December 2015 Quotations (56)

"When we talk about alternative energy, there’s solar, and there’s wind. And there’s Bernie Sanders."
~~ eco-journalist Bill McKibben

"Your movies are like babies who need love. You have to carry them and take care of them for at least one year after their birth. Being a director is like being a dad."
~~ filmmaker Gaspar Noé

"Democracy isn't a gift. It's a responsibility."
~~ Dalton Trumbo [1905-76]

"With Donald Trump as President, every day would be Bad Hair Day."
~~ G.E. Nordell

"Criticism is easier to take when you realize that the only people who aren't criticized are those who don't take risks."
~~ Donald J. Trump

"We’ve all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act on. That’s who we really are."
~~ by J.K. Rowling, in "Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix"

"Poetry is the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits."
~~ poet Carl Sandburg [1878-1967]

“God has a brown voice, as soft and full as beer."
~~ Anne Sexton [1928-74]

Mad Hatter: "Have I gone mad?" Alice: "I'm afraid so. You're entirely bonkers. But I'll tell you a secret. All the best people are."
~~ Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) [1832-98]

"The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom."
~~ Isaac Asimov [1920-92]

"The radical novelty of modern science lies precisely in the rejection of the belief . . . that the forces which move the stars and atoms are contingent upon the preferences of the human heart."
~~ Walter Lippmann [1889-1974]

"Politicians should read science fiction, not Westerns and detective stories."
~~ Arthur C. Clarke [1917-2008]

"I had a monumental idea this morning, but I didn't like it."
~~ movie mogul Samuel Goldwyn [1879-1974]

"Morality is only evidence of low blood pressure."
~~ Jack London [1876-1916]

"The thing you have to remember about integrity is [that] it’s a mountain with no top."
~~ philosopher Werner Erhard

“For it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas."
~~ Charles Dickens [1812-70], in "A Christmas Carol", 1843

“You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give."
~~ Khalil Gibran [1883-1931], in "The Prophet", 1923

“After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one's own relations."
~~ Oscar Wilde [1854-1900], in the 1893 stageplay "A Woman of No Importance"

"There is no mistaking a real book when one meets one. It is like falling in love."
~~ Christopher Morley [1890-1957]

"Of all lies, art is the least untrue."
~~ Gustave Flaubert [1821-80], in a letter dated 1846

"Ignorance is the necessary condition of life itself. If we knew everything, we could not endure existence for a single hour."
~~ Anatole France [1844-1924], in "The Garden of Epicurus", 1894

"The best decoration in the world is a roomful of books."
~~ decorator Billy Baldwin [1903-83]

"Dead men are heavier than broken hearts."
~~ Raymond Chandler; 1888-1959], in "The Big Sleep", 1939

"A book is a friend whose face is constantly changing."
~~ Andrew Lang [1844-1912] of Scotland, in 1881

"If you hear that someone is speaking ill of you, instead of trying to defend yourself, you should say: 'He obviously does not know me very well, since there are so many other faults he could have mentioned.'"
~~ Stoic philosopher Epictetus [55?–135? C.E.]

"You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them."
~~ Ray Bradbury [1920-2012], in 1994

"I think one remains the same person throughout, merely passing, as it were, in these lapses of time from one room to another, but all in the same house."
~~ J.M. Barrie [1860-1937]

"All men who have turned out worth anything have had the chief hand in their own education."
~~ Ivanhoe character, as written by Sir Walter Scott [1771-1832]

"Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving."
~~ Albert Einstein [1879-1955]

“Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events. It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance."
~~ Robert F. Kennedy [1925-68]

"The object of art is to give life shape."
~~ William Shakespeare [1564-1616]

"Rejection is inevitable. Let it hit you hard for a moment, feel the hurt, and then move on."
~~ NYC artist Molly Crabapple

"Fear has never been a good advisor, neither in our personal lives nor in our society."
~~ Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany

"Santa Claus has the right idea: Visit people only once a year."
~~ entertainer Victor Borge [1909-2000]

"Do the best [that] you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better."
~~ Dr. Maya Angelou [1928-2014]

"Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."
~~ George Orwell [1903-50]

"All of us, we're links in a chain. And if we do our job right, there will be many, many links to come."
~~ folksinger Pete Seeger [1919-2014]

"No one would remember the Good Samaritan if he'd only had good intentions: he had money as well."
~~ Margaret Thatcher [1925-2013]

"Saving is a fine thing. Especially when your parents have done it for you."
~~ Sir Winston Churchill [1874-1965]

"People talk loud and long, in order to say as little as possible. The really true and interesting things are the intrigues in the background, about which not a word is mentioned."
~~ Franz Kafka [1883-1924]

"We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten."
~~ Bill Gates

"Nothing cleanses your soul like getting the hell kicked out of you."
~~ Ohio football coach Wayne Woodrow 'Woody' Hayes [1913-87]

"For a politician to complain about the press is like a ship's captain complaining about the sea."
~~ British MP Enoch Powell [1912-98]

"To make men love their country, their country ought to be lovable."
~~ Edmund Burke [1729-97]

"Normal is just a cycle on the washing machine."
~~ entertainer Whoopi Goldberg

"Ambition is a dream with a V-8 engine."
~~ Elvis Presley [1935-77]

"If you can accept losing, you can't win."
~~ Vince Lombardi [1913-70]

"The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today."
~~ Seneca the Younger [4? B.C.E. - 65 A.D.]

"Our most dangerous tendency is to expect too much of government, and at the same time do for it too little."
~~ Warren G. Harding [1865-1923]

"Practice any art, no matter how well or badly, not to get money and fame but to experience becoming, to find out what's inside you, to make your soul grow."
~~ Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. [1922-2007]

"The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong."
~~ Mahatma Gandhi [1869-1948]

"Good things happen slowly, bad things happen fast."
~~ memoirist Abigail Thomas

"Trust your hunches. They're usually based on facts filed away just below the conscious level."
~~ Dr. Joyce Brothers [1927-2013], pioneer TV psychologist

"I don't know that there are any shortcuts to doing a good job."
~~ Sandra Day O'Connor, retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice

"That, of course, is the great secret of the successful fool – that he is no fool at all."
~~ Isaac Asimov [1920-92]

"Peasant lives matter."
~~ G.E. Nordell

{each set of posted quotations are then posted at the Working Minds website, alphabetical by author}