Quotes about purse (126 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“I'm Kan, the Louis Vouitton don / Bought my mom purse, now she Louis Vuitton mom / I didn't play the hand I was dealt I changed my cards / I prayed to the skies and I changed my stars / I went to the malls and I balled too hard / Oh My God is that a Black card / I turned around and replied why yes, but I prefer the term African American Express”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Last Call
Lyrics, The College Dropout (2004)

God , Star , Moms , Change

“He who has his thumb on the purse has the power.”

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

Wer den Daumen auf dem Beutel hat, der hat die Macht.
Speech to North German Reichstag (21 May 1869), Stenographische Berichte p. 1017 (left) http://books.google.de/books?id=wm9HAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA1017
1860s

“Shaunee was digging in her purse like she'd misplaced a tube of one of MAC's seasonal lipsticks that you buy and fall in love with AND THEN THEY DISCONTINUE IT BECAUSE THEY REALLY HATE US AND WANT US TO BE CRAZY.”

P. C. Cast book Destined

Source: Destined

Love , Hate , Season

“I forgot my purse of laughter when I dressed this mornin'," she told me. "Have you not bought anythin' the last few days? Prices have gone up. Pay or starve, it's all one to me.”

Tamora Pierce book Bloodhound

Source: Bloodhound

Laughter

“Every woman should have a purse of her own.”

Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906) American women's rights activist

“It is a lie if we tell ourselves that the police can protect us everywhere, at all times. Firearms restrictions are bad enough, but now a woman can't even carry Mace in her purse?”

Timothy McVeigh (1968–2001) American army soldier, security guard, terrorist

1990s, Letter to John J. LaFalce (1992)

Lie , Time

“That abolition of the privy purse will strengthen and ensure success of democracy is pure bunkum. Advanced countries like Britain and Japan are not less democratic or less progressive for the maintenance of their kings and princes. Royalty was not abolished even by socialist parties when they came to power in these countries.”

Charan Singh (1902–1987) prime minister of India

His reaction to the abolition of princes’ Privy purses by Indira Gandhi, p. 206
Profiles of Indian Prime Ministers

Democracy , Success , Country

“man's heart is a wonderful thing, especially when carried in the purse”

Karl Marx book Das Kapital

Vol. I, Ch. 9, pg. 252.
Das Kapital (Buch I) (1867)

Heart

“Remember that time is money. He that can earn ten shillings a day by his labor, and goes abroad, or sits idle, one half of that day, though he spends but sixpence during his diversion or idleness, ought not to reckon that the only expense; he has really spent, rather thrown away, five shillings, besides.
“Remember, that credit is money. If a man lets his money lie in my hands after it is due, he gives me interest, or so much as I can make of it during that time. This amounts to a considerable sum where a man has good and large credit, and makes good use of it.
“Remember, that money is of the prolific, generating nature. Money can beget money, and its offspring can beget more, and so on. Five shillings turned is six, turned again it is seven and three pence, and so on, till it becomes a hundred pounds. The more there is of it, the more it produces every turning, so that the profits rise quicker and quicker. He that kills a breeding sow, destroys all her offspring to the thousandth generation. He that murders a crown, destroys all that it might have produced, even scores of pounds.”
“Remember this saying, The good paymaster is lord of another man’s purse. He that is known to pay punctually and exactly to the time he promises, may at any time, and on any occasion, raise all the money his friends can spare. This is sometimes of great use. After industry and frugality, nothing contributes more to the raising of a young man in the world than punctuality and justice in all his dealings; therefore never keep borrowed money an hour beyond the time you promised, lest a disappointment shut up your friend’s purse for ever.
“The most trifling actions that affect a man’s credit are to be regarded. The sound of your hammer at five in the morning, or eight at night, heard by a creditor, makes him easy six months longer; but if he sees you at a billiard table, or hears your voice at a tavern, when you should be at work, he sends for his money the next day; demands it, before he can receive it, in a lump. ‘It shows, besides, that you are mindful of what you owe; it makes you appear a careful as well as an honest man, and that still increases your credit.’
“Beware of thinking all your own that you possess, and of living accordingly. It is a mistake that many people who have credit fall into. To prevent this, keep an exact account for some time both of your expenses and your income. If you take the pains at first to mention particulars, it will have this good effect: you will discover how wonderfully small, trifling expenses mount up to large sums, and will discern what might have been, and may for the future be saved, without occasioning any great inconvenience.
“For six pounds a year you may have the use of one hundred pounds, provided you are a man of known prudence and honesty.
“He that spends a groat a day idly, spends idly above six pounds a year, which is the price for the use of one hundred pounds.
“He that wastes idly a groat’s worth of his time per day, one day with another, wastes the privilege of using one hundred pounds each day.
“He that idly loses five shillings’ worth of time, loses five shillings, and might as prudently throw five shillings into the sea.
“He that loses five shillings, not only loses that sum, but all the advantage that might be made by turning it in dealing, which by the time that a young man becomes old, will amount to a considerable sum of money.””

Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790) American author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, inventor, civic activist, …

Money , Pain , People , Lie

“Joy may be a miser,
But Sorrow’s purse is free.”

Richard Henry Stoddard (1825–1903) American poet

Persian Song.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Joy

“Personally, I wouldn't go anywhere important without my own favorite Hermès black bag… I have my jewelry with me in case something happens and I suddenly have to dress up. For me, going out without that purse would seem almost like going out naked. Well, almost.”

Grace Kelly (1929–1982) American actress and Princess consort of Monaco

Kelly (1954) attributed to her in: Charlotte Chandler (2005) It's Only a Movie: Alfred Hitchcock: A Personal Biography. p. 212 : Kelly had mentioned this to Hitchcock during the preparations of the movie Rear Window.

Personality

“Kiss me as if you made believe
You were not sure, this eve,
How my face, your flower, had pursed
It's petals up.”

