Quotes about thought
page 25

“Dragon kind was no less cruel than mankind. The Dragon, at least, acted from bestial need rather than bestial greed.”
~ A thought by Lessa ~”

Anne McCaffrey book Dragonflight

Source: Dragonflight

“I think where I am not, therefore I am where I do not think. I am not whenever I am the plaything of my thought; I think of what I am where I do not think to think.”

Jacques Lacan (1901–1981) French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist

Thinking

“Like her father, he wasn't comfortable sharing his thoughts and feelings. She tried to explain that she needed to be closer to him, but it had never seemed to make a difference.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Notebook

Source: The Notebook

Feeling

“Oh, it's you," Curran's voice said quietly. "I thought it was an elephant.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Bites

“This thought strengthened in me my belief that all men, without exception, deserve to be pitied, if only because they are alive.”

Alberto Moravia book The Woman of Rome

Source: The Woman of Rome

Men

“Whoever thought a tiny candy bar should be called fun size was a moron.”

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

“Here's a basic difference between Morelli and me. My first thought was always of cake. His first thought was always of sex. Don't get me wrong. I like sex… a lot. But it's never going to replace cake.”

Janet Evanovich book Eleven on Top

Source: Eleven on Top

Sex

“People, he thought, were as hungry for a sight of joy as he had always been--for a moment's relief from that gray load of suffering which seemed so inexplicable and unnecessary. He had never been able to understand why men should be unhappy.”

Ayn Rand book Atlas Shrugged

Source: Atlas Shrugged

Men, People, Understanding, Suffering

“The quality of light by which we scrutinize our lives has direct bearing upon the product which we live, and upon the changes which we hope to bring about through those lives. It is within this light that we form those ideas by which we pursue our magic and make it realized. This is poetry as illumination, for it is through poetry that we give name to those ideas which are, until the poem, nameless and formless-about to be birthed, but already felt. That distillation of experience from which true poetry springs births thought as dream births concept, as feeling births idea, as knowledge births (precedes) understanding.”

Audre Lorde (1934–1992) writer and activist

"Poetry is Not a Luxury"
Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches (1984)

Dreams, Hope, Feeling, Spring

“I needed to choose between the one thing that really filled m thoughts-my love for that woman-and losing my freedom and all the choices that the future promised me. To be honest, the decision was easy.
-Lukas Jessen-Petersen”

Paulo Coelho (1947) Brazilian lyricist and novelist

Source: The Witch Of Portobello

Love, Decision, Freedom, Future

“That Shay was in possesion of hand grenades was a comforting thought showed what kind of night this had become.”

Scott Westerfeld book Specials

Source: Specials

Night

“She's had so little love, Jesse thought, I will drown her in it for the rest of her life.”

LaVyrle Spencer (1943) American writer

Source: Hummingbird

Love, Life

“Melt all the guns, I thought, break the knives, burn the guillotines-and the malicious will still write letters that kill.”

Ray Bradbury book Death Is a Lonely Business

Source: Death Is a Lonely Business

“I dont know about happily ever after… but I know about happily, Weetzie Bat thought..”

Francesca Lia Block (1962) American children's writer

“Sometimes I thought about nothing and sometimes I thought about my life. At least I made a living. What kind of living? A living. It wasn't easy. I found out how little is unbearable.”

Nicole Krauss The History of Love

Source: The History of Love

Life

“What business had I to think of one that never thought of me?”

Anne Brontë book Agnes Grey

Source: Agnes Grey

Business, Thinking

“However many blessings we expect from God, His infinite liberality will always exceed all our wishes and our thoughts.”

John Calvin (1509–1564) French Protestant reformer

God

“A poem is never a put-up job, so to speak. It begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness. It is never a thought to begin with.”

Robert Frost (1874–1963) American poet

Sense

“She avoids deep thought like an empty restaurant, not out of stupidity, but a canny resolve to be happy.”

Alex Shakar (1968) American writer

Source: Luminarium

Happiness, Stupidity, Deep

“Love and death are everything, Jenny. Danger is the best part of the game. I thought you knew that."
-Julian”

L.J. Smith (1965) American author

Source: The Chase

Love, Death, Game, Parting

“God knows what I thought! Your brain does amazing acrobatics when it doesn't want to believe something.”

