Quotes about master (1923 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“The task of the teacher has come to an end and it is the right time for the student to outshine the master.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Time , Teachers

“Teachers should be able to help learners to efficiently communicate to other numerical ideas and to make connection with real-life problems in the areas chosen for their eventual career. Training only on subject matter is definitely not going to bring about this expertise. There must be more emphasis on coaching and facilitating techniques. In their normal practices, teachers must see very clearly where each individual learner stands on the learning continuum of that particular development, what problems and difficulties he or she is going to face and what lies ahead on that learning continuum to be walked by the learner. Teachers should be trained to be a master of how to help each and every learn to walk through the learning task. Going through the learning task is a necessary and essential aspect of teacher training but it is not sufficient to make them good and effective teachers.”

Sukavich Rangsitpol (1935) Thai politician

Teacher

Help , Learning , Communication , Teachers

“Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar", every "supreme leader", every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there — on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.
Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.
It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.”

Carl Sagan book Pale Blue Dot

Source: Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space (1994), p. 8, Supplemental image at randi.org http://www.randi.org/images/122801-BlueDot.jpg

Love , Life , World , Religion

“An osteopath is only a human engineer, who should understand all the laws governing his engine and thereby master disease.”

Andrew Taylor Still (1828–1917) Founder of Osteopathic Medicine

Autobiography of A.T. Still, page 253.

Disease , Law , Understanding

“Play always as if in the presence of a master.”

Robert Schumann (1810–1856) German composer, aesthete and influential music critic

“Shihonage is the foundation of Aikido. All you ever need to master is shihonage.”

Morihei Ueshiba (1883–1969) founder of aikido

Shihonage (or Shiho-nage the "Four Corner Throw") is a technique of maintaining control over an opponent in Aikido, as quoted in Aikido Shugyo (1991) by Gōzō Shioda, p. 61

“Today, the majority of preachers compete to write more personal books, rather than trying to compete to master the holy scriptures first.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Personality , Books

“Man acts as though he were the shaper and master of language, while in fact language remains the master of man.”

Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) German philosopher

“If you serve too many masters, you'll soon suffer.”

Homér Ancient Greek epic poet, author of the Iliad and the Odyssey

Suffering

“If you want to travel the Way of Buddhas and Zen masters, then expect nothing, seek nothing, and grasp nothing.”

Dogen (1200–1253) Japanese Zen buddhist teacher

Way , Travel

“Consciousness expresses itself through creation. This world we live in is the dance of the Creator. Dancers come and go in the twinkling of an eye but the dance lives on. On many an occasion when I am dancing, I have felt touched by something sacred. In those moments, I felt my spirit soar and become one with everything that exists. I become the stars and the moon. I become the lover and the beloved. I become the victor and the vanquished. I become the master and the slave. I become the singer and the song. I become the knower and the known. I keep on dancing and then, it is the eternal dance of creation. The Creator and the creation merge into one wholeness of joy. I keep on dancing — until there is only … the dance.”

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

"The Dance" - from inlay sleeve of Dangerous (1991)

World , Star , Lovers , Joy

“He is the master who, after reaching the furthest shores and plumbing the inmost depths of the sea of ultimate knowledge of mathematics, kinematics and spherics, handed over the three sciences to the learned world.”

Aryabhata (476–550) Indian mathematician-astronomer

Bhaskara I, quoted in: J J O'Connor and E F Robertson "Aryabhata the Elder".

Sea , Learning , Knowledge , Mathematics

“Begin by mastering your emotions, then your mind.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“Therefore, you must accept a gift only from those whom you wish to make as your masters.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“The attempt to develop a sense of humor and to see things in a humorous light is some kind of a trick learned while mastering the art of living.”

Viktor E. Frankl (1905–1997) Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist, and Holocaust survivor

Art , Sense , Light , Learning

“I have lived with several Zen masters -- all of them cats.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment

Cats

“Wise men don't need to prove their point;
men who need to prove their point aren't wise.
The Master has no possessions.
The more he does for others, the happier he is.
The more he gives to others, the wealthier he is.
The Tao nourishes by not forcing.
By not dominating, the Master leads.”

Laozi book Tao Te Ching

Source: Tao Te Ching, Ch. 81 as interpreted by Stephen Mitchell (1992)

Men

“Who is master of Bohemia is master of Europe.”

Otto von Bismarck (1815–1898) German statesman, Chancellor of Germany

Reported as frequently quoted but unverified in Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations (1989), which states, "it cannot be found in the official writings and pronouncements of Bismarck. It is possible that he said it, and it was passed on orally rather than being recorded, or that he expressed the sentiment in other terms and the idea took this form as others tried to quote him".
Disputed

“When you oppose the shaykh, it's like the slave who kills himself over a quarrel with his master. Hey, why are you killing yourself over a quarrel?
He says, So my master will suffer loss.”