Robert Browning (1812–1889) English poet and playwright of the Victorian Era

"In a Gondola", line 49 (1842).

Flowers , Kiss

“[Women's] boarding schools, as we know, hold the three principal subjects which constitute the basis of human virtue to be the French language (a thing indispensable to the happiness of married life), piano-playing (a thing wherewith to beguile a husband’s leisure moments), and that particular department of housewifery which is comprised in the knitting of purses and other “surprises.” Nevertheless changes and improvements have begun to take place, since things now are governed more by the personal inclinations and idiosyncracies of the keepers of such establishments. For instance, in some seminaries the regimen places piano-playing first, and the French language second, and then the above department of housewifery; while in other seminaries the knitting of “surprises” heads the list, and then the French language, and then the playing of pianos—so diverse are the systems in force!”

Nikolai Gogol book Dead Souls

Vol. 1, ch. 2
Dead Souls (1842)

Life , Women , School , Change

“People mistake L. Ron Hubbard and his Scientology. They see the apparency, and not the actuality. By design. Scientology does not work as stated; but as intended. As intended by its creator L Ron Hubbard. To keep the Doorway open. To remain in the realm of the Great Beast. To feed the hunger of the Will. His Will. When he emptied the purse of man and the heart of women; it seeks onward and outward. Appetite. Forever appetite. Scientology is the snare. The passion flower. the Cloak of Lights. The glow of power. A power always wanting. Always needing. The Will never satisfied.”

Ronald DeWolf (1934–1991) American critic of Scientology

The Telling of Me, by Me (1981)

Women , Hunger , People , Flowers

“I'll play a lot, stake matches. Not like the Russians. They win the championship and then hide for three years. Every few months, anyway twice a year, I'd like to get up a purse and meet a challenger. It's good for the game, keeps up interest in chess, and it's good for the bank account. I want to get some money together. Like take professional football. All these athletes making hundreds of thousands of dollars. Contracts, endorsements. If there's room for all of them, there ought to be room for one of me. I mean, after all, I'm a great goodwill ambassador for the United States!”

Bobby Fischer (1943–2008) American chess prodigy, chess player, and chess writer

Interview by Brad Darrach for Life Magazine, 1971 http://www.bobby-fischer.net/Bobby_Fischer_Articles5.html
1970s

Money , Game , Football

“I can hardly understand the importance given to the word research in connection with modern painting. In my opinion to search means nothing in painting. To find is the thing. Nobody is interested in following a man who, with his eyes fixed on the ground, spends his life looking for the purse that fortune should put in his path. The one who finds something no matter what it might be, even if his intention were not to search for it, at least arouses our curiosity, if not our admiration.”

Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer

Source: 1920s, "Picasso Speaks" (1923), p. 315

Life , Search , Understanding , Painting

“So little in his purse, so much upon his back.”

Joseph Hall (1574–1656) British bishop

Portrait of a Poor Gallant.

“"It's my purse."(talking about his sporran)”

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

This quote waiting for review.

“Latin America’s right-wing has no shame in throwing itself at the highest bidder — their morals shift to match whoever’s holding the purse strings.”

José Baroja (1983) Chilean author and editor

Source: 1480 AM Rock&Pop. Guadalajara, Mexico.

“Those swords are mine! Touch them and I’ll use ‘em to slice off your nut sack! For a coin purse!”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Dreams of a Dark Warrior

“Bad divorce?" Hardy asked, his gaze falling to my hands. I realized I was clutching my purse in a death grip.

“No, the divorce was great,” I said. “It was the marriage that sucked.”

Lisa Kleypas (1964) American writer

Source: Blue-Eyed Devil

Death , Marriage

“Wealth, my son, should never be your goal in life. Your words are eloquent but they are mere words. True wealth is of the heart, not of the purse.”

Og Mandino book The Greatest Salesman in the World

Source: The Greatest Salesman in the World

Life , Heart , Wealth

“Well, it's not my fault that you can't manage your money.'
You threw away my purse.'
I thought it was an enemy.”

Obert Skye book Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo

Source: Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo

Money

“Happiness was useless to me. It was heartache that filled my purse. What happy man has need of Shakespeare?”

Jennifer Donnelly book Revolution

Source: Revolution

Happiness

“Sir, the fact that the book is in a public library brings no comfort. Books are the one element in which I am personally and nakedly acquisitive. If it weren't for the law I would steal them. If it weren't for my purse I would buy them.”

Harold J. Laski (1893–1950) British academic

Books , Law , Personality

“It has been suggested that hanging out with a dust bunny who carries a purse might have a negative impact on my image as a hard-core crime fighter."
"Don't be ridiculous. It's a very nice clutch.”

Jayne Ann Krentz (1948) American novelist

Source: Canyons of Night

“She wore her sexuality with an older woman's ease, and not like an awkward purse, never knowing how to hold it, where to hang it, or when to just put it down.”

Zadie Smith (1975) British writer

“Imagine the uproar if the Federal government tried to make everyone wear a radio transmitter around their neck so we can keep track of their movements. But people happily carry their cell phones in their purses and pockets.”

Lee Child book A Wanted Man

Source: A Wanted Man

People , Imagination

“As it was, I couldn't escape the feeling that I was out of my element. I found myself thinking of a book I'd left half-read at home and wishing I'd stuck it in my purse so I could pull it out now.”

Charlaine Harris (1951) American writer

Source: Last Scene Alive

Books , Feeling , Home , Thinking

“Apart from my heart, I feel everything grows old in me. Even my heart has something artificial. It has been sewn by the dancers in a soft, pink satin purse like their shoes.”

