Quotes about wish
page 20

George William Curtis photo
François de La Rochefoucauld photo

“It is a great folly to wish to be wise alone.”

C'est une grande folie de vouloir être sage tout seul.
Maxim 231.
Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims (1665–1678)

David Lloyd George photo
Roger Ebert photo

“The audience I joined was perhaps 80 percent female. I heard some sniffles and glimpsed some tears, and no wonder. Eat Pray Love is shameless wish-fulfillment, a Harlequin novel crossed with a mystic travelogue, and it mercifully reverses the life chronology of many people, which is Love Pray Eat.”

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

Review http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/eat-pray-love-2010 of Eat Pray Love (11 Aug 2010)
Reviews, Two star reviews

“Now, with the general decay of religious faith, it is the scientists who must speak ex cathedra, whether they wish to or not.”

Richard M. Weaver (1910–1963) American scholar

“Ultimate Terms in Contemporary Rhetoric,” p. 93.
Language is Sermonic (1970)

Nathanael Greene photo
Frederick Douglass photo
Jim Starlin photo
Huey P. Newton photo
Frederick Douglass photo
Titian photo

“[I wish]to engrave and distribute [the prints] for the benefit and knowledge and use of painters and sculptors and other knowledge-able persons.”

Titian (1488–1576) Italian painter

official document, 1567; as quoted by Bruce Kohl in Titian and Venetian Painting, 1450-1590; publishers Westview Press, 1999, p. 117
In 1567 Titian applied to the Venetian senate for a fifteen-year copyright privilege for engravings, made after his work. The Dutch artist Cornelis Cort produced prints after Titian's work, all made in collaboration, in 1555-56 and 1571-72
1541-1576

Happy Rhodes photo
Henrik Ibsen photo

“To think it, wish it, even want it —
but do it! No, that I cannot understand.”

Henrik Ibsen (1828–1906) Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet

Peer Gynt, after he sees a boy cut off his finger to avoid serving in the army, Act III, Scene I
Peer Gynt (1867)

Anand Patwardhan photo
Anne Morrow Lindbergh photo
Aubrey Beardsley photo
James Madison photo
Daniel Patrick Moynihan photo
Cristoforo Colombo photo
Marsden Hartley photo
Phillip Guston photo
Kate Bush photo

“I thought you were crazy, wishing such a thing.
I saw only a stick on fire,
Alone on its journey
Home to the quickening ground,
With no one there to catch it.”

Kate Bush (1958) British recording artist; singer, songwriter, musician and record producer

Song lyrics, The Sensual World (1989)

George W. Bush photo
Jack White photo
George Crabbe photo

“In idle wishes fools supinely stay;
Be there a will, and wisdom finds a way.”

George Crabbe (1754–1832) English poet, surgeon, and clergyman

The Birth of Flattery, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

Alexander Mackenzie photo

“How I wished for manhood and the opportunity to wreak my vengeance on my country’s oppressors”

Alexander Mackenzie (1822–1892) 2nd Prime Minister of Canada

his lecture Sarnia April 1858 "Anglo-Saxon race" reflecting on his youthhood readings of Bruce and Wallace - Buckingham page 137

Robert A. Heinlein photo
Alfred Noyes photo
Mary Parker Follett photo
Ralph Bunche photo

“Religious people crucified the Son of God. He was not fitting to their wishes.”

Wilhelm Busch (pastor) (1897–1966) German pastor and writer

I just can't believe! People who can't believe in God. p. 114
Jesus Our Destiny

Richard Dawkins photo
James Hudson Taylor photo
Calvin Coolidge photo
Nathanael Greene photo

“Before I came into the department, your Excellency was obliged often to stand Quarter-master. However capable the principal was of doing his duty, he was hardly ever with you. The line and the staff were at war with each other. The country had been plundered in a way that would now breed a kind of civil war between the staff and the inhabitants. The manner of my engaging in this business, and your Excellency's declaration to the Committee of Congress, that you would stand Quarter-master no longer, are circumstances which I wish may not be forgotten; as I may have occasion, at some future day, to appeal to your Excellency for my own justification. One thing I can say, with truth and sincerity, that I have conducted the business with as much prudence and economy, as if my private fortune had been answerable for the disbursements. And I believe your Excellency will do me the justice to say, the department has cooperated with your measures as far as circumstances were to be governed by me; and this you had reason to apprehend would not have been the case had I not taken direction of the business. And here, in justice to my colleagues, I shall mention that I think them entitled to your Excellency's personal esteem, from the warmth of their wishes, and a desire to promote your ease and convenience.”