Shams-i Tabrizi (1185–1248) 1185-1248, spiritual instructor of Mewlānā Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Balkhi.

Me & Rumi (2004)

Suffering , Loss

“For love is beautiful only when you have mastered your emotions and mind.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Beauty , Love

“The student will always outshine the teacher at the end of the journey. Therefore, outshining the master.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Teachers

“The mountains were his masters. They rimmed in life. They were the cup of reality, beyond growth, beyond struggle and death. They were his absolute unity in the midst of eternal change.”

Thomas Wolfe book Look Homeward, Angel

Source: Look Homeward, Angel

Life , Death , Mountain , Reality

“But in the loneliest desert happens the second metamorphosis: here the spirit becomes a lion; he will seize his freedom and be master in his own wilderness.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Source: Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Freedom

“Loving life is easy when you are abroad. Where no one knows you and you hold your life in your hands all alone, you are more master of yourself than at any other time”

Hannah Arendt book Rahel Varnhagen

Source: Rahel Varnhagen: The Life of a Jewess

Love , Life , Time

“It is better to be subject to the Laws under one Master, than to be subservient to many.”

Catherine the Great (1729–1796) Empress of Russia

Proposals for a New Law Code (1768)

Law

“The main thing for me right now is just to live my life with my family and friends. They treat me like Leo, not 'Leonardo, Master Thespian'. That's all I need to keep my sanity.”

Leonardo DiCaprio (1974) American actor and film producer

http://www.popmonk.com/actors/leonardo-dicaprio/quotes-leonardo-dicaprio.htm

Life , Family

“We must allow every day of our lives to represent healthy closure now! When we live for love, this is most natural because all of our associations will be quality associations in which we share our compassion, determination, and realizations, and receive the same from others. This is the technology of how to celebrate life now and live with proper preparation and detachment, so that we will master the science of dying before dying so as to connect with the should and its home-the spiritual world. After all, death is to remove all that is false and secondary. I am that lowly beggar who is desperately trying to die before dying.”

Bhakti Tirtha Swami (1950–2005) American Hindu writer

?
Books, The Beggar, Volume IV: Die Before Dying (Hari-Nama Press, 2005)

Love , Life , Death , World

“The green of my garden, my sweet sugar, my treasure, my love who cares for nothing in this world.
My master of Egypt, my Joseph, my everything, the queen of my heart's realm.
My Stanbul, my Karaman, my land of the Roman Caesers,
My Badahshan, my Kipcak, my Baghdad, and Khorasan.
O my love of black hair with bow-like eyebrows, with langourous perfidius eyes.
If I die you are my killer, O merciless, infidel woman.”

Suleiman (1494–1566) Sultan of the Ottoman Empire

Mansel, Philip, Constantinople: city of the world's desire 1453-1924 (1995), p. 84
Written to his wife - see the article Hurrem for another translation of this verse.
Poetry

Love , World , Heart

“Our race is the Master Race. We are divine gods on this planet. We are as different from the inferior races as they are from insects. In fact, compared to our race, other races are beasts and animals, cattle at best. Other races are considered as human excrement. Our destiny is to rule over the inferior races. Our earthly kingdom will be ruled by our leader with a rod of iron. The masses will lick our feet and serve us as our slaves.”

Texe Marrs (1944–2019) American writer

The text by Texe Marrs titled "All Hail the Jewish Master Race" was published before 2004 https://web.archive.org/web/20031217191553/http://texemarrs.com/112003/jewish_master_race.htm (allegedly 25 November 2003 https://web.archive.org/web/20031205052353/http://www.rense.com/general45/master.htm) and claimed "In his memoirs of his years in the White House, former President Jimmy Carter wrote that there could have been peace between the Arabs and the Israelis had it not been for the bigoted, Nazi-like racial views of Israeli's Prime Minister Menachem Begin. Begin, Carter recalled, believed the Jews were a Master Race, a holy people superior to Egyptians and Arabs." No source is provided regarding the Jimmy Carter claim.
Misattributed to Menachem Begin. Attributed in page 208 of Oil Crisis by Colin John Campbell in 2005 https://books.google.ca/books?id=VaGCbpbzjRwC&pg=PA208

God , Animals

“Let me tell you one thing. There is great complexity in this creation. The Master does one thing through one man and another thing through another person. Oh, it is so inscrutable!”

Sarada Devi (1853–1920) Hindu religious figure, spiritual consort of Ramakrishna

[Swami Tapasyananda, Swami Nikhilananda, Sri Sarada Devi, the Holy Mother; Life and Conversations, 312]

Personality

“I have given my life to try to alleviate the sufferings of Africa. There is something that all white men who have lived here like I must learn and know: that these individuals are a sub-race. They have neither the intellectual, mental, or emotional abilities to equate or to share equally with white men in any function of our civilization. I have given my life to try to bring them the advantages which our civilization must offer, but I have become well aware that we must retain this status: the superior and they the inferior. For whenever a white man seeks to live among them as their equals they will either destroy him or devour him. And they will destroy all of his work. Let white men from anywhere in the world, who would come to Africa, remember that you must continually retain this status; you the master and they the inferior like children that you would help or teach. Never fraternize with them as equals. Never accept them as your social equals or they will devour you. They will destroy you.”