Edgar Degas (1834–1917) French artist

Quote in Degas' letter to the sculptor Paul-Albert Bartolomé, January 1886; as cited in 'Performing Fine Arts: Dance as a Source of Inspiration in Impressionism, by Johannis Tsoumas http://rupkatha.com/dance-in-impressionism/
1876 - 1895

Shoe , Feeling , Heart

“What happened? Did a house fall on your sister?" I asked. Maybe there was a benefit to our language barrier. She pursed her lips.
"You can't stay here much longer," she said.
My mouth dropped open.
"You… you speak English?"
She snorted. "Of course.”

Richelle Mead Blood Promise

Source: Blood Promise

Sister , Housing

“If you keep a gun in your purse, you get killed, because no woman can find anything in her purse in under twelve minutes. It's a rule.”

Laurell K. Hamilton (1963) Novelist

“HARRY DRESDEN—WIZARD Lost Items Found. Paranormal Investigations. Consulting. Advice. Reasonable Rates. No Love Potions, Endless Purses, Parties, or Other Entertainment”

Jim Butcher book Storm Front

Source: Storm Front

Love

“The heart wants what the heart wants," she says, somewhat cryptically. I purse my lips in disapproval. "You'd think the heart would know better.”

Candace Bushnell book Summer and the City

Source: Summer and the City

Thinking , Heart

“Fletch then kisses me on the forehead before opening the cabinet under the coffeemaker to grab placemats and napkins. Retrieving these items is his job because I kind of don't like to bend. I also refuse to carry anything heavier than my purse.”

Jen Lancaster (1967) American writer

Kiss

“That's a lovely piece," Kat said, pointing at a Louise XV armoire near the fireplace.
The man raised his eyebrows. "Did you come to steal it?"
"Darn it," Kat said with a snap of her fingers."I knew I should have brought my big purse.”

Ally Carter book Heist Society

Source: Heist Society

Love

“Adjustments, Mr. President, will have to be made by Congress to correct and rectify things, and certain processes will have to be implemented to hasten and facilitate the implementation of projects without violating the Supreme Court decision, and yet without impairing the Executive branch’s need for flexibility in the budget execution phase --- just like, Mr. President, treading a veritable tightrope, if I may say so. If and when these adjustments are effected, Mr. President, only then can we perhaps say that truly, the legislative power of the purse is a myth no more. Now Mr. President, what is the President’s proposed budget under the N. E. P. which they aptly titled toward inclusive and sustained development.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

2014, Speech: Sponsorship Speech for the FY 2015 National Budget

Decision

“White women in Washington who have been raped and mugged on the streets in broad daylight have experienced the most revolting sort of violation of their civil rights. The hundreds of others who had their purses snatched last year by Negro hoodlums may understandably insist that their right to walk the street unmolested was violated.”

Jesse Helms (1921–2008) American politician

(1963), as quoted in Whitewash: In his new autobiography, Jesse Helms sees himself as a humanitarian not a racist supporter of brutal right-wing regimes who turned obstructionism into a foreign policy by Barry Yeoman http://www.indyweek.com/indyweek/whitewash/Content?oid=1195584
1960s

Women , Understanding

“I ran three miles today… finally I said, "Lady, take your purse."”

Emo Philips (1956) American comedian

E=MO² (1985), A Fine How Ya Do

“3685. Not to oversee Workmen, is to leave them your Purse open.”

Thomas Fuller (writer) (1654–1734) British physician, preacher, and intellectual

Compare Poor Richard's Almanack (1751) : Not to oversee Workmen, is to leave them your Purse open.
Introductio ad prudentiam: Part II (1727), Gnomologia (1732)

“The purse strings tie us to our kind.”

Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) British journalist, businessman, and essayist

Literary Studies (1879)

“But your own vegetarianism, Mrs. Costello,” says President Garrard, pouring oil on troubled waters: “it comes out of moral conviction, does it not?”
“No, I don't think so,” says his mother. “It comes out of a desire to save my soul.”
Now there truly is a silence, broken only by the clink of plates as the waitresses set baked Alaskas before them.
“Well, I have a great respect for it,” says Garrard. “As a way of life.”
“I'm wearing leather shoes,” says his mother. “I'm carrying a leather purse. I wouldn't have overmuch respect if I were you.”
“Consistency,” murmurs Garrard. “Consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds. Surely one can draw a distinction between eating meat and wearing leather.”

J.M. Coetzee book The Lives of Animals

“Degrees of obscenity,” she replies.
Source: The Lives of Animals (1999), pp. 43-44

Life , Shoe , Way , Soul

“I buried your face, someplace
by the side of the new road
so I would not trip over it
every morning or on evening strolls still, I am helplessly drawn
to the scene of this crime
for fear of forgetting
the sum of your splendor then there’s also the rain
that loosens the soil
to reveal a bewitching feature
awash with emotion an eye, perhaps tender or
a pale, becalmed cheek
a mouth tight with reproach or
lips pursed in a deathless smile other times you are inscrutable
worse, is when I seem to lose you
and pick at the earth like a scab
frantic, and faithful, like a dog.”

Yahia Lababidi (1973)

"Cairo" online at ditch, the poetry that matters http://www.ditchpoetry.com/yahialababidi.htm <p>

Fear , Faith , Smile , Dogs

“It goes without saying that we have no affinities with the Japanese. They're too foreign to us, by their way of living, by their culture. But my feelings against Americanism are feelings of hatred and deep repugnance. I feel myself more akin to any European country, no matter which. Everything about the behaviour of American society reveals that it's half Judaised, and the other half negrified. How can one expect a State like that to hold together—a State where 80 per cent of the revenue is drained away for the public purse—a country where everything is built on the dollar? From this point of view, I consider the British State very much superiour.”

Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) Führer and Reich Chancellor of Germany, Leader of the Nazi Party

7 January 1942.
Disputed, (1941-1944) (published 1953)

Way , Feeling , Country

“And are there no laws of moral health? Can they be outraged and the penalty not paid? Let a man turn out of the bright and bustling Broadway, out of the mad revel of riches and the restless, unripe luxury of ignorant men whom sudden wealth has disordered like exhilarating gas; let him penetrate through sickening stench the lairs of typhus, the dens of small-pox, the coverts of all loathsome disease and unimaginable crimes; let him see the dull, starved, stolid, lowering faces, the human heaps of utter woe, and, like Jefferson in contemplating slavery a hundred years ago in Virginia, he will murmur with bowed head, 'I tremble for this city when I remember that God is just'. Is his justice any surer in a tenement-house than it is in a State? Filth in the city is pestilence. Injustice in the State is civil war. 'Gentlemen', said George Mason, a friend and neighbor of Jefferson's, in the Convention that framed the Constitution, 'by an inscrutable chain of causes and effects Providence punishes national sins by national calamities'. 'Oh no. gentlemen, it is no such thing', replied John Rutledge of South Carolina. 'Religion and humanity have nothing to do with this question. Interest is the governing principle with nations'. The descendants of John Rutledge live in the State which quivers still with the terrible tread of Sherman and his men. Let them answer! Oh seaports and factories, silent and ruined! Oh barns and granaries, heaps of blackened desolation! Oh wasted homes, bleeding hearts, starving mouths! Oh land consumed in the fire your own hands kindled! Was not John Rutledge wrong, was not George Mason right, that prosperity which is only money in the purse, and not justice or fair play, is the most cruel traitor, and will cheat you of your heart's blood in the end?”

George William Curtis (1824–1892) American writer

1860s, The Good Fight (1865)

Men , Money , God , War

“Once the needs of hunger are satisfied — and they are soon satisfied — the vanity, the necessity — for it is a necessity — arises of imposing ourselves upon and surviving in others. Man habitually sacrifices his life to his purse, but he sacrifices his purse to his vanity. He boasts even of his weakness and his misfortunes, for want of anything better to boast of, and is like a child who, in order to attract attention, struts about with a bandaged finger.”

Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936) 19th-20th century Spanish writer and philosopher

The Tragic Sense of Life (1913), III : The Hunger of Immortality

Life , Hunger

“damn gentlemen, there is not such a set of enemies to a real artist in the world as they are, if not kept at a proper distance.... They think (and so may you for a while) that they reward your merit by their Company and notice.... if they don't stand clear, know that they have but one part worth looking at, and that is their Purse; their Hearts are seldom near enough the right place to get a sight of it..”

Thomas Gainsborough (1727–1788) English portrait and landscape painter

Quote from Gainsborough's letter to his friend William Jackson of Exeter, from Bath, 2 Sept 1767; as cited in Thomas Gainsborough, by William T, Whitley https://ia800204.us.archive.org/6/items/thomasgainsborou00whitrich/thomasgainsborou00whitrich.pdf; New York, Charles Scribner's Sons – London, Smith, Elder & Co, Sept. 1915, p. 380 (Appendix A - Letter II)
1755 - 1769

World , Thinking , Heart , Parting

“She moved slowly, and her coat, too tight, made her belly stick out more prominently. With the two dollars deep in her purse she wandered off, more uncertain than ever, for now she saw the shining pans and pots and the cloth, so soft to the touch. Her desires grew vast and many, and she left, poorer certainly than when she had come in the store.”

Gabrielle Roy book The Tin Flute

Source: The Tin Flute (1945), P.120

Clothes

“A little in one's own pocket is better than much in another man's purse. 'Tis good to keep a nest egg. Every little makes a mickle.”

Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish novelist, poet, and playwright

Source: Don Quixote de la Mancha (1605–1615), Part II (1615), Book III, Ch. 7.

“And then he pursed his lips in disgust. “Doubtless that was the result of supernatural interference with our brains! How I hate the supernatural!””

Michael Moorcock book The Runestaff

Book 1, Chapter 5 “A City of Glowing Shadows” (p. 406)
The Runestaff (1969)

Hate

“But your sign says you can conjure up ever-filled purses,” Holger began.
“Advertising,” Martinus admitted. “Corroborative detail intended to lend artistic verisimilitude.”

Poul Anderson book Three Hearts and Three Lions

Source: Three Hearts and Three Lions (1961), Chapter 17 (p. 162)

“So all you people here, despite evidence to the contrary, still choose to support a man that for all intents and purposes can't even support himself? OK, OK, so if you're a Jeff Hardy fan, if you're wearing a Jeff Hardy t-shirt, if you're wearing one of his diabolical little handsleeves, God forbid if you have your face painted, I want to see you stand up right now. I want to hear you make some noise! Go ahead, if you love and support Jeff Hardy, let the world know! (Crowd cheers, stands up.) Cameraman, cameraman get a good shot, get a real good shot at all these people. The truth is ladies and gentlemen, I don't blame you. I don't blame anybody here for supporting Jeff Hardy. The people I blame, are their parents. Or let's be realistic here, I said parents, what I should have said was parent. Because it's obviously a single parent situation, just like the way Jeff Hardy grew up. See you people are so concerned with the relationship with your children failing, just like your marriage did, that you acquiesce to their every whim and their every desire. I hate to tell you, this doesn't make you a good parent, Philadelphia, it makes you an enabler. (Crowd boos. Starts chanting for Hardy.) And the fact that you even let your children look up to a guy like Jeff Hardy, just shows that you really don't care what happens to them to begin with. It's a sad situation. So I don't blame anybody here or sitting at home watching this, that supports Jeff Hardy if they're under 17, because they're young and they're, well, they're impressionable. The real problem lies with the parents, it's the parents who don't make a conscious effort to sit their children down and teach them the proper way to live! (Crowd boos.) You see it starts with a Jeff Hardy t-shirt, next thing you know they're smoking a pack of cigarettes, after that, they're drinking a bottle of beer. Right after that they move on to shots of Jack Daniels, which is a gateway drug for marijuana…(Crowd pops for marijuana.) And the fact that you people sit here and cheer that goes to show that I'm telling the truth! How about some old fashioned street drugs? And before you know it they're digging through Mom's purse because they're addicted, they're addicted to prescription medication. (Crowd cheers, Punk mouths,"That's not cool!" to fans.) All of this can be stopped before it's too late! Parents, all you have to do is talk to your children. Sit them down and show them the way, tell them the words that can save their lives, show them that sometimes it's what you don't do that makes you who you are! For weeks, for weeks I've been saying to people like you, just say no. But today I think we should just say yes. Yes to the future of a straight edge, drug free America! Just say yes to the winner of tonight's match, just say yes, to the World Heavyweight Champion! Thank you!”

