Quotes about set (4426 quotes, page 18)

“I don't back any party, I'm better off setting an example.”

Amir Khan (boxer) (1986) British boxer

Interview with BBC Sport 17 January 2015

“It would make a positive difference in world security and counterterrorism by setting our mind on pursuing peaceful solutions rather than escalating the war on terror. Mahatma Gandhi once said, "You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is like an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty."”

Newton Lee American computer scientist

Counterterrorism and Cybersecurity: Total Information Awareness (2nd Edition), 2015

War , World , Peace , Faith

“A form of influence such as advertising sets out intentionally to insulate reactors (mindless consumers) from the more conscious and critical selves (potential abstainers) not by multiplying alternatives (as laisser-faire advocates of the market economy would like to believe) but by provoking dormant and partial desires in a way that circumvents the normal, conscious, rational process.”

Benjamin R. Barber (1939–2017) US political scientist

Source: Forced to be Free (1971), p. 69-70

Way

“In France, Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire attempted to portray the skeleton of vertebrates as a set of modifications upon an archetypal vertebra. In the 1820's, Geoffroy extended his ambitious plan to include annelids and arthropods under that same rubric. …Vertebrates support their soft parts with an internal skeleton, but insects must live within their vertebrae (a reality, not a metaphor, for Geoffroy). This comparison led to… the claim that a vertebrate rib must represent the same organ as an arthropod leg - and that insects must therefore walk on their own ribs!”

Stephen Jay Gould book Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms

"Brotherhood by Inversion", p. 326
Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms (1998)

Support , Reality , Parting

“God grant, that not only the Love of Liberty, but a thorough Knowledge of the Rights of Man, may pervade all the Nations of the Earth, so that a Philosopher may set his Foot anywhere on its Surface, and say, 'This is my Country.”

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

Letter to David Hartley (December 4, 1789); reported in Albert H. Smyth, ed., The Writings of Benjamin Franklin (1907), Volume 10, p. 72; often quoted as, "Where liberty dwells, there is my country".
Decade unclear

Love , God , Knowledge , Country

“When a man is dead, they put money in his coffin, erect monuments to his memory, and celebrate the anniversary of his birthday in set speeches. Would they take any notice of him if he were living? No!”

William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English writer

"On Living to One's-Self"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

Money , Birthday , Memory , Dead

“Historians desiring to write the actions of men, ought to set down the simple truth, and not say anything for love or hatred; also to choose such an opportunity for writing as it may be lawful to think what they will, and write what they think, which is a rare happiness of the time.”

Walter Raleigh (1554–1618) English aristocrat, writer, poet, soldier, courtier, spy, and explorer

Source: The Cabinet Council (published 1658), Chapter 25

Love , Men , Truth , Law

“.. Our life is a pilgrim's progress. I once saw a very beautiful picture: it was a landscape at evening. In the distance on the right-hand side a row of hills appeared blue in the evening mist. Above those hills the splendour of the sunset, the grey clouds with their linings of silver and gold and purple. The landscape is a plain or heath covered with grass and its yellow leaves, for it was in autumn. Through the landscape a road leads to a high mountain far, far away, on the top of that mountain is a city wherein the setting sun casts a glory. On the road walks a pilgrim, staff in hand. He has been walking for a good long while already and he is very tired. And now he meets a woman, or figure in black, that makes one think of St. Paul's word: As being sorrowful yet always rejoicing. That Angel of God has been placed there to encourage the pilgrims and to answer their questions and the pilgrim asks her: Does the road go uphill then all the way? And the answer is: "Yes to the very end."”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

Quote of Vincent van Gogh, from his 'First Sunday Sermon' http://www.vggallery.com/misc/archives/sermon.htm: 'I Am a Stranger on the Earth..'; 29 October 1876
1870s

Life , God , Beauty , Angels

“Enthusiastic partisans of the idea of progress are in danger of failing to recognize — because they set so little store by them — the immense riches accumulated by the human race on either side of the narrow furrow on which they keep their eyes fixed; by underrating the achievements of the past, they devalue all those which still remain to be accomplished.”

Claude Lévi-Strauss book Tristes Tropiques

Source: Tristes Tropiques (1955), Chapter 38 : A Little Glass of Rum, p. 393

Idea , Past

“To its very core, the mind of ressentiment man is filled with envy, the impulse to detract, malice, and secret vindictiveness. These affects have become fixed attitudes, detached from all determinate objects. Independently of his will, this man’s attention will be instinctively drawn by all events which can set these affects in motion. The ressentiment attitude even plays a role in the formation of perceptions, expectations, and memories. It automatically selects those aspects of experience which can justify the factual application of this pattern of feeling.”

Max Scheler (1874–1928) German philosopher

Source: Das Ressentiment im Aufbau der Moralen (1912), L. Coser, trans. (1973), p. 74

Secret , Feeling , Memory , Envy

“There were so many different characters that I have played. Radha in Sangam was a very sophisticated woman and the setting was very refined, while in Dhanno in Gunga Jumna was rustic, a village belle. Even the language was different.”

Vyjayanthimala (1936) Indian actress, politician & dancer

Why Vyjayanthimala has 'nothing to say' about today's heroines

“In 1991, I crossed party lines and supported the use of force against Saddam Hussein, but he was allowed to survive his defeat as the result of a calculation we all had reason to deeply regret for the ensuing decade. And we still do. So this time, if we resort to force, we must absolutely get it right. It must be an action set up carefully and on the basis of the most realistic concepts. Failure cannot be an option, which means that we must be prepared to go the limit. And wishful thinking based on best-case scenarios or excessively literal transfers of recent experience to different conditions would be a recipe for disaster.”

Al Gore (1948) 45th Vice President of the United States

Quotes, Our Larger Tasks (2002)

Failure , Support , Thinking , Time

“But that great struggle was carried on by those whom this day is set apart to commemorate, not only for the preservation of the Union. The authority of the Federal Government had been resisted by armed force. They were also striving to restore peace. It must be remembered that our Republic was organized to avoid and discourage war, and to promote and establish peace. It is the leading characteristic of our national holidays that they are days of peace. The ways of our people are the ways of peace. They naturally seek ways to make peace more secure.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Freedom and its Obligations (1924)

War , People , Peace , Way

“The ideals of truth, beauty, and goodness represent attempts to interpret the process of development as a group of tendencies permanently directed towards certain permanent and universal ends. But human behaviour is not directed towards unchanging ends, not even towards those temporary ideals which each community sets up for itself. The formative tendency is displayed, not in any steady process of definite orientation, but in a rhythmic sequence of transformation which cannot be represented as tending towards any particular final condition.”

Lancelot Law Whyte (1896–1972) Scottish industrial engineer

Source: The Next Development in Man (1948), p. 261-262

Truth , Beauty , Communication , Universe

“I write to discover something, not so much to set down what I already know. I see ignorance and confusion all around me. I see these things in myself. I'm subject of all kinds of fears and conflicting desires. But one of those desires, the sanest one, is to see through the confusion.”

Philip Ó Ceallaigh (1968) Irish writer

Interview by Tom Vowler (2010-13)

Fear

“We had to be able to make a decision like that, without reprocessing all of our learning. So we take a small slice of information and a profile of the customer, set up a promotion, prime up the customer's history, and wait for the events. It primes up just the right amount of information in real time… [A system like that, ] might not be as precise, but it would be statistically good enough. Maybe it would be wrong five percent of the time, but that's okay. It would be more like making judgment calls.”

