of Ghazni

About the defeat of Jaipal. Tarikh Yamini (Kitabu-l Yamini) by Al Utbi, in Elliot and Dowson, Vol. II : Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, 8 Volumes, Allahabad Reprint, 1964. p. 27 Also quoted (in part) in Jain, Meenakshi (2011). The India they saw: Foreign accounts.
Quotes from Tarikh Yamini (Kitabu-l Yamini) by Al Utbi

Women, Men, God, Children

“For all the gold that is beneath the moon,
Or ever has been, of these weary souls
Could never make a single one repose.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto VII, lines 64–66 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

Soul

“These two experiences taught me several lessons. Lesson that I have never forgotten. I did not want to learn these lessons but I found out that it isn’t what one wants in this world that one gets. Force and might makes right. Perhaps things shouldn’t be that way but thats the way they are. I learned to look with suspicion and hatred on everybody. As the years went on that idea persisted in my mind above all others. I figured that if I was strong enough and clever enough to impose my will on others, I was right. I still believe that to this day. Another lesson I learned at that time was that there were a lot of very nice things in this world. Among them were Whisky and Sodomy. But it depended on who and how they were used. I have used plenty of both since then but I have recieved more pleasure of them since; than I did those first times. Those were the days when I was learning the lessons that life teaches us all and they made me what I am today.”

Carl Panzram (1891–1930) American serial killer

sic
Lustmord: The Writings and Artifacts of Murderers, p. 174, (1997), Brian King, ed. ISBN 096503240X

Life, Pleasure, World, Way

“I eagerly await tomorrow's mail to have news of Russia and Poland. For now, I have to content myself with a few vague rumors which float around. I have heard about new, bloody skirmishes in Poland between the people and troops; I was told that, even in Russia, there was a conspiracy against the czar and the whole royal family.
I am equally passionate about the struggle between the North and the Southern American states. Of course, my heart goes out to the North. But alas! It is the South who acted with the most force, wisdom, and solidarity, which makes them worthy of the triumph they have received in every encounter so far. It is true that the South has been preparing for war for three years now, while the North has been forced to improvise. The surprising success of the ventures of the American people, for the most part happy; the banality of the material well being, where the heart is absent; and the national vanity, altogether infantile and sustained with very little cost; all seem to have helped deprave these people, and perhaps this stubborn struggle will be beneficial to them in so much as it helps the nation regain its lost soul. This is my first impression; but it could very well be that I will change my mind upon seeing things up close. The only thing is, I will not have enough time to examine really closely.”

Mikhail Bakunin (1814–1876) Russian revolutionary, philosopher, and theorist of collectivist anarchism

Letter http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/anarchist_archives/bakunin/letters/toherzenandogareff.html to Aleksandr Ivanovich Herzen and Ogareff from San Francisco (3 October 1861); published in Correspondance de Michel Bakounine (1896) edited by Michel Dragmanov

Wisdom, War, Happiness, People

“love when i lose aobut 100 followers immediately after making a beautiful post. the weak shriveling up into dust. Thats called darwin”

Dril Twitter user

[ Link to tweet https://twitter.com/dril/status/955933835329462273] Tweets by year, 2018

Love, Beauty

“I'm always making a comeback but nobody ever tells me where I've been.”

Billie Holiday book Lady Sings the Blues

Source: Lady Sings the Blues (1956), Ch. 23.

“A man may take to drink because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.”

George Orwell book Politics and the English Language

Politics and the English Language (1946)

Feeling, Failure, Drink

“If I can do just one-tenth of the good Michael Jackson did for others, I can really make a difference in this world.”

Justin Bieber (1994) Canadian singer-songwriter, record producer, and actor

First Step 2 Forever: My Story (2010), p. 177

World

“The music industry can make you feel like a prostitute.”

Jonathan Davis (1971) Heavy metal singer, frontman for Korn

Music, Feeling

“Even God cannot make two times two not make four.”

