Quotes about rope (190 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“Sex at age 90 is like trying to shoot pool with a rope.”

George Burns (1896–1996) American comedian, actor, and writer

Age , Sex

“When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.”

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

Motivational , For Team , Deep , Success

“We will hang the capitalists with the rope that they sell us.”

Joseph Stalin (1879–1953) General secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

Often attributed to Stalin and Marx, according to the book, They Never Said It (1989), p. 64, the phrase derives from a rumour that Lenin said this to one of his close associates, Grigori Zinoviev, not long after a meeting of the Politburo in the early 1920s, but there is no evidence that he ever did. It has also been believed that Lenin may have expressed that the profit motive cannot be undone in that "If we were to hang the last capitalist, another would suddenly appear to sell us the rope". Experts on the Soviet Union reject the rope quote as spurious. However, it is established that Lenin did remark on the same underlying theme (even if not in reference to rope), namely, that capitalists in their addiction to high profits could not help themselves from selling things to a socialist state, even if it was against their own long-term interests by strengthening an enemy; Edvard Radzinsky covers it in his discussion of Lenin's comments on the "deaf-mutes" in Radzinsky's biography of Stalin.
Misattributed

“When you're at the end of your rope, tie a knot and hold on.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

“The last capitalist we hang shall be the one who sold us the rope.”

Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist

“Niggers was the ones with the rope, hanging off trees; Niggas are the ones with gold ropes, hanging out at clubs.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

Posthumous attributions, Tupac: Resurrection (2003)
Source: Resurrection, 1971-1996

Tree

“We will hang the capitalists with the rope that they sell us.”

Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution

According to the book, "They Never Said It", p. 64, there is no evidence Lenin ever said this. Lenin was supposed to have made his observation to one of his close associates, Grigori Zinoviev, not long after a meeting of the Politburo in the early 1920s, but there is no evidence that he ever did. Experts on the Soviet Union reject the rope quote as spurious.
Misattributed

“Owing to ignorance of the rope the rope appears to be a snake; owing to ignorance of the Self the transient state arises of the individualized, limited, phenomenal aspect of the Self.”

Nanak (1469–1539) Founder of Sikhism

Guru Nanak quotes

Appearance

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

Mahmud of Ghazni (971–1030) Sultan of Ghazni

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

Women , Men , God , Children

“Man is something that shall be overcome. Man is a rope, tied between beast and overman - a rope over an abyss. What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not an end.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Source: Thus Spoke Zarathustra

“I have stretched ropes from steeple to steeple; Garlands from window to window; Golden chains from star to star… And I dance.”

Arthur Rimbaud (1854–1891) French Decadent and Symbolist poet

Source: Complete Works

Star , Dance

“A leash is a rope with a noose at both ends.”

Ayn Rand (1905–1982) Russian-American novelist and philosopher

“Man is a rope, tied between beast and Superman--a rope over an abyss.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

“The true way is along a rope that is not spanned high in the air, but only just above the ground. It seems intended more to cause stumbling than to be walked upon.”

Franz Kafka book The Zürau Aphorisms

1
The Zürau Aphorisms (1917 - 1918)

Way

“Suicide was against the law. Johnny had wondered why. It meant that if you missed, or the gas ran out, or the rope broke, you could get locked up in prison to show you that life was really very jolly and thoroughly worth living.”

Terry Pratchett book Johnny and the Dead

Johnny and the Dead (1993)

Life , Law , Suicide

“If we were to hang the last capitalist, another would appear to sell us the rope.”

Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist

A variant of the above misquote, sometimes also attributed to Lenin. This gained popularity during the glasnost era when black market activity was at its most visible in the USSR; meant to show the profit motive was human nature and cannot be eradicated.
Misattributed

Appearance

“Faith has a saving connection with Christ. Christ is on the shore, so to speak, holding the rope, and as we lay hold of it with the hand of our confidence, He pulls us to shore; but all good works having no connection with Christ are drifted along down the gulf of fell despair.”

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

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 228.

Faith , Confidence , Christ , Despair

“"But we've got passengers aboard," our skipper shouted through the darkness. "Prisoners?" the deck called; with a note of curiosity. "Stand by to bring the prisoners aboard." I climbed a rope ladder up the Augusta's side and crawled over the rail, cold, wet, hungry, and tired. The crew pressed forward to see its "prisoners". "Oh, hell," a sailor grunted, "it's only General Bradley."”

