Quotes about well
page 79

John C. Calhoun photo

“I never know what South Carolina thinks of a measure. I never consult her. I act to the best of my judgment, and according to my conscience. If she approves, well and good. If she does not, or wishes any one to take my place, I am ready to vacate. We are even.”

John C. Calhoun (1782–1850) 7th Vice President of the United States

Reported in Walter J. Miller, "Calhoun as a Lawyer and Statesman"' part 2, The Green Bag (June 1899), p. 271. Miller states "I will cite his own words", but this quotation is reported as not verified in Calhoun's writings in Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations (1989).

Pete Doherty photo
Jacques Barzun photo
Marcel Duchamp photo
Calvin Coolidge photo
Anthony Burgess photo

“If you reject family - which a mother holds together - as well as the ties of Church and State, is there anything left for you?”

Anthony Burgess (1917–1993) English writer

Non-Fiction, Here Comes Everybody: An Introduction to James Joyce for the Ordinary Reader (1965)

Henry Stephens Salt photo
Cormac McCarthy photo
Thomas Jefferson photo

“For a people who are free, and who mean to remain so, a well organized and armed militia is their best security.”

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

Thomas Jefferson's Eighth State of the Union Address (8 November 1808)
1800s, Second Presidential Administration (1805-1809)

John F. Kennedy photo

“Well, he [the wolf] huffed, and he puffed, and he puffed, and he puffed and he puffed and huffed; but he could not get the house down.”

English Fairy Tales (1890), Preface to English Fairy Tales, The Story of the Three Little Pigs

Laurence Sterne photo
Stephen Baxter photo

“[The process of paraphrasing or summarizing each piece of data enters information] into your unconscious, as well as consciously processing the information.”

Richard Boyatzis (1946) American business theorist

Source: Transforming qualitative information (1998), p. 45 as cited in: Eimear Muir-Cochrane & Jennifer (2006) " Demonstrating Rigor Using Thematic Analysis http://www.ualberta.ca/~iiqm/backissues/5_1/PDF/FEREDAY.PDF". In: International Journal of Qualitative Methods 5 (1) April 2006.

Poul Anderson photo

“Tis colder outside than a well-born maiden’s heart.”

Source: The Broken Sword (1954), Chapter 24 (p. 171)

Jiddu Krishnamurti photo

“It's no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

As quoted in The Eden Express https://books.google.com/books?id=o89v2m2ybCEC&q=%22well-adjusted+to+a+profoundly+sick+society%22 (1975) by Mark Vonnegut, p. 208
1970s

Calvin Coolidge photo
Grant Morrison photo
Robert Herrick photo
Charles Stross photo
George Meredith photo

“The well of true wit is truth itself.”

George Meredith (1828–1909) British novelist and poet of the Victorian era

Source: Diana of the Crossways http://www.gutenberg.org/files/4470/4470.txt (1885), Ch. 1.

Marc Chagall photo
Audrey Hepburn photo
Vitruvius photo
John of St. Samson photo
Bruce Springsteen photo
Thomas Jefferson photo
Thomas Henry Huxley photo
Madeleine Stowe photo
Joe Zawinul photo
George Carlin photo

“The world around us can be construed as a huge "house" that we share with other humans, as well as with animals and plants. It is in this world that we exist, fulfilling our tasks, enjoying things, developing social relations, creating a family. In short, we live in this world. We thus have a deep human need to know and to trust it, to be emotionally involved in it. Many of us, however, experience an increasing feeling of alienation. Even though, with the expansion of society, virtually the entire surface of the planet has become a part of our house, often we do not feel "at home" in that house. With the rapid and spontaneous changes of the past decades, so many new wings and rooms have been constructed or rearranged that we have lost familiarity with our house. We often have the impression that what remains of the world is a collection of isolated fragments, without any structure and coherence. Our personal "everyday" world seems unable to harmonise itself with the global world of society, history and cosmos.
It is our conviction that the time has come to make a conscious effort towards the construction of global world views, in order to overcome this situation of fragmentation. There are many reasons why we believe in the benefit of such an enterprise, and in the following pages we shall attempt to make some of them clear.”

