Quotes about ruling
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“A prude is a person who thinks that his own rules of propriety are natural laws.”

Robert A. Heinlein (1907–1988) American science fiction author

Law, Nature, Thinking, Personality

“The first rule of hurricane coverage is that every broadcast must begin with palm trees bending in the wind.”

Carl Hiaasen (1953) journalist, columnist and novelist from the United States

Tree

“Wizard's Seventh Rule
Life is the future, not the past.”

Terry Goodkind book The Pillars of Creation

Source: The Pillars of Creation

Life, Past, Future

“To be a saint is the exception; to be a just person is the rule. Err, stumble, commit sin, but be one of the just.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

Personality

“The tyrant dies and his rule is over; the martyr dies and his rule begins.”

Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism

1848
1840s, The Journals of Søren Kierkegaard, 1840s
Source: The Journals of Kierkegaard

“I feel that the dormant goodwill in people needs to be stirred. People need to hear that it makes sense to behave decently or to help others, to place common interests above their own, to respect the elementary rules of human coexistence.”

Václav Havel (1936–2011) playwright, essayist, poet, dissident and 1st President of the Czech Republic

People, Feeling, Sense, Help

“THREE THINGS TO REMEMBER As long as you’re dancing, you can break the rules. Sometimes breaking the rules is just extending the rules. Sometimes there are no rules.”

Mary Oliver (1935–2019) American writer

Source: A Thousand Mornings

Dance

“The Supreme Court has ruled that they cannot have a nativity scene in Washington, D. C. This wasn't for any religious reasons. They couldn't find three wise men and a virgin.”

Jay Leno (1950) American comedian, actor, writer, producer, voice actor and television host

Men

“To every rule there is an exception—and an idiot ready to demonstrate it. Don't be the one!”

Vera Nazarian (1966) American writer

Source: The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

“To know a thing well, know it's limits; Only when pushed beyond it's tolerance will it's true nature be seen.
-The Amtal Rule”

Frank Herbert book Children of Dune

Source: Children of Dune

Nature

“People who know how to creatively break the rules also know why the rules were there in the first place.”

Richard Rohr (1943) American spiritual writer, speaker, teacher, Catholic Franciscan priest

Source: Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life

People

“You cannot convince people to love you. This is an absolute rule. No one will ever give you love because you want him or her to give it. Real love moves freely in both directions. Don’t waste your time on anything else.”

Cheryl Strayed book Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar

Source: Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar

Love, People, Time

“Part of her revolted against the insanity of the rules. Part of her was grateful. In a world of chaos, any guidelines helped. And she knew that each day she remained alive,. One plus one plus one. The Devil's arithmetic…”

Jane Yolen (1939) American speculative fiction and children's writer

World, Help, Parting

“Rule of life. If you bother to ask someone’s advice, then bother to listen to it.”

Sophie Kinsella book The Secret Dreamworld of a Shopaholic

Source: Confessions of a Shopaholic

Life

“The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience.”

Harper Lee book To Kill a Mockingbird

Source: To Kill a Mockingbird

Personality

“I keep forgetting that rules are only for little nice people.”

Bill Watterson (1958) American comic artist

Source: The Complete Calvin and Hobbes

People, Forgetting

“She is free not by disobeying the rules but by obeying them.”

Elisabeth Elliot (1926–2015) American missionary

Source: Let Me be a Woman

“Colonialism. The enforced spread of the rule of reason. But who is going to spread it among the colonizers?”

Anthony Burgess (1917–1993) English writer

“No, I'm a man with a rule. People leave me alone, I leave them alone. If they don't, I don't.”

Lee Child book Nothing to Lose

Source: Nothing to Lose

People

“I was told love should be unconditional. That's the rule, everyone says so. But if love has no boundaries, no limits, no conditions, why should anyone try to do the right thing ever? If I know I am loved no matter what, where is the challenge?”

Gillian Flynn book Gone Girl

Source: Gone Girl

Love

“The rule is: don’t use commas like a stupid person. I mean it.”

Lynne Truss (1955) British writer

Source: Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation

Stupidity, Personality

“Heroes aren't allowed to be nervous."
"Who made up that rule?"
"It's a known fact…”

David Eddings (1931–2009) American novelist

Source: The Seeress of Kell

“It's not wise to violate the rules until you know how to observe them.”