Hugo Grotius (1583–1645) philosopher

As quoted in Delbert D. Thiessen (ed.), A Sociobiology Compendium: Aphorisms, Sayings, Asides, p. 18

God, Time

“I’m becoming daily more and more misanthropic and misogynous…nothing worthwhile, good or useful to do… no one to devote myself to. My situation makes me horridly sad and wretched. Even musical production has lost its attraction for me for I can’t see the point or goal.”

Charles-Valentin Alkan (1813–1888) French composer and pianist

jackgibbons.com http://www.jackgibbons.com/writings/alkanmyths.htm

Sadness, Music

“Although you perform many works, if you do not deny your will and submit yourself, losing all solicitude about yourself and your affairs, you will not make progress.”

John of the Cross (1542–1591) Spanish mystic and Roman Catholic saint

The Sayings of Light and Love

“For your sake, I gave up all pleasures,
Now why are you making me long for you?
You create the pang of separation inside the bosom
So that you can come and quench it?
O! Lord! Now I will not leave you
Smilingly, call me soon!
Meera is your servant in birth after birth
Unite me with you in every limb.”

Meera Bai Hindu mystic poet

V.K.Subramanian in Mystic Songs of Meera http://books.google.co.in/books?id=dP-oekmHwWQC&pg=PA81#v=onepage&q&f=false, p. 21

Pleasure, Birth

“In general, complexity and precision bear an inverse relation to one another in the sense that, as the complexity of a problem increases, the possibility of analysing it in precise terms diminishes. Thus 'fuzzy thinking' may not be deplorable, after all, if it makes possible the solution of problems which are much too complex for precise analysis.”

Lotfi A. Zadeh (1921–2017) Electrical engineer and computer scientist

Zadeh (1972) "Fuzzy languages and their relation to human intelligence". in: Proceedings of the International Conference Man and Computer, Bordeaux, France. Basel: S. Karger, pp. 130-165. cited in Gaines (1976) "Foundations of fuzzy reasoning" in: International Journal of Man-Machine Studies 8(6), p. 624
1970s

Problem, Thinking, Sense

“As men, we have God for our King, and are under the law of reason: as Christians, we have Jesus the Messiah for our King, and are under the law revealed by him in the gospel. And though every Christian, both as a deist and a Christian, be obliged to study both the law of nature and the revealed law, that in them he may know the will of God, and of Jesus Christ, whom he hath sent; yet, in neither of these laws, is there to be found a select set of fundamentals, distinct from the rest, which are to make him a deist, or a Christian. But he that believes one eternal, invisible God, his Lord and King, ceases thereby to be an atheist; and he that believes Jesus to be the Messiah, his king, ordained by God, thereby becomes a Christian, is delivered from the power of darkness, and is translated into the kingdom of the Son of God; is actually within the covenant of grace, and has that faith, which shall be imputed to him for righteousness; and, if he continues in his allegiance to this his King, shall receive the reward: eternal life.”

John Locke (1632–1704) English philosopher and physician

§ 228
The Reasonableness of Christianity (1695)

Life, Men, God, Faith

“When one watches some tired hack on the platform mechanically repeating the familiar phrases -- bestial, atrocities, iron heel, bloodstained tyranny, free peoples of the world, stand shoulder to shoulder -- one often has a curious feeling that one is not watching a live human being but some kind of dummy: a feeling which suddenly becomes stronger at moments when the light catches the speaker's spectacles and turns them into blank discs which seem to have no eyes behind them. And this is not altogether fanciful. A speaker who uses that kind of phraseology has gone some distance toward turning himself into a machine. The appropriate noises are coming out of his larynx, but his brain is not involved, as it would be if he were choosing his words for himself. If the speech he is making is one that he is accustomed to make over and over again, he may be almost unconscious of what he is saying, as one is when one utters the responses in church. And this reduced state of consciousness, if not indispensable, is at any rate favourable to political conformity.”

George Orwell book Politics and the English Language

Politics and the English Language (1946)

People, World, Feeling, Light

“"Film star," "movie star" — whatever they want to try to call you is limiting, in the sense that I think an actor has to be able to play characters. To separate these things — you know: "leading man," "action hero," "character actor," stuff like that — I guess if I want to be close to anything, it would be a character actor, which is what I think an actor should be. So any of that "movie star" stuff, I just don't buy it. It just doesn't make sense to me.”