Diederik Aerts (1953) Belgian theoretical physicist

Source: World views. From Fragmentation to Integration (1994), p. 1; About "The fragmentation of our world"

Joel Fuhrman photo
Jane Austen photo
Frits Bolkestein photo
Zach Braff photo
Jacques Ellul photo
Michelle Obama photo

“And that brings me to the other big lesson that I want to share with you today. It’s a lesson about how to get through those struggles, and that is, instead of letting your hardships and failures discourage or exhaust you, let them inspire you. Let them make you even hungrier to succeed. Now, I know that many of you have already dealt with some serious losses in your lives. Maybe someone in your family lost a job or struggled with drugs or alcohol or an illness. Maybe you’ve lost someone you love […]. […] So, yes, maybe you’ve been tested a lot more and a lot earlier in life than many other young people. Maybe you have more scars than they do. Maybe you have days when you feel more tired than someone your age should ever really feel. But, graduates, tonight, I want you to understand that every scar that you have is a reminder not just that you got hurt, but that you survived. And as painful as they are, those holes we all have in our hearts are what truly connect us to each other. They are the spaces we can make for other people’s sorrow and pain, as well as their joy and their love so that eventually, instead of feeling empty, our hearts feel even bigger and fuller. So it’s okay to feel the sadness and the grief that comes with those losses. But instead of letting those feelings defeat you, let them motivate you. Let them serve as fuel for your journey.”

Michelle Obama (1964) lawyer, writer, wife of Barack Obama and former First Lady of the United States

2010s, Commencement speech for Martin Luther King Jr. College Prep graduates (2015)

Philip Pullman photo
Albert Speer photo
Neil Diamond photo
Titian photo
Yury Dombrovsky photo
Al-Biruni photo
Peter F. Drucker photo
Stendhal photo

“Why not make an end of it all?" he asked himself. "Why this obstinate resistance to the fate that is crushing me? It is all very well my forming what are apparently the most reasonable forms of conduct, my life is a succession of griefs and bitter feelings. This month is no better than the last; this year is no better than last year. Why this obstinate determination to go on living? Can I be wanting in firmness? What is death?" he asked himself, opening his case of pistols and examining them. "A very small matter, when all is said; only a fool would be concerned about it.”

Pourquoi ne pas en finir? se dit-il enfin; pourquoi cette obstination à lutter contre le destin qui m'accable? J'ai beau faire les plans de conduite les plus raisonnables en apparence, ma vie n'est qu'une suite de malheurs et de sensations amères. Ce mois-ci ne vaut pas mieux que le mois passé; cette année-ci ne vaut pas mieux que l'autre année; d'où vient cette obstination à vivre? Manquerais-je de fermeté? Qu'est-ce que la mort? se dit-il en ouvrant la caisse de ses pistolets et les considérant. Bien peu de chose en vérité; il faut être fou pour s'en passer.
Source: Armance (1827), Ch. 2

Nina Kiriki Hoffman photo
Billy Joel photo
Adelaide Anne Procter photo

“I do not ask that flowers should always spring
Beneath my feet
I know too well the poison and the sting
Of things too sweet.”

Adelaide Anne Procter (1825–1864) English poet and songwriter

"Per Pacem ad Lucem".
A Chaplet of Verses (1862)

Jim Webb photo
Robert Holmes photo
Bernardo Dovizi photo

“Fair is his end who loving well doth die.”

Bernardo Dovizi (1470–1520) Italian cardinal and playwright

Act I, scene II. — (Lidio).
Translation reported in Harbottle's Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 254.
La Calandria (c. 1507)

Lucius Shepard photo
John D. Carmack photo

“It's a good thing Doom 3 is selling very well…”

John D. Carmack (1970) American computer programmer, engineer, and businessman

Having destroyed a rocket test vehicle worth $35,000 USD, Quoted in John Carmack Biography http://www.biographybase.com/biography/Carmack_John.html.

Charles James Fox photo

“On speaking to Mr. Fox (who had just received the seals as Secretary of State) on the important event of the day, he said certainly things look very well, but he, meaning the K[ing], will dye soon, and that will be best of all.”