T.S. Eliot (1888–1965) 20th century English author

“You exist in a place that is beyond all rules for me. Do you understand that? - JZB”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: Shadowfever

Understanding

“Ah, come now. I look like an angel, but I'm not. The old rules of nature encompass many creatures like me. We're beautiful like the diamond-backed snake, or the striped tiger, yet we're merciless killers”

Anne Rice book Interview with the Vampire

Source: Interview with the Vampire

Beauty, Angels, Nature

“This isn't going to be pretty. Rules will be broken. Friendships will be tested. And huge risks will be taken. But they're small prices to pay for true love and freedom, right?”

Lisi Harrison Monster High

Source: Monster High

Love, Friendship, Freedom

“Rules without relationship leads to rebellion.”

Josh McDowell (1939) American writer

Why True Love Waits: A Definitive Book on How to Help Your Youth Resist Sexual Pressure (2002), p. 158

“All right, then, her first rule for the rest of her days: no more looking outside for definitions. She might not have any clue who she was, but better to be lost and searching than shoved into a social box by someone else.”

Jessica Bird book Lover Revealed

Source: Lover Revealed

Search, Box

“Wizard's Ninth Rule
A contradiction can not exist in reality. Not in part, nor in whole.”

Terry Goodkind Chainfire

Source: Chainfire

Reality, Parting

“Better no rule than cruel rule.”

Aesop book Aesop's Fables

Aesop's Fables

“Man cannot become attached to higher aims and submit to a rule if he sees nothing above him to which he belongs. To free him from all social pressure is to abandon him to himself and demoralize him.”

Émile Durkheim (1858–1917) French sociologist (1858-1917)

Source: On Suicide: A Study in Sociology

“This is a rule of racing: No race has ever been won in the first corner; many have been lost there.”

Garth Stein The Art of Racing in the Rain

Source: The Art of Racing in the Rain

“It has been the dream of very few men to rule the entire world.
- Dr. Grief”

Anthony Horowitz book Point Blanc

Source: Point Blank

Men, World, Dreams

“Fear is the State's psychological weapon of choice to frighten citizens into sacrificing their basic freedoms and rule-of-law protections in exchange for the security promised by their all-powerful government.”

Philip G. Zimbardo book The Lucifer Effect

Source: The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil

Fear, Law, Freedom

“The cup of tea on arrival at a country house is a thing which, as a rule, I particularly enjoy. I like the crackling logs, the shaded lights, the scent of buttered toast, the general atmosphere of leisured cosiness.”

P.G. Wodehouse book The Code of the Woosters

Source: The Code of the Woosters

Light, Tea, Housing, Country

“It feels like the whole world has turned upside down. There aren't any more rules.

Hey,' I say to Sam, because if the world's gone crazy, then I guess I can do whatever I want. "Guess what? I'm a worker.”

Holly Black book White Cat

Source: White Cat

World, Feeling

“The only permanent rule in Calvinball is that you can never play it the same way twice! (Calvin)”

Bill Watterson (1958) American comic artist

Source: The Revenge of the Baby-Sat

Way

“Outcasts may grow up to be novelists and filmmakers and computer tycoons, but they will never be the athletic ruling class.”

Chuck Klosterman book Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto

Source: Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto

“… and for a moment I thought I loved her. But I am slow-thinking and full of interior rules that act as brakes on my desires”

F. Scott Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby

Source: The Great Gatsby

Love, Thinking

“Yet he who reigns within himself, and rules
Passions, desires, and fears, is more a king.”

John Milton (1608–1674) English epic poet

Source: Paradise Regained by John Milton

Fear, Passion

“Wizard's Third Rule
Passion rules reason, for better or for worse.”

Terry Goodkind Blood of the Fold

Source: Blood of the Fold

Passion

“Live by your own rules Move to your rhythm, instead of dancing to the beat of someone else’s drum Decide how you want to be treated Choose what you will or will not tolerate Leave if you don’t get what you want.”

Sherry Argov (1977) American writer

Source: Why Men Love Bitches: From Doormat to Dreamgirl—A Woman's Guide to Holding Her Own in a Relationship

Dance

“Two forces rule the universe: light and gravity.”

Simone Weil (1909–1943) French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist

Light, Universe

“I believe in a relatively equal society, supported by institutions that limit extremes of wealth and poverty. I believe in democracy, civil liberties, and the rule of law. That makes me a liberal, and I’m proud of it.”