Omar Bradley (1893–1981) United States Army field commander during World War II

Source: A Soldier's Story (1951), p. 278.

Hell

“I heard the Master preach.
“Don’t be chained to love and suffering. Instead, cut the ties of love and you will rejoice in your heart.” So he said in a loud voice.The Master is quite a fool.
He does not know: true it hurts to be tied with love, but it will hurt more to cut the ties of love, it will hurt more than even death.
In the tight binding of love’s bonds lies their unbinding.Thus great liberation is to be had in the bonds themselves.
My love, I was afraid the rope of your love might be weak so I doubled the strands of my love for you.”

Han Yong-un (1879–1944) Korean writer

"The Master’s Sermon", translated by Sammy Solberg

Love , Death , Fools , Suffering

“We will hang the capitalists with the rope that they sell us.”

Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist

Often attributed to Lenin or Stalin, less often to Marx. According to the book, "They Never Said It", p. 64, the phrase derives from a rumour that Lenin said this to one of his close associates, Grigori Zinoviev, not long after a meeting of the Politburo in the early 1920s, but there is no evidence that he ever did. Experts on the Soviet Union reject the rope quote as spurious.
Misattributed

“"Leave the goat and drag its rope".”

Manuel Archives

“Mama, your son in the red hat
Had suffered set-backs, had 'shouldn't-have-said-thats'
Had made everyone mad Give 'em enough of they own rope to hang 'em with
The paparazzi never really got what my angle is
They treat my married life like some type of entanglement.”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Life of the Party
Lyrics, Donda (2021)

Suffering , Madness , Life

“Plainly said, he was giving me enough rope to hang myself with. Apparently he didn’t realize that once a noose is tied, it will fit one neck as easily as another.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Name of the Wind

Source: The Name of the Wind (2007), Chapter 39, “Enough Rope” (p. 281)

“I danced along a colored wind/
Dangled from a rope of sand”

Tom Waits (1949) American singer-songwriter and actor

Source: Lyrics of Tom Waits: The Early Years, 1971-1983

Color , Dance

“People are working harder than ever, but because they lack clarity and vision, they aren’t getting very far. They, in essence, are pushing a rope… with all of their might.”

Stephen R. Covey book The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness

Source: The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness

People

“Three more days. That’s what Sven always told me. When you think you’re at the end of your rope, give it three more days. And then another three. Sometimes you’ll find the rope is longer than you thought.”

Mary E. Pearson (1955) young-adult fiction writer

Source: The Heart of Betrayal

Thinking

“Gravity was something you could beat; all it took was hydrogen, hot air, or even a bit of rope. But being a girl was a miserable, never-ending struggle.”

Scott Westerfeld (1963) American science fiction writer

Girl

“The rope that pulls you from the flood can become a noose around your neck.”

Khaled Hosseini book And the Mountains Echoed

Source: And the Mountains Echoed

“The train is roaring toward you and the villain is twirling his moustache and you're fussing that he's tied you to the tracks with the wrong kind of rope.”

Robin McKinley book Sunshine

Source: Sunshine

Training

“Most people have a rope that ties them to someone, and that rope can be short or it can be long. (Be long. Belong. Get it?) You don't know how long, though. It's not your choice.”

Nick Hornby book A Long Way Down

Source: A Long Way Down

People

“What are you" -Mac

"I don't follow" -Jericho

"You dropped 30 feet in that warehouse. You should have broken something. What are you?" -Mac

"A man with a rope." -Jericho”

Karen Marie Moning book Darkfever

Source: Darkfever

“I am the beast at the end of the rope.”

Sarah Kane (1971–1999) playwright from England

“The sky is blue today, Max, and there is a big long cloud, and it's stretched out, like a rope. At the end of it, the sun is
like a yellow hole…”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

Sun

“Our ignorance allowed us to live, as you are in the mountains, and your rope is frayed and about to break, but you don't know it and feel safe.”

Primo Levi book The Periodic Table

Source: The Periodic Table

Feeling , Mountain

“A difference in self loathing? Please. The only difference between a gun and a rope is the time it takes to tie the knot.”