Johnny Depp (1963) American actor, film producer, and musician

Quoted in "'Johnny Depp - From Hell' special," http://www.johnnydeppfan.com/interviews/From%20Hell%20Special.htm ITV (January 2002)

Star, Thinking, Sense

“The terrible situation of the country makes my mind restless and I cannot keep silent. Meaningless ritual keep the Hindus divided in hundred sects. Sop we are suffering from series of defeats. We are tired and worn-out by the fortunes by the internal external enemies. The Muslims are united in religion and rituals. The Bengali Muslims the South Indian Muslims and even the Muslims outside India-all are united. They always stand untied in face of danger. The broken and divided Hindus will not be able to combat them. Days are coming when the Hindus will be again humiliated by the Muslims. "You are a mother of children, one day you will die, passing the future of Hindus society on the weak shoulders of your children, but think about their future."”

Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) Bengali polymath

From the letter to Hemantabala Sarkar, written on 16the October, 1933, quoted in Bengali weekly `Swastika', 21-6-1999 http://hindusamhati.blogspot.com/2013/05/thoughts-of-rabindranath-tagore-on.html

Children, Religion, Thinking, Suffering

“And his will is our peace; this is the sea
To which is moving onward whatsoever
It doth create, and all that nature makes.”

Dante Alighieri book Paradiso

Canto III, lines 85–87 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Paradiso

Peace, Nature, Sea

“Someone will say: Yes, Socrates, but cannot you hold your tongue, and then you may go into a foreign city, and no one will interfere with you? Now I have great difficulty in making you understand my answer to this. For if I tell you that this would be a disobedience to a divine command, and therefore that I cannot hold my tongue, you will not believe that I am serious; and if I say that the greatest good of a man is daily to converse about virtue, and all that concerning which you hear me examining myself and others, and that the life which is unexamined is not worth living — that you are still less likely to believe.”

Socrates (-470–-399 BC) classical Greek Athenian philosopher

37e–38a
Plato, Apology

Life, Understanding

“If you are not capable of cruelty, then you are absolutely a victim of anyone who is. For those who are exceedingly agreeable, there is a part of them crying out for the incorporation of the monster within them, which is what gives them strength of character and self-respect, because it is impossible to respect yourself until you grow teeth. And if you grow teeth, you realize that you're somewhat dangerous, or seriously dangerous. Then you might be more willing to demand that you treat yourself with respect and that other people do the same thing. That doesn't mean that being cruel is better than not being cruel. What it means is that being able to be cruel, and then not being cruel, is better than not being able to be cruel, because in the first case you're nothing but weak and naive, and in the second case you're dangerous but you have it under control. If you're competent at fighting, it actually decreases the probability that you're going to have to fight, because when someone pushes you you'll be able to respond with confidence, and with any luck a reasonable show of confidence, which is a show of dominance, will be enough to make the bully back off.”

Jordan Peterson (1962) Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLc_MC7NQek&t=0s "2017 Personality 04/05: Heroic and Shamanic Initiations"

People, Confidence, Fight, Parting

“I think Marilyn is bound to make an almost overwhelming impression on the people who meet her for the first time. It is not that she is pretty, although she is of course almost incredibly pretty, but she radiates, at the same time, unbounded vitality and a kind of unbelievable innocence. I have met the same in a lion-cub, which my native servants in Africa brought me. I would not keep her, since I felt that it would in some way be wrong…I shall never forget the almost overpowering feeling of unconquerable strength and sweetness which she conveyed. I had all the wild nature of Africa amicably gazing at me with mighty playfulness.”

Karen Blixen (1885–1962) Danish writer

Written of her experience with actress Marilyn Monroe in a letter to the American author, Fleur Cowles Meyer, in 1961. As quoted in Fragments, by Stanley Buchthal and Bernard Comment (2010)

People, Way, Feeling, Nature

“To make the world safe for those who own it, politically active elements of the owning class have created a national security state that expends billions of dollars and enlists the efforts of vast numbers of people.”