Paul Krugman book The Conscience of a Liberal

Source: The Conscience of a Liberal (2007), Ch. 13. The Conscience of a Liberal http://books.wwnorton.com/books/detail.aspx?ID=5887. W. W. Norton & Company. 352 pages ISBN 978-0-393-06069-0, 1st edition (2007)

Law, Democracy, Support, Wealth

“No animal, according to the rules of animal etiquette, is ever expected to do anything strenuous, or heroic, or even moderately active during the off-season of winter.”

Kenneth Grahame book The Wind in the Willows

Source: The Wind in the Willows (1908), Ch. 4, "Mr. Badger"

Winter, Animals, Season

“You're Mac," he says. "And I'm Jericho. And nothing else matters. Never will. You exsist in a place that is beyond all rules for me. Do you understand that?"
"I do.”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: Shadowfever

Understanding

“According to Dickens, the first rule of human nature is self-preservation and when I forgive him for writing a character as pathetic as Oliver Twist, I'll thank him for the advice.”

Melina Marchetta book On the Jellicoe Road

Source: On the Jellicoe Road

Forgiveness, Nature

“The exception is more interesting than the rule. The rule proves nothing; the exception proves everything. In the exception the power of real life breaks through the crust of a mechanism that has become torpid by repetition.”

Carl Schmitt (1888–1985) German jurist, political theorist and professor of law

Source: Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty

Life

“Life, it turns out, goes on. There is no cosmic rule that grants you immunity from the details just because you have come face-to-face with a catastrophe. The garbage can still overflow, the bills arrive in the mail, telemarketers, interrupt dinner.”

Jodi Picoult Perfect Match

Source: Perfect Match

Life

“He lied, Jenny thought, racing up the steps. He changed the rules and he lied. Sometimes you can't return good for evil; sometimes evil simply has to be stopped.”

L.J. Smith The Forbidden Game

Source: The Forbidden Game

Evil, Change

“We are what we are. Nothing more, nothing less. There is good and evil among every kind of people. It's the evil among us who rule now.”

Anne Bishop (1955) American fiction writer

Source: Daughter of the Blood

People, Evil

“What are the three most important rules of the chemist?"

This I knew from Ben. "Label clearly. Measure twice. Eat elsewhere.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Name of the Wind

Source: The Name of the Wind

“Some time ago," he said, "--how long it seems! -- I remember saying to a young friend of mine of the name of Spiller, 'Comrade Spiller, never confuse the unusual with the impossible.' It is my guiding rule in life.”

P.G. Wodehouse (1881–1975) English author

Life, Time

“The secret we should never let the gamemasters know is that they don't need any rules.”

Gary Gygax (1938–2008) American writer and game designer

Secret

“Habit rules the unreflecting herd.”

William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Romantic poet

Part II, No. 28 - Reflections.
Ecclesiastical Sonnets (1821)

“As a rule, the more bizarre a thing is the less mysterious it proves to be. It is your commonplace, featureless crimes which are really puzzling, just as a commonplace face is the most difficult to identify.”

Arthur Conan Doyle book The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Source: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“As centuries of dictators have known, an illiterate crowd is easiest to rule; since the craft of reading cannot be untaught once it has been acquired, the second-best recourse is to limit its scope.”

Alberto Manguel (1948) writer

Forbidden Reading, p. 281.
Source: A History of Reading (1996)

Reading

“One man's style must not be the rule of another's.”

Jane Austen book Emma

Source: Emma

“Love rules, but no one knows where it has its throne; in order to know that secret place, you must first submit to Love.”

Paulo Coelho book Manuscript Found in Accra

Source: Manuscript Found in Accra (2012), Our fate

Love, Secret

“Here is a rule to remember in future, when anything tempts you to feel bitter: not "This is misfortune," but "To bear this worthily is good fortune.”

Marcus Aurelius book Meditations

Source: Meditations

Feeling, Future

“Those who rule the world get so little opportunity to run about and laugh and play in it.”

Stephen Fry (1957) English comedian, actor, writer, presenter, and activist

Source: The Fry Chronicles

World

“First rule of bodyguard detail: know where your 'body' is at all times.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Burns

Time

“Do not mistake the rule of force
for true power. Men are not shaped by force.”

Euripidés The Bacchae

Source: The Bacchae

Men

“She was the stone-faced queen, then and ever after. She had needed the mask to rule, and she had been glad to have it. She wondered if Eugenides was glad of his.”