Albert Schweitzer (1875–1965) French-German physician, theologian, musician and philosopher

This has usually been presented as something "said shortly before his death" without any definite source, but appears to be entirely spurious. The "FAQ about the life and thoughts of Albert Schweitzer" http://www.schweitzer.org/faq?lang=en#rasist asserts "This quote is utterly false and is an outrageously inaccurate picture of Dr. Schweitzer’s view of Africans. Dr. Schweitzer never said or wrote anything remotely like this. It does NOT appear in the book African Notebook." This refers to some citations of it being from Afrikanische Geschichten (1938), which was translated as From My African Notebook (1939) by Mrs. C. E. B Russell
Misattributed

Life , Men , Children , World

“The manager is a servant. His master is the institution he manages and his first responsibility must therefore be to it.”

Peter F. Drucker (1909–2005) American business consultant

Source: 1960s - 1980s, MANAGEMENT: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices (1973), Part 1, p. 343

“It is a grand thing to see a man thoroughly possessed with one master-passion. Such a man is sure to be strong, and if the master-principle be excellent, he is sure to be excellent, too.”

Charles Spurgeon (1834–1892) British preacher, author, pastor and evangelist

The Soul-Winner (1895)

Strong , Passion

“"'Vexilla Regis prodeunt Inferni'
Towards us; therefore look in front of thee,"
My Master said, "if thou discernest him."”
"Vexilla regis prodeunt inferni verso di noi; però dinanzi mira," disse 'l maestro mio, "se tu 'l discerni."

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XXXIV, lines 1–3 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“I can respect the artistic aim of a composer if he arrives at the so-called modern idiom after an intense period of preparation…Such composers know what they are doing when they break a law; they know what to react against, because they have had experience in the classical forms and style. Having mastered the rules, they know which can be violated and which should be obeyed. But, I am sorry to say, I have found too often that young composers plunge into the writing of experimental music with their school lessons only half learned. Too much radical music is sheer sham, for this very reason: its composer sets about revolutionizing the laws of music before he learned them himself.”

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943) Russian composer, pianist, and conductor

Interviewed by David Ewen in The Etude, 1941; cited from Josiah Fisk and Jeff Nichols (eds.) Composers on Music (Boston, MA: Northeastern Universities Press, 1997) pp. 235-6

School , Law , Music , Learning

“He that would govern others, first should be the master of himself.”

Philip Massinger The Bondman

The Bondman (1623), Act I, scene iii http://books.google.com/books?id=K0cNAQAAMAAJ&q=%22He+that+would+govern+others+first+should+be+the+master+of+himself%22&pg=PA193#v=onepage.

“Successive technological revolutions have immeasurably widened the psychological gap between generations. With some reason, perhaps, the man of the age of electricity and of the airplane feels himself removed from his masters.”

Marc Bloch (1886–1944) French historian, medievalist, and historiographer

The Historian's Craft, pg.36

Age , Feeling , Success

“Here is a story of latifundia and death squads, masters and slaves, patriarchs and subordinated women, self-enriching capitalists and plundered provinces, proﬁteering slumlords and urban rioters. Here is a struggle between the plutocratic few and the indigent many, the privileged versus the proletariat, featuring corrupt politicians, money-driven elections, and the political assassination of popular leaders. I leave it to the reader to decide whether any of this might resonate with the temper of our own times.”

Michael Parenti book The Assassination of Julius Caesar: A People's History of Ancient Rome

Introduction
The Assassination of Julius Caesar: A People's History of Ancient Rome (2003)

Money , Time , Self-confidence , Death

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Heart , Love

“Mastering time is similar to an individual who's trying to predict the direction in which the wind will blow.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Time

“The salary simply means becoming dependent on someone's pocket. Like a good dog who waits for his master to throw the bone at him, after having eaten all the meat.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Dependency , Waiting , Dogs

“If you go on working with the light available, you will meet your Master, as he himself will be seeking you.”

Ramana Maharshi (1879–1950) Indian religious leader

Light

“Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console,
To be understood as to understand,
To be loved, as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
It is in dying to self that we are born to Eternal Life.
Amen.”