Michael Parenti (1933) American academic

3 CONSPIRACY: PHOBIA AND REALITY, The JFK Assassination II: p. 174
Dirty truths (1996), first edition

People, World, Effort

“Education, in general, should not be limited to the acquisition of knowledge and preparation for a career or in common parlance, "to make a better living." We must think in terms of a "better life," not only for the individual, but also for society as a whole. The educational system must, therefore, pay more attention, indeed the main attention, to the building of character, with emphasis on moral and ethical values.”

Menachem Mendel Schneerson (1902–1994) Hasidic rabbi

Endorsement of President Jimmy Carter's Education Program - Feb. 7, 1979.

Life, Education, Knowledge, Thinking

“Part of how we come to take command of our world, to take command of our environment, to make these tools by which we're able to do this, is we ask ourselves questions about it the whole time. So this man starts to ask himself questions. "This world," he says, "so who made it?" Now, of course he thinks that, because he makes things himself. So he's looking for someone who would have made this world. He says, "Well, so who would have made this world? Well, it must be something a little like me. Obviously much much bigger. And necessarily invisible. But he would have made it. Now why did he make it?" Now we always ask ourselves "why?" because we look for intention around us; because we always intend– we do something with intention. We boil an egg in order to eat it. So we look at the rocks, and we look at the trees, and we wonder what intention is here even though it doesn't have intention.”

Douglas Adams (1952–2001) English writer and humorist

Parrots, the Universe and Everything (2001)

World, Question, Thinking, Tree

“Since I think just in pictures it's sort of hard to think about abstract concepts so I have to have visual images like for example when I was a child I didn't really understand some of the stuff in the Lord's Prayer and y'know when it talks about "the power and the glory"… and I thought "electrical high tension lines, circular rainbow." "Thou art in Heaven"; that didn't make any sense to me but another autistic person says "Well I always pictured God up in Heaven with an easel."”

Temple Grandin (1947) USA-american doctor of animal science, author, and autism activist

First Person (TV series) Episode 1 "Stairway to Heaven" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Person_(TV_series)#Season_1

God, Art, Understanding, Thinking

“I believe we shall make them rue the day they try to invade our island. No such discussion can be permitted.”

Winston S. Churchill book The Second World War

Minute (1 June 1940) in response to the Foreign Office's suggestion that preparations should be made for the evacuation of the Royal Family and the British Government to "some part of the Overseas Empire", quoted in Martin Gilbert, Finest Hour: Winston S. Churchill, 1939–1941 (London: Heinemann, 1983), p. 449
The Second World War (1939–1945)

“There is no comparison between him and me; he developed a whole new way of making art and he's clearly in a league of his own. It would be like making comparisons with Warhol.”

Tracey Emin (1963) English artist, one of the group known as Britartists or Young British Artists

The Independent on Sunday http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/film/features/article350884.ece 2005-03-12. Accessed 2006-03-19. On artist Damien Hirst.

Art, Way

“Very frankly, I am opposed to people being programmed by others. My whole approach in broadcasting has always been 'You are an important person just the way you are. You can make healthy decisions.' Maybe I'm going on too long, but I just feel that anything that allows a person to be more active in the control of his or her life, in a healthy way, is important.”

Fred Rogers (1928–2003) American television personality

U.S. District Court testimony September 1979 http://www.law.cornell.edu/copyright/cases/464_US_417.htm#464us417n27.

Life, People, Way, Feeling

“What magical trick makes us intelligent? The trick is that there is no trick. The power of intelligence stems from our vast diversity, not from any single, perfect principle.”

Marvin Minsky book Society of Mind

Source: The Society of Mind (1987), p. 308

Intelligence, Perfection

“Einstein's relativity work is a magnificent mathematical garb which fascinates, dazzles and makes people blind to the underlying errors. The theory is like a beggar clothed in purple whom ignorant people take for a king… its exponents are brilliant men but they are metaphysicists rather than scientists.”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

New York Times (11 July 1935), p. 23, c.8

Men, People, Error, Mathematics

“I make what it pleases me to make.... I have no ideas about what the paintings imply about the world. I don't think that's a painter's business. He just paints paintings without a conscious reason. I intuitively paint flags.”