Phil Brooks (1978) American professional wrestler and mixed martial artist

At Night of Champions 2009
Friday Night SmackDown

Love , God , Hate , Marriage

“6493. A light Purse
Is a heavy Curse.”

Thomas Fuller (writer) (1654–1734) British physician, preacher, and intellectual

Compare Poor Richard's Almanack (1745) : A light purse is a heavy Curse.
Introductio ad prudentiam: Part II (1727), Gnomologia (1732)

Light

“Oh! my name is John Wellington Wells,
I'm a dealer in magic and spells,
In blessings and curses
And ever-filled purses,
In prophecies, witches, and knells.

If you want a proud foe to "make tracks"—
If you'd melt a rich uncle in wax—
You've but to look in
On our resident Djinn,
Number seventy, Simmery Axe!”

W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) English librettist of the Gilbert & Sullivan duo

Mr Wells' song, Act I.
"Simmery Axe" is the traditional pronunciation of "St. Mary Axe", a road in the City of London.
In Gilbert's day, the last building was number 68, though number 70 was built later.
The Sorcerer (1877)

“It does harm a great many other people, but primarily because it's prohibited. There are an enormous number of innocent victims now. You've got the people whose purses are stolen, who are bashed over the head by people trying to get enough money for their next fix. You've got the people killed in the random drug war. You've got the corruption of the legal establishment. You've got the innocent victims who are taxpayers who have to pay for more and more prisons, and more and more prisoners, and more and more police. You've got the rest of us who don't get decent law enforcement because all the law enforcement officials are busy trying to do the impossible.
And, last, but not least, you've got the people of Colombia and Peru and so on. What business do we have destroying and leading to the killing of thousands of people in Colombia because we cannot enforce our own laws? If we could enforce our laws against drugs, there would be no market for these drugs.”

Milton Friedman (1912–2006) American economist, statistician, and writer

America's Drug Forum interview (1991)

Money , War , People , Law

“We cannot pretend that we do not see the armed policeman who marches up and down beneath our window to guarantee our security while we eat our luxurious dinner, or look at the new piece at the theater, or that we are unaware of the existence of the soldiers who will make their appearance with guns and cartridges directly our property is attacked.
We know very well that we are only allowed to go on eating our dinner, to finish seeing the new play, or to enjoy to the end the ball, the Christmas fete, the promenade, the races or, the hunt, thanks to the policeman's revolver or the soldier's rifle, which will shoot down the famished outcast who has been robbed of his share, and who looks round the corner with covetous eyes at our pleasures, ready to interrupt them instantly, were not policeman and soldier there prepared to run up at our first call for help.
And therefore just as a brigand caught in broad daylight in the act cannot persuade us that he did not lift his knife in order to rob his victim of his purse, and had no thought of killing him, we too, it would seem, cannot persuade ourselves or others that the soldiers and policemen around us are not to guard us, but only for defense against foreign foes, and to regulate traffic and fetes and reviews; we cannot persuade ourselves and others that we do not know that the men do not like dying of hunger, bereft of the right to gain their subsistence from the earth on which they live; that they do not like working underground, in the water, or in the stifling heat, for ten to fourteen hours a day, at night in factories to manufacture objects for our pleasure. One would imagine it impossible to deny what is so obvious. Yet it is denied.”

Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian writer

Source: The Kingdom of God is Within You (1894), Chapter 12

Men , Hunger , Pleasure , Imagination

“A novelist carries with him constantly what most women carry in large purses: much that is useless, a few absolutely essential items, and then, for good measure, a great number of things that fall in between. But the novelist does not transport them physically because his trove of possessions is mental. Now and then he adds a new and entirely useless idea; now and then he reluctantly cleans out the trash -- the obviously worthless ideas -- and with a few sentimental tears sheds them. Once in a great while, however, he happens by chance onto a thoroughly stunning idea new to him that he hopes will turn out to be new to everyone else. It is this final category that dignifies his existence. But such truly priceless ideas… perhaps during his entire lifetime he may, at best, acquire only a meager few. But that is enough; he has, through them, justified his existence to himself and to his God.”

Philip K. Dick (1928–1982) American author

"If You Find This World Bad, You Should See Some of the Others" (1977)

Women , God , Hope , Idea

“I very much enjoyed working on the drawing, so much so that I made a whole series of small watercolors that I can use at any time for application on embroidered purses, pillows, rugs and wall hangings.”

Sophie Taeuber-Arp (1889–1943) Swiss artist

Quote in a letter to her sister Erika Schlegel, 22 February, 1922; from: Today is Tomorrow, Sophie Taeuber-Arp, ed. Thomas Schmutz; Aargauer Kunsthaus, and Zurich: Scheidegger & Spiess, 2014, p. 221
Taeuber describes creating a series of watercolors that she intends to rework across carpets, bags, pillows, and wall covers

Time , Drawing

“What does a woman desire?' she asked, speaking as if to herself, and her voice was soft as she gazed over the valley. 'Men think it is a handsome face or a brisk air or a smooth tongue. And some will have it that it is a deep purse or a high station. But I think it is the honest heart that goes all the way with a woman's love. We are not so blind as to believe that the glitter is the gold. We love romance, but we seek it in its true home.”