Justine Larbalestier (1967) Australian young-adult fiction author

Source: Zombies Vs. Unicorns

Time

“Guilt is a rope that wears thin.”

Ayn Rand book Atlas Shrugged

Source: Atlas Shrugged

“Republicans don't like people to talk about depressions. You can hardly blame them for that. You remember the old saying: Don't talk about rope in the house where somebody has been hanged.”

Harry Truman (1884–1972) American politician, 33rd president of the United States (in office from 1945 to 1953)

People , Housing

“And his hands would plait the priest's entrails,
For want of a rope, to strangle kings.”

Denis Diderot (1713–1784) French Enlightenment philosopher and encyclopædist

Et ses mains ourdiraient les entrailles du prêtre,
Au défaut d’un cordon pour étrangler les rois.
"Les Éleuthéromanes", in Poésies Diverses (1875)
Variant translation: His hands would plait the priest's guts, if he had no rope, to strangle kings.
This derives from the prior statement widely attributed to Jean Meslier: "I would like — and this would be the last and most ardent of my wishes — I would like the last of the kings to be strangled by the guts of the last priest". It is often claimed the passage appears in Meslier's Testament (1725) but it only appears in abstracts of the work written by others. See the Wikipedia article Jean Meslier for details.
Let us strangle the last king with the guts of the last priest.
Attributed to Diderot by Jean-François de La Harpe in Cours de Littérature Ancienne et Moderne (1840)
Attributions to Diderot of similar statements also occur in various forms, i.e.: "Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest."
Variant: Et des boyaux du dernier prêtre
Serrons le cou du dernier roi.

“If a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, then a family is more like a rope. We're lots of fragile little strands, and we survive by becoming hopelessly intertwined with each other.”

Brian K. Vaughan (1976) American screenwriter, comic book creator

Source: Saga, Vol. 7

Family , Strong

“A person needs a little madness, or else they never dare cut the rope and be free.”

Nikos Kazantzakis book Zorba the Greek

As quoted in Wisdom for the Soul : Five Millennia of Prescriptions for Spiritual Healing (2006) by Larry Chang, p. 412
Variant: You have everything but one thing: madness. A man needs a little madness or else - he never dares cut the rope and be free.
Source: Zorba the Greek

Personality , Madness

“I knew he would never leave me, never let me down-because the man had never abandoned anything in his long life. If I hadn’t taken the gold rope of our bond, I knew Adam would have sat on me and hog-tied me with it. I liked that. A lot.”

Patricia Briggs book Silver Borne

Source: Silver Borne

Life

“Are you, are you coming to the tree?
Wear a necklace of rope, side by side with me.
Strange things did happen here.
No stranger would let it be if we met up
At midnight in the hanging tree.”

Suzanne Collins book Mockingjay

Source: Mockingjay

Tree

“I am always chilled and astonished by the would-be writers who ask me for advice and admit, quite blithely, that they "don't have time to read." This is like a guy starting up Mount Everest saying that he didn't have time to buy any rope or pitons.”

Stephen King (1947) American author

Guy , Time , Reading

“What are you?
"A man with a rope?"
"Ha-ha.”

Karen Marie Moning book Darkfever

Source: Darkfever

“It takes 3 girls to tow always; two to hold the rope, and the other one runs round and round, and giggles.”

Jerome K. Jerome book Three Men in a Boat

Source: Three Men in a Boat

Girl

“My genes, my love, are rubber bands and rope - make yourself a structure you can live inside.”

Aimee Bender (1969) Novelist, short story writer

Source: Willful Creatures

Love

“I keep telling this story - different people, different places, different times - but always you, always me, always this story, because a story is a tight rope between two worlds.”

Jeanette Winterson (1959) English writer

Source: The Powerbook

People , World , Time

“If you don't break your ropes while you're alive, do you think ghosts will do it after?”

Kabir (1440–1518) Indian mystic poet

Thinking

“If you're at the end of your rope… untie the knot in your heart.”

Cooper Edens (1945) American writer

Source: If You're Afraid of the Dark, Remember the Night Rainbow/Add One More Star to the Night

Heart

“Poetry is a life-cherishing force. For poems are not words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes let down to the lost, something as necessary as bread in the pockets of the hungry. Yes indeed.”