Nathanael Greene (1742–1786) American general in the American Revolutionary War

Letter to George Washington (24 April 1779)

Nick Griffin photo
Ernest Mandel photo
Bret Easton Ellis photo
Merrill McPeak photo
Glen Cook photo
G. I. Gurdjieff photo
Ernest Renan photo

“I can die when I wish to: that is my elixir of life.”

Ernest Renan (1823–1892) French philosopher and writer

The Republic.
Ernest Renan: a Critical Biography (1964)

W. H. Auden photo

“When one looks into the window of a store which sells devotional art objects, one can't help wishing the iconoclasts had won.”

"Postscript: Christianity & Art", p. 461
The Dyer's Hand, and Other Essays (1962)

Edward VIII of the United Kingdom photo

“At long last I am able to say a few words of my own… You must believe me when I tell you that I have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge my duties as King as I would wish to do without the help and support of the woman I love.”

Edward VIII of the United Kingdom (1894–1972) king of the United Kingdom and its dominions in 1936

Abdication Speech, December 11, 1936, via radio to a worldwide audience. http://www.historyplace.com/speeches/edward.htm

Jesse Ventura photo
Frederick Douglass photo
Sri Aurobindo photo

“What the Divine wants is for man to embody Him here, in the individual and in the collectivity… to realise God in life. The old system of yoga could not harmonise or unify Spirit and life; it dismissed the world as Maya or a transient play of God. The result has been a diminution of life-power and the decline of India. The Gita says, utsideyur ime loka na kuryam karma cedaham ["These peoples would crumble to pieces if I did not do actions," 3.24]. Truly 'these peoples' of India have gone to ruin. What kind of spiritual perfection is it if a few Sannyasins, Bairagis and Saddhus attain realisation and liberation, if a few Bhaktas dance in a frenzy of love, god-intoxication and Ananda, and an entire race, devoid of life, devoid of intelligence, sinks to the depths of extreme tamas?… But now the time has come to take hold of the substance instead of extending the shadow. We have to awaken the true soul of India and in its image fashion all works…. I believe that the main cause of India's weakness is not subjection, nor poverty, nor a lack of spirituality or Dharma, but a diminution of thought-power, the spread of ignorance in the motherland of Knowledge. Everywhere I see an inability or unwillingness to think… incapacity of thought or 'thought-phobia'…. The mediaeval period was a night, a time of victory for the man of ignorance; the modern world is a time of victory for the man of knowledge. It is the one who can fathom and learn the truth of the world by thinking more, searching more, labouring more, who will gain more Shakti. Look at Europe, and you will see two things: a wide limitless sea of thought and the play of a huge and rapid, yet disciplined force. The whole Shakti of Europe lies there. It is by virtue of this Shakti that she has been able to swallow the world, like our Tapaswins of old, whose might held even the gods of the universe in awe, suspense and subjection. People say that Europe is rushing into the jaws of destruction. I do not think so. All these revolutions, all these upsettings are the initial stages of a new creation….. We, however, are not worshippers of Shakti; we are worshippers of the easy way…. Our civilisation has become ossified, our Dharma a bigotry of externals, our spirituality a faint glimmer of light or a momentary wave of intoxication. So long as this state of things lasts, any permanent resurgence of India is impossible…. We have abandoned the sadhana of Shakti and so the Shakti has abandoned us…. You say what is needed is emotional excitement, to fill the country with enthusiasm. We did all that in the political field during the Swadeshi period; but all we did now lies in the dust…. Therefore I no longer wish to make emotional excitement, feeling and mental enthusiasm the base. I want to make a vast and heroic equality the foundation of my yoga; in all the activities of the being, of the adhar [vessel] based on that equality, I want a complete, firm and unshakable Shakti; over that ocean of Shakti I want the vast radiation of the sun of Knowledge and in that luminous vastness an established ecstasy of infinite love and bliss and oneness. I do not want tens of thousands of disciples; it will be enough if I can get as instruments of God a hundred complete men free from petty egoism. I have no faith in the customary trade of guru. I do not want to be a guru. What I want is that a few, awakened at my touch or at that of another, will manifest from within their sleeping divinity and realise the divine life. It is such men who will raise this country.”

Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) Indian nationalist, freedom fighter, philosopher, yogi, guru and poet

April, 1920, Letter to Barin Ghose, Sri Aurobindo's brother, Translated from Bengali
India's Rebirth

Roberto Clemente photo

“This is my ball park. Every game is played in daylight and I can see the ball good. And I can reach the stands in any direction. I hope I'm never traded but if I am, I wish it would be to the Cubs. I know I do well there in 77 games.”

Roberto Clemente (1934–1972) Puerto Rican baseball player

Discussing Wrigley Field (where he was currently hitting .693 for the season, with 9 hits in 13 AB, with 3 home runs and 9 RBI); as quoted in "Feast Then Famine For Pirates: Split Means Lost Ground In Race" https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=o2scAAAAIBAJ&sjid=Fk8EAAAAIBAJ&pg=4554%2C1706304 by Lester J. Biederman, in The Pittsburgh Press (Friday, July 7, 1961), p. 26. To access article, drag image from right to left, bringing relevant headline immediately into view, displayed on its side; continue dragging until you reach the fifth paragraph from the end.
Baseball-related, <big><big>1960s</big></big>, <big>1961</big>

Saint Patrick photo
Jerry Coyne photo
James Anthony Froude photo
Robert E. Howard photo
Wilbur Wright photo
Roger Bacon photo
Sarah Monette photo

““It will cause a great many changes.”
“Yes, but one cannot prevent change simply by wishing it not to happen.””

Source: The Goblin Emperor (2014), Chapter 22, "The Bridge over the Upazhera" (p. 275)

Stevie Smith photo
Robert Fripp photo
Herbert Read photo

“It is not my purpose as a poet to condemn war (or to be exact, modern warfare). I only wish to present the universal aspects of a particular event”

Herbert Read (1893–1968) English anarchist, poet, and critic of literature and art

Note appended to his poem The End of War (1933)
Literary Quotes

James Bryce, 1st Viscount Bryce photo
Michel Aflaq photo
Chris Berman photo

“Do I wish I didn't say a few things nine years ago? Yes. But if that's the worst thing I ever did, I can live with it.”

Chris Berman (1955) American sportscaster

On Sports Media: 'Big Brother' watches, listens, Barry Jackson, 2008-02-22, 2008-03-27, MiamiHerald.com, http://web.archive.org/web/20070811065546/http://www.miamiherald.com/sports/story/428521.html, 2007-08-11 http://www.miamiherald.com/sports/story/428521.html,

Lysander Spooner photo
Ernest Hemingway photo

“I wish I could write well enough to write about aircraft. Faulkner did it very well in Pylon but you cannot do something someone else has done though you might have done it if they hadn't.”

Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American author and journalist

Letter (3 July 1956); published in Ernest Hemingway: Selected Letters 1917–1961 (1981) edited by Carlos Baker

Joseph Addison photo

“Plenty of people wish to become devout, but no one wishes to be humble.”

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

A translation of one of La Rochefoucauld's maxims, published posthumously in 1693. In the original: "Force gens veulent être dévots, mais personne ne veut être humble.".
Misattributed

Karel Zeman photo

“I'm on a journey to discover the beauty of the fairy tale and I want to stay on that path, trying to find better ways to capture it on film. And I have only one wish — to delight the eyes and heart of every child.”

Karel Zeman (1910–1989) Czech film director, artist and animator

Jsem na cestě objevování krásy pohádek, a tak na ní chci zůstat a hledat stále dokonalejší způsob jejich filmového vyprávění. Mám jedinou touhu — potěšit dětské oči a dětská srdce.
Quoted on the website of the Karel Zeman Museum in Prague (in English http://www.muzeumkarlazemana.cz/en/karel-zeman and Czech http://www.muzeumkarlazemana.cz/cz/karel-zeman).

John F. Kennedy photo
Dallin H. Oaks photo

“If you wish to marry well, inquire well.”