John Buchan book Salute to Adventurers

Source: Salute to Adventurers (1915), Ch. 28 "How Three Souls Found Their Heritage"

Love , Men , Way , Home

“Mr. President, esteemed colleagues, once more we are tasked to exercise the power of the purse in the enactment of this Supplemental Appropriations for 2014. I therefore ask for the swift passage of the measure.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

2014, Speech: Sponsorship Speech for the Supplemental Appropriations for FY 2014

Exercises

“In short, if your body or mind
Or your soul or your purse come to grief,
You need only get drunk, and you'll find
Complete and immediate relief.”

James Kenneth Stephen (1859–1892) English poet, tutor to Prince Albert Victor

Drinking Song.

Soul

“We may fill our purses, but we pay a heavy price for it in the loss of picturesqueness and beauty.”

James Nasmyth (1808–1890) Scottish mechanical engineer and inventor

Source: James Nasmyth engineer, 1883, p. 153 (in 2010 edition)

Beauty , Loss

“Who to patch up his fame, or fill his purse,
Still pilfers wretched plans, and makes them worse;
Like gypsies, lest the stolen brat be known,
Defacing first, then claiming for his own.”

Charles Churchill (satirist) (1731–1764) British poet

Apology addressed to the Critical Reviewers (1761), line 232, comparable with: "Steal! to be sure they may; and, egad, serve your best thoughts as gypsies do stolen children,—disguise them to make 'em pass for their own", Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The Critic, act i. sc. i

“…on this September morning in 1812, while the Indomitable held her same course under reduced canvas, the ship's small drummers and fifers marched and countermarched up and down the crowded gundeck, the familiar tune Portsmouth Lass lively enough to set a man's foot tapping, or purse his lips in a silent whistle.”

Douglas Reeman (1924–2017) British author

For My Country's Freedom, Cap 17 "And For What?"

“The Chancellor of the Exchequer should boldly uphold economy in detail; and it is the mark of a chicken-hearted Chancellor when he shrinks from upholding economy in detail, when because it is a question of only two or three thousand pounds, he says it is no matter. He is ridiculed, no doubt, for what is called candle-ends and cheese-parings, but he is not worth his salt if he is not ready to save what are meant by candle-ends and cheese-parings in the cause of the country. No Chancellor of the Exchequer is worth his salt who makes his own popularity either his consideration, or any consideration at all, in administering the public purse. In my opinion, the Chancellor of the Exchequer is the trusted and confidential steward of the public. He is under a sacred obligation with regard to all that he consents to spend.”

William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898) British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom

Speech in Edinburgh (29 November 1879), quoted in Gladstone as Financier and Economist (1931) by F. W. Hirst, p. 243
1870s

Question , Heart , Country

“In the 1920… the closed body rose to dominance, the Model T came to an end, and the upgrading of cars began. The events of the past few years of car market, I believe, have validated the General Motors product policy that we formulated in 1921. John Gordon, president of General Motors, recently observed that our slogan of “a car for every purse and purpose” is as appropriate as ever; indeed, we have never offered our customers greater variety and choice than we do today. In the 1963 model year the industry offers 429 models of domestically produced cars, compared with 272 in 1955; General Motor alone had 138 models in 1963, compared with 85 in 1955.”

Alfred P. Sloan (1875–1966) American businessman

Source: My Years with General Motors, 1963, p. 512 (2015 edition)

Cars , Past

“You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, and you can't change human nature from intelligent self-interest into pure idealism—not in this life; and if you could, what would be left for paradise?”

Joseph Gurney Cannon (1836–1926) American politician

Maxim quoted in a tribute to Cannon on his retirement, reported in The Sun, Baltimore, Maryland (March 4, 1923); Congressional Record (March 4, 1923), vol. 64, p. 5714.

Life , Intelligence , Nature , Change

“241. A light Purse makes a heavy Heart.”

Thomas Fuller (writer) (1654–1734) British physician, preacher, and intellectual

Compare Poor Richard's Almanack (1733) : Light purse, heavy heart.
Introductio ad prudentiam: Part II (1727), Gnomologia (1732)

Light , Heart

“He who steals my purse steals trash, but he that filches from me my good name robs me of that which not enriches him, and makes me poor indeed.”

Joseph Heller book God Knows

Shakespeare's Othello said it first.
God Knows (1984)

“Peace treaties signed by the vanquished are not freely signed. Men sign with a knife at their throat, they sign in spite of themselves, in order to avoid still greater losses; they sign as men surrender their purse when it is a case of your money or your life.”

François Fénelon (1651–1715) Catholic bishop

Les traités de paix ne couvrent rien, lorsque vous êtes le plus fort, & que vous réduisez vos voisins à signer le traité pour éviter de plus grands maux: alors il signe comme un particulier donne sa bourse à un voleur qui lui tient le pistolet sur la gorge.
Directions pour la conscience d'un roi (Paris: Estienne, 1775) p. 60; translation by A. Lentin, cited from Margaret Lucille Kekewich (ed.) Princes and Peoples: France and the British Isles, 1620-1714 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1994) p. 226. (c. 1694).

Life , Men , Money , Peace

“The original story that I sold [Morgan Creek] (and that I shot) ended with Kinderman blowing away Patient X. There was no exorcism. But it was a Mexican stand-off between me and the studio. I was entitled to one preview, then they could go and do what they wanted with the picture. They gave me a preview but it was the lowest end preview audience I have ever seen in my life. They dragged in zombies from Haiti to watch this film. It was unbelievable. But I decided, better I should do it than anyone else. I foolishly thought: I can do a good exorcism, I’ll turn this pig’s ear into a silk purse. So I did it”

William Peter Blatty book The Exorcist

The Exorcist: Out of the Shadows (Omnibus Press, 1999)

Life

“He carried no dagger in his mouth, as many reformers have done. He cared for no cause that reason could not win. There never was a more cautious innovator, a more practical dreamer, or a more reasoning revolutionist. Whatever he commended he supported with his purse. It was this that won for him confidence and trust, given to no compeer of his time.”