Mary Oliver (1935–2019) American writer

Variant: Poetry is a life-cherishing force. For poems are not words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes let down to the lost, something as necessary as bread in the pockets of the hungry.
Source: A Poetry Handbook

Life

“When I can make
Of ten small words a rope to hang the world!
"I had you and I have you now no more.”

Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950) American poet

Source: Renascence and Other Poems

World

“And Meredith and Bonnie, who's going to bend some spoons for us next. I'm going to throw you down a rope… that is, unless Bonnie can levitate you out.”

L.J. Smith book The Vampire Diaries: The Struggle

Source: The Struggle

“I have the intention to dedicate Le Gibet to you. It is not because I think you merit a rope to hang yourself, but because it is the least difficult of the three pieces.”

Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) French composer

Ravel to pianist Jean Marnold about Le Gibet from Gaspard de la Nuit

Thinking

“All Nine often used to come to me, I mean the Muses:
But I ignored them: my girl was in my arms.
Now I’ve left my sweetheart: and they’ve left me,
And I roll my eyes, seeking a knife or rope.
But Heaven is full of gods: You came to aid me:
Greetings, Boredom, mother of the Muse.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German writer, artist, and politician

Epigram 27
Venetian Epigrams (1790)

God , Girl

“You're going to be roped!
And you're going to be caged!
And, as for your dust speck – hah!
That we shall boil in a hot steaming kettle of Beezle-Nut Oil!”

Dr. Seuss Horton Hears a Who!

Horton Hears a Who! (1954)

“Arms, hands [of the two van Gogh brothers, Vincent and Theo], like rifles, thrust out like non-stop ideas thoughts. Enormous thick veins like the ropes of a ship through which flow thoughts and inspirational excitement. They join the two brothers like nerve connections that pass from one body to the other, channeling the waves and opening up both in a magnetic ring of work and passion.”

Ossip Zadkine (1890–1967) French sculptor

quote, c. 1955; as quoted in: Zadkine and Van Gogh, ed. Garance Schabert and Ron Dirven (transl. Anne Porcelijn), Vincent van Goghhuis, Zundert & Scriptum Art, Schiedam 2008, p. 64
1940 - 1960

Idea , Passion

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Muwatta of Imam Malik, Book of Sadaqa, hadith 10 http://ahadith.co.uk/permalink-hadith-4938
Sunni Hadith

Peace

“Panurge had no sooner heard this, but he was upon the high-rope.”

Francois Rabelais book Gargantua and Pantagruel

Source: Gargantua and Pantagruel (1532–1564), Fifth Book (1564), Chapter 18.

“When you're big you don't need a reason to sweat. You don't, right? My friends cannot grab a hold of this concept. They come up to me all the time like "Jeez! What have you been doing? What are ya jumpin rope in the attic?!" "Well, I peeled an orange.. about an hour ago. Why, what's up?"”

Kevin James (1965) American actor and comedian

Sweat the Small Stuff (2001)

Time

“Take the rope to my heart and fall”

Daniel Johns (1979) Australian musician

Black Tangled Heart
Song lyrics, Neon Ballroom (1999)

Heart

“…when the experiment was attempted by Michelson and Morley it failed, thus showing that space and time assumed in the picture were not true to the facts of nature. …the pattern of events was the same whether the world stood at rest in the supposed ether, or had an ether wind blowing through it at a million miles an hour. It began to look as though the supposed ether was not very important in the scheme of things… and so might as well be abandoned. But if the bell-rope is to be discarded, what is to ring the bell?”

James Jeans (1877–1946) British mathematician and astronomer

Physics and Philosophy (1942)

World , Nature , Time

“And this Thing I saw! How can I describe it? A monstrous tripod, higher than many houses, striding over the young pine trees, and smashing them aside in its career; a walking engine of glittering metal, striding now across the heather; articulate ropes of steel dangling from it, and the clattering tumult of its passage mingling with the riot of the thunder.”