Francis of Assisi (1182–1226) Catholic saint and founder of the Franciscan Order

Widely known as The Prayer of St. Francis, it is not found in Esser's authoritative collection of Francis's writings.
[Fr. Kajetan, Esser, OFM, ed., Opuscula Sancti Patris Francisci Assisiensis, Rome, Grottaferrata, 1978]. Additionally there is no record of this prayer before the twentieth century.
[Fr. Regis J., Armstrong, OFM, Francis and Clare: The Complete Works, New York, Paulist Press, 1982, 10, 0-8091-2446-7]. Dr. Christian Renoux of the University of Orleans in France traces the origin of the prayer to an anonymous 1912 contributor to La Clochette, a publication of the Holy Mass League in Paris. It was not until 1927 that it was attributed to St. Francis.
The Origin of the Peace Prayer of St. Francis, 2013-06-28, Renoux, Christian http://www.franciscan-archive.org/franciscana/peace.html,.
[Christian, Renoux, La prière pour la paix attribuée à saint François: une énigme à résoudre, Paris, Editions franciscaines, 2001, 2-85020-096-4].
Misattributed

Love , Life , Sadness , Peace

“Free election of masters does not abolish the masters or the slaves.”

Herbert Marcuse (1898–1979) German philosopher, sociologist, and political theorist

“What worries you, masters you.”

John Locke (1632–1704) English philosopher and physician

“Is war perhaps nothing else but a need to face death, to conquer and master it, to come out of it alive -- a peculiar form of denial of our mortality?”

Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (1926–2004) American psychiatrist

Death , War

“… But the human tongue is a beast that few can master. It strains constantly to break out of its cage, and if it is not tamed, it will tun wild and cause you grief.”

Robert Greene book The 48 Laws of Power

Source: The 48 Laws of Power

“I tell you loneliness is the thing to master. Courage and fear, love, death are only parts of it and can easily be ruled afterwards. If I make myself master my own loneliness there will be peace or safety: and perhaps these are the same.”

Martha Gellhorn (1908–1998) journalist from the United States

Notebook entry, quoted in "Gellhorn : A Twentieth Century Life" (2003) by Caroline Moorehead, p. 88.

Loneliness

“J. M. W. Turner's Poem dedicated to Ivan Aivazovsky (1842)

Like a curtain slowly drawn
It stops suddenly half open,
Or, like grief itself, filled with gentle hope,
It becomes lighter in the shore-less dark,
Thus the moon barely wanes
Winding her way above the storm-tossed sea.
Stand upon this hill and behold endlessly
This scene of a formidable sea,
And it will seem to thee a waking dream.
That secret mind flowing in thee
Which even the day cannot scatter,
The serenity of thinking and the beating of the heart
Will enchain thee in this vision;
This golden-silver moon
Standing lonely over the sea,
All curtain the grief of even the hopeless.
And it appears that through the tempest
Moves a light caressing wind,
While the sea swells up with a roar,
Sometimes, like a battlefield it looks to me
The tempestuous sea,
Where the moon itself is a brilliant golden crown
Of a great king.
But even that moon is always beneath thee
Oh Master most high,
Oh forgive thou me
If even this master was frightened for a moment
Oh, noble moment, by art betrayed…
And how may one not delight in thee,
Oh thou young boy, but forgive thou me,
If I shall bend my white head
Before thy art divine
Thy bliss-wrought genius…”

J.M.W. Turner (1775–1851) British Romantic landscape painter, water-colourist, and printmaker

Source: J.M.W. Turner

Secret , Dreams , Hope , Art

“Poor is the pupil that does not surpass his master.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), I Prolegomena and General Introduction to the Book on Painting

“I have always been absurdly, ridiculously tall. To give you an idea- when we went on school trips to Interesting and Improving Places, the form-master wouldn't say "Meet under the clock tower," or "Meet under the War Memorial," but "Meet under Adams.”

Douglas Adams book The Salmon of Doubt

Source: The Salmon of Doubt

War , School , Idea , Memory

“Control is illusory. No matter what university you go to, no matter what degree you hold, if your goal is to becomes master of your own destiny, you have more to learn.”

Michael J. Fox (1961) Canadian-American actor

Learning , Universe

“You cannot control what happens to you, but you can control your attitude
toward what happens to you, and in that, you will be mastering change rather
than allowing it to master you.”

Brian Tracy (1944) American motivational speaker and writer

Attitude , Change

“Man was born free, and he is everywhere in chains. Those who think themselves the masters of others are indeed greater slaves than they.”

Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778) Genevan philosopher

Thinking

“It is too dangerous for me to put these things into words. I am afraid they might then become gigantic and I be no longer able to master them.”

Erich Maria Remarque book All Quiet on the Western Front

Source: All Quiet on the Western Front

“Each man is master of his own death, and all that we can do when the time comes is to help him die without fear of pain.”

Gabriel García Márquez (1927–2014) Colombian writer

Death , Pain , Fear , Time

“Tell your master that if there were as many devils at Worms as tiles on its roofs, I would enter.”