Sumit Chowdhury (1969) Indian writer and businessman

Source: Vivek Ranadive, ‎Kevin Maney (2011) The Two-Second Advantage: How We Succeed by Anticipating the Future--Just Enough. p. 109-10

History , Decision , Learning , Time

“I insist that my positive knowledge, however small, is not to be set aside for the gentleman's ignorance, however great.”

Leonard Bacon (1802–1881) American Congregational preacher and writer.

Reported in Friends' Intelligencer and Journal (1898) Volume 55, p. 210. No earlier source for this quotation is given, or has otherwise been identified. Several variants are found elsewhere, e.g., ""I cannot allow my opponent's Ignorance, however vast, to offset my knowledge, however small," reported in The Kingston Daily Freeman, Volume 33, Number 167, 3 May 1904, p. 4; and "my knowledge, however small, must outweigh your ignorance, however large," reported in Semi-Centennial (1939), p. 5, by Leonard Bacon, the great-grandson of the preacher. This quote has recently been mis-attributed to William James.

Knowledge

“The Roman public's thirst for blood and pleasure in witnessing pain seems to have been unquenchable and without limit." "The caged animals were kept in dungeons below the main arena. The terrified animals in their cages were hoisted up from this pit. And not only animals, human beings too, criminals, slaves and prisoners of war. And here in this arena they were set one upon the other to provide the crowd with spectacles of the most appalling carnage. It still continues to this day in Spain.”

David Attenborough (1926) British broadcaster and naturalist

The First Eden (1987)

Pain , War , Pleasure , Animals

“It is not necessary that a specific set of 2000 enzymes be assembled… Whenever a collection of chemicals contains enough different kinds of molecules, a metabolism will crystallize from the broth.”

Stuart Kauffman (1939) American biophysicist

Source: At Home in the Universe: The Search for the Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity (1996), p.45 as cited in: Gert Korthof (1998) "Kauffman at home in the Universe: The secret of life is auto-catalysis". Book review, 20 Oct 1998 ( online http://home.wxs.nl/~gkorthof/kortho32.htm)

“The Rigveda stated that the earth was a …globe suspended freely in space. The Vedic texts disclosed that the Sun held the earth and heavenly bodies in its orbit. The Shatapatha Brahmana, a treatise of untold antiquity, recognized and explained the fact that the earth was spherical.. Aryabhata explained the daily rising and setting of planets and stars in terms of the earth’s constant revolutionary motion. The Surya Siddhantha said that the earth, owing to its gravitational force draw all things to itself. In physics, the thinker Kanada, explained light and heat as different aspects of the same element, thus anticipating Clarke Maxwell's Electro-magnetic Theory, which unified different forms of radiant energy. Sankaracharya, in his Advaita thought expanded the concept of unity of matter and energy. Vacaspati recognized light as composed of minute particles emitted by substances, anticipating Newton’s Corpuscular Theory of Light and the later discovery of the Photon. In Botany, Sankara Mishra and Kanada have discussed the circulation of sap in the Plant and the Santiparva of Mahabharata has clearly stated that the plants develop on the strength of nutrients made through interaction of sunlight and materials obtained from the air and ground. Bhaskarcharya's concept of Differential Calculus preceded Newton by many centuries. His study of time identified Truti: The 3400th part of a second as the unit of time.”

Shankar Dayal Sharma (1918–1999) Indian politician

He has rightly brought out the rationality and application of Sanskrit literature in diverse fields
Source: Aruna Goel Good Governance and Ancient Sanskrit Literature http://books.google.co.in/books?id=El_VADF13pUC&pg=PA16, Deep and Deep Publications, 1 January 2003, p. 16-17

Star , Study , Light , Time

“Everything that we set up for legislation that will promote Christianity will only pave the way for Islam later on because it is the fastest growing religion while Christianity is in a state of decline. Demographics change; you can’t fight religion with religion. What will happen is Islam will eventually dominate Christianity; there won’t be any Christians left. Fortunately, secularists, atheists, and nonbelievers are on the rise faster than even the fastest growing religion. You can’t fight religion with religion, but you can fight it with reason. That’s what the atheist groups are really all about.”

Aron Ra (1962) Aron Ra is an atheist activist and the host of the Ra-Men Podcast

Exclusive Interview with Aron Ra – Public Speaker, Atheist Vlogger, and Activist https://conatusnews.com/interview-aron-ra-past-president-atheist-alliance-america/, Conatus News (May 17, 2017)

Religion , Way , Change , Fight

“I know the disposition of women: when you will, they won't; when you won't, they set their hearts upon you of their own inclination.”

Terence Eunuchus

Act IV, scene 7, 42, line 812.
Eunuchus

Women , Heart

“One scarcely knows if he would be of more use to us as a hostage, or set loose to be a very bad enemy leader.”

Lois McMaster Bujold (1949) Science Fiction and fantasy author from the USA

Source: World of the Five Gods series, Paladin of Souls (2003), p. 459

“Verse is a set of specially related sounds, repeated aloud.”

Sidney Lanier (1842–1881) American musician, poet

Preface to The Science of English Verse 1880

“A just and reasonable modesty does not only recommend eloquence, but sets off every great talent which a man can be possessed of.”

Joseph Addison (1672–1719) politician, writer and playwright

No. 231 (24 November 1711).
The Spectator (1711–1714)

“Every culture, or subculture, is defined by a set of common values, that is, generally agreed upon preferences. Without a core of common values a culture cannot exist, and we classify society into cultures and subcultures precisely because it is possible to identify groups who have common values.”

Kenneth E. Boulding (1910–1993) British-American economist

Source: 1960s, Economics As A Moral Science, 1969, p. 12

“O faithless brother what has happened that in vain you joined hands to violate my honour, and to stain your own hand with my blood. You gathered round yourself a band of persons addicted to vice … you excited this gang of villains to hate me … I appointed you to act for me. I ordered my friends to obey you … you are now out to destroy me. I was your guest you abused me. You swore at me in my face. That which you yourself deserved you ascribed to me. You inspired your servants with rancorous hatred of me. Even you taught your own barber your own falsehoods. He gave false evidence against the truth. You set in motion this great sedition …. Outwardly you pretended to be my friend. You attended my feast. You ate my meal of trust. Inwardly you manifested your falsehood until Shawal 23 [Presumably March 11, 1866] when I was keeping a fast you withheld bread and water from me. … By deceit you intercepted my epistles. Some of them which were to your advantage you paraded before the inhabitants of the city [i. e. Edirne]. At present am in straitened circumstances and you are in affluence. And yet you pretend the contrary.”

Subh-i-Azal (1831–1912) Persian religious leader

Quoted in Mirza Mustafa Katib's Response to Zayn al-Muqarrabin on page 46
Open Letter to Bahá'u'lláh

Hate , Truth , Water , Personality

“Freedom of speech was set under the respect for the warlord, rapist and female-abuser Muhammad who murdered and accepted rape as a conquest technique.”