H. G. Wells book The War of the Worlds

Book I, Ch. 10: In the Storm
The War of the Worlds (1898)

Tree , Housing

“It was from this day on that I began to notice a real difference between our vaqueros on the ranch from Mexico and the gringo cowboys. The American cowboys always seemed so ready to act rough and tough, wanting to “break” the horse, cow, or goat or anything else. Where, on the other hand, our vaqueros—who used the word “amanzar,” meaning to make “tame,” for dealing with horses—had a whole different attitude towards everything. To “break” a horse, for the cowboys, actually, really meant to take a green, untrained horse and rope him, knock him down, saddle him while he fought to get loose, then mount him as he got up on all four legs, and ride the living hell out of the horse until you tired him out, taught him who was boss, and “broke” his spirit. To “amanzar” a horse, on the other hand, was a whole other approach that took weeks of grooming, petting, and leading the green horse around in the afternoon with a couple of well-trained horses. Then, after about a month, you began to put a saddle on the horse and tie him up in shade in the afternoon for a couple of hours until, finally, the saddle felt like just a natural part of him. Then, and only then, did a person finally mount the horse, petting and sweet-talking him the whole time, and once more the green horse was taken on a walk between two well-trained horses.”

Victor Villaseñor (1940) American writer

Burro Genius: A Memoir (2004)

Hell , Nature , Time , Horse

“Those who sell their liberty for security are understandable, if pitiable, creatures. Those who sell the liberty of others for wealth, power, or even a moment's respite deserve only the end of a rope.”

L. Neil Smith (1946) American writer

"Some New Tactical Reflections".

Understanding , Wealth

“Much water has gone down the Ganges after Lammens wrote in 1929. Islamic Apologetics in India since then has progressed by leaps and bounds. The Quran has been roped in to prove that Islam stands for equality of all religions and religious tolerance.”

Sita Ram Goel book The Calcutta Quran Petition

The Calcutta Quran Petition (1986)

Religion , Water

“I am learning the ropes of captaincy from MS Dhoni.”

MS Dhoni (1981) Indian cricket player

Dwayne Bravo https://www.scoopwhoop.com/sports/dhoni-quotes/

Learning

“For the cold of the pistol-butt and the bullet's heat,
For the ropes that choke, the manacles that bind,
The huge voice, metal, that lies from a thousand tubes
And the stuttering machine-gun that answers all.”

Stephen Vincent Benét (1898–1943) poet, short story writer, novelist

Litany for Dictatorships (1935)

“Grand pappy told my pappy back in my day son
A man had to answer for the wicked that he'd done
Take all the rope in Texas, find a tall oak tree
Round up all of them bad boys, hang them high in the street
For all the people to seeThat justice is the one thing you should always find
You got to saddle up your boys, you got to draw a hard line
When the gun smoke settles, we'll sing a victory tune
And we'll all meet back at the local saloon.
We'll raise up our glasses against Evil forces singing
Whiskey for my men, beer for my horses.”

Toby Keith (1961) American country music singer and actor

Beer for My Horses, written with Scotty Emerick.
Song lyrics, Unleashed (2002)

Men , People , Justice , Boy

“At that time I was very friendly with Picasso. Our temperaments were very different, but we had the same idea. Later on it became clear, Picasso is Spanish and I am French; as everyone knows that mean a lot of differences, but during those days the differences did not count… We were living in Montmartre, we used to meet every day, we used to talk... In those years Picasso and I said things to each other that nobody will ever say again, that nobody could say any more... It was rather like a pair of climbers roped together.”

Georges Braque (1882–1963) French painter and sculptor

Source: 1946 - 1963, In conversation with Dora Vallier' (1954), p. 264 - Braque's quote is referring to the early common starting years of Cubism in Paris with Picasso, ca. 1907 -1910

Idea , Time

“1657. Give him but Rope enough, and he'll hang himself.”

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

Introductio ad prudentiam: Part II (1727), Gnomologia (1732)

“The people with whom I grew up in the Vestmannaeyjar carried heaven within themselves; even if it was sixty fathoms at the end of a rope down a cliff, fowling, they were at home in God's City of Zion.”

Halldór Laxness (1902–1998) Icelandic author

old María
Paradísarheimt (Paradise Reclaimed) (1960)

God , People , Home

“Before we continue our story we must stop to ask, “What is a castle?” Once a castle was defined simply as the fortified and self-sufficient dwelling of an individual feudal lord. Today we know that castles had many functions, both practical and symbolic. The castle was a new ar chitectural form—part fortress, part residence, part statehouse, part the atrical stage. Furthermore, every castle was different, depending on the wealth of the builder, the reason for the castle (control of territory, bor der, coastlines), the local geography (availability of naturally defensible sites), the knowledge of the master builder or patron, the available ma terials, the degree of urgency (speed), and finally the building traditions of the region (the techniques the workmen knew and used). In short, there is no such thing as a typical castle; a castle was a very special build ing whose form and function answered the needs of people living in Eu rope from the eleventh through the fifteenth century.”