Martin Luther Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott

Psalm. Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott (translated by Frederic H. Hedge), Reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919). "On the 16th of April, 1521, Luther entered the imperial city [of Worms]... On his approach… the Elector's chancellor entreated him, in the name of his master, not to enter a town where his death was decided. The answer which Luther returned was simply this". Bunsen, Life of Luther

“That your art follows her so far as it can, as the disciple does the master, so that your art is as it were grandchild of God.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XI, lines 103–105 (tr. Charles Eliot Norton).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

God , Art

“[Bill Evans talking about Miles Davis's change of style to jazz fusion] I would like to hear more of the consummate melodic master, but I feel that big business and his record company have had a corrupting influence on his material. The rock and pop thing certainly draws a wider audience. It happens more and more these days, that unqualified people with executive positions try to tell musicians what is good and what is bad music. It’s tempting for the musician to prejudice his own views when recording opportunities are so infrequent but I for one am determined to resist the temptation.”

Bill Evans (1929–1980) American jazz pianist

http://jazztimes.com/articles/20128-miles-davis-and-bill-evans-miles-and-bill-in-black-white.

People , Music , Feeling , Business

“O Adam, Adam! no longer will you have to earn your bread by the sweat of your brow; you will return to Paradise where you were nourished by the hand of God. You will be free and supreme; you will have no other task, no other work, no other cares than to perfect your own being. You will be the master of creation.”

Karel Čapek R.U.R.

R.U.R. (1920)

God , Perfection

“You are only a disciple because your eyes are closed. The day you open them you will see there is nothing you can learn from me or anyone."
"What then is a Master for?"
"To make you see the uselessness of having one.”

Anthony de Mello (1931–1987) Indian writer

Blindness
One Minute Wisdom (1989)

Learning

“It is a mistake to think that the practice of my art has become easy to me. I assure you, dear friend, no one has given so much care to the study of composition as I. There is scarcely a famous master in music whose works I have not frequently and diligently studied.”

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) Austrian Romantic composer

Spoken in Prague, 1787, to conductor Kucharz, who led the rehearsals for Don Giovanni, from Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words by Friedrich Kerst, trans. Henry Edward Krehbiel (1906).

Art , Music , Thinking , Study

“The brave man is not only he who overcomes the enemy, but he who is stronger than pleasures. Some men are masters of cities, but are enslaved to women.”

Democritus Ancient Greek philosopher, pupil of Leucippus, founder of the atomic theory

Freeman (1948), p. 163
Variant: The brave man is he who overcomes not only his enemies but his pleasures. There are some men who are masters of cities but slaves to women.

Women , Men , Pleasure

“It is as a composer that his name will live longest. He was the last of the colourful Russian masters of the late 19th cent[ury], with their characteristic gift for long and broad melodies imbued with a resigned melancholy which is never long absent.”

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943) Russian composer, pianist, and conductor

Michael Kennedy The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music, 3rd edn. (London: Oxford University Press, 1980) p. 516.
Criticism

“This man is the master of us all.”

George Frideric Handel (1685–1759) German, later British Baroque composer

Er ist der Meister von uns allen!
Haydn, at a performance of Messiah. Quoted in John Galt George the Third, His Court and Family (1824) p. 34, and in Leopold Schmidt Joseph Haydn (1898) p. 86.
Criticism

“The person who does not control his territory does not control his existence. If someone is not conscious, he is taken over, not only outwardly but also with the thoughts that assault him. He is very vulnerable to desires and feelings. For example, you live calmly with your wife, and then—catastrophe! Suddenly you lose control because you have fallen in love with another. You don't have to fall victim to that reality; what you have to do is navigate in it, overcome the winds and sandstorms. Amid the storms at sea and the signs, you must move forward calmly and look toward the port you're heading for. In New York, when I was filming The Holy Mountain, I had problems of all sorts. I soaked six or seven T-Shirts a night with my sweat. I went to see a Chinese sage that someone had recommended. He was a poet, a great master of tai chi, and a doctor. When he first saw me, he said, "What is your purpose in life?" I was disconcerted and did not answer. He continued, "If you do not tell me what is your purpose in life, I cannot heal you."”

Alejandro Jodorowsky (1929) Filmmaker and comics writer

So I understood that if a ship crosses the sea without a purpose, it will arrive at no port. What prevents life from devouring us is having a purpose. The higher it is, the further it will carry us...
Psychomagic: The Transformative Power of Shamanic Psychotherapy (2010)

Love , Life , Feeling , Mountain

“This contradiction lies here: they wish God, and they wish humanity. They persist in connecting two terms which, once separated, can come together again only to destroy each other. They say in a single breath: "God and the liberty of man," "God and the dignity, justice, equality, fraternity, prosperity of men" — regardless of the fatal logic by virtue of which, if God exists, all these things are condemned to non-existence. For, if God is, he is necessarily the eternal, supreme, absolute master, and, if such a master exists, man is a slave; now, if he is a slave, neither justice, nor equality, nor fraternity, nor prosperity are possible for him. In vain, flying in the face of good sense and all the teachings of history, do they represent their God as animated by the tenderest love of human liberty: a master, whoever he may be and however liberal he may desire to show himself, remains none the less always a master. His existence necessarily implies the slavery of all that is beneath him. Therefore, if God existed, only in one way could he serve human liberty — by ceasing to exist.”