Carl I. Hagen (1944) Norwegian politician

In his book Ærlig talt (2007) in a chapter revolving around the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy, cited in Vårt Land (15 November 2007) http://www.vl.no/samfunn/article15494.zrm

Freedom

“Every night, at exactly a quarter past three, something dreadful happens on the street outside our bedroom window. We peek through the curtains, yawning and shivering in the life-draining chill, and then we clamber back beneath the blankets without exchanging a word, to hug each other tightly and hope for sound sleep before it's time to rise.

Usually what we witness verges on the mundane. Drunken young men fighting, swaying about with outstretched knives, cursing incoherently. Robbery, bashings, rape. We wince to see such violence, but we can hardly be shocked or surprised any more, and we're never tempted to intervene: it's always far too cold, for a start! A single warm exhalation can coat the window pane with mist, transforming the most stomach-wrenching assault into a safely cryptic ballet for abstract blobs of light.

On some nights, though, when the shadows in the room are subtly wrong, when the familiar street looks like an abandoned film set, or a painting of itself perversely come to life, we are confronted by truly disturbing sights, oppressive apparitions which almost make us doubt we're awake, or, if awake, sane. I can't catalogue these visions, for most, mercifully, are blurred by morning, leaving only a vague uneasiness and a reluctance to be alone even in the brightest sunshine.”

Greg Egan (1961) Australian science fiction writer and former computer programmer

Scatter My Ashes http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/HORROR/SCATTER/Scatter.html, published in Interzone (Spring 1988)
Fiction

Life , Men , Hope , Sleep

“Allah set Hajj for the consolidation and reinforcement of the religion.”

Fatimah (604–632) daughter of Muhammad and Khadijah

Ayan al-Shī‘ah, vol.1, p. 316.
Religious Wisdom

Religion

“I won't die, eaten alive," he said. He put a fresh clip in his gun. I'll do you first if you want, or you can do it yourself.
Save your bullets, Edward. I lifted a can of gasoline in one hand.
What are you planning? he asked.
I'm going to set the shed on fire. I splashed gasoline on the door. The smell was sharp and tugged at the back of my throat.
With us inside? he asked.
Yes.
I'd rather shoot myself, if it's all the same to you.”

Laurell K. Hamilton (1963) Novelist

Edward and Anita
Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series, Guilty Pleasures (1993)

“If, then, at the end of this analysis, I am asked to take off the mortar-board of the academic and put on the hat of someone deeply involved in the political developments of the age he lives in, I have no hesitation in saying that my preference is for the rule of law rather than of men. The rule of law is now celebrating its final triumph as the basis of the democratic system. What is democracy other than a set of rules (the so-called rules of the game) for the solution of conflicts without bloodshed? And what constitutes good democratic government if not rigorous respect for these rules? I for one have no doubts about how such questions are to be answered. And precisely because I have no doubts I can conclude in all good conscience that democracy is the rule of law par excellence. The very moment a democracy loses sight of this, its inspiring principle, it rapidly reverts into its opposite, into one of the many forms of autocratic government which haunt the chronicles of historians and the speculations of political thinkers.”

Norberto Bobbio (1909–2004) Italian legal scholar

The Future of Democracy: A Defence Of The Rules Of The Game (1984), Ch. 7: The Rule of Men or the Rule of Law

Men , Age , Law , Democracy

“We accept that there are legitimate casus belli: acts or situations "provoking or justifying war". The present debate feels off-centre, and faintly unreal, because the US and the UK are going to war for a new set of reasons (partly undisclosed) while continuing to adduce the old set of reasons (which in this case do not cohere or even overlap).”

Martin Amis (1949) Welsh novelist

"The Palace of the End" (2003)

War , Feeling

“By going on the defensive… libertarians are, inadvertently, conceding that speech should be policed for propriety, and that those who violate standards set by the PC set are somehow defective on those grounds alone and deserve to be purged from “polite” company.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"Fee-fi-fo-fem, I Smell The Blood Of A Racist", http://www.wnd.com/2014/05/fee-fi-fo-fem-i-smell-the-blood-of-a-racist/ WorldNetDaily.com, May 15, 2014.
2010s, 2014

“An underlying characteristic of a person in that it may be a motive, trait, skill, aspect of one’s self-image or social role, or a body of knowledge which he or she uses… a person’s competencies reflect his or her capability. They are describing what he or she can do, not necessarily what he or she does, nor does all the time regardless of the situation and setting.”

Richard Boyatzis (1946) American business theorist

Source: Competent manager (1982), p. 23.

Motivation , Knowledge , Time , Personality

“Monkeys, who very sensibly refrain from speech lest they should be set to earn their livings.”

Kenneth Grahame book The Golden Age

The Golden Age. "Lusisti Satis"

“Asjadi composed the following qaSida in honour of this expedition: When the King of kings marched to Somnat, He made his own deeds the standard of miracles' 'Once more he led his army against Somnat, which is a large city on the coast of the ocean, a place of worship of the Brahmans who worship a large idol. There are many golden idols there. Although certain historians have called this idol Manat, and say that it is the identical idol which Arab idolaters brought to the coast of Hindustan in the time of the Lord of the Missive (may the blessings and peace of God be upon him), this story has no foundation because the Brahmans of India firmly believe that this idol has been in that place since the time of Kishan, that is to say four thousand years and a fraction' The reason for this mistake must surely be the resemblance in name, and nothing else' The fort was taken and Mahmud broke the idol in fragments and sent it to Ghaznin, where it was placed at the door of the Jama' Masjid and trodden under foot.'….'In the year AH 402 (AD 1011) he set out for Thanesar and Jaipal, the son of the former Jaipal, offered him a present of fifty elephants and much treasure. The Sultan, however, was not to be deterred from his purpose; so he refused to accept his present, and seeing Thanesar empty he sacked it and destroyed its idol temples, and took away to Ghaznin, the idol known as Chakarsum on account of which the Hindus had been ruined; and having placed it in his court, caused it to be trampled under foot by the people… From thence he went to Mathra (Mathura) which is a place of worship of the infidels and the birthplace of Kishan, the son of Basudev, whom the Hindus Worship as a divinity - where there are idol temples without number, and took it without any contest and razed it to the ground. Great wealth and booty fell into the hands of the Muslims, among the rest they broke up by the orders of the Sultan, a golden idol.”

Mahmud of Ghazni (971–1030) Sultan of Ghazni

Muntakhabut-Tawarikh, translated into English by George S.A. Ranking, Patna Reprint 1973, Vol. I, p. 17-28
Quotes from Muslim medieval histories

God , People , Peace , Time

“If it weren't for President Obama we might not have done the intelligence community assessment that we did that set up a whole sequence of event which are still unfolding today, including Special Counsel Mueller's investigation. President Obama is responsible for that. It was he who tasked us to do that intelligence community assessment in the first place.”

James Clapper (1941) US government official

[Did Obama, Brennan And Clinton Illegally Collude To Take Trump Down?, https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/russia-trump-collusion-investigation/, 27 July 2018, Investor's Business Daily, July 23, 2018]

Intelligence , Communication

“Depersonalization is a concept difficult to delineate. It can be regarded as a symptom or as a loosely associated group of symptoms that occurs in psychiatric patients. It can be induced experimentally and also occurs spontaneously in normal subjects. A major obstacle to clearer definition of this concept lies in the fact that it refers to exceedingly private events in the individual's experience. These prove very difficult to describe by a language geared to the description of public (consensually validated) events or private events, such as pain, that occur usually in clearly defined social settings. When it comes to describing and conveying something as ineffable as depersonalization or derealization, the subject resorts to metaphors, "as if" expressions, and figures of speech. The result is semantic confusion. Different authors mean different things when they use the term depersonalization.
The concept of depersonalization merges by imperceptible degrees with the concept derealization, the concept of altered body image and self, deja vu, jamais vu, altered time and space perception and so on - the whole gamut of phenomenological description of the experiences of mental patients. Therefore, it is rather difficult to evaluate and to review objectively the psychiatric literature on the phenomena of depersonalization.”

