John Catron > John's Quotes

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#1

“IN ONE THING YOU HAVE NOT CHANGED, DEAR FRIEND," SAID ARAGORN: "YOU STILL SPEAK IN RIDDLES."

"WHAT? IN RIDDLES?" SAID GANDALF. "NO! FOR I WAS TALKING ALOUD TO MYSELF. A HABIT OF THE OLD: THEY CHOOSE THE WISEST PERSON PRESENT TO SPEAK TO; THE LONG EXPLANATIONS NEEDED BY THE YOUNG ARE WEARYING.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Piano/Vocal/Chords) [Paperback] [2003] 1 Ed. Howard Shore

tags: aragorn, gandalf, wise

0 likes

#2

“Remember, when you are dead, you do not know you are dead. It is only painful for others.
The same applies when you are stupid.”
― Ricky Gervais

tags: stupidity

127 likes

#3

“[T]he useful idiots, the leftists who are idealistically believing in the beauty of the Soviet socialist or Communist or whatever system, when they get disillusioned, they become the worst enemies. That’s why my KGB instructors specifically made the point: never bother with leftists. Forget about these political prostitutes. Aim higher. [...] They serve a purpose only at the stage of destabilization of a nation. For example, your leftists in the United States: all these professors and all these beautiful civil rights defenders. They are instrumental in the process of the subversion only to destabilize a nation. When their job is completed, they are not needed any more. They know too much. Some of them, when they get disillusioned, when they see that Marxist-Leninists come to power—obviously they get offended—they think that they will come to power. That will never happen, of course. They will be lined up against the wall and shot.”
― Yuri Bezmenov

tags: beauty, civil-rights, communism, communists, defenders, destabilization, disillusioned, disillusionment, enemies, enemy, execution, idealism, instructors, instrumental, job, kgb, knowledge, marxism, marxists, nation, offended, offense, political, politics, power, professors, prostitutes, purpose, socialism, socialist, soviet, united-states, useful-idiots, worst

69 likes

#4

“If you only read the books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is thinking.”
― Haruki Murakami, Norwegian Wood

tags: books, thought

31229 likes

#5

“Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.”
― haruki murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

tags: inspirational, running

8518 likes

#6

“Don't feel sorry for yourself. Only assholes do that.”
― Haruki Murakami, Norwegian Wood

tags: nagasawa

4022 likes

#7

“I can bear any pain as long as it has meaning.”
― Haruki Murakami, 1Q84

tags: pain

1708 likes

#8

“Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

tags: equanimity, future, inspirational, reason, stoic, stoicism, worry

1748 likes

#9

“When I die and go to heaven, to St. Peter, I will tell: "one more soldier reporting for duty, sir. I've served my time in hell.”
― M. Popplewell

tags: life-and-death, religious-quote

5 likes

#10

“There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”
― Isaac Asimov

tags: anti-intellectualism, cult, culture, democracy, ignorance, intellectual, political, politics, united-states, willful-ignorance

2449 likes

#11

“Life is so damned hard, so damned hard... It just hurts people and hurts people, until finally it hurts them so that they can't be hurt ever any more. That's the last and worst thing it does.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Beautiful and Damned

444 likes

#12

“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

tags: bene-gesserit, fear, litany-against-fear, motivational, scifi

16752 likes

#13

“If the truth shall kill them, let them die.”
― Immanuel Kant

tags: death, killing, truth

143 likes

#14

“I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight, I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice.”
― Theodore Parker, The present aspect of slavery in America and the immediate duty of the North: a speech delivered in the hall of the State house, before the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Convention, on Friday night, January 29, 1858

tags: arc-of-the-universe, atheism, barack-obama, justice, martin-luther-king-jr, morality, obama-inaguration, obama-speeches, preacher, sermons, slavery, unitarianism

100 likes

#15

“War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers

tags: lotr, war

4512 likes

#16

“In one thing you have not changed, dear friend," said Aragorn: "you still speak in riddles."
"What? In riddles?" said Gandalf. "No! For I was talking aloud to myself. A habit of the old: they choose the wisest person present to speak to; the long explanations needed by the young are wearying.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers

799 likes

#17

“When I was young, I forgot how to laugh in the cave of Trophonius; when I was older, I opened my eyes and beheld reality, at which I began to laugh, and since then, I have not stopped laughing. I saw that the meaning of life was to secure a livelihood, and that its goal was to attain a high position; that love’s rich dream was marriage with an heiress; that friendship’s blessing was help in financial difficulties; that wisdom was what the majority assumed it to be; that enthusiasm consisted in making a speech; that it was courage to risk the loss of ten dollars; that kindness consisted in saying, “You are welcome,” at the dinner table; that piety consisted in going to communion once a year. This I saw, and I laughed.”
― Søren Kierkegaard

tags: kierkegaard, laugh, life, philosophy

147 likes

#18

“If everything around seems dark, look again, you may be the light.”
― Rumi

tags: dark, darkness, inspiration, inspirational, light

57 likes

#19

“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

tags: paraphrased, strength

34016 likes

#20

“If socialists understood economics they wouldn't be socialists.”
― Friedrich Hayek

129 likes

#21

“Fascism is the stage reached after communism has proved an illusion.”
― Friedrich von Hayek

tags: communism, fascism

161 likes

#22

“From the fact that people are very different it follows that, if we treat them equally, the result must be inequality in their actual position, and that the only way to place them in an equal position would be to treat them differently. Equality before the law and material equality are therefore not only different but are in conflict with each other; and we can achieve either one or the other, but not both at the same time”
― Friedrich August von Hayek, Constitution of Liberty

tags: political_philosopy

190 likes

#23

“We mature with the damage, not with the years.”
― Mateus Williams

11 likes

#24

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.”
― Albert Camus

tags: seasons, strength, trial, triumph

11216 likes

#25

“Nobody can hurt me without my permission.”
― Mahatma Gandhi

tags: fighting, hurt, inner-peace, peace, permission, strength, trial

5633 likes

#26

“Don’t walk in front of me… I may not follow
Don’t walk behind me… I may not lead
Walk beside me… just be my friend”
― Albert Camus

tags: attributed-no-source, friends, friendship, misattributed-albert-camus

93521 likes

#27

“I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Happy Prince and Other Stories

tags: intelligence, self-deprecation

71688 likes

#28

“Without music, life would be a mistake.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols

tags: inspirational, music, philosophy

74334 likes

#29

“Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.”
― Oscar Wilde

tags: attributed-no-source, enemies, forgiveness, strategy

81812 likes