Quotes about tell
page 69

Charles Darwin photo

“As man advances in civilisation, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simplest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all the members of the same nation, though personally unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an artificial barrier to prevent his sympathies extending to the men of all nations and races. If, indeed, such men are separated from him by great differences in appearance or habits, experience unfortunately shews us how long it is before we look at them as our fellow-creatures. Sympathy beyond the confines of man, that is humanity to the lower animals, seems to be one of the latest moral acquisitions. It is apparently unfelt by savages, except towards their pets. How little the old Romans knew of it is shewn by their abhorrent gladiatorial exhibitions. The very idea of humanity, as far as I could observe, was new to most of the Gauchos of the Pampas. This virtue, one of the noblest with which man is endowed, seems to arise incidentally from our sympathies becoming more tender and more widely diffused, until they are extended to all sentient beings. As soon as this virtue is honoured and practised by some few men, it spreads through instruction and example to the young, and eventually through public opinion.”

volume I, chapter III: "Comparison of the Mental Powers of Man and the Lower Animals — continued", pages 100-101 http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=113&itemID=F937.1&viewtype=image
The Descent of Man (1871)

Charles Darwin photo

“To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree. When it was first said that the sun stood still and the world turned round, the common sense of mankind declared the doctrine false; but the old saying of Vox populi, vox Dei, as every philosopher knows, cannot be trusted in science. Reason tells me, that if numerous gradations from a simple and imperfect eye to one complex and perfect can be shown to exist, each grade being useful to its possessor, as is certainly the case; if further, the eye ever varies and the variations be inherited, as is likewise certainly the case; and if such variations should be useful to any animal under changing conditions of life, then the difficulty of believing that a perfect and complex eye could be formed by natural selection, though insuperable by our imagination, should not be considered as subversive of the theory. How a nerve comes to be sensitive to light, hardly concerns us more than how life itself originated; but I may remark that, as some of the lowest organisms, in which nerves cannot be detected, are capable of perceiving light, it does not seem impossible that certain sensitive elements in their sarcode should become aggregated and developed into nerves, endowed with this special sensibilites.”

On the Origin of Species (1859)

Erykah Badu photo

“I can see the evidence of that when I listen to music or hear young artists talk and they’re not shy at all about telling me thank you for the things I’ve contributed to them.”

Erykah Badu (1971) American neo-soul singer

On her influence on younger artists in “'I'm not sorry I said it': Erykah Badu on music, motherhood and wildly unpopular opinions” https://www.theguardian.com/music/2018/may/24/erykah-badu-interview in The Guardian (2018 May 24)

Benjamin Franklin photo

“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I may remember. Involve me and I learn.”

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

There is no evidence that Franklin said this. Scholars believe the saying comes from the Xunzi.
Additional information may be read at the following websites:
http://dakinburdick.wordpress.com/2012/03/14/tell-me-and-i-forget/
http://www.quora.com/History/Where-and-when-did-Benjamin-Franklin-say-Tell-me-and-I-forget-teach-me-and-I-may-remember-involve-me-and-I-learn
http://gazettextra.com/weblogs/word-badger/2013/mar/24/whose-quote-really/
Misattributed

Alfred von Waldersee photo
Alfred von Waldersee photo
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez photo
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez photo
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez photo

“You shouldn’t need a Bible to tell you to protect our planet, but it does anyway.”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (1989) American politician

Twitter post, https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1088200189524017157 (23 January 2019)
Twitter Quotes (2019), January 2019