Thaddus E. Weckowicz (1919–2000) Canadian psychologist

Source: Depersonalization, (1970), p. 171

Pain , Literature , Time

“Nor, though surrounded by such men, did the youngest manager pass unnoticed. At an age when most of those who distinguish themselves in life are still contending for prizes and fellowships at college, he had won for himself a conspicuous place in Parliament. No advantage of fortune or connection was wanting that could set off to the height his splendid talents and his unblemished honour. At twenty-three he had been thought worthy to be ranked with the veteran statesmen who appeared as the delegates of the British Commons, at the bar of the British nobility. All who stood at that bar, save him alone, are gone, culprit, advocates, accusers. To the generation which is now in the vigour of life, he is the sole representative of a great age which has passed away. But those who, within the last ten years, have listened with delight, till the morning sun shone on the tapestries of the House of Lords, to the lofty and animated eloquence of Charles Earl Grey, are able to form some estimate of the powers of a race of men among whom he was not the foremost.”

Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey (1764–1845) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

Thomas Babington Macaulay, ‘ Warren Hastings http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00generallinks/macaulay/hastings/txt_complete.html’, Edinburgh Review LXXIV (October, 1841), pp. 160–255.
About

Life , Men , Age , Appearance

“4106. Set a Thief to catch a Thief.”

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

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

“It is not easy to write a familiar style. Many people mistake a familiar for a vulgar style, and suppose that to write without affectation is to write at random. On the contrary, there is nothing that requires more precision, and, if I may so say, purity of expression, than the style I am speaking of. It utterly rejects not only all unmeaning pomp, but all low, cant phrases, and loose, unconnected, slipshod allusions. It is not to take the first word that offers, but the best word in common use; it is not to throw words together in any combinations we please, but to follow and avail ourselves of the true idiom of the language. To write a genuine familiar or truly English style, is to write as anyone would speak in common conversation who had a thorough command and choice of words, or who could discourse with ease, force, and perspicuity, setting aside all pedantic and oratorical flourishes… It is easy to affect a pompous style, to use a word twice as big as the thing you want to express: it is not so easy to pitch upon the very word that exactly fits it, out of eight or ten words equally common, equally intelligible, with nearly equal pretensions, it is a matter of some nicety and discrimination to pick out the very one the preferableness of which is scarcely perceptible, but decisive.”

William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English writer

"On Familiar Style" (1821)
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

People , Intelligence , Decision

“The writer, and co-laborers, proclaimed the fact of the Lord's presence, demonstrating it from prophecy, and on charts or tables, such as are used in this book, until the fall of 1878, when arrangements were made for starting our present publication, ZION'S WATCH TOWER, and Herald of Christ's Presence. By the Lord's blessing, millions of copies of this publication have carried abroad the tidings that the time is fulfilled, and that the Kingdom of Christ is even now being set up, while the kingdoms and systems of men are crumbling to their utter destruction.”

Charles Taze Russell (1852–1916) Founder of the Bible Student Movement

Source: Milennial Dawn, Vol. III: Thy Kingdom Come (1891), p. 93.

Men , Books , Time , Christ

“When someone from Skagafjörður was settled comfortably against our gable-wall and was launched on to the Úlfar-rímur set to a Skagafjörður chant, with that obligatory opening about King Cyrus, there opened up before us a whole wide world of heroic poetry all the way to the Orient, fitfully lit by strange flashes of illumination.”

Halldór Laxness (1902–1998) Icelandic author

Brekkukotsannáll (The Fish Can Sing) (1957)

World , Way

“Liberated, Iraq is the only Arab country, so far, to have changed governments three times through elections and also the only one where all political parties operate freely. Iraqis didn’t achieve what they hoped; they achieved what they could. The invasion was not about the United States setting up bases or stealing Iraq’s oil or using Iraq for an invasion of Iran, as Saddam’s apologists claimed. Nor was it about imposing democracy by force. It was about two things: stopping a time bomb that was ticking in the heart of the region and removing the impediment to democratization that was Saddam’s regime. More than a million Americans fought and worked in Iraq. They share part of the credit for the fact that Iraqis today are able to run their own lives without fear. They can be proud that, once again, American power was used to free a nation from tyranny.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

"What Saddam’s ouster achieved" http://nypost.com/2013/03/19/what-saddams-ouster-achieved/, New York Post (March 19, 2013).
New York Post

Fear , Hope , Democracy , Change

“I can now report that the mathematics of the multiple focus are a most improbable thicket, and the useful service I enforced upon what I must call an absurd set of contradictions is one of my secrets. I know that thousands of scientists, at home and abroad, are attempting to duplicate my work; they are welcome to the effort. None will succeed. Why do I speak so positively? That is my other secret.”

Jack Vance (1916–2013) American mystery and speculative fiction writer

Section 3 (p. 169)
Short fiction, Rumfuddle (1973)

Secret , Home , Mathematics , Effort

“Again, the subject of internal improvements, under the power of Congress to regulate commerce, is put at rest under our system. The power, claimed by construction under the old constitution, was at least a doubtful one; it rested solely upon construction. We of the South, generally apart from considerations of constitutional principles, opposed its exercise upon grounds of its inexpediency and injustice. Notwithstanding this opposition, millions of money, from the common treasury had been drawn for such purposes. Our opposition sprang from no hostility to commerce, or to all necessary aids for facilitating it. With us it was simply a question upon whom the burden should fall. In Georgia, for instance, we have done as much for the cause of internal improvements as any other portion of the country, according to population and means. We have stretched out lines of railroads from the seaboard to the mountains; dug down the hills, and filled up the valleys at a cost of not less than $25,000,000. All this was done to open an outlet for our products of the interior, and those to the west of us, to reach the marts of the world. No State was in greater need of such facilities than Georgia, but we did not ask that these works should be made by appropriations out of the common treasury. The cost of the grading, the superstructure, and the equipment of our roads was borne by those who had entered into the enterprise. Nay, more not only the cost of the iron no small item in the aggregate cost was borne in the same way, but we were compelled to pay into the common treasury several millions of dollars for the privilege of importing the iron, after the price was paid for it abroad. What justice was there in taking this money, which our people paid into the common treasury on the importation of our iron, and applying it to the improvement of rivers and harbors elsewhere? The true principle is to subject the commerce of every locality, to whatever burdens may be necessary to facilitate it. If Charleston harbor needs improvement, let the commerce of Charleston bear the burden. If the mouth of the Savannah river has to be cleared out, let the sea-going navigation which is benefited by it, bear the burden. So with the mouths of the Alabama and Mississippi river. Just as the products of the interior, our cotton, wheat, corn, and other articles, have to bear the necessary rates of freight over our railroads to reach the seas. This is again the broad principle of perfect equality and justice, and it is especially set forth and established in our new constitution.”