Elizabeth Wein book Rose Under Fire

Source: Rose Under Fire

God

“Jason patted me on the back. “Tomorrow night we'll take you out chasing deer.”
“I thought you'd chase cars,” I said.
He grinned. “What fun is that? Cars don't bleed.”

Laurell K. Hamilton book The Killing Dance

Source: The Killing Dance

Cars, Night

“I thought for a minute, and then I got heavy, heavy boots.”

Jonathan Safran Foer book Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

Source: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

“This is love, she thought, isn't it? When you notice someone's absence and hate that absence more than anything? More, even, than you love his presence?”

Jonathan Safran Foer book Everything Is Illuminated

Source: Everything Is Illuminated

Love, Hate

“And I thought, there was no God, there was only what you wanted.”

Janet Fitch book White Oleander

Source: White Oleander

God

“Any idea, plan, or purpose may be placed in the mind through repetition of thought.”

Napoleon Hill book Think and Grow Rich

Source: Think and Grow Rich (1938), p. 54

Idea

“He looked at the silver pocketknife in his hand. An idea came to him – possibly the stupidest, craziest idea he’d had since he thought, Hey, I’ll get Percy to swim in the River Styx! He’ll love me for that!”

Rick Riordan book The Blood of Olympus

Source: The Blood of Olympus

Love, Idea

“No one should be alone in their old age, he thought.”

Ernest Hemingway book The Old Man and the Sea

Source: The Old Man and the Sea

Age

“What if I’ve forgotten the most important thing? What if somewhere inside me there is a dark limbo where all the truly important memories are heaped and slowly turning into mud?… the thought fills me with an almost unbearable sorrow.”

Haruki Murakami book Norwegian Wood

Source: Norwegian Wood

Memory

“That's what being crazy was, wasn't it? You thought you were fine. Everyone else knew better.”

Kelley Armstrong book The Summoning

Source: The Summoning

“Then he thought himself unhappy, but happiness was all in the future; now he felt that the best happiness was already in the past.”

Leo Tolstoy book Anna Karenina

Source: Anna Karenina

Happiness, Past, Future

“I suppose I really seemed mad, then; but it was only through the awfulness of having said nothing but the truth, and being thought to be deluded.”

Sarah Waters book Fingersmith

Source: Fingersmith

Truth, Madness

“I want to see your tailpipe fading off into the sunset."
Good luck, I thought. My tailpipe was somewhere on Route 1, along with my muffler.”

Janet Evanovich book One for the Money

Source: One for the Money

“He must love me, i thought, amazed. A faint whiff of nausea hit me at seeing pain as proof of love, but it seemed true. Unavoidable.”

Katherine Dunn book Geek Love

Source: Geek Love

Love, Pain

“The only reason any person does not have enough money is because they are blocking money from coming to them with their thoughts.”

Rhonda Byrne book The Secret

Source: The Secret

Money, Personality

“And I thought the whole point of my education was that violence IS the answer.”

Richelle Mead Shadow Kiss

Source: Shadow Kiss

Education

“I could shove this swizzle stick through his heart, Min thought. She would'nt do it, of course. The stick was plastic and not nearly pointed enough on the end.”

Jennifer Crusie book Bet Me

Source: Bet Me

Heart

“All my life I've thought I needed someone to complete me, now I know I need to belong to myself.”

Sue Monk Kidd book The Mermaid Chair

Source: The Mermaid Chair

Life

“Work joyfully and peacefully, knowing that right thoughts and right efforts inevitably bring about right results.”

James Allen (1864–1912) British philosophical writer

Effort

“This is worse than Hollywood, he thought. A girl comes in with a pork chop and I write a song for her.”

Eva Ibbotson (1925–2010) British children's writer

Girl

“What were you going to do with it?” McCain asked.

"I just thought it might come in useful.”

"Were you planning to attack me?”

"No. But that’s a good idea.”

Anthony Horowitz book Crocodile Tears

Source: Crocodile Tears

Idea

“The power of human thought grows exponentially with the number of minds that share that thought.”

Dan Brown book The Lost Symbol

Source: The Lost Symbol

“I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see.”

John Burroughs (1837–1921) American naturalist and essayist

Books, Thinking, Reading

“When I was a child, I thought as a child. But now I have put away childish things. … I must be scientific.”

Philip K. Dick book The Man in the High Castle

Source: The Man in the High Castle (1962)
Context: When I was a child, I thought as a child. But now I have put away childish things.... I must be scientific.