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez photo

“When we talk about the concern of the environment as an elitist concern, one year ago I was waitressing in a taco shop in Downtown Manhattan. I just got health insurance for the first time a month ago. This is not an elitist issue; this is a quality-of-life issue. You want to tell people that their concern and their desire for clean air and clean water is elitist? Tell that to the kids in the South Bronx, which are suffering from the highest rates of childhood asthma in the country. Tell that to the families in Flint, whose kids have—their blood is ascending in lead levels. Their brains are damaged for the rest of their lives. Call them elitist… People are dying. This should not be a partisan issue. This is about our constituents and all of our lives. Iowa, Nebraska, broad swaths of the Midwest are drowning right now, underwater. Farms, towns that will never be recovered and never come back. And we’re here, and people are more concerned about helping oil companies than helping their own families? I don’t think so…This is about American lives. And it should not be partisan. Science should not be partisan. We are facing a national crisis. And if… if we tell the American public that we are more willing to invest and bail out big banks than we are willing to invest in our farmers and our urban families, then I don’t know what we’re here doing…”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (1989) American politician

“Tell That to the Families in Flint”: AOC Demolishes GOP Claim That Green New Deal Is “Elitist”, DemocracyNow, https://www.democracynow.org/2019/3/28/tell_that_to_the_families_in<BR> Video only: This is not an elitist issue: AOC on... inaction on climate change –video, Guardian News https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5M8vvEhCFI (26 March 2019)
Quotes (2019)

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez photo
Tony Blair photo

“Ask me my three main priorities for government, and I tell you: education, education and education.”

Tony Blair (1953) former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

We are 35th in the world league of education standards &ndash; 35th. At every level, radical improvement and reform.
"We are back as the people's party, says Blair", The Times, 2 October 1996.
1990s

Raymond Chandler photo
Jiddu Krishnamurti photo

“The answer is in the problem, not away from the problem. I go through the searching, analysing, dissecting process, in order to escape from the problem. But, if I do not escape from the problem and try to look at the problem without any fear or anxiety, if I merely look at the problem — mathematical, political, religious, or any other — and not look to an answer, then the problem will begin to tell me. Surely, this is what happens. We go through this process and eventually throw it aside because there is no way out of it. So, why can’t we start right from the beginning, that is, not seek an answer to a problem?”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

which is extremely arduous, isn’t it? Because, the more I understand the problem, the more significance there is in it. To understand, I must approach it quietly, not impose on the problem my ideas, my feelings of like and dislike. Then the problem will reveal its significance. Why is it not possible to have tranquillity of the mind right from the beginning?
"Eighth Talk in The Oak Grove, 7 August 1949" http://www.jkrishnamurti.org/krishnamurti-teachings/view-text.php?tid=320&chid=4643&w=%22The+answer+is+in+the+problem%2C+not+away+from+the+problem%22, J.Krishnamurti Online, JKO Serial No. 490807, Vol. V, p. 283
Posthumous publications, The Collected Works

Fidel Castro photo

“Let me tell you a story: Once there was a republic. It had its constitution, its laws, its freedoms, a president, a congress and courts of law. Everyone could assemble, associate, speak and write with complete freedom.”

Fidel Castro (1926–2016) former First Secretary of the Communist Party and President of Cuba

ibid., p. 89-901
History Will Absolve Me (October 16th, 1953)

Fidel Castro photo
Abu Hamid al-Ghazali photo
Seneca the Younger photo
Poul Anderson photo

“I seek occasional relief in old books. They help me tell the transient from the enduring.”

Source: The Boat of a Million Years (1989), Chapter 16 “Niche” (p. 291)

Noam Chomsky photo

“It’s certainly true that the world is better off without Saddam Hussein, and also without the people who supported him through his worst atrocities, and are now telling us about them.”

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

Quotes 2000s, 2004, 25th Anniversary of Coalition for Peace Action, 2004

John Holloway photo
Tucker Carlson photo

“It’s obvious we need more scientists and skilled engineers. What we’re getting instead are waves of poor people with a high school education or less. They’re nice people; nobody doubts that. But as an economic matter, this is insane. It’s indefensible, so nobody tries to defend it. It’s indefensible, so no one even tries to defend it.Instead, our leaders demand you shut up and accept it. We’ve got a moral obligation to admit the world’s poor, they tell us, even if it makes our own country poorer, dirtier and more divided.”