George Holyoake (1817–1906) British secularist, co-operator, and newspaper editor

Memorial dedication (1902)

Confidence , Support , Time

“History will record that the two biggest deficits of the Obama administration were the failure to create a robust economy and the president's retreat from the terrorist battlefield. For years, Talking Points has been telling you the Obama administration has no strategy to defeat the ISIS threat. But President Obama somehow does not seem to understand that the civilized world is losing the fight against ISIS. Just hours before the Paris attack the president said 'we have contained' ISIS. Obviously that is not true. They are a threat worldwide, they continue to kill people with impunity. Nevertheless, the president is unrepentant and unwilling to admit that his strategy has failed. At a press conference today in Turkey he said, 'The strategy we're pursing is the right one.' The Republican Party is taking note. Senator Ted Cruz says 'Barack Obama does not wish to defend the country,' and Senator Lindsey Graham warns, 'There's a 9/11 coming, and it's coming from Syria if we don't disrupt their operations inside of Syria.”

Bill O'Reilly (1949) American political commentator, television host and writer

It is long past time that we the people demand ISIS be defeated, not contained.
The O'Reilly Factor http://www.billoreilly.com/show?action=viewTVShow&showID=4059&destinationpage=/mobile/tvshow.jsp (16 November 2015)

People , World , History , Failure

“What's funny?' said Pin, shifting uncomfortably in the hospital bed.
'I was looking at your mouth. It's exactly the same as mine.'
'Small and mean,' said Pin, whose devotion to the church did not damp her vulgar sense of humour. 'Wanna see a cat's bum?' She pursed her lips into a tight bunch. They snickered in the quiet ward.
'You'll never go to heaven,' said Kathleen. 'You're rude.”

Helen Garner (1942) Australian author

Page 21.
Honour (1980)

Cats , Sense

“"It is undeniably beautiful, do you not agree?" Jarlaxle asked, looking back at the soaring cathedral, with its tall spires, soaring buttresses, and great, colored windows.
"The mask of a god," Entreri replied sourly.
"The mask or the face?" asked the always-surprising Jarlaxle.
Entreri stared hard at his companion, and back at the towering cathedral. "The mask," he said, "or perhaps the illusion, concocted by those who seek to elevate themselves above all others and have not the skills to do so."
Jarlaxle looked at him curiously.
"A man inferior with the blade or with his thoughts can still so elevate himself," Entreri explained curtly, "if he can impart the belief that some god or other speaks through him. It is the greatest deception in all the world, and one embraced by kings and lords, while minor lying thieves on the streets of Calimport and other cities lose their tongues for so attempting to coax the purses of others."
That struck Jarlaxle as the most poignant and revealing insight he had yet pried from the mouth of the elusive Artemis Entreri, a great clue as to who this man truly was.”

R. A. Salvatore book Servant of the Shard

Servant of the Shard

God , World , Beauty , Color

“You can't sit down right,
Cause your jeans are too tight,
And you're lucky it's ladies night.
With your big empty purse,
Every week it gets worse,
At least your breasts cost more than hers.”

Amy Winehouse (1983–2011) English singer and songwriter

Fuck Me Pumps
Song lyrics, Frank (2003)

Night

“He's a curious man; a shrug of the shoulders and a wink and that's him. He's never thought it odd that his daughter cross-dresses for a living and sells second-hand purses on the side. But then, he's never thought it odd that his daughter was born with webbed feet.”

Jeanette Winterson book The Passion

Source: The Passion (1987), p.61

Daughters

“Those who corrupt the public mind are just as evil as those who steal from the public purse.”

Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965) mid-20th-century Governor of Illinois and Ambassador to the UN

Speeches of Adlai Ewing Stevenson (1952), p. 99

Evil

“It is important, of course, that controversies be settled right, but there are many civil questions which arise between individuals in which it is not so important the controversy be settled one way or another as that it be settled. Of course a settlement of a controversy on a fundamentally wrong principle of law is greatly to be deplored, but there must of necessity be many rules governing the relations between members of the same society that are more important in that their establishment creates a known rule of action than that they proceed on one principle or another. Delay works always for the man with the longest purse.”

William Howard Taft (1857–1930) American politician, 27th President of the United States (in office from 1909 to 1913)

"Adequate Machinery for Judicial Business," Journal of the American Bar Association, vol. 7, p. 454 (September 1921).

Law , Way , Question

“Now there was a young gentleman which had married a merchant's wife. And having a little wanton money, which him thought burned out the bottom of his purse, in the first year of his wedding took his wife with him and went over sea, for none other errand but to see Flanders and France and ride out one summer in those countries.”

Thomas More (1478–1535) English Renaissance humanist

Works (c. 1530)
Sometimes paraphrased "A little wanton money, which burned out the bottom of his purse."

Money , Wedding , Summer , Sea

“I'm so glad Courtney Love is here; I left my crack in my other purse.”

Sarah Silverman (1970) American comedian and actress

To Courtney Love on her Comedy Central Roast of Pamela Anderson (14 August 2005)

Love

“The louder a man tells you he’s honest, the harder you must hold onto your purse.”

Robert Jordan (1948–2007) American writer

Two Rivers saying
(15 October 1993)

“The church has had the field for eighteen hundred years. For most of this time it has held the sword and purse of the world. For many centuries it controlled colleges and universities and schools. It had within its gift wealth and honor. It held the keys, so far as this world is concerned, of heaven and hell—that is to say, of prosperity and misfortune. It pursued its enemies even to the grave. It reddened the scaffold with the best blood, and kept the sword of persecution wet for many centuries. Thousands and thousands have died in its dungeons. Millions of reputations have been blasted by its slanders. It has made millions of widows and orphans, and it has not only ruled this world, but it has pretended to hold the keys of eternity, and under this pretence (sic) it has sentenced countless millions to eternal flames.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

A Christmas Sermon (1890)

World , School , Hell , Universe

“Can we then hold the poverty-in-wealth of the money-grubbing usurers to be of any account? They may seem to be kings with purses full of gold, but they never even in their dreams have had a glimpse of the wealth that has eyes to see.”