“Jace was kissing her like he thought he might go to hell for doing it, but it would be worth it.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Fallen Angels

Source: City of Fallen Angels

Hell, Kiss

“My friends call me by my name."
"You don't have any friends."
"I don't want you to be my friend, Selia, or my servant, not now. I thought you were both. You have let me know I was wrong. So are you to treat me so. You are wrong.”

Shannon Hale The Goose Girl

Source: The Goose Girl

“Excuse me?" I said, palms down on the Formica tabletop. "Coffee? I thought we came here for pie." "I don't eat the kind of pie they serve here." I felt a flash of heat go through my stomach. I knew firsthand the kind of pie Ranger liked.”

Janet Evanovich book To the Nines

Source: To the Nines

Coffee

“A story was a form of telepathy. By means of inking symbols onto a page, she was able to send thoughts and feelings from her mind to her reader's. It was a magical process, so commonplace that no one stopped to wonder at it.”

Ian McEwan book Atonement

Source: Atonement

Feeling

“The dreamers, those who misread the actual state of affairs and act upon their emotions, are often the source of the greatest mistakes in history—the wars that are not thought out, the disasters that are not foreseen”

Robert Greene book The 50th Law

Source: The 50th Law

War, History

“Instead of satisfying me, the kisses have the opposite effect, of make my need greater. I thought I was something of an expert on hunger, but this is an entirely new kind.”

Suzanne Collins book Catching Fire

Source: Catching Fire

Hunger, Kiss

“I carry thoughts of you like my own personal constellation. How far away you are, my dearest friend, but no farther than those fixed stars in my soul.”

Lisa Kleypas (1964) American writer

Source: Love in the Afternoon

Soul, Star, Personality

“Magnus thought of James Herondale, burning up with too much light, too much love, too much, too much- while the boy in the portrait was as lovely as a dying poet, with the fragile beauty of a candle about to gutter out.”

Cassandra Clare The Bane Chronicles

Source: The Bane Chronicles

Love, Beauty, Boy, Light

“I made mistakes in drama. I thought drama was when actors cried. But drama is when the audience cries.”

Frank Capra (1897–1991) Sicilian-born American film director

1001 quotations to inspire you before you die, Quintessence Editions Ltd., 2016, ISBN 978-1-84403-895-4

“In medieval times, if someone displayed the symptoms we now identify as boredom, that person was thought to be committing something called, a 'dangerous form of spiritual alienation' -- a devaluing of the world and its creator.”

Richard Louv (1949) American journalist

World, Time, Personality

“When I got to the street, I walked boldly. But I was always accompanied by an agonizing thought: the fear that honest people may be thieves who have chosen a cleverer and safer way of stealing.”

Jean Genet (1910–1986) French novelist, playwright, poet and political activist

Source: Miracle of the Rose

People, Fear, Way

“It's the best possible time to be alive, when almost everything you thought you knew is wrong.”

Tom Stoppard Arcadia

Source: Arcadia

Time

“Give me the storm and tempest of thought and action, rather than the dead calm of ignorance and faith! Banish me from Eden when you will; but first let me eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge!”

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

Source: The Works Of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. Iii

Faith, Knowledge, Tree, Dead

“It was the first time I was ever in love, and I learned a lot. Before that I'd never even thought about killing myself.”

Steven Wright (1955) American actor and author

Love, Learning, Time

“Personally, I think knees should be kept for the eighth or ninth date, or the wedding day. As a nice surprise you know? 'oh, my darling, you have knees! I never would have thought”

Derek Landy (1974) Irish children's writer

Source: Mortal Coil

Thinking, Wedding, Personality

“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.”

Marcus Aurelius book Meditations

Source: Meditations

Life, Happiness, Nature, Dependency

“Waiting on God requires the willingness to bear uncertainty, to carry within oneself the unanswered question, lifting the heart to God about it whenever it intrudes upon one's thoughts.”

Elisabeth Elliot (1926–2015) American missionary

God, Question, Waiting, Heart

“I never thought… that someone liked me… not like a demon… not like a half-demon… not even like human… just like… just like me!" -Inuyasha”

Rumiko Takahashi (1957) manga artist

“To achieve the impossible, it is precisely the unthinkable that must be thought.”