Alexander H. Stephens (1812–1883) Vice President of the Confederate States (in office from 1861 to 1865)

The Cornerstone Speech (1861)

Money , Hostility , People , World

“If the people at large be not already convinced that a sufficient general case has been made out for Administrative Reform, I think they never can be, and they never will be…. Ages ago a savage mode of keeping accounts on notched sticks was introduced into the Court of Exchequer, and the accounts were kept, much as Robinson Crusoe kept his calendar on the desert island. In the course of considerable revolutions of time, the celebrated Cocker was born, and died; Walkinghame, of the Tutor's Assistant, and well versed in figures, was also born, and died; a multitude of accountants, book-keepers and actuaries, were born, and died. Still official routine inclined to these notched sticks, as if they were pillars of the constitution, and still the Exchequer accounts continued to be kept on certain splints of elm wood called "tallies." In the reign of George III an inquiry was made by some revolutionary spirit, whether pens, ink, and paper, slates and pencils, being in existence, this obstinate adherence to an obsolete custom ought to be continued, and whether a change ought not to be effected.
All the red tape in the country grew redder at the bare mention of this bold and original conception, and it took till 1826 to get these sticks abolished. In 1834 it was found that there was a considerable accumulation of them; and the question then arose, what was to be done with such worn-out, worm-eaten, rotten old bits of wood? I dare say there was a vast amount of minuting, memoranduming, and despatch-boxing on this mighty subject. The sticks were housed at Westminster, and it would naturally occur to any intelligent person that nothing could be easier than to allow them to be carried away for fire-wood by the miserable people who live in that neighbourhood. However, they never had been useful, and official routine required that they never should be, and so the order went forth that they were to be privately and confidentially burnt. It came to pass that they were burnt in a stove in the House of Lords. The stove, overgorged with these preposterous sticks, set fire to the panelling; the panelling set fire to the House of Lords; the House of Lords set fire to the House of Commons; the two houses were reduced to ashes; architects were called in to build others; we are now in the second million of the cost thereof, the national pig is not nearly over the stile yet; and the little old woman, Britannia, hasn't got home to-night…. The great, broad, and true cause that our public progress is far behind our private progress, and that we are not more remarkable for our private wisdom and success in matters of business than we are for our public folly and failure, I take to be as clearly established as the sun, moon, and stars.”

Charles Dickens (1812–1870) English writer and social critic and a Journalist

"Administrative Reform" (June 27, 1855) Theatre Royal, Drury Lane Speeches Literary and Social by Charles Dickens https://books.google.com/books?id=bT5WAAAAcAAJ (1870) pp. 133-134

Wisdom , People , Books , Age

“I believe that in our period it is definitely necessary that, as far as possible, the paint is applied in pure colours, set next to each other in a pointillist or diffuse manner. This is stated strongly, and yet it relates to the idea which is the basis of meaningful expression in form, as I see it. It seems to me that the clarity of ideas should be accompanied by a clarity of technique.”

Piet Mondrian (1872–1944) Peintre Néerlandais

Quote in Mondrian's letter to Israel Querido, Summer of 1909; published in the weekly magazine 'De Controleur' 23 Oct, 1909; as cited in English translation, in Two Mondrian sketchbooks 1912 - 1914, ed. Robert P. Welsh & J. M. Joosten, Amsterdam 1969 p. 10
1900's

Idea , Painting

“Sociobiology is not just any statement that biology, genetics, and evolutionary theory have something to do with human behavior. Sociobiology is a specific theory about the nature of genetic and evolutionary input into human behavior. It rests upon the view that natural selection is a virtually omnipotent architect, constructing organisms part by part as best solutions to problems of life in local environments. It fragments organisms into “traits,” explains their existence as a set of best solutions, and argues that each trait is a product of natural selection operating “for” the form or behavior in question. Applied to humans, it must view specific behaviors (not just general potentials) as adaptations built by natural selection and rooted in genetic determinants, for natural selection is a theory of genetic change. Thus, we are presented with unproved and unprovable speculations about the adaptive and genetic basis of specific human behaviors: why some (or all) people are aggressive, xenophobic, religious, acquisitive, or homosexual.”

Stephen Jay Gould book Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes

"Our Natural Place", p. 243
Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes (1983)

Life , People , Behavior , Question

“During my early years as an actor, Bond was never a desire, but when Cassie was playing in For Your Eyes Only, then, of course, it became a joke. I would do my own impersonations of James Bond. Just for fun. Just driving her home from work, or going out, or talking about her experience on it. But even so, it was not an ambition to play James Bond. I had my sights set on other aspects of the work.”

Pierce Brosnan (1953) Irish-American actor, film producer, and environmentalist

Brosnan. Pierce Brosnan. http://www.cigaraficionado.com/webfeatures/show/id/Brosnan-Pierce-Brosnan_6003/p/2 (November 1997)

Home

“The first article in the foregoing quotation brings to my recollection the extraordinary performances of a professed fire-eater, whose name was Powel, well known in different parts of the kingdom about forty years ago. Among other wonderful feats, I saw him do the following: He ate the burning coals from the fire; he put a large bunch of matches lighted into his mouth, and blew the smoke of the sulphur through his nostrils; he carried a red-hot heater round the room in his teeth; and broiled a piece of beef-steak upon his tongue. To perform this, he lighted a piece of charcoal, which he put into his mouth beneath his tongue, the beef was laid upon the top; and one of the spectators blew upon the charcoal, to prevent the heat decreasing, till the meat was sufficiently broiled. By way of conclusion, he made a composition of pitch, brimstone, and other compustibles, to which he added several pieces of lead; the whole was melted in an iron ladle, and then set on fire; this he called his soup; and, taking it out of the ladle with a spoon of the same metal, he ate it in its state of liquefaction, and blazing furiously, without appearing to sustain the least injury.”

Joseph Strutt (1749–1802) British engraver, artist, antiquary and writer

pg. 237
The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England (1801), Public entertainment

Way , Light , Appearance , Parting

“The battle raged with great fury: victory was long doubtful, till two Indian princes, Brahman Dew and Dabishleem, with other reinforcements, joined their countrymen during the action, and inspired them with fresh courage. Mahmood at this moment perceiving his troops to waver, leaped from his horse, and, prostrating himself before God implored his assistance' At the same time he cheered his troops with such energy, that, ashamed to abandon their king, with whom they had so often fought and bled, they, with one accord, gave a loud shout and rushed forwards. In this charge the Moslems broke through the enemy's line, and laid 5,000 Hindus dead at their feet' On approaching the temple, he saw a superb edifice built of hewn stone. Its lofty roof was supported by fifty-six pillars curiously carved and set with precious stones. In the centre of the hall was Somnat, a stone idol five yards in height, two of which were sunk in the ground. The King, approaching the image, raised his mace and struck off its nose. He ordered two pieces of the idol to be broken off and sent to Ghizny, that one might be thrown at the threshold of the public mosque, and the other at the court door of his own palace. These identical fragments are to this day (now 600 years ago) to be seen at Ghizny. Two more fragments were reserved to be sent to Mecca and Medina. It is a well authenticated fact, that when Mahmood was thus employed in destroying this idol, a crowd of Brahmins petitioned his attendants and offered a quantity of gold if the King would desist from further mutilation. His officers endeavoured to persuade him to accept of the money; for they said that breaking one idol would not do away with idolatry altogether; that, therefore, it could serve no purpose to destroy the image entirely; but that such a sum of money given in charity among true believers would be a meritorious act. The King acknowledged that there might be reason in what they said, but replied, that if he should consent to such a measure, his name would be handed down to posterity as 'Mahmood the idol-seller', whereas he was desirous of being known as 'Mahmood the destroyer': he therefore directed the troops to proceed in their work'…'The Caliph of Bagdad, being informed of the expedition of the King of Ghizny, wrote him a congratulatory letter, in which he styled him 'The Guardian of the State, and of the Faith'; to his son, the Prince Ameer Musaood, he gave the title of 'The Lustre of Empire, and the Ornament of Religion'; and to his second son, the Ameer Yoosoof, the appellation of 'The Strength of the Arm of Fortune, and Establisher of Empires.”