Mikhail Bakunin book God and the State

God and the State (1871; publ. 1882)

Love , Men , God , Justice

“Man's sin is in his failure to live what he is. Being the master of the earth, man forgets that he is the servant of God.”

Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–1972) Polish-American Conservative Judaism Rabbi

As quoted in The World's Religions (1976) by Sir James Norman Dalrymple Anderson, p. 61

God , Failure , Forgetting

“Since the beginning of time, children have not liked to study. They would much rather play, and if you have their interests at heart, you will let them learn while they play; they will find that what they have mastered is child's play.”

Carl Orff (1895–1982) German composer

As quoted in a review of Langley Schools Music Project : Innocence and Despair (2001) http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/4685-innocence-and-despair/ by Dominique Leone (6 January 2002)

Children , Study , Learning , Time

“O Lord, this earth groans and suffers; chaos has made this world its abode. The darkness is so great that Thou alone canst dispel it. Come, manifest Thyself, that Thy work may be accomplished. Solitude, a harsh, intense solitude, and always this strong impression of having been flung headlong into an inferno of darkness! … Sometimes … I cannot prevent my total sub-mission from taking a hue of melancholy, and the calm and mute converse with the Master within is transformed for a moment into an invocation almost suppliant, O Lord, what have I done that Thou throwest me thus into the sombre night?”

The Mother (1878–1973) spiritual collaborator of Sri Aurobindo

Her entry in her diary when she left Pondicherry and on the tumultuous developments in the world for the War, quoted in "Diary notes and Meeting with Sri Aurobindo" and also in IV. Diary Notes And Meeting With Sri Aurobindo http://www.motherandsriaurobindo.org/Content.aspx?ContentURL=/_staticcontent/sriaurobindoashram/-04%20Centers/India/Pondicherry/Sri%20Aurobindo%20Society/Wilfried/The%20Mother%20-%20A%20Short%20Biography/007_Diary%20Notes%20and%20Meeting%20with%20Sri%20Aurobindo.htm, p. 21

World , Solitude , Strong , Suffering

“I wanted man to become a master! So he wouldn't have to live from hand to mouth! I didn't want to see another soul grow numb slaving over someone else's machines! I wanted there to be nothing, nothing, nothing left of that damned social mess! I abhorred degradation and suffering! I was fighting against poverty! I wanted a new generation of mankind! … I wanted to transform all of humanity into a world-wide aristocracy. Unrestricted, free, and supreme people. Something even greater than people.”

Karel Čapek R.U.R.

R.U.R. (1920)

People , World , Soul , Suffering

“The organic unity of mathematics is inherent in the nature of this science, for mathematics is the foundation of all exact knowledge of natural phenomena. That it may completely fulfil this high mission, may the new century bring it gifted masters and many zealous and enthusiastic disciples!”

David Hilbert Mathematical Problems

Mathematical Problems (1900)

Mathematics , Nature , Knowledge , Science

“Opinion in all parts of the world would agree that Rachmaninoff is the most complete of living masters of the instrument; his technique is comprehensive, and he is, of course, musical to his bone's marrow. Most important of all, he is a composer, and for this reason he is able to approach a work as none of his pianist contemporaries can approach one – that is, from the inside, as an organic and felt creative process.”

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943) Russian composer, pianist, and conductor

Neville Cardus The Delights of Music (London: Victor Gollancz, 1966) p. 90.
Criticism

World , Music , Parting

“The relationship between those who are constantly watched and tracked and those who watch and track them is the relationship between masters and slaves.”

Chris Hedges (1956) American journalist

“ [30:02 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOlg_2qAbUA Our Only Hope Will Come Through Rebellion]” (2014)

“Before all masters, necessity is the one most listened to, and who teaches the best.”

Jules Verne book The Mysterious Island

La nécessité est, d’ailleurs, de tous les maîtres, celui qu’on écoute le plus et qui enseigne le mieux.
Part I, ch. XVII
The Mysterious Island (1874)

“The master made it his task to systematically destroy every doctrine, every belief, every concept of the divine, for these things, which were originally intended as pointers, were now taken as descriptions. He loved to quote the Eastern saying: "When the sage points at the moon, all that the idiot sees is the finger."”

Anthony de Mello (1931–1987) Indian writer

Source: One Minute Nonsense (1992), p. 132

Love , Quotes

“The genes are the master programmers, and they are programming for their lives.”