Tucker Carlson (1969) American political commentator

Immigration is a form of atonement. Previous leaders of our country committed sins. So, we must pay for those sins by welcoming an endless chain of migrant caravans.
December 13, 2018 on Tucker Carlson Tonight ([December 14, 2018, Tucker Carlson: Why no one ever makes the economic case for mass immigration, Tucker, Carlson, Fox News, https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/tucker-carlson-why-no-one-ever-makes-the-economic-case-for-mass-immigration]; [The New York Times, August 20, 2019, Hsu, Tiffany, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/20/business/media/tucker-carlson-fox-advertisers.html]; [Tucker Carlson said immigration makes America ‘dirtier.’ So an advertiser took action, The Washington Post, Erik, Wemple, w:Erik Wemple, December 15, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2018/12/15/tucker-carlson-said-immigration-makes-america-dirtier-so-an-advertiser-took-action/]; [Advertisers recoil as Tucker Carlson says immigrants make US ‘dirtier’, The Guardian, Luke, O'Neil, December 18, 2018, https://www.theguardian.com/media/2018/dec/18/tucker-carlson-immigrants-poorer-dirtier-advertisers-pull-out]; [Advertisers bail on Fox News' Tucker Carlson over immigration comments, NBC News, December 17, 2018, Tim, Stelloh, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/all/advertisers-bail-fox-news-tucker-carlson-over-immigration-comments-n949171]; [Red Lobster stops advertising on Tucker Carlson's Fox News show after he made controversial comments about women's pay and immigrants, Kate, Taylor, Eliza, Relman, January 7, 2019, Business Insider, https://www.businessinsider.com/red-lobster-cuts-advertising-on-tucker-carlsons-fox-news-show-2019-1]; [September 17, 2019, Is Tucker Carlson the Most Important Pundit in America?, Park, MacDougald, New York, The Intelligencer, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/09/is-tucker-carlson-the-most-important-pundit-in-america.html])
2010s, 2018

Donald Tusk photo

“No-one will ever tell me that Brexit is a good thing because as I have always said, in fact, Brexit is only about damage control.”

Donald Tusk (1957) Polish politician, current President of the European Council

Brexit: Donald Tusk says not enough progress in talks https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41389498 BBC News (26 September 2017)
2011, 2017

Anwar Sadat photo

“Today I tell you, and I declare it to the whole world, that we accept to live with you in permanent peace based on justice. We do not want to encircle you or be encircled ourselves by destructive missiles ready for launching, nor by the shells of grudges and hatreds.”

Anwar Sadat (1918–1981) Egyptian president and Nobel Peace Prize recipient

[Address by Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to the Knesset, Anwar, Sadat, Visit to Israel by President Sadat, Jerusalem, November 20, 1977, https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/address-by-egyptian-president-anwar-sadat-to-the-knesset, October 9, 2018]

Ta-Nehisi Coates photo
Ta-Nehisi Coates photo
Hannah Arendt photo
Dick Stuart photo

“That was when I started telling Polish jokes. Actually, Maz robbed me. If I had hit that home run, I would have made a lot more out of it than Maz did. He never made much effort to capitalize on it. Can you imagine what that homer would be worth in endorsements today?”

Dick Stuart (1932–2002) American baseball player

On the walk-off home run—hit with pinch hitter Stuart on-deck—that ended the 1960 World Series; as quoted in "A Sad Story: Dick Stuart's Bat Was Solid; So Was His Glove"

Giacomo Leopardi photo
Nicolas Chamfort photo

“Poets, orators, even philosophes, say the same things about fame we were told as boys to encourage us to win prizes. What they tell children to make them prefer being praised to eating jam tarts is the same idea constantly drummed into us to encourage us to sacrifice our real interests in the hope of being praised by our contemporaries or by posterity.”