Philo (-15–45 BC) Roman philosopher

213-215.
On the Virtues

Money , Dreams , Wealth

“…When we sink, we become a revolutionary proletariat, but when we rise, there rises also our terrible power of the purse.”

Theodor Herzl (1860–1904) Austro-Hungarian journalist and writer

Herzl about the way the Jews are perceived by antisemites when they do not have a country of their own
Der Judenstaat [The Jewish State] (1896)

“What has been the state of things since 1853? It is useless to blink the fact that not merely within the circle of the public departments and of Cabinets, but throughout the country at large, and within the precincts of this House—the guardians of the purse of the people—the spirit of public economy has been relaxed; charges upon the public funds of every kind have been admitted from time to time upon slight examination; every man's petition and prayer for this or that expenditure has been conceded with a facility which I do not hesitate to say you have only to continue for some five or ten years longer in order to bring the finances of the country into a state of absolute confusion.”

William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898) British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom

Speech https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1859/jul/21/financial-policy-of-the-late-government in the House of Commons (21 July 1859) against Benjamin Disraeli's Budget.
1850s

People , Time , Housing , Country

“Dweller in yon dungeon dark,
Hangman of creation, mark!
Who in widow weeds appears,
Laden with unhonoured years,
Noosing with care a bursting purse,
Baited with many a deadly curse?”

Robert Burns (1759–1796) Scottish poet and lyricist

Ode on Mrs. Oswald.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Appearance

“Keepe pursed his lips, nodded. “We’re already in a very strong position in this country, of course. We’ve taken over all of the antigovernment militias, most of the religious groups who think of themselves as conservative, plus what’s left of the KKK and the American Nazi party, but they’re only pocket change. We now own the Republican party. Any moderates still hiding in there have been flushed out. We’ve been managing the press for over twenty years now, and the public is accustomed to our view of the world.”
Jagger paid attention. “I didn’t realize…”
“Oh, yes. People don’t want to absorb new information. They like predictability. So as long as we don’t surprise the public with the truth, we’re free to move as we like. Very shortly we won’t even have to be covert about it. And then, of course, people are sick of issues. Civil rights, human rights, women’s rights—people are tired of all that. You understand?””

Sheri S. Tepper (1929–2016) American fiction writer

Source: Gibbon's Decline & Fall (1996), Chapter 2 (p. 52; spoken by one of the leaders of a secretive neo-fascist organization)

Women , People , Truth , World

“A true prayer and religious reconciling of ourselves to Almighty God cannot enter into an impure soul, subject at the very time to the dominion of Satan. He who calls God to his assistance whilst in a course of vice, does as if a cut-purse should call a magistrate to help him, or like those who introduce the name of God to the attestation of a lie.”

Michel De Montaigne book Essays

Book I, Ch. 56. Of Prayers
Essais (1595), Book I

God , Lie , Soul , Time

“We all thought you such a daring romantic then, and so outspoken about all us more conventional souls! Remember what you used to say about the world of business? All toadying and chicanery, lean purses fawning on fat ones for favors? Were those not the days? How far we wander from our youthful views!”

Michael Shea book Nifft the Lean

Part 1, Chapter 3 (p. 32)
Nifft the Lean (1982)

Youth , World , Soul , Business

“Outside the building, she started to walk west to Lexington to catch the bus. Between Third and Lexington, she reached into her coat pocket for her purse and found the sandwich half. She took it out and started to bring her arm down, to drop the sandwich into the street, but instead she put it back into her pocket. A few years before, it had taken her three days to dispose of the Easter chick she had found dead on the sawdust in the bottom of her wastebasket.”

Jerome David Salinger book Nine Stories

Nine Stories (1953), Just Before the War with the Eskimos (1948)

Dead

“Still the Constitution tells us emphatically that the power of the purse belongs to Congress. It is hoped, Mr. President, distinguished colleagues, that with these proposed amendments in the Fiscal Year 2015 budget or GAA, Congress will adhere to the ruling of the highest Court in the land and regain its Constitutionally-mandated control over the purse strings.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

2014, Speech: Sponsorship Speech for the FY 2015 National Budget

Hope

“She came in with coffee and biscuits at half-past eleven with her mouth pursed up very prunes and prisms, and would hardly speak to me.”

Agatha Christie book Surprise! Surprise!

Surprise! Surprise! (1965)

Coffee , Past

“From now on, the pound abroad is worth 14 per cent or so less in terms of other currencies. That doesn't mean, of course, that the Pound here in Britain, in your pocket or purse or in your bank, has been devalued.”

Harold Wilson (1916–1995) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Broadcast http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/november/19/newsid_3208000/3208396.stm (19 November 1967), following the devaluation of the Pound Sterling. Usually remembered as "the Pound in your pocket".
Prime Minister

“Can it be your spirit does not thrive? Can it be you’ve weighed your life of kissing arse and crouching before fat purses, and have found it wanting?”

Michael Shea book Nifft the Lean

Part 1, Chapter 9 (p. 65)
Nifft the Lean (1982)

Life , Kiss

“I watched his interview with her, though. He asked her real difficult questions, like 'What would you say to Governor Bush?' 'What was her answer?' I wonder. 'Please,' Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, 'don't kill me.”

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

During the Larry King-Karla Faye Tucker exchange, Tucker never actually asked to be spared.
1990s
Source: "Devil May Care" by Tucker Carlson, Talk Magazine, September 1999, p. 106.

Question