Mahmud of Ghazni (971–1030) Sultan of Ghazni

He at the same time assured Mahmood, that to whomsoever he should bequeath the throne at his death, he himself would confirm and support the same.'
Tarikh-i-Firishta, translated into English by John Briggs under the title History of the Rise of the Mahomedan Power in India, 4 Volumes, New Delhi Reprint, 1981. p. 38-49 (Alternative translation: "but the champion of Islam replied with disdain that he did not want his name to go down to posterity as Mahmud the idol-seller (but farosh) instead of Mahmud the breaker-of-idols (but shikan)." in Lal, K. S. (1992). The legacy of Muslim rule in India. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan. Chapter 3)
Sack of Somnath (1025 CE)

Death , Money , God , Faith

“To sum up: 1. The cosmos is a gigantic fly-wheel making 10,000 revolutions a minute. 2. Man is a sick fly taking a dizzy ride on it. 3. Religion is the theory that the wheel was designed and set spinning to give him the ride.”

H.L. Mencken (1880–1956) American journalist and writer

"Coda" from Smart Set (December 1920)
1920s

Religion , Flying

“Most scripts are bad. I read a lot of them. Brick was a good script just to read. It was like, “Oh my God, these words feel so good in my mouth.” A lot of movies try to set up a world with cool sets, costumes, camera work. In Brick, the world is born from the words.”

Joseph Gordon-Levitt (1981) American actor, director, producer, and writer

Newsweek, March 31, 2006

God , World , Feeling , Reading

“Sleep demands of us a guilty immunity. There is not one of us who, given an eternal incognito, a thumbprint nowhere set against our souls, would not commit rape, murder and all abominations.”

Djuna Barnes book Nightwood

Source: Nightwood (1936), Ch. 5 : Watchman, What of the Night?

Soul , Sleep

“Light suddenly caught the steel of his helmet and made it burn like the face of some mighty fallen angel. It could have been the face of Lucifer himself. I felt then that he was perfectly capable of destroying the whole world without a shred of remorse if he believed that he could not, himself, go on living. Such creatures, I remember thinking, have always dwelt among us. They would reduce the multiverse to ash, if they could. Why, I agonized, can we not recognize them and stop them before they achieve so much power? A tiny part of the human race was responsible for the misery of the majority.
I thought again of the injustices which we ourselves casually perpetrated and I wondered how we should ever set anything to rights while we continued to allow such vast discrepancy, so much at odds with the religious and political principles we claim as our daily guides.”

Michael Moorcock book The Steel Tsar

Book 2, Chapter 7 “A Mechanical Man” (p. 386)
The Steel Tsar (1981)

World , Angels , Thinking , Light

“Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith. They will need Thy blessings. Their road will be long and hard. For the enemy is strong. He may hurl back our forces. Success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again; and we know that by Thy grace, and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) 32nd President of the United States

1940s, Prayer on D-Day (1944)

God , Faith , Religion , Strong

“I shall have to express a very deep conviction: that until we have courage to recognize cruelty for what it is—whether its victim is human or animal—we cannot expect things to be much better in the world. There can be no double standard. We cannot have peace among men whose hearts find delight in killing any living creature. By every act that glorifies or even tolerates such moronic delight in killing, we set back the progress of humanity.”

Rachel Carson (1907–1964) American marine biologist and conservationist

Letter to Fon Boardman; quoted in Rachel Carson: Legacy and Challenge, ed. Lisa H. Sideris and Kathleen Dean Moore (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2008), p. 102 https://books.google.it/books?id=awR4kJrhQK0C&pg=PA102.

Men , World , Peace , Courage

“In the religious age, the religious hierarchy wields power; in the political age, the ruler, nobles and commoners; in the economic, the hierarchy of wealth. The development of Europe during the last six centuries has consisted in the progressive shifting of the hierarchy of power from one set of functions to another.”

Lancelot Law Whyte (1896–1972) Scottish industrial engineer

Source: The Next Development in Man (1948), p. 132

Age , Wealth

“The prescriptions and proscriptions held by members of a role set are designated as role expectations. … The role expectations held for a certain person by some member of his or her role set will reflect that member's conception of the person's office and his or her abilities. The content of these expectations may include preferences with respect to specific acts and personal characteristics or styles; they may deal with what the person should do, what kind of person he should be, what he should think, or believe, and how he should relate to others.”

Robert L. Kahn (1918–2019) American psychologist

Source: Organizational stress: Studies in role conflict and ambiguity, 1964, p. 14

Thinking , Personality

“The last time I visited the Capitol, I came to take an oath. On the steps of this building, I pledged to honor our Constitution and laws, and I asked you to join me in setting a tone of civility and respect in Washington. I hope America is noticing the difference. We are making progress. Together, we are changing the tone in the Nation’s capital. And this spirit of respect and cooperation is vital, because in the end we will be judged not only by what we say or how we say it, we will be judged by what we are able to accomplish. America today is a Nation with great challenges, but greater resources.”

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

2000s, 2001, Address to Joint Session of Congress on Administration Goals (February 2001)

Law , Hope , Change , Time

“It seems to me that we are charcoal ready to be kindled and that Holy Communion is entirely suited to set us on fire. But when this charcoal is kindled only on the surface, as soon as it is set aside, it is extinguished. On the contrary, that which is fired all the way to the centre is not extinguished, but is consumed.”

Marguerite Bourgeoys (1620–1700) French colonist and foundress

The Writings of Marguerite Bourgeoys, p. 204

Way

“This book is therefore consecrated to the deeper and fuller study of that linguistic world in which the Hebrew Bible is set.”

James Barr (1924–2006) British bible scholar

Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament, p. 304

Books , World , Study

“At first they set up forked stakes connected by twigs and covered these walls with mud. Others made walls of lumps of dried mud, covering them with reeds and leaves to keep out the rain and the heat. Finding that such roofs could not stand the rain during the storms of winter, they built them with peaks daubed with mud, the roofs sloping and projecting so as to carry off the rain water.”

Vitruvius book De architectura

Source: De architectura (The Ten Books On Architecture) (~ 15BC), Book II, Chapter I, Sec. 3

Water , Winter

“He set no great value on money, or, perhaps, to speak properly, he set on it no more than its true value.”