Nicolas Chamfort (1741–1794) French writer

Ce que les poètes, les orateurs, même quelques philosophes nous disent sur l'amour de la Gloire, on nous le disait au Collège, pour nous encourager à avoir les prix. Ce que l'on dit aux enfants pour les engager à préférer à une tartelette les louanges de leurs bonnes, c'est ce qu'on répète aux hommes pour leur faire préférer à un intérêt personnel les éloges de leurs contemporains ou de la postérité.
Maximes et Pensées, #85
Reflections

“But was it not you who used to tell me that the more you knew, the better? That knowledge was the sharpest fang?”

Steve Perry (1947) American writer

Source: The Vastalimi Gambit (2013), Chapter 3

Imran Khan photo
Ayman Odeh photo

“Today, I will have to tell my children, along with all the children of Palestinian Arab towns in the country, that the state has declared that it does not want us here. … It has passed a law of Jewish supremacy and told us that we will always be second-class citizens.”

Ayman Odeh (1975) Israeli lawyer and member of the Knesset

About the Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People, as quoted in Israel 'nation-state' law prompts criticism around the world, including from U.S. Jewish groups https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/israel-nation-state-law-prompts-criticism-around-world-n893036 (July 20, 2018) by Paul Goldman, Lawahez Jabari and F. Brinley Bruton, NBC News.

“You should never revile people who are satisfied with their own religion… Listen you disciples of Christ! I, solicitous of your own welfare, tell you this truthfully… Diminution of Hari’s religion, anger, cruelty, subversion of authority and dissensions among the populace would result from reviling the religion of others. Increase of God’s religion, contentment, gentleness, harmony between the ranks would result from praising all religions. For each person his own religion is best; the same religion would be perilous for another person.”

John Muir (indologist) (1810–1882) Scottish Sanskrit scholar and Indologist

Subaji Bapu, MataparIkshAsikshA, from his reply to John Muirs Matapariksha, Cited by R.F. Young and quoted from Goel, S. R. (2016). History of Hindu-Christian encounters, AD 304 to 1996. Chapter 10. ISBN 9788185990354 https://web.archive.org/web/20120501043412/http://voiceofdharma.org/books/hhce/
About John Muirs Matapariksha

Ryū Murakami photo
Isa Chandra Moskowitz photo

“I think if you are a chef who thinks that vegan cooking has less taste and flavor than other foods than that just speaks to your own inability. Vegetables can stand on their own they don’t need all your duck blood on them, thank you. Also people tend to think vegans are emaciated self sacrificing, well tell that to my big ass jew hips.”

Isa Chandra Moskowitz (1973) American food writer

" Isa Chandra Moskowitz, Creator, Post Punk Kitchen, Author, Vegan With a Vengeance http://gothamist.com/2005/11/03/isa_chandra_moskowitz_creator_post_punk_kitchen_author_vegan_with_a_vengeance.php". Interview by Rachel Kramer Bussel for Gothamist, November 3, 2005

Alastair Reynolds photo

“Tell me, scientist to scientist, do you honestly think it will work?”

“We won’t know until we try,” Naqi said. Any other answer would have been politically hazardous: too much optimism and the politicians would have started asking just why the expensive project was needed in the first place. Too much pessimism and they would ask exactly the same question.

Turquoise Days, Chapter 2 (pp. 240-241)
Short fiction, Diamond Dogs, Turquoise Days (2003)

Norodom Ranariddh photo
Joseph Strutt photo
Camille Pissarro photo

“Bracquemond tells me that he looked attentively at my works at our exhibition. Far from objecting to them, as I expected, he said they were compactly drawn, and modeled, but he is shocked by the dots; he enjoined me to stick to divisionism but not to use the dot.”

Camille Pissarro (1830–1903) French painter

I said nothing to him of our experiments. He told me that of all the impressionist painters he liked my work best; this was not the first time he had said this; to each one his own taste. He does completely accept my view that the old disorderly method of execution has become impossible.
Quote of Camille Pissarro, in a letter, Eragny, 23 January 1887, to his son Lucien; in Camille Pissarro - Letters to His Son Lucien ed. John Rewald, with assistance of Lucien Pissarro; from the unpublished French letters; transl. Lionel Abel; Pantheon Books Inc. New York, second edition, 1943, p. 97
1880's

Bobby Robson photo
Swathi Thirunal Rama Varma photo
Ellen Page photo
Victor Villaseñor photo
Victor Villaseñor photo
Premchand photo

“A good part — and definitely the most fun part — of being a feminist is about frightening men. American and Australian feminists have always known this, and absorbed it cheerfully into their act; one thinks of Shere Hite julienning men on phone- in shows, or Dale Spender telling us that a good feminist is rude to a man at least three times a day on principle.”