Dallin H. Oaks (1932) Apostle of the LDs Church

Divorce https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2007/04/divorce, Dallin H. Oaks, April 2007

Georgia O'Keeffe photo
Ernst Gombrich photo
C. Rajagopalachari photo
Clive Staples Lewis photo
François de La Rochefoucauld photo

“We try to make virtues out of the faults we have no wish to correct.”

Nous essayons de nous faire honneur des défauts que nous ne voulons pas corriger.
Maxim 442.
Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims (1665–1678)

Camille Pissarro photo
Charles Dickens photo
Everett Dean Martin photo
Jean Tinguely photo

“Everything moves continuously. Immobility does not exist. Don't be subject to the influence of out-of-date concepts. Forget hours, seconds and minutes. Accept instability. Live in Time. Be static - with movement. For a static of the present movement. Resist the anxious wish to fix the instantaneous, to kill that which is living.
Stop insisting on 'values' which can only break down. Be free, live. Stop painting time. Stop evoking movements and gestures. You are movement and gesture. Stop building cathedrals and pyramids which are doomed to fall into ruin. Live in the present, live once more in Time and by Time - for a wonderful and absolute reality”

Jean Tinguely (1925–1991) Swiss painter and sculptor

Original text in German:
Es bewegt sich alles, Stillstand gibt es nicht. Lasst Euch nicht von überlebten Zeitbegriffen beherrschen. Fort mit den Stunden, Sekunden und Minuten. Hört auf, der Veränderlichkeit zu widerstehen. SEID IN DER ZEIT – SEID STATISCH, SEID STATISCH – MIT DER BEWEGUNG. Fur Statik. Im Jetzt stattfindenden JETZT... Lasst es sein, Kathedralen und Pyramiden zu bauen, die zerbröckeln wie Zuckerwerk. Atmet tief, lebt Jetzt, lebt auf und in der Zeit. Für eine schöne und absolute Wirklichkeit!
In For Statics (original title: Für Statik), 1958 programmatic text for the 'Concert for Seven Pictures' in Düsseldorf: as quoted in: Arts/Canada. Vol. 25. (1968) p. 4.
Quotes, 1950's

Donald J. Trump photo
Edmund Burke photo
Arthur Kekewich photo

“I wish to uphold counsel in the exercise of their discretion.”

Arthur Kekewich (1832–1907) British judge

In re Somerset; Somerset v. Earl Poulett (1893), L. R. [1894], 1 Ch. 249.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe photo

“My son, whoever wishes to keep a secret, must hide from us that he possesses one. Self complaisance over the concealed destroys its concealment.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German writer, artist, and politician

Bk. I, Ch. 5 http://books.google.com/books?id=q4JKAAAAYAAJ&q=%22Whoever+wishes+to+keep+a+secret+must+hide+from+us+that+he+possesses+one%22&pg=PA73#v=onepage
Wilhelm Meister's Wanderjahre (Journeyman Years) (1821–1829)

Ramakrishna photo

“Those who wish to attain God and progress in religious devotion, should particularly guard themselves against the snares of lust and wealth. Otherwise they can never attain perfection.”

Ramakrishna (1836–1886) Indian mystic and religious preacher

As quoted in Hindu Psychology : Its Meaning for the West (1946) by Swami Akhilananda, p. 204

Erich Fromm photo
Izaak Walton photo
Jack Johnson (musician) photo
Bill Hybels photo

“Don't let your prayers turn into a wish list for Santa Claus. Worship God and praise him when you come to him in prayer.”

Bill Hybels (1951) American writer

Too Busy Not to Pray (2008, InterVarsity Press)

Silvio Berlusconi photo

“I wish luck to you and your nation that loves you as the election results we can see testify.”

Silvio Berlusconi (1936) Italian politician

On Alexander Lukashenko, as quoted in Results of the official visit of Silvio Berlusconi to Belarus at belarus.by (1 December 2009) the official website of the Republic of Belarus http://www.belarus.by/en/press-center/news/results-of-the-official-visit-of-silvio-berlusconi-to-belarus_i_0000000549.html
2009

Mohammad Reza Pahlavi photo

“I wish to salute the intransigent patriotism and the unflinching determination for independence of the Roumanian president. I was allied to him by a true friendship.”

Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (1919–1980) Shah of Iran

Page 147
Publications, The Shah's Story (1980), On world leaders and statesmen

Daniel Defoe photo
Carl Sagan photo