Stephen Baxter (1957) author

Source: Ages in Chaos (2003), Chapter 8, “A cursed country where one has to shape everything out of a block” (p. 68)

Money

“You ask of me then for what reason it was that Pythagoras abstained from eating of flesh. I for my part do much admire in what humor, with what soul or reason, the first man with his mouth touched slaughter, and reached to his lips the flesh of a dead animal, and having set before people courses of ghastly corpses and ghosts, could give those parts the names of meat and victuals, that but a little before lowed, cried, moved, and saw; how his sight could endure the blood of slaughtered, flayed, and mangled bodies; how his smell could bear their scent; and how the very nastiness happened not to offend the taste, while it chewed the sores of others, and participated of the saps and juices of deadly wounds.”

Plutarch book Moralia

I, 1
Moralia, Of Eating of Flesh

People , Soul , Animals , Parting

“The amazing part of the great Danish cartoon caper isn't that Muslims immediately engage in acts of mob violence when things don't go their way. That is de rigueur for the Religion of Peace. Their immediate response to all bad news is mass violence. That's a "dog bites man" story and belongs on page B-34, next to the grade school hot lunch menu and the birth notices. After an Egyptian ferry capsized recently, killing hundreds of passengers, a whole braying mob of passengers' relatives staged an organized attack on the company, throwing furniture out the window and burning the building to the ground. Witnesses say it was the most violent ocean liner-related incident since Carnival Cruise Lines fired Kathie Lee Gifford. The "offense to Islam" ruse is merely an excuse for Muslims to revert to their default mode: rioting and setting things on fire.”

Ann Coulter (1961) author, political commentator

"Muslim Bites Dog" (15 February 2006) http://www.anncoulter.com/cgi-local/printer_friendly.cgi?article=100.
2006

School , Peace , Religion , Dogs

“My friend Bonner has just set off to Charlotte Street to pack your picture (an old painting) and forward it; it is a beautiful representation of a summer's evening; calm, warm and delicious; the colour on the man's face is perfect sunshine. The liquid pencil of this school is replete with a beauty peculiar to itself. Nevertheless, I don't believe they had any 'nostrums,' but plain linseed oil; 'honest linseed' as old Wilson called it. But it is always right to remember that the ordinary painters of that day used, as now, the same vehicle as their betters, and also that their works have all received the hardening and enamelling effects of time, so that we must not judge of originality by these signs always.”

John Constable (1776–1837) English Romantic painter

Quote from John Constable's letter to Rev. John Fisher (20 December 1833), as quoted in Richard Friedenthal, Letters of the great artists – from Blake to Pollock (Thames and Hudson, London, 1963), pp. 45-46
1830s

School , Beauty , Time , Summer

“I humbly accept the Centennial Nobel Peace Prize. Forty years ago today, the Prize for 1961 was awarded for the first time to a Secretary-General of the United Nations — posthumously, because Dag Hammarskjöld had already given his life for peace in Central Africa. And on the same day, the Prize for 1960 was awarded for the first time to an African — Albert Luthuli, one of the earliest leaders of the struggle against apartheid in South Africa. For me, as a young African beginning his career in the United Nations a few months later, those two men set a standard that I have sought to follow throughout my working life.”

Kofi Annan (1938–2018) 7th Secretary-General of the United Nations

Nobel lecture (2001)

Life , Men , Peace , Time

“Man cannot will unless he has first understood that he must count on no one but himself; that he is alone, abandoned on earth in the midst of his infinite responsibilities, without help, with no other aim than the one he sets himself, with no other destiny than the one he forges for himself on this earth.”

Jean Paul Sartre (1905–1980) French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and …

Characterizations of Existentialism (1944)

Help

“Tyrannosaurus rex did not have 6-to-8-inch serrated teeth and an arc of D-cross-sectioned teeth set in a massive, powerful skull just to consume rotting carcasses! These were killing tools. In sharp contrast are the weak beaks and feet of vultures and condors- the only true living scavengers.”

Gregory Scott Paul (1954) U.S. researcher, author, paleontologist, and illustrator

Gregory S. Paul (1988) Predatory Dinosaurs of the World, Simon and Schuster, p. 33
Predatory Dinosaurs of the World

“The inductive-reasoning system I have described above consists of a multitude of “elements” in the form of belief-models or hypotheses that adapt to the aggregate environment they jointly create. Thus it qualifies as an adaptive complex system. After some initial learning time, the hypotheses or mental models in use are mutually co-adapted. Thus we can think of a consistent set of mental models as a set of hypotheses that work well with each other under some criterion—that have a high degree of mutual adaptedness. Sometimes there is a unique such set, it corresponds to a standard rational expectations equilibrium, and beliefs gravitate into it. More often there is a high, possibly very high, multiplicity of such sets. In this case we might expect inductive reasoning systems in the economy—whether in stock-market speculating, in negotiating, in poker games, in oligopoly pricing, in positioning products in the market—to cycle through or temporarily lock into psychological patterns that may be non-recurrent, path-dependent, and increasingly complicated. The possibilities are rich.”

W. Brian Arthur (1946) American economist

Source: Inductive Reasoning and Bounded Rationality (The El Farol Problem) (1994), p. 8

Game , Thinking , Learning , Time

“I have ever deemed it more honorable and profitable, too, to set a good example than to follow a bad one.”

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

As quoted in The Life and Writings of Thomas Jefferson : Including All of His Important Utterances on Public Questions (1900) by Samuel E. Forman, p. 429
Posthumous publications

“Heathrow the next morning looked like one of those bad science fiction movies "set in the near future" after the security forces have taken over the state. Two armored personnel carriers were parked outside the terminal. A dozen men with Rambo machine guns and bad haircuts patrolled outside. Vast lines of passengers queued to be frisked and X-rayed, carrying their shoes in one hand and their pathetic tolietries in a clear plastic bag in the other. Travel is sold as freedom, but we were free as lab rats. This is how they'll manage the next holocaust, I thought, as I shuffled forward in my stockinged feet: they'll simply issue us with air tickets and we'll do whatever we're told.”

Robert Harris book The Ghost

Source: The Ghost (2007), Ch. 3.

Men , Shoe , Travel , Freedom

“A wedge strategy is where you focus on a highly charged issue at the borders of rationality and emotion. The emotional content of the issue can create a moral conviction that the issue needs to be resolved at any cost. Tactics that would otherwise be called into question can then be employed to resolve the issue. This sets precedent for the future use of those tactics in other arenas.”

Ze Frank (1972) American online performance artist

http://www.zefrank.com/wiki/index.php/the_show:_06-29-06
"The Show" (www.zefrank.com/theshow/)

Question , Future

“Joel groaned softly. “I-ah-I don’t think I was altogether myself,” he excused.
“Are you ever?” Bertrand countered.
“What?”
“I am always my self, even when my objurgatory circuits are cut in by some frustration-inducing outside event. But you’re invariably either drunk or suffering indigestion or still half-asleep or so excited as to be manic or so downcast as to be suicidal or—”
Loftily Joel broke in: “That’s part of the marvel and wonder of the subjective human experience, not susceptible machine analysis.” He gulped the last of his brandy and set the glass aside. “And we are a fantastic species really, aren’t we? For all our shortcomings! I mean, well—here I am talking to a machine, for pity’s sake, a machine, a manufactured article! So cleverly designed, it’s impossible to tell that its responses are programmed in, not the result of intelligence.””

John Brunner (1934–1995) British author

“I resent that,” Bertrand said, but Joel ignored the comment.
Section 6 (pp. 135-136)
You’ll Take the High Road (1973)

Intelligence , Thinking , Suicide , Suffering

“It took me a long time to adjust and narrow down my life. I made my shift to the mind-set … there's time for my daughter outside work and that's all. This is my new life. This is not drudgery. This is fun.”