Julie Burchill (1959) British writer

Of course, there's a lot more to feminism... but scaring the shit out of scumbags is an amusing and necessary part because, sadly, a good many men still respect nothing but strength,
Burchill (1990) The Sunday Times; as cited in: Christopher W. Tindale (1999) Acts of arguing: a rhetorical model of argument. p. 58

Rajinikanth photo
James K. Morrow photo

“On your planet, how do you tell somebody that you love her?”

James K. Morrow (1947) (1947-) science fiction author

“It’s very complicated. You say, ‘I love you,’ and then you stand back and see what happens.”
Source: The Wine of Violence (1981), Chapter 9 (p. 112)

Scott Lynch photo

“My responsibility was to tell you the truth, not wrap you in swaddling clothes.”

She raised her hood again, half-veiling her face in shadow. “Nor protect you from your own badly aimed temper.”
Source: The Republic of Thieves (2013), Chapter 9 “The Five-Year Game: Reasonable Doubt” section 2 (p. 551)

“Something tells me that this isn’t going to be as simple as it looks.”

“What is?” Wald said, raising his eyebrows.
“Nothing, of course. But hope springs eternal in the human spleen.”
Source: The Quincunx of Time (1973), Chapter 7, “A Few Cosmic Jokes” (p. 77)

Sebastian Vettel photo
Frederick B. Maurice photo

“As a soldier who has spent a quarter of his life in the study of the science of arms, let me tell you I went into the British Army believing that if you want peace you must prepare for war. I believe now that if you prepare thoroughly and efficiently for war, you get war.”

Frederick B. Maurice (1871–1951) British Army general and historian

Speaking in Carnegie Hall, New York City, on 4 April 1919.
[New York Times, 5 April 1919, 13, Maurice Criticises Peace Conferees, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B00E6DC1E3BEE3ABC4D53DFB2668382609EDE]

Catherine of Aragon photo

“Did I not tell you that whenever you argue with the Queen she is sure to have the upper hand?! I see that one fine morning you will succumb to her reasoning and cast me off!”

Catherine of Aragon (1485–1536) first wife of Henry VIII of England (1485–1536)

Anne Boleyn — quoted in Alison Weir (1991). The Six Wives of Henry VIII. ISBN 0802136834, p. 213.

Jim Butcher photo

“When you put the ball in his hands there is no telling what is going to happen - sometimes I am just amazed watching what he can do even though I am playing on the same field he is.”

Javon Ringer (1987) All-American college football player, professional football player, running back

MSU WR Mark Dell, quoted here http://www.ncaa.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/092108acj.html

Paul Scholes photo
Paul Scholes photo
Ted Hughes photo
Peter Beckford photo
Harvey Fierstein photo
Albert Kesselring photo
Thomas Eakins photo
Wendy Liebman photo

“My mother is a ventriloquist – but not professionally. For ten years I thought the dog was telling me to kill my father.”

Wendy Liebman (1961) American comedian

Waiting a beat, Liebman adds, "I got my brother to do it."
Wendy Liebman page http://delafont.com/comedians/wendy-liebman.htm Richard De La Font Agency, Inc. web site. (url accessed on October 22, 2008)

Uwe Boll photo
Chetan Bhagat photo
Phillip Guston photo

“I got sick and tired of all that Purity! Wanted to tell stories..”

