
“Why is it that a woman can see from a distance what a man cannot see close?”
Source: The Return of the Native
“Why is it that a woman can see from a distance what a man cannot see close?”
Source: The Return of the Native
“When a man is old enough to do wrong he should be old enough to do right also.”
Source: A Woman of No Importance
“The man who is swimming against the stream knows the strength of it.”
Section VIII: “Monopoly, or Opportunity?”, p. 117 http://books.google.com/books?id=rxC4IG60KTwC&pg=PA177&dq=%22man+who+is+swimming%22
1910s, The New Freedom (1913)
“Is it better for a man to have chosen evil than to have good imposed upon him?”
Source: A Clockwork Orange
“A man's character may be learned from the adjectives which he habitually uses in conversation.”
“A man who does not think for himself does not think at all.”
The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)
“I don't aspire to be a good man. I aspire to be a whole man.”
“A man who wants to make a relationship work will move mountains to keep the
woman he loves”
Source: He's Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys
As quoted after his arrest for treason; see Treason: the story of disloyalty and betrayal in American history http://books.google.com/books?id=lXZKAAAAMAAJ&q=%E2%80%9CIf+a+man+isn%27t+willing+to+take+some+risk+for+his+opinions,+either+his+opinions+are+no+good+or+he%27s+no+good%E2%80%9D&dq=%E2%80%9CIf+a+man+isn%27t+willing+to+take+some+risk+for+his+opinions,+either+his+opinions+are+no+good+or+he%27s+no+good%E2%80%9D&hl=en&sa=X&ei=RgacUteRAZDYoATC1IDYCg&ved=0CDcQ6AEwAjgU by Nathaniel Weyl (1950), p. 400
“Many a man is given what is intended for another, but no man is given another's fate.”
Source: The Wife
“Schopenhauer as educator” ("Schopenhauer als Erzieher"), § 3.1, R. Hollingdale, trans. (1983), p. 127
Untimely Meditations (1876)
Context: In his heart every man knows quite well that, being unique, he will be in the world only once and that no imaginable chance will for a second time gather together into a unity so strangely variegated an assortment as he is: he knows it but he hides it like a bad conscience—why? From fear of his neighbor, who demands conventionality and cloaks himself with it. But what is it that constrains the individual to fear his neighbor, to think and act like a member of a herd, and to have no joy in himself? Modesty, perhaps, in a few rare cases. With the great majority it is indolence, inertia. … Men are even lazier than they are timid, and fear most of all the inconveniences with which unconditional honesty and nakedness would burden them. Artists alone hate this sluggish promenading in borrowed fashions and appropriated opinions and they reveal everyone’s secret bad conscience, the law that every man is a unique miracle.
“When love is in excess, it brings a man no honor, no worthiness.”
“You can judge a man's true character by the way he treats his fellow animals.”
“No man is good enough to govern another man without that other’s consent.”
“Do not be duped by little duties. Do not be a chore man all your days.”
“The demand for certainty is one which is natural to man, but is nevertheless an intellectual vice.”
1940s, Philosophy for Laymen (1946)
Context: The demand for certainty is one which is natural to man, but is nevertheless an intellectual vice. If you take your children for a picnic on a doubtful day, they will demand a dogmatic answer as to whether it will be fine or wet, and be disappointed in you when you cannot be sure. The same sort of assurance is demanded, in later life, of those who undertake to lead populations into the Promised Land. “Liquidate the capitalists and the survivors will enjoy eternal bliss.” “Exterminate the Jews and everyone will be virtuous.” “Kill the Croats and let the Serbs reign.” “Kill the Serbs and let the Croats reign.” These are samples of the slogans that have won wide popular acceptance in our time. Even a modicum of philosophy would make it impossible to accept such bloodthirsty nonsense. But so long as men are not trained to withhold judgment in the absence of evidence, they will be led astray by cocksure prophets, and it is likely that their leaders will be either ignorant fanatics or dishonest charlatans. To endure uncertainty is difficult, but so are most of the other virtues. For the learning of every virtue there is an appropriate discipline, and for the learning of suspended judgment the best discipline is philosophy.