Megan Whalen Turner The Queen of Attolia

Source: The Queen of Attolia

“If any religion had a chance of ruling over England, nay Europe within the next hundred years, it could be Islam.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

Religion, Chance

“What can I say? Librarians rule.”

Regis Philbin (1931) American television personality

“Life, with its rules, its obligations, and its freedoms, is like a sonnet: You're given the form, but you have to write the sonnet yourself. - Mrs. Whatsit”

Madeleine L'Engle book A Wrinkle in Time

Source: A Wrinkle in Time

Life, Freedom

“There's no shame in fear. But understand this - the coward is ruled by fear, while the hero rides it like a wild stallion.”

David Gemmell book Dark Moon

Source: Dark Moon

Fear, Understanding

“Now I wish she'd never broken any of her rules. I understood why she held to them so hard. Once you broke the first one, they all broke, one by one, like firecrackers exploding in your face in a parking lot on the Fourth of July.”

Janet Fitch book White Oleander

Source: White Oleander

“The dead should not rule the living.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

Dead

“A man can go along obeying all the rules and then it don’t matter a damn anymore.”

Raymond Carver book What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

Source: What We Talk About When We Talk About Love (1981)

“Each day my reason tells me so; But reason doesn't rule in love, you know.”

Molière The Misanthrope

Source: The Misanthrope

Love

“Rules and school are tools for fools! I don't give two mules for rules.”

Trenton Lee Stewart The Mysterious Benedict Society

Source: The Mysterious Benedict Society

School, Fools

“Rule #1 in the Universe: the crap always hits the fan. It's the nature of crap. It's a fan magnet.”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: Iced

Nature, Universe

“What, are you, crazy?' 'It's a possibility I haven't ruled out yet', said Zaphod quietly. 'I know as much about myself as my mind can work out under its current conditions. And its current conditions are not good.”

Douglas Adams The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy pentalogy

Source: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“HOUSE RULES [at the Praetor Lupus Headquarters]

No shape-shifting in the hallways.
No howling.
No silver.
Clothing must be worn at all times. ALL TIMES.
No fighting. No biting.
Mark all your food before you put it in the communal refrigerator.”

Cassandra Clare The City of Lost Souls

Source: City of Lost Souls

Food, Communication, Time, Fight

“The most important rule there is, the Wizard's Sixth Rule: the only sovereign you can allow to rule you is reason.”

Terry Goodkind Faith of the Fallen

Source: Faith of the Fallen

“You cannot thrash the person who makes you coffee. It's a rule somewhere.”

Kim Harrison (1966) Pseudonym

Source: Ever After

Coffee, Personality

“Damned mating heat. Lawe is threatening to join a monastery and Rule's threatening to quit. Why don't you two try to show the younger guys it can be fun instead of taking a note out of everyone else's books and letting it drive you insane?
-Jonas”

Lora Leigh (1965) American writer

Source: Mercury's War

Books, Law, Guy

“His life has been like a ballpark, hasn't it? All lines, structure, and rules, never changing. But now he's been hit over the wall into unknown territory.”

Neal Shusterman book Unwind

Source: Unwind

Life, Change

“Make this the golden rule, the equivalent of the Hippocratic oath: Everything we ask a child to do should be worth doing.”

Philip Pullman (1946) English author

“The golden rule is that there are no golden rules.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

For Parents

“One wonders what would happen in a society in which there were no rules to break. Doubtless everyone would quickly die of boredom.”

Susan Howatch (1940) British writer

“If reason ruled the world would history even exist?”

Ryszard Kapuściński (1932–2007) Polish historian

World, History

“The rule of the Morrell family was over, and Richard owned a used-car lot and Monica worked at a nail salon, until one day she got run over by a bus. Very sad.”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: Black Dawn

Sadness, Family, Cars

“This is politics. People in power never have to play by the same rules.”

Richelle Mead Shadow Kiss

Source: Shadow Kiss

People

“Wizard's Eighth Rule
Talga Vassternich.
(Deserve Victory)”

Terry Goodkind book Naked Empire

Source: Naked Empire

Victory

“There is one rule for the industrialist and that is: Make the best quality of goods possible at the lowest cost possible, paying the highest wages possible.”

Henry Ford (1863–1947) American industrialist

Variant: There is one rule for the industrialist and that is: Make the best quality of goods possible at the lowest cost possible, paying the highest wage possible.

Business