Lucy Lawless (1968) New Zealand actress

On balancing work and family-life — reported in Barbara Yost, The Arizona Republic (April 15, 1996) "Actress Easily Conquers Role in 'Xena: Warrior Princess'", Chicago Tribune, p. 5.

Life , Time , Daughters

“I've repeatedly said that for people as little in common as Joanne and myself, we have an uncommonly good marriage. We are actors, we make pictures — and that's about all we have in common. Maybe that's enough. Wives shouldn't feel obligated to accompany their husbands to a ball game, husbands do look a bit silly attending morning coffee breaks with the neighbourhood wives when most men are out at work. Husbands and wives should have separate interests, cultivate different sets of friends — and not impose one upon the other.”

Paul Newman (1925–2008) American actor and film director

Quoted in Paul Newman (1975) by Charles Hamblett ISBN 0-491-01761-8, p. 176

Men , Marriage , People , Feeling

“I am one who tells the truth and exposes evil and seeks with Beauty for Beauty to set the world right.”

W.E.B. Du Bois (1868–1963) American sociologist, historian, activist and writer

Source: The Wisdom of W.E.B. Du Bois (2003), p. xi

Truth , World , Beauty , Evil

“Is that a sacrilege that I praise a Holocaust movie [Schindler's List] for being entertaining? The word doesn't imply that a movie need be cheerful. In my mind, entertainment in this genre springs from characters who are brought to full life, who we care about and who are set in a powerful story. My motto: "No good movie is depressing. All bad movies are depressing."”

Roger Ebert (1942–2013) American film critic, author, journalist, and TV presenter

Review http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/in-darkness-2011 of In Darkness (15 February 2012)
Reviews, Two-and-a-half star reviews

Life , Spring

“.. modern destruction begins where architectural structure is opened up and set into motion by colour relationships. The colour-planes, however, are always in orthogonal relationship.”

Theo van Doesburg (1883–1931) Dutch architect, painter, draughtsman and writer

Quote in Van Doesburg's article: 'Aantekeningen bij Bijlage 12 (Notes), De Zaag en de goudvischkom van P.Alma', by Theo van Doesburg; in art-magazine 'De Stijl' 1 8, June 1918, p. 93
1912 – 1919

“There is a somewhat analogous situation with regard to the heterosexual seduction procedure in our Politically Correct times: the two sets, the set of PC behaviour and the set of seduction, do not actually intersect anywhere; that is, there is no seduction which is not in a way an "incorrect" intrusion or harassment — at some point, one has to expose oneself and "make a pass." So does this mean that every seduction is incorrect harassment through and through? No, and that is the catch: when you make a pass, you expose yourself to the Other (the potential partner), and she decides retroactively, by her reaction, whether what you have just done was harassment or a successful act of seduction — and there is no way to tell in advance what her reaction will be. This is why assertive women often despise "weak" men — because they fear to expose themselves, to take the necessary risk. And perhaps this is even more true in our PC times: are not PC prohibitions rules which, in one way or another, are to be violated in the seduction process? Is not the seducer’s art to accomplish this violation properly — so that afterwards, by its acceptance, its harassing aspect will be retroactively cancelled?”

Slavoj Žižek (1949) Slovene philosopher

The Fragile Absolute: or, why is the Christian legacy worth fighting for? (London: Verso, 2000, ), p. 111.

Women , Men , Fear , Art

“A fractal is by definition a set for which the Hausdorff-Besicovitch dimension strictly exceeds the topological dimension.”

Benoît Mandelbrot book The Fractal Geometry of Nature

The Fractal Geometry of Nature (1982)

“To occupy my imagination, which has been depressed by dwelling on my misfortunes, and to compensate at least in part for some of the considerable expenses I have incurred, I set myself to painting a series of cabinet pictures.... they depict themes that cannot usually be dealt with in commissioned works, where 'capricho' [whim] and invention do not have much of a role to play. I thought of sending them to the academy..”

Francisco De Goya (1746–1828) Spanish painter and printmaker (1746–1828)

letter to his friend Bernardo de Iriarte, deputy of the Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid, Jan. 1794; as quoted in 'Goya and Iriarte', in Goya his Life and Work, P. Gassier and J. Wilson, 1971, p. 382
cabinet paintings were small portable paintings, which did not need a lot of wall-space and could be moved around at the owner's whim. Goya's famous series 'Caprichos' really begin after physical and probably mental breakdown in 1792. He was 46, and thereafter deaf until his death in 1828
1790s

Imagination , Parting , Painting

“Set a beggar on horseback and he will ride a gallop.”

Robert Burton book The Anatomy of Melancholy

Section 2, member 2.
The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621), Part II

“Walk the Path: No truth can set you free unless you walk the enlightened path diligently, pragmatically and wisely.”

Thich Nhat Tu (1969) Vietnamese philosopher

Buddhist Socteriological Ethics: A Study of the Buddha’s Central Teachings (1999)

Truth

“In my own country, and perhaps in some others, the workers for the League of Nations are sometimes reproached with attaching too much importance to collective security and the forcible prevention of war. That only shows how short people's memories are in political affairs. As a matter of fact, during the first ten years of the League very little was said about these subjects. We dwelt on the social and humanitarian sides of the League. We urged disarmament and treaty revision. Great reliance — particularly in England — was placed not upon forcible action but upon public opinion. We preached — and, I am glad to say, preached successfully — the enormous importance of publicity in the actions of the League, so that the world might know not only what was being done but why it was being done at Geneva. We attached perhaps even too great importance to the conception that no nation would be so rash or so wicked as to set itself against the public opinion of the world.”

Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood (1864–1958) lawyer, politician and diplomat in the United Kingdom

The Future of Civilization (1938)

War , People , World , Memory

“Though the snow-drifts of Yoshino were heaped across his path, doubt not that whither his heart is set, his footsteps shall tread out their way.”

Murasaki Shikibu book The Tale of Genji

Source: Tale of Genji, The Tale of Genji, trans. Arthur Waley, Ch. 19: A Wreath of Cloud

Way , Heart

“In a national capital Mirabeau and his set
Attacked mystery; the packed galleries roared
And history marched to the drums of a clear idea,
The aim of the Rational City, quick to admire,
Quick to tire.”

W. H. Auden (1907–1973) Anglo-American poet

Memorial for the City (1947)

History , Idea

“The Orient that appears in Orientalism, then, is a system of representations framed by a whole set of forces that brought the Orient into Western learning, Western consciousness, and later, Western empire. … The Orient is the stage on which the whole East is confined. On this stage will appear the figures whose role it is to represent the larger whole from which they emanate. The Orient then seems to be, not an unlimited extension beyond the familiar European world, but rather a closed field, a theatrical stage affixed to Europe.”

Edward Said book Orientalism

Orientalism (1978)

World , Learning , Appearance

“You get set on a path and, if you succeed, you get better parts, but of the same kind. If you don't take a lot of trouble, you get stuck like that.”

Fenella Fielding (1927–2018) English actress

Interview: Independent, Sunday 24 February 2008 http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/the-lady-vanishes-what-ever-happened-to-fenella-fielding-785265.html

Parting