But if philosophy is to serve a positive purpose, it must not teach mere skepticism, for, while the dogmatist is harmful, the skeptic is useless. Dogmatism and skepticism are both, in a sense, absolute philosophies; one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or of ignorance.
Source: Flowers for Algernon
Not by Twain, but from Edward Abbey's A Voice Crying In The Wilderness (1989).
Misattributed
“Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows.”
Trinculo, Act II, scene ii.
Source: The Tempest (1611)
“The world steps aside for the man who knows where he is going”
“The real man smiles in trouble, gathers strength from distress, and grows brave by reflection.”
“The progressive development of man is vitally dependent on invention.”
Source: My Inventions (1919)
Context: The progressive development of man is vitally dependent on invention. It is the most important product of his creative brain. Its ultimate purpose is the complete mastery of mind over the material world, the harnessing of the forces of nature to human needs. This is the difficult task of the inventor who is often misunderstood and unrewarded. But he finds ample compensation in the pleasing exercises of his powers and in the knowledge of being one of that exceptionally privileged class without whom the race would have long ago perished in the bitter struggle against pitiless elements. Speaking for myself, I have already had more than my full measure of this exquisite enjoyment; so much, that for many years my life was little short of continuous rapture.
“The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.”
“If the writing is honest it cannot be separated from the man who wrote it.”
“The dog is a gentleman; I hope to go to his heaven not man's.”
“… the man of my dreams is a girl.”
Variant: Cut the ending. Revise the script. The man of her dreams is a girl.
Source: Keeping You a Secret
Source: Striking Thoughts: Bruce Lee's Wisdom for Daily Living
The Refuge of the Derelicts (unpublished manuscript written 1905–1906)
Source: Google Books link https://books.google.com/books?id=uLfR7-ETm0MC&pg=PA326&dq=%22every+man+is+a+moon%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAGoVChMIn_iGm83gyAIVTedjCh0LwAap#v=onepage&q&f=false
Source: 1850s, Letter to Henry L. Pierce (1859), p. 375
Context: The Democracy of to-day hold the liberty of one man to be absolutely nothing, when in conflict with another man's right of property. Republicans, on the contrary, are both for the man and the dollar, but, in case of conflict, the man before the dollar. I remember once being much amused at seeing two partially intoxicated men engaged in a fight with their great-coats on, which fight, after a long and rather harmless contest, ended in each having fought himself out of his own coat, and into that of the other. If the two leading parties of this day are really identical with the two in the days of Jefferson and Adams, they have performed the same feat as the two drunken men.
Source: 1950s, Unpopular Essays (1950)
Letter to Susan B. Anthony (1860-06-14).
Context: Women's degradation is in man's idea of his sexual rights. Our religion, laws, customs, are all founded on the belief that woman was made for man. Come what will, my whole soul rejoices in the truth that I have uttered.
Chapter V Applied Idealism http://www.bartleby.com/55/5.html
1910s, Theodore Roosevelt — An Autobiography (1913)
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
Source: Leonardo's Notebooks
Source: Malcolm X Speaks: Selected Speeches and Statements
Source: Malcolm X Speaks (1965), p. 22
“Only a man's character is the real criterion of worth.”
22 August 1944
My Day (1935–1962)
Source: You Learn by Living: Eleven Keys for a More Fulfilling Life
“There is no wholly masculine man, no purely feminine woman.”
“No woman wants to be in submission to a man who isn't in submission to God!”
“Behind the perfection of a man's style, must lie the passion of a man's soul.”
Source: Reviews
“Nanny Ogg looked under her bed in case there was a man there. Well, you never knew your luck.”
Source: Lords and Ladies
Isabelle and Jace, pg. 534
Source: The Mortal Instruments, City of Glass (2009)
Context: "I think it's strawberry juice," Isabelle said. "Anyway, it's yummy. Jace?" She offered him the glass.
"I am a man," he told her, "and men do not consume pink beverages. Get thee gone, woman, and bring me something brown."
"Brown?" Isabelle made a face.
"Brown is a manly color."
Source: 1950s, Unpopular Essays (1950)
en.wikiquote.org - Bertrand Russell / Quotes / 1950s / Unpopular Essays (1950)
“To be a well-favoured man is the gift of fortune; but to write and read comes by nature.”
Source: Much Ado About Nothing