Richard Dawkins book The Selfish Gene

Source: The Selfish Gene (1976, 1989), Ch. 4. The Gene machine

“With what is he concerned? Drawing was at its lowest ebb; it had to be restored. Looking at these nudes, I exclaim, 'Drawing has come back again!'
As a man and painter he sets an example. 'Degas' is one of those rare masters who could have had anything he wanted, yet he scorned decorations, honors, fortune, without bitterness, without jealousy.”

Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) French Post-Impressionist artist

Quote of Paul Gauguin, in Avant et après (1903)
1890s - 1910s

Jealousy , Drawing

“The Master in these tales is not a single person. He is a Hindu Guru, a Zen Roshi, a Taoist Sage, a Jewish Rabbi, a Christian Monk, a Sufi Mystic. He is Lao-tzu and Socrates; Buddha and Jesus; Zarathustra and Mohammed.”

Anthony de Mello (1931–1987) Indian writer

Introduction
One Minute Nonsense (1992)
Context: The Master in these tales is not a single person. He is a Hindu Guru, a Zen Roshi, a Taoist Sage, a Jewish Rabbi, a Christian Monk, a Sufi Mystic. He is Lao-tzu and Socrates; Buddha and Jesus; Zarathustra and Mohammed. His teaching is found in the seventh century B. C. and the twentieth century A. D. His wisdom belongs to East and West alike. Do his historical antecedents really matter? History, after all, is the record of appearances, not Reality; of doctrines, not of Silence.

Personality

“I never was truly my own master but was always ruled by circumstances.”

Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French

Conversation with Emmanuel, comte de Las Cases (11 November 1816), Mémorial de Sainte Hélène, v. 4, p. 133 http://books.google.com/books?id=945jAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA133.
Context: I may have had many projects, but I never was free to carry out any of them. It did me little good to be holding the helm; no matter how strong my hands, the sudden and numerous waves were stronger still, and I was wise enough to yield to them rather than resist them obstinately and make the ship founder. Thus I never was truly my own master but was always ruled by circumstances.

“Everyone is master of his own destiny.”

Harbhajan Singh Yogi (1929–2004) Indian-American Sikh Yogi

Remark (23 June 1972), as quoted in Transitions to a Heart Centered World : Through the Kundalini Yoga and Meditations of Yogi Bhajan (1988) by Guru Rattana and Ann M. Maxwell, p. 107
Context: Everyone is master of his own destiny. Those who do not know how to be commanded do not know how to command. Temptation is the law of Maya (illusion). One who can withstand it knows the law of life: assess your 1) stamina 2) potential 3) basic flexibility, and know where your emotions are.

“The master key of knowledge is, indeed, a persistent and frequent questioning.”

Peter Abelard Sic et Non

Introduction as translated in Readings in European History, Vol. I (1904) edited by James Harvey Robinson, p. 451
Variant translation:
Constant and frequent questioning is the first key to wisdom … For through doubting we are led to inquire, and by inquiry we perceive the truth.
Prologue as translated in A History of Education During the Middle Ages and the Transition to Modern Times (1918) by Frank Pierrepont Graves; 2005 edition, p. 53
Sic et Non (1120)
Context: I have ventured to bring together various dicta of the holy fathers, as they came to mind, and to formulate certain questions which were suggested by the seeming contradictions in the statements. These questions ought to serve to excite tender readers to a zealous inquiry into truth and so sharpen their wits. The master key of knowledge is, indeed, a persistent and frequent questioning. Aristotle, the most clear-sighted of all the philosophers, was desirous above all things else to arouse this questioning spirit, for in his Categories he exhorts a student as follows: "It may well be difficult to reach a positive conclusion in these matters unless they be frequently discussed. It is by no means fruitless to be doubtful on particular points." By doubting we come to examine, and by examining we reach the truth.

Question , Knowledge

“As long as we have a master in heaven, we will be slaves on earth.”

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

Man, Society, and Freedom (1871)
Context: The first revolt is against the supreme tyranny of theology, of the phantom of God. As long as we have a master in heaven, we will be slaves on earth.

“All that is done and said and thought and suffered upon the Earth combine together, and flow onward in one broad resistless current toward those great results to which they are determined by the will of God.
We build slowly and destroy swiftly. Our Ancient Brethren who built the Temples at Jerusalem, with many myriad blows felled, hewed, and squared the cedars, and quarried the stones, and car»ed the intricate ornaments, which were to be the Temples. Stone after stone, by the combined effort and long toil of Apprentice, Fellow-Craft, and Master, the walls arose; slowly the roof was framed and fashioned; and many years elapsed, before, at length, the Houses stood finished, all fit and ready for the Worship of God, gorgeous in the sunny splendors of the atmosphere of Palestine. So they were built. A single motion of the arm of a rude, barbarous Assyrian Spearman, or drunken Roman or Gothic Legionary of Titus, moved by a senseless impulse of the brutal will, flung in the blazing brand; and, with no further human agency, a few short hours sufficed to consume and melt each Temple to a smoking mass of black unsightly ruin.
Be patient, therefore, my Brother, and wait!
The issues are with God: To do,
Of right belongs to us.
Therefore faint not, nor be weary in well-doing! Be not discouraged at men's apathy, nor disgusted with their follies, nor tired of their indifference! Care not for returns and results; but see only what there is to do, and do it, leaving the results to God! Soldier of the Cross! Sworn Knight of Justice, Truth, and Toleration! Good Knight and True! be patient and work!”