Tom Robbins book Jitterbug Perfume

Source: Jitterbug Perfume (1984)

“I have seen sights and travelled in countries you cannot imagine. I have been afraid and I have been in danger, and I have never for one moment thought that I would throw myself at at a man for his help.”

Philippa Gregory book The Queen's Fool

Source: The Queen's Fool

Travel, Imagination, Help, Country

“She thought of the library, so shining white and new; the rows and rows of unread books; the bliss of unhurried sojourns there and of going out to a restaurant, alone, to eat.”

Maud Hart Lovelace book Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown

Source: Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown (1943)

Books

“It’s extraordinary how we go through life with eyes half shut, with dull ears, with dormant thoughts. Perhaps it’s just as well; and it may be that it is this very dullness that makes life to the incalculable majority so supportable and so welcome.”

Joseph Conrad (1857–1924) Polish-British writer

Life, Support

“… I couldn't let go of the thought that it had, in fact, been he, restless and moody Heathcliff. Day after day, he floated through all the Wal-Marts in America, searching for me in a million lonely aisles.”

Marisha Pessl Special Topics in Calamity Physics

Source: Special Topics in Calamity Physics

“Maybe that's what love is, I thought: it's being pissed off.”

Margaret Atwood book The Year of the Flood

Source: The Year of the Flood

Love

“She missed him the days when some pretext served to take him away from her, just as one misses the sun on a cloudy day without having thought much about the sun when it was shining.”

Kate Chopin (1850–1904) American author

Source: The Awakening and Selected Stories

Sun

“When you follow your bliss… doors will open where you would not have thought there would be doors, and where there wouldn't be a door for anyone else.”

Joseph Campbell (1904–1987) American mythologist, writer and lecturer

“Don't you love Jesus?' Well, I thought an' I thought an' finally I says, 'No, I don't know nobody name' Jesus. I know a bunch of stories, but I only love people.”

John Steinbeck book The Grapes of Wrath

Source: The Grapes of Wrath

Love, People

“And Vishous… V was the worst of them. He stood by the door, staring into space. Icy before, he was glacial now, a sinkhole in the room.

-Phury's thoughts”

Jessica Bird book Lover Unbound

Source: Lover Unbound

“You've changed me, she thought. Not just showing me that boys aren't all pond scum. You've made me different, made me look at the broader picture. Given me vision.”

L.J. Smith (1965) American author

Source: Dark Visions

Boy, Change

“One of the oddest things about being grown-up was looking back at something you thought you knew and finding out the truth of it was completely different from what you had always believed.”

Patricia Briggs book Bone Crossed

Source: Bone Crossed

Truth

“Thought's a luxury. Do you think the peasant sits and thinks of God and Democracy when he gets inside his mud hut at night?”

Graham Greene book The Quiet American

Source: The Quiet American

God, Democracy, Thinking, Night

“Conflict is the gadfly of thought. It stirs us to observation and memory. It instigates invention. It shocks us out of sheep-like passivity, and sets us at noting and contriving…conflict is a sine qua non of reflection and ingenuity.”

John Dewey (1859–1952) American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer

Memory

“There is thought, and then there is thinking about thoughts, and they don't feel the same.”

Susanna Kaysen book Girl, Interrupted

Source: Girl, Interrupted

Feeling, Thinking

“I thought helping someone else might take me out of my own head for a while.”

Cammie McGovern

Source: Say What You Will

Help

“Until she met the exploding statue, Annabeth thought she was prepared for anything.”

Rick Riordan The Mark of Athena

Source: The Mark of Athena

“Friends come and go but I wouldn't have thought you'd be one of them”

Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) American poet, short story writer, critic and satirist

“Bright star,” Magnus said, and his eyes were thoughtful, as if he were remembering something, or someone. “Those of you who are mortal, you burn so fiercely. And you fiercer than most, Will. I will not ever forget you.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Princess

Source: Clockwork Princess

Star, Forgetting

“My mission, should I choose to accept it, is to find peace with exactly who and what I am. To take pride in my thoughts, my appearance, my talents, my flaws and to stop this incessant worrying that I can’t be loved as I am.”

Anaïs Nin (1903–1977) writer of novels, short stories, and erotica

Love, Peace, Appearance

“Whisky, I find, helps clarity of thought. And reduces pain. It has the additional virtue of making you drunk or, if taken in sufficient quantity, very drunk.”