Marilyn Stokstad (1929–2016) art historian

Overview: Castles in Context
Medieval castles (2005)

People , Nature , Knowledge , Parting

“The slavery debate has been really a death-struggle from that moment. Mr. Clay thought not. Mr. Clay was a shrewd politician, but the difference between him and Calhoun was the difference between principle and expediency. Calhoun's sharp, incisive genius has engraved his name, narrow but deep, upon our annals. The fluent and facile talents of Clay in a bold, large hand wrote his name in honey upon many pages. But time is already licking it away. Henry Clay was our great compromiser. That was known, and that was the reason why Mr. Buchanan's story of a bargain with J. Q. Adams always clung to Mr. Clay. He had compromised political policies so long that he had forgotten there is such a thing as political principle, which is simply a name for the moral instincts applied to government. He did not see that when Mr. Calhoun said he should return to the Constitution he took the question with him, and shifted the battle-ground from the low, poisonous marsh of compromise, where the soldiers never know whether they are standing on land or water, to the clear, hard height of principle. Mr. Clay had his omnibus at the door to roll us out of the mire. The Whig party was all right and ready to jump in. The Democratic party was all right. The great slavery question was going to be settled forever. The bushel-basket of national peace and plenty and prosperity was to be heaped up and run over. Mr. Pierce came all the way from the granite hills of New Hampshire, where people are supposed to tell the truth, to an- nounce to a happy country that it was at peace — that its bushel-basket was never so overflowingly full before. And then what? Then the bottom fell out. Then the gentlemen in the national rope -walk at Washington found they had been busily twining a rope of sand to hold the country together. They had been trying to compromise the principles of human justice, not the percentage of a tariff; the instincts of human nature and consequently of all permanent government, and the conscience of the country saw it. Compromises are the sheet-anchor of the Union — are they? As the English said of the battle of Bunker Hill, that two such victories would ruin their army, so two such sheet- anchors as the Compromise of 1850 would drag the Union down out of sight forever.”

George William Curtis (1824–1892) American writer

1850s, The Present Aspect of the Slavery Question (1859)

Death , People , Truth , Peace

“Suffering, my son, is the fount of love. Suffering is the grace, the great grace, which our Father in heaven pours down upon us. For suffering gives men submissive hearts. He that does not suffer thinks that he stands upon a mighty rock which he himself has raised. He does not see his brother; he sees only himself. He believes in no one; he believes only in his own strength. His heart becomes a swamp which swarms with reptiles: pride, obstinacy, and self-love. And when his footstool is rolled away from under him, he sinks, together with all the reptiles, into the depths of hell. But he to whom God has granted suffering shall find his pains like ropes which bind him to his Father in heaven. His heart is awake to feel the pains of his brother in need. He sends afflictions upon you and makes you small on earth that you may be great in heaven.”

Sholem Asch (1880–1957) Polish-American novelist, dramatist, essayist

The Nazarene, 1939, p. 512.

Love , Men , God , Pain

“…[Bob Kane] had an idea for a character called "Batman", and he'd like me to see the drawings. I went over to Kane's, and he had drawn a character who looked very much like Superman with kind of … reddish tights, I believe, with boots … no gloves, no gauntlets … with a small domino mask, swinging on a rope. He had two stiff wings that were sticking out, looking like bat wings. And under it was a big sign … BATMAN.”

Bill Finger (1914–1974) American comic strip and comic book writer

[Jim Steranko, The Steranko History of Comics, Supergraphics, Reading, Pa., 1970, ISBN 0-517-50188-0, p.44]

Idea , Drawing

“It pains me to see my old company, which has meant so much to America, on the ropes. But Chrysler has been in trouble before, and we got through it, and I believe they can do it again. […] Let's face it, if your car breaks down, you're not going to take it to the White House to get fixed. But, if your company breaks down, you've got to go to the experts on the ground, not the bureaucrats.”