Albert Pike book Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry

Source: Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry (1871), Ch. XIX : Grand Pontiff, p. 321

Men , God , Truth , Justice

“We, holding Art in our hands, confidently consider ourselves to be its masters”

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918–2008) Russian writer

Nobel lecture (1970)
Context: We, holding Art in our hands, confidently consider ourselves to be its masters; boldly we direct it, we renew, reform and manifest it; we sell it for money, use it to please those in power; turn to it at one moment for amusement — right down to popular songs and night-clubs, and at another — grabbing the nearest weapon, cork or cudgel — for the passing needs of politics and for narrow-minded social ends. But art is not defiled by our efforts, neither does it thereby depart from its true nature, but on each occasion and in each application it gives to us a part of its secret inner light.

Art , Confidence

“Hold all and wait.
The questions that are in one’s mind will be worked out eventually without a word from the Master.
The light becomes stronger and the darkness vanishes in the reorganization of the inner man and his thinking processes and habits.
Do not make the mistake of trying to fit the teachings of ECK into the old ways of thinking.
Drop all and start over again.”

Paul Twitchell (1909–1971) American writer

Way , Question , Thinking , Light

“To be completely woman you need a master, and in him a compass for your life. You need a man you can look up to and respect. If you dethrone him it's no wonder that you are discontented, and discontented women are not loved for long.”

Marlene Dietrich (1901–1992) German-American actress and singer

Love , Life , Making love , Women

“What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly.”

Richard Bach (1936) American spiritual writer

World , Depressing

“The people of these United States are the rightful masters of both Congresses and courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.”

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

Lincoln never said these words, but wrote and said some that are very similar to the above quote. As Lincoln's popularity within the Republican Party grew, he was invited to address members of his party throughout the nation. In September 1859 Lincoln gave several speeches to Ohio Republicans. The notes Lincoln used for his 1859 engagements state: "We must not disturb slavery in the states where it exists, because the Constitution, and the peace of the country both forbid us — We must not withhold an efficient fugitive slave law, because the constitution demands it — But we must, by a national policy, prevent the spread of slavery into new territories, or free states, because the constitution does not forbid us, and the general welfare does demand such prevention — We must prevent the revival of the African slave trade, because the constitution does not forbid us, and the general welfare does require the prevention — We must prevent these things being done, by either congresses or courts — The people — the people — are the rightful masters of both Congresses, and courts — not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert it —" Source: Abraham Lincoln [September 16-17, 1859<nowiki> http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/mal:@field(DOCID+@lit(d0189300))#I379</nowiki>] (Notes for Speech in Kansas and Ohio) http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=mal&fileName=mal1/018/0189300/malpage.db&recNum=1 in "Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916." Transcribed and Annotated by the Lincoln Studies Center, Knox College. Galesburg, Illinois. Lincoln transformed his prior quoted notes in the following words: "I say that we must not interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists, because the Constitution forbids it, and the general welfare does not require us to do so. We must not withhold an efficient Fugitive Slave law, because the Constitution requires us, as I understand it, not to withhold such a law. But we must prevent the outspreading of the institution, because neither the Constitution nor general welfare requires us to extend it. We must prevent the revival of the African slave trade, and the enacting by Congress of a Territorial slave code. We must prevent each of these things being done by either Congresses or courts. The people of these United States are the rightful masters of both Congresses and courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution." Source: Speech at Cincinnati, Ohio, September 17, 1859 http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/2/5/3253/3253-h/files/2657/2657-h/2657-h.htm#2H_4_0043; in "The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Volume Five, Constitutional Edition", edited by Arthur Brooks Lapsley and released as " The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Volume Five, by Abraham Lincoln http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/2/5/3253/3253-h/files/2657/2657-h/2657-h.htm" (2009) by Project Gutenberg.
Ref: en.wikiquote.org - Abraham Lincoln / Disputed
1850s

People , Men

“Let every man be master of his time.”

William Shakespeare Macbeth

Source: Macbeth

Time

“As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.”

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

Written speech fragment presented by to the Chicago Veterans Druggist's Association in 1906 by Judge James B. Bradwell, who claimed to have received it from Mary Todd Lincoln. Collected Works, 2:532 http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=lincoln;cc=lincoln;view=text;idno=lincoln2;rgn=div1;node=lincoln2%3A547
Posthumous attributions

Democracy , Idea