Jasper Johns (1930) American artist

Quote of Jasper Johns, as cited in Trend to the Anti-Art: Targets and Flags, Newsweek 51 no. 13, March 1958, p. 96
1950s

World, Idea, Business, Thinking

“I go back and forth between [being a vegan and not being a vegan]. I try lots of different things. I really feel that you need to kind of listen to your body and what your body is telling you to eat. So I was a vegan for about two years. … Well, everything with being vegan and vegetarian is a really big commitment. You have to do what you feel is best and what you believe in and what your body is telling you that it needs. I really think everyone should do what’s best for them, and what’s best for me may not be best for someone else. But like I said, you just have to do what makes you feel good.”

Lea Michele (1986) actress, singer

“Lea Michele: From Gleek to Do-Gooder,” interview with Shape (July 2012) http://www.shape.com/celebrities/interviews/lea-michele-gleek-do-gooder.

Feeling, Thinking

“I tell you, if one wants to be active, one must not be afraid of going wrong, one must not be afraid of making mistakes now and then. Many people think that they will become good just by doing no harm - but that's a lie, and you yourself used to call it that. That way lies stagnation, mediocrity.”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

1880s, 1884, Letter to Theo (Nuenen, Oct. 1884)
Context: I tell you, if one wants to be active, one must not be afraid of going wrong, one must not be afraid of making mistakes now and then. Many people think that they will become good just by doing no harm - but that's a lie, and you yourself used to call it that. That way lies stagnation, mediocrity.
Just slap anything on when you see a blank canvas staring you in the face like some imbecile. You don't know how paralyzing that is, that stare of a blank canvas is, which says to the painter, You can't do a thing. The canvas has an idiotic stare and mesmerises some painters so much that they turn into idiots themselves. Many painters are afraid in front of the blank canvas, but the blank canvas is afraid of the real, passionate painter who dares and who has broken the spell of 'you can't' once and for all.
Life itself, too, is forever turning an infinitely vacant, dispiriting blank side towards man on which nothing appears, any more than it does on a blank canvas. But no matter how vacant and vain, how dead life may appear to be, the man of faith, of energy, of warmth, who knows something, will not be put off so easily. He wades in and does something and stays with it, in short, he violates, "defiles" - they say. Let them talk, those cold theologians.

People, Lie, Way, Thinking

“I just want to make my mark, leave something musically good behind. If it's a big record, that's the frosting on the cake, but music's the main meal.”

Ray Charles (1930–2004) American musician

As quoted "Words of the Week" in Jet magazine, Vol. 64, No. 6 (25 April 1983), p. 40
Context: Music has been around a long time, and there's going to be music long after Ray Charles is dead. I just want to make my mark, leave something musically good behind. If it's a big record, that's the frosting on the cake, but music's the main meal.

Music

“I thought scientists were going to find out exactly how everything worked, and then make it work better.”

Kurt Vonnegut (1922–2007) American writer

Bennington College address (1970)
Context: I thought scientists were going to find out exactly how everything worked, and then make it work better. I fully expected that by the time I was twenty-one, some scientist, maybe my brother, would have taken a color photograph of God Almighty — and sold it to Popular Mechanics magazine.
Scientific truth was going to make us so happy and comfortable. What actually happened when I was twenty-one was that we dropped scientific truth on Hiroshima.

“You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.”