Charles James Fox (1749–1806) British Whig statesman

Fox to Lord Carmarthen (27 March 1783), quoted in Oscar Browning (ed.), The Political Memoranda of Francis Fifth Duke of Leeds (Camden Society, 1884), pp. 65-66, n.
1780s

Antonio Cocchi photo
Lloyd Kenyon, 1st Baron Kenyon photo
Sam Harris photo

“This is a common criticism: the idea that the atheist is guilty of a literalist reading of scripture, and that it’s a very naive way of approaching religion, and there’s a far more sophisticated and nuanced view of religion on offer and the atheist is disregarding that. A few problems with this: anyone making that argument is failing to acknowledge just how many people really do approach these texts literally or functionally - whether they’re selective literalists, or literal all the way down the line. There are certain passages in scripture that just cannot be read figuratively. And people really do live by the lights of what is literally laid out in these books. So, the Koran says “hate the infidel” and Muslims hate the infidel because the Koran spells it out ad nauseam. Now, it’s true that you can cherry-pick scripture, and you can look for all the good parts. You can ignore where it says in Leviticus that if a woman is not a virgin on her wedding night you’re supposed to stone her to death on her father’s doorstep. Most religious people ignore those passages, which really can only be read literally, and say that “they were only appropriate for the time” and “they don’t apply now”. And likewise, Muslims try to have the same reading of passages that advocate holy war. They say “well, these were appropriate to those battles that Mohammed was fighting, but now we don’t have to fight those battles”. This is all a good thing, but we should recognize what’s happening here: people are feeling pressure from a host of all-too-human concerns that have nothing, in principle, to do with God: secularism, and human rights, and democracy, and scientific progress. These have made certain passages in scripture untenable. This is coming from outside religion, and religion is now making a great show of its sophistication in grappling with these pressures. This is an example of religion losing the argument with modernity.”

Sam Harris (1967) American author, philosopher and neuroscientist

Sam Harris in interview by Big Think (04/07/2007) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zV3vIXZ-1Y&t=6s
2000s

Kate Mulgrew photo
Georg Cantor photo
Kent Hovind photo
Thomas Moore photo

“Oh, ever thus, from childhood's hour,
I 've seen my fondest hopes decay;
I never loved a tree or flower
But 't was the first to fade away.
I never nurs'd a dear gazelle,
To glad me with its soft black eye,
But when it came to know me well
And love me, it was sure to die.”

Thomas Moore (1779–1852) Irish poet, singer and songwriter

Lalla Rookh http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00generallinks/lallarookh/index.html (1817), Part V-VIII: The Fire-Worshippers

Naomi Klein photo
John F. Kennedy photo
William Stanley Jevons photo
Lawrence Wright photo
Norbert Wiener photo
Harold Wilson photo

“David Dimbleby: You couldn't - you couldn't set our minds at rest on the vexed question of what the Sunday Times did actually pay you for the book?
Harold Wilson: No, I don't think it's a matter of interest to the BBC or to anybody else.
Dimbleby: But why..
Wilson: If you're interested in these things, you'd better find out how people buy yachts. Do you ask that question? Did you ask him how he was able to pay for a yacht?
Dimbleby: I haven't interviewed …
Wilson: Have you asked him that question?
Dimbleby: I haven't interviewed him.
Wilson: Well, has the BBC ever asked that question?
Dimbleby: I don't know …
Wilson: Well, what's it got to do with you, then?
Dimbleby: I imagine they have..
Wilson: Why you ask these question, I mean why, if people can afford to buy £25,000 yachts, do the BBC not regard that as a matter for public interest? Why do you insult me with these questions here?
Dimbleby: It's only that it's been a matter of..
Wilson: All I'm saying, all I'm saying..
Dimbleby: … public speculation, and I was giving you an opportunity if you wanted to, to say something about it.
Wilson: It was not a matter of speculation, it was just repeating press gossip. You will not put this question to Mr. Heath. When you have got an answer to him, come and put the question to me. And this last question and answer are not to be recorded. Is this question being recorded?
Dimbleby: Well it is, because we're running film.
Wilson: Well, will you cut it out or not? All right, we stop now. No, I'm sorry, I'm really not having this. I'm really not having this. The press may take this view, that they wouldn't put this question to Heath but they put it to me; if the BBC put this question to me, without putting it to Heath, the interview is off, and the whole programme is off. I think it's a ridiculous question to put. Yes, and I mean it cut off, I don't want to read in the Times Diary or miscellany that I asked for it to be cut out. [pause]
Dimbleby: All right, are we still running? Can I ask you this, then, which I mean, I.. let me put this question, I mean if you find this question offensive then..
Wilson: Coming to ask if your curiosity can be satisfied, I think it's disgraceful. Never had such a question in an interview in my life before.
Dimbleby: I.. [gasps]
Joe Haines (Wilson's Press Secretary): Well, let's stop now, and we can talk about it, shall we?
Dimbleby: No, let's.. well, I mean, we'll keep going, I think, don't you?
Wilson: No, I think we'll have a new piece of film in and start all over again. But if this film is used, or this is leaked, then there's going to be a hell of a row. And this must be..
Dimbleby: Well, I certainly wouldn't leak it..
Wilson: You may not leak it but these things do leak. I've never been to Lime Grove without it leaking.”