Lee Iacocca (1924–2019) American businessman

It Pains Me, Halpert, Julie, 2009-04-30, Newsweek, 2009-05-23 http://www.newsweek.com/id/195551,

Pain , Cars , Housing

“The prose writer drags meaning along with a rope, the poet makes it stand out and hit you.”

T. E. Hulme (1883–1917) English Imagist poet and critic

Speculations (Essays, 1924)

“I should have known earlier about President Bush, but I gave him some rope - a lot of rope, and then he hung all of us with it. I should have known it when I heard him say "When it comes to evolution, the jury is still out."”

Lewis Black (1948) American stand-up comedian, author, playwright, social critic and actor

What jury, where? The Scopes Trial is over.
Red, White, and Screwed (2006)

“Al Utbi, the author of Tarikh-i-Yamini, writes how Sultan Mahmud punished Nawasa Shah: “Satan had got the better of Nawasa Shah, for he was again apostatizing towards the pit of plural worship, and had thrown off the slough of Islam, and held conversation with the chiefs of idolatry respecting the casting off the firm rope of religion from his neck. So the Sultan went swifter than the wind in that direction, and made the sword reek with the blood of his enemies. He turned Nawasa Shah out of his government, took possession of all the treasures which he had accumulated, re-assumed the government, and then cut down the harvest of idolatry with the sickle of his sword and spear. After God had granted him this and the previous victory, which were tried witnesses as to his exalted state and proselytism, he returned without difficulty to Ghazna.””

Mahmud of Ghazni (971–1030) Sultan of Ghazni

Utbi, in Lal, K. S. (1992). The legacy of Muslim rule in India. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan. Chapter 2
Quotes from Tarikh Yamini (Kitabu-l Yamini) by Al Utbi

God , Religion , Victory

“Abu Hurayra reported that the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said, "It is better for one of you to take a rope and carry firewood on his back than for him to go to a man to beg from him who then gives to him or refuses to."”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Riyadh-as-Saliheen by Imam Al-Nawawi, volume 4, hadith number 540
Sunni Hadith

Peace

“I can't remember how they did this effect [on 1977's Mannaja), but it looked awful! One of the girls said to me that I was made of steel because Maurizio dragged me through the rain with the rope around my neck. That was tough indeed. Poor Maurizio died some time after that in a tennis accident.”

Donald O'Brien (actor) (1930–2003) Italian film and TV actor

Euro Trash Cinema magazine interview (March 1996)

Girl , Time

“Several years after Wilt stopped playing, he toyed with the idea of a comeback. On the day he visited the Knicks' offices in Madison Square Garden, he talked to Red Holzman, then strode out to the elevator. When it opened, two deliverymen were struggling with a dolly piled high with boxes of office supplies, mostly letterheads and envelopes. The load was so heavy, the elevator had stopped maybe four inches below the floor level and now the deliverymen were huffing and puffing, but they couldn't raise the dolly high enough to get it on the floor level. After maybe two minutes of the deliverymen's huffing and puffing, Wilt, his biceps bulging in a tank top, peered down at them and intoned, "Gentlemen, maybe I can help." They stepped back, he stepped into the elevator, grabbed each end of the rope slung under the dolly and without much exertion, quickly lifted the dolly onto the floor level. Looking up in awe, the deliverymen said, "Thank you." Wilt said, "You're welcome." Wilt stepped into the elevator and rode down to the street level as another witness followed the two deliverymen toward the Knick offices and asked, "How much does all this weigh?"”

Wilt Chamberlain (1936–1999) basketball player

They quickly surveyed the stack of big boxes of office supplies. "Close to 600 pounds," one said.
The Good Natured Giant Wasn't Belligerent, Sports of the Times; Oct 13, 1999; Dave Anderson
Strength

Idea , Help , Box

“Both gods knotted the rope of strife and leveling war,
strangling both sides at once by stretching the mighty cable,
never broken, never slipped, that snapped the knees of thousands.”

Homér Iliad

XIII. 358–360 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

God , War

“The whole business is the crudest sort of stratagem, since we have no way of foreseeing it to the end. It is a mere paying out of rope on the chance that somewhere along the length of it will be a noose.”