Charlie Chaplin (1889–1977) British comic actor and filmmaker

The Great Dictator (1940), The Barber's speech
Context: I'm sorry, but I don't want to be an emperor. That's not my business. I don't want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone, if possible, Jew, gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other's happiness — not by each other's misery. We don't want to hate and despise one another.
In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men's souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.
The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men, cries out for universal brotherhood, for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world — millions of despairing men, women and little children — victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me, I say — do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed — the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people and so long as men die, liberty will never perish.
Soldiers! Don't give yourselves to brutes — men who despise you — enslave you — who regiment your lives — tell you what to do — what to think or what to feel! Who drill you, diet you, treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don't give yourselves to these unnatural men — machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don't hate! Only the unloved hate — the unloved and the unnatural!
Soldiers! Don't fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the 17th Chapter of St. Luke it is written: "the Kingdom of God is within man" — not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people have the power — the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.
Then, in the name of democracy, let us use that power! Let us all unite! Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give youth the future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power, but they lie! They do not fulfill their promise; they never will. Dictators free themselves, but they enslave the people! Now, let us fight to fulfill that promise! Let us fight to free the world, to do away with national barriers, to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men's happiness.
Soldiers! In the name of democracy, let us all unite!
[Cheers]
Hannah, can you hear me? Wherever you are, look up, Hannah. The clouds are lifting. The sun is breaking through. We are coming out of the darkness into the light. We are coming into a new world, a kindlier world, where men will rise above their hate, their greed and brutality. Look up, Hannah. The soul of man has been given wings, and at last he is beginning to fly. He is flying into the rainbow — into the light of hope, into the future, the glorious future that belongs to you, to me and to all of us. Look up, Hannah. Look up.

Life, People, Beauty

“The artist works out his own formulas; the interest of science lies in the art of making science.”

Paul Valéry (1871–1945) French poet, essayist, and philosopher

Moralités (1932)
Context: Science is feasible when the variables are few and can be enumerated; when their combinations are distinct and clear. We are tending toward the condition of science and aspiring to do it. The artist works out his own formulas; the interest of science lies in the art of making science.

Art, Science

“The man who, through his own efforts, is able to perform all the actions necessary for his comfort and development in life, conquers himself, and in doing so multiplies his abilities and perfects himself as an individual.
We must make of the future generation, powerful men, and by that we mean men who are independent and free.”

Maria Montessori (1870–1952) Italian pedagogue, philosopher and physician

Source: The Montessori Method (1912), Ch. 5 : Discipline, p. 100.
Context: Let us picture to ourselves a clever and proficient workman, capable, not only of producing much and perfect work, but of giving advice in his workshop, because of his ability to control and direct the general activity of the environment in which he works. The man who is thus master of his environment will be able to smile before the anger of others, showing that great mastery of himself which comes from consciousness of his ability to do things. We should not, however, be in the least surprised to know that in his home this capable workman scolded his wife if the soup was not to his taste, or not ready at the appointed time. In his home, he is no longer the capable workman; the skilled workman here is the wife, who serves him and prepares his food for him. He is a serene and pleasant man where he is powerful through being efficient, but is domineering where he is served. Perhaps if he should learn how to prepare his soup he might become a perfect man! The man who, through his own efforts, is able to perform all the actions necessary for his comfort and development in life, conquers himself, and in doing so multiplies his abilities and perfects himself as an individual.
We must make of the future generation, powerful men, and by that we mean men who are independent and free.

Life, Men, Effort, Future

“Those who have driven away from the altar of God people whom He has chosen to make different, commit an ugly sin! The sin called Apartheid.”

Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) President of South Africa, anti-apartheid activist

Also quoted in Nelson Mandela: from freedom to the future: tributes and speeches (2003), edited by ‎Kader Asmal & ‎David Chidester. Jonathan Ball, p. 332
1990s, Speech at the Zionist Christian Church Easter Conference (1992)
Context: Yes! We affirm it and we shall proclaim it from the mountaintops, that all people – be they black or white, be they brown or yellow, be they rich or poor, be they wise or fools, are created in the image of the Creator and are his children! Those who dare to cast out from the human family people of a darker hue with their racism! Those who exclude from the sight of God's grace, people who profess another faith with their religious intolerance! Those who wish to keep their fellow countrymen away from God's bounty with forced removals! Those who have driven away from the altar of God people whom He has chosen to make different, commit an ugly sin! The sin called Apartheid.

God, People

“One of the blessings of age is to learn not to part on a note of sharpness, to treasure the moments spent with those we love, and to make them whenever possible good to remember, for time is short.”

Eleanor Roosevelt My Day

5 February 1943
My Day (1935–1962)

Love, Age, Learning, Time

Quotes about making page 9

Quotes about making
page 9