Julian Barnes book The Sense of an Ending

Source: The Sense of an Ending

Pain, Help

“I thought how tenuous the links were between mother and children between friends family things you think are eternal. Everything could be lost more easily than anyone could imagine.”

Janet Fitch book White Oleander

Source: White Oleander

Children, Family, Imagination, Thinking

“To whom could I put this question (with any hope of an answer)? Does being able to live without someone you loved mean you loved her less than you thought…?”

Roland Barthes (1915–1980) French philosopher, critic and literary theorist

Love, Hope, Question

“So many of us find ourselves saying, “but he was so great!” Yes, and the people who got on the Titanic thought they were going on vacation. Things changed and it’s important to remember that they did.”

Greg Behrendt (1963) American comedian

Source: It's Called a Breakup Because It's Broken: The Smart Girl's Break-Up Buddy

People, Change

“It seems to me that if you or I must choose between two courses of thought or action, we should remember our dying and try so to live that our death brings no pleasure to the world.”

John Steinbeck book East of Eden

Source: East of Eden (1952)
Context: When a man comes to die, no matter what his talents and influence and genius, if he dies unloved his life must be a failure to him and his dying a cold horror. It seems to me that if you or I must choose between two courses of thought or action, we should remember our dying and try so to live that our death brings no pleasure to the world.
We have only one story. All novels, all poetry, are built on the never-ending contest in ourselves of good and evil. And it occurs to me that evil must constantly respawn, while good, while virtue, is immortal. Vice has always a new fresh young face, while virtue is venerable as nothing else in the world is.
Context: In uncertainty I am certain that underneath their topmost layers of frailty men want to be good and want to be loved. Indeed, most of their vices are attempted short cuts to love. When a man comes to die, no matter what his talents and influence and genius, if he dies unloved his life must be a failure to him and his dying a cold horror. It seems to me that if you or I must choose between two courses of thought or action, we should remember our dying and try so to live that our death brings no pleasure to the world.
We have only one story. All novels, all poetry, are built on the never-ending contest in ourselves of good and evil. And it occurs to me that evil must constantly respawn, while good, while virtue, is immortal. Vice has always a new fresh young face, while virtue is venerable as nothing else in the world is.

Death, Pleasure, World

“But words are things, and a small drop of ink,
Falling, like dew, upon a thought produces
That which makes thousands, perhaps millions think.”

George Gordon Byron (1788–1824) English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement

Thinking

“Is it a crime when you love someone so much that you can't stand the thought of them changing? Is it a crime when you love someone so much that you can't see clearly?”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

Source: Vanishing Acts

Love, Change

“Oh, for Thor's sake…" said Hiccup. "I thought that was just a story…"
"Stories come from somewhere," said the witch. "The past haunts the present in more ways than we realise.”

Cressida Cowell book How to Break a Dragon's Heart

Source: How to Break a Dragon's Heart

Way, Past

“Sometimes, he thought wryly, a reputation for being right all the time could be a heavy burden.”

John Flanagan (1873–1938) Irish-American hammer thrower

Source: The Ruins of Gorlan

Time

“No one means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous.”

Henry Adams book The Education of Henry Adams

The Education of Henry Adams (1907)
Source: The Education of Henry Adams

“He was born on third base and thought he hit a triple. [about George Bush, Sr. ]”

Ann Richards (1933–2006) American politician

about George Bush, Sr. Earlier use by Barry Switzer<ref name="kcstar">[Tom, Shatel, http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1986-12-14/sports/8604030680_1_big-eight-coach-aren-t-many-coaches-oklahoma, The Unknown Barry Switzer, Kansas City Star and Times, December 14, 1986, 2012-04-05]
Misattributed

“It was funny to hear her voice aloud. Her thoughts and perceptions usually existed so deep inside her, they rarely made it to the surface without a deliberate effort.”

Ann Brashares The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

Source: The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

Effort

“I thought I'd begin by reading a poem by Shakespeare, but then I thought, why should I? He never reads any of mine.”

Spike Milligan (1918–2002) British-Irish comedian, writer, musician, poet, playwright, soldier and actor

Spike Milligan with Jeremy Taylor Live at Cambridge University. Recorded at Cambridge University on December 2, 1973, this was previously released as a double LP, and later re-issued as a 2 CD set. Milligan used variations on the Shakespear line throughout his later life.

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