Phillip Guston (1913–1980) American artist

Guston's quote in 1967, referring to his swift from Abstract expressionism to figurative painting
Abstract Expressionism, David Anfam, Thames and Hudson Ltd London, 1990, p. 207
1961 - 1980

Zinedine Zidane photo

“The greatest player of the past 20 years? It has to be Zidane. He had everything. You never needed to tell him anything as he did it all by himself and knew what was expected.”

Zinedine Zidane (1972) French association football player and manager

Marcello Lippi, September 2011 http://www.espnstar.com/football/serie-a/news/detail/item683056/%22Zidane-is-greatest-football-player%22/

Dylan Moran photo
Larry David photo

“Let me tell you something; I do hate myself, but it has nothing to do with being Jewish.”

Larry David (1947) American comedian, writer, actor, and television producer

When accused of being a self-loathing Jew; Curb Your Enthusiasm, Season 2, Episode 3, "Trick or Treat"

Stokely Carmichael photo

“The time for running has come to an end. You tell them white folk in Mississippi that all the scared niggers are dead!”

Stokely Carmichael (1941–1998) American activist

addressing a crowd alongside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and others during the March Against Fear, 1966, Link http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/mlk/filmmore/pt.html

Richard Pryor photo

“Let me tell you what really happened… Every night before I go to bed, I have milk and cookies. One night I mixed some low-fat milk and some pasteurized, then I dipped my cookie in and the shit blew up.”

Richard Pryor (1940–2005) American stand-up comedian, actor, social critic, writer, and MC

At the start of a routine about his freebasing accident. Live At The Sunset Strip (1982) [album and movie]

Woodrow Wilson photo
Immortal Technique photo
John Muir photo
Prem Rawat photo
Julian of Norwich photo

“Now behoveth me to tell in what manner I saw sin deadly in the creatures which shall not die for sin, but live in the joy of God without end.”

Julian of Norwich (1342–1416) English theologian and anchoress

The Sixteenth Revelation, Chapter 72

Jane Austen photo
Jane Austen photo
Teal Swan photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo
Slobodan Milošević photo
Pierce Brown photo

“Is a man a coward if he realizes that bravery is just a myth the old tell the young so they line up for the meatgrinder?”

Source: Dark Age (2019), Ch. 10: The Ash Rain; Lysander

Teal Swan photo
Teal Swan photo
Phyllis Diller photo
W. H. Auden photo
Richard Dawkins photo
Richard Dawkins photo

“I don't believe you until you tell me, do you really believe, for example, if they say they are Catholic, "Do you really believe that when a priest blesses a wafer, it turns into the body of Christ? Are you seriously telling me you believe that? Are you seriously saying that wine turns into blood?"”

Richard Dawkins (1941) English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author

Mock them. Ridicule them. In public. Don't fall for the convention that we're all too polite to talk about religion. Religion is not off the table. Religion is not off limits. Religion makes specific claims about the universe which need to be substantiated and need to be challenged and, if necessary, need to be ridiculed with contempt.
Reason Rally, National Mall, Washington, DC,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dq7rHRplZKU
YouTube
Richard Dawkins and his Foundation at the Reason Rally
2012-04-07

Anton Chekhov photo

“Tell me, pleez, my sawl, when will I live like human, that is, to work and not to be in need? Now I work, and I'm in need, and I spoil my reputation by the need to write bullshit.”

Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) Russian dramatist, author and physician

Скажи, пожалюста, душя моя, когда я буду жить по-человечески, т. е. работать и не нуждаться? Теперь я и работаю, и нуждаюсь, и порчу свою репутацию необходимостью работать херовое.
Letter to the Alexander Chekhov (April 14, 1887)
Letters

Thurgood Marshall photo
James P. Gray photo

“Ask your local high school or junior college students and they will tell you the same thing they tell me: that it is easier for our children and underage adults to get illicit drugs than it is for them to get alcohol.”

James P. Gray (1945) American judge

Source: Why Our Drug Laws Have Failed and What We Can Do About It: A Judicial Indictment of the War on Drugs, 2011, p. 50

James P. Gray photo
James P. Gray photo
Luis Alberto Urrea photo