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

Part V, The Merchant Princes, section 2; originally published as “The Big and the Little” in Astounding (August 1944)
The Foundation series (1951–1993), Foundation (1951)

Way , Business , Chance

“The Captain's fore-arm like buncht-up rope,
With Anita wrigglin' free onto skull n' dagger,
And a portrait of Christ, nailed to an anchor,
Etched into the upper…”

Nick Cave (1957) Australian musician

Song lyrics, From Her to Eternity (1984), Cabin Fever!

Christ

“A man called, wanting to borrow a rope.
"You cannot have it," said Nasrudin.
"Why not?"
"Because it is in use."
"But I can see it just lying there, on the ground."”

Nasreddin (1208–1284) philosopher, Sufi and wise man from Turkey, remembered for his funny stories and anecdotes

"That's right: that's its use."
Idries Shah, The Pleasantries of the Incredible Mulla Nasrudin (1968), ISBN 0525473068, p. 152

Lying

“At this time, space was supposed to be filled with an ether, a substance which might well serve, among other functions, to transmit forces across space. So long as such an ether could be called on, the transmission of force to a distance was easy to understand; it was like ringing a distant bell by pulling a bell-rope.”

James Jeans (1877–1946) British mathematician and astronomer

Physics and Philosophy (1942)

Understanding , Distant , Time

“The ploughman ploughs, the fisherman dreams of fish;
Aloft, the sailor, through a world of ropes
Guides tangled meditations, feverish
With memories of girls forsaken, hopes
Of brief reunions, new discoveries,
Past rum consumed, rum promised, rum potential.”

Michael Hamburger (1924–2007) British translator, poet, critic, memoirist and academic

Lines On Brueghel's "Icarus" http://www.themediadrome.com/content/poetry/hamburger_lines_on_icarus.htm

World , Dreams , Hope , Girl

“One of the things that I learned in the war is that we're not the top species on the planet because we're nice. We are a very aggressive species; it is in us. People talk a lot about how well the military turns kids into killing machines, and I'll always argue that it's just finishing school. What we do with civilization is that we learn to inhibit and rope in these aggressive tendencies, and we have to recognize them. I worry about a whole country that doesn't recognize them, because think of how many times we get ourselves into scrapes as a nation because we're always the 'good guys.”

Karl Marlantes (1944) Businessman, novelist

Sometimes, I think if we thought we weren't always the good guys, we might actually get into less wars.
The Vietnam War (2017), episode 5, documentary by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick

War , People , School , Guy

“People today often want to separate slavery, and say that Lincoln was interested in preserving the union and not in destroying slavery. No, that gets it exactly wrong. The two are as knotted together as a rope, because the only union worth preserving is a union that has abjured slavery. So for Lincoln to get rid of slavery is to purge America of the aristocratic poison. He once said that slavery was the one retrograde institution that was poisoning the American republic, keeping the American republic from realizing its full potential.”

Allen C. Guelzo (1953) American historian

2010s, Interview with Tom Mackaman (2013)

People

“Faith is the grip that clergy have over you. It's the invisible rope around your neck that pulls you along the road they want you to travel, for their benefit, not yours. It's a dead-end word. It's a word of bondage. It's a word that lets you believe what you've been told to believe, without feeling that you've been told what to believe, but you have, and you can stop pretending any time you like. It's not a virtue, that's the last thing it is. It's an abdication from reality. It's a dumb act of self-hypnosis. It's a cowardly cop-out. It's gullibility with a halo, and hiding behind it is like pretending to be an invalid.”

Pat Condell (1949) Stand-up comedian, writer, and Internet personality

"Your faith is a joke" (16 December 2010)
2010

Faith , Travel , Feeling , Reality

“I'm begging you, your right to religion and freedom to exercise religion and read all of the passages of the Bible as you want to read them and as your church wants to preach them… are going to come under the ropes in the next year. If it lasts that long it will be the next year. I beg you, look for the words "social justice" or "economic justice" on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes!”

Glenn Beck (1964) U.S. talk radio and television host

The Glenn Beck Program
Premiere Radio Networks
2010-03-02
Goodstein
Laurie
Outraged by Glenn Beck’s Salvo, Christians Fire Back
New York Times
2010-03-11
0362-4331
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/12/us/12justice.html
2010s, 2010