Harold Wilson (1916–1995) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Exchange with BBC interviewer David Dimbleby recorded for a documentary called "Yesterday's Men" broadcast on 16 June 1971. The BBC did agree not to show this portion of the interview, but Wilson's fears of a leak were justified as a transcript was published on page 1 of The Times on June 18, 1971. A fuller transcript appeared in Private Eye during 1972.
Leader of the Opposition

John Greenleaf Whittier photo

“God's ways seem dark, but, soon or late,
They touch the shining hills of day;
The evil cannot brook delay,
The good can well afford to wait.”

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892) American Quaker poet and advocate of the abolition of slavery

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 282

Thomas Nashe photo

“The Sun shineth as well on the good as the bad: God from on high beholdeth all the workers of iniquity, as well as the upright of heart.”

Thomas Nashe (1567–1601) English Elizabethan pamphleteer and poet

Christ's Tears over Jerusalem 1593.

Eric R. Kandel photo
William Morris photo
Will Eisner photo
Kliment Voroshilov photo
David Foster Wallace photo
Harry Turtledove photo
John F. Kennedy photo

“Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

This is one of seven quotes inscribed on the walls at the gravesite of John F. Kennedy at Arlington National Cemetery.
1961, Inaugural Address

Ernest Bevin photo

“My policy is to be able to take a ticket at Victoria station and go anywhere I damn well please!”

Ernest Bevin (1881–1951) British labour leader, politician, and statesman

Attributed to Bevin in the Spectator, 20 April 1951.
Bevin's definition of his foreign policy. Variously quoted as "to be able to buy a ticket at Victoria Station to anywhere I damn please!".

John F. Kennedy photo
Michael Crichton photo
Vladimir Horowitz photo

“Of the Russian pianists I like only one, Richter. Gilels did some things well, but I did not like his mannerisms, the way he moved around while he was playing.”

Vladimir Horowitz (1903–1989) American classical pianist and composer

quoted in Harold C. Schonberg, Horowitz: his life and music

William Harvey photo
Niccolo Machiavelli photo
William Lane Craig photo

“Well, there are two kinds of people in the world, my friend. Those who show up and those who get Eastwooded. You get Eastwooded.”

William Lane Craig (1949) American Christian apologist and evangelist

to an empty chair representing Richard Dawkins, Contending with Christianity's Critics Conference, Watermark Community Church, Dallas,
viewable at [2012-10-09, Eastwooding Richard Dawkins, ReasonableFaithOrg, YouTube, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XZb8m7p8ng, 2012-10-10] Also quoted in [2012-10-09, Christian Apologist ‘Eastwooding’ After Richard Dawkins Refuses Debate, Michael, Gryboski, The Christian Post, http://www.christianpost.com/news/christian-apologist-eastwooding-after-richard-dawkins-refuses-debate-82963/, 2012-10-10]

Dick Cheney photo
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner photo

“After lengthy struggles I now find myself here [Dr Kohnstamm's sanatorium in Königstein, in Taunus] for a time to put my mind into some kind of order. It is a terribly difficult thing, of course, to be among strangers so much of the day. But perhaps I'll be able to see and create something new. For the time being, I would like more peace and absolute seclusion. Of course, I long more and more for my work and my studio. Theories may be all very well for keeping a spiritual balance, but they are grey and shadowy compared with work and life.”

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (1880–1938) German painter, sculptor, engraver and printmaker

Letter from Königstein, Taunus to Dr. Karl Hagemann, January 1916 (friend and patron in Leverkusen and collector of his art); as quoted in the biography-pdf http://www.kirchnermuseum.ch/data/media/downloads/Biography.pdf of the Kirchner museum, Davos
Kirchner suffered then a serious mental breakdown and was also afraid for being drafted once more in the German army, so back in the war
1916 - 1919

Wayne Pacelle photo