Pithy Quotes and Such

Edmund Burke 1729-1797

A quote which may have greater meaning today:

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.

Socrates 470-399 BC

Contentment is natural wealth. Luxury is artificial poverty.

Dalai Lama (14th)

When asked what surprised him most about humanity, he said “Man. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.

When you talk, you are only repeating what you already know. But when you listen, you may learn something new.

Robert Burns 1759-1796

Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Great minds discuss ideas.

Average minds discuss events.

Small minds discuss people.

Brian Grosman yesterday

Good friends are God’s apologies for relatives

Oscar Wilde 1854-1900

Never judge anyone shortly as every saint has a past and every sinner a future.

A little sincerity is a dangerous thing. And a great deal of it is absolutely fatal.

Youth is wasted on the young.

Old age is a high price to pay for wisdom.

Niagara falls – a new bride’s second biggest disappointment.

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

Always forgive your enemies — nothing annoys them so much.

Henry James writes fiction as if it were a painful duty.

Work is the curse of the drinking class.

Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.

Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.

If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing well. If it is worth having, it is worth waiting for. If it is worth attaining, it is worth fighting for. If it is worth experiencing, it is worth putting aside time for.

Thomas Jefferson

I am a great believer in luck and I find the harder I work, the more of it I have.

He was also pretty “lucky” with Sally Hemings, but that is another story.  His relationship with his slave, Ms. Hemings, began after the death of his wife. It seems that the man who wrote the Declaration of Independence, all men are created free and all that, forgot that given his slave holdings,  that he had three children with his “friend”. Jefferson, ironically, promised freedom to his children with Ms. Hemings. So generous to offer this to his own children. Hard to imagine.

Ms. Hemings traveled to France with Tommy when he was the American ambassador. She lived as a free woman when she was there, in her own residence and free to do as she pleased. This must have been quite the experience for her. She was 14 when she first arrived in France.

James McNeill Whistler 1834-1903

If other people are going to talk, conversation becomes impossible.

Robert Frost

The afternoon knows what the morning never suspected.

Tolstoy

If you harbour bitterness, happiness docks elsewhere.

It is not how compatible you are, it is how you handle the non compatibilities.

Charlotte Bronte

He that is low need fear no fall.

It was a relationship of mutual respect…they respected him and he respected that.

George Jonas

Marry a doctor and you will appreciate poetry.

Marry a poet and you will appreciate money.

Yeats

Every trial endured and weathered in the right spirit makes a soul nobler and stronger than it was before

Judy Garland

For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart. It was not my lips you kissed, but my soul.

William Zara

Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned. Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.

Kennedy on Contest with Russians in Space

Now we will see once and for all who is smarter – their Germans or our Germans

John Kennedy on Winston Churchill – he mobilized the English language and sent it into battle.

Churchill

From now on, ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I shall not put.

From Casablanca

You must remember this, a kiss is just a kiss…

As time goes by…

Play it again, sam

We’ll always have Paris

Here’s looking at you, kid.

La bella royal – the day the Germans walked in to Paris

Who are you really and what did you do before ?

This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Kiss me as if it were the last time.

Of all the gin joints in all the towns in the world, she walks into mine

Is that cannon fire or my heart pounding?

Round up the usual suspects

Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens

His dad had told him many times that the definition of a real man is one who cries without shame, reads poetry with his heart, feels opera in his soul, and does that which is necessary to defend a woman.

Confucius

You have two lives. The second one begins when you realize you only have one.

Native Indian Proverbs

The only true wisdom is knowing that you know nothing.

The more you give, the more good things come to you.

Never judge a man until you have walked two moons in his moccasins.

Never trust a woman who loves money.

The greatest healing therapy is friendship and love.

Anon

The significant difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits.

Anthony Bourdain

Eat a local restaurant tonight. Get the cream sauce. Have a cold pint in a mostly empty bar. Go somewhere you have never been. Listen to someone you think may have nothing in common with you. Order the steak rare. Eat an oyster. Have a negroni. Have two. Be open to a world where you may not understand or agree with the person next to you, but have a drink with them anyways. Eat slowly. Tip your server. Check in on your friends. Check in on yourself. Enjoy the ride.