Billyt > Billyt's Quotes

“If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the will which says to them: 'Hold on!'

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!”
― Rudyard Kipling, If: A Father's Advice to His Son

“I have spread my dreams under your feet.
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.”
― W.B. Yeats

“Being Irish, he had an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy.”
― William Butler Yeats

“When people make a contract with the devil and give him an air-conditioned office to work in, he doesn't go back home easily.”
― James Lee Burke, In the Electric Mist With Confederate Dead

“It has been my experience that most human stories are circular rather than linear. Regardless of the path we choose, we somehow end up where we commenced - in part, I suspect, because the child who lives in us goes along for the ride.”
― James Lee Burke, The Glass Rainbow

“We drank our whiskeys. It was the good stuff and it tasted of salt, sea, rain, wind and the Old Testament.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Cold Cold Ground

“He was one of those characters who felt that a weak handshake could somehow damage his authority, which meant that every handshake had to bloody hurt.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Cold Cold Ground

“Greek mythology has always been my Achilles elbow.”
― Adrian McKinty, Rain Dogs

“A black Mercedes Benz 450 SL pulled up. It was your classic hood auto beloved of terrorists, pimps and African dictators.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Cold Cold Ground

“Johnnie Walker in the tea, Jim Beam in the coffee”
― Adrian McKinty, The Cold Cold Ground

“I remembered about the pharma coke, went outside and nailed a line so pure it was like getting yelled at by God. Yorkshire tea, Mrs Campbell’s Black Forest, Bayer cocaine – the lunch of champions.”
― Adrian McKinty, Gun Street Girl

“Patriotism is a hard disease to eradicate, and ennui stamps us all.”
― Adrian McKinty, Gun Street Girl

“The whiskey kicked like a mugger.”
― Ken Bruen, Blitz

“Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it. ”
― Raymond Chandler

“From 30 feet away she looked like a lot of class. From 10 feet away she looked like something made up to be seen from 30 feet away.”
― Raymond Chandler, The High Window

“I was neat, clean, shaved and sober and I didn't care who knew it.”
― Raymond Chandler

“The teachings of the Bible are so interwoven and entwined with our whole civic and social life that it would be literally impossible for us to figure to ourselves what that life would be if these teaching were removed.”
― TEDDY ROOSEVELT

“The only man who never makes a mistake is the one one who never does anything.”
― Teddy Roosevelt

“Complaining about a problem without posing a solution is called whining.”
― Teddy Roosevelt

“Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how it's done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves.”
― Brendan Behan

“It's not that the Irish are cynical. It's rather that they have a wonderful lack of respect for everything and everybody.”
― Brendan Behan, Brendan Behan, Interviews and Recollections Volume 1

“They took away our land, our language, and our religion; but they could never harness our tongues...”
― Brendan Behan

“No dumb bastard ever won a war by going out and dying for his country. He won it by making some other dumb bastard die for his country.”
― George S. Patton Jr.

“The defenders of decent society and the disciples of degeneracy are often the same people.”
― Caleb Carr, The Alienist

“I'm over the hill for come-on lines. On a quiet day, I can hear my liver rotting. For exercise, I fall down.”
― James Lee Burke, Creole Belle

“In a badass, beer-glass brawl, would you rather have an academic liberal covering your back or a hobnailed redneck?”
― James Lee Burke, Black Cherry Blues

“You’ve got another problem. Like most white trash, you’re disrespectful to your betters and proud of your stupidity and ignorance.”
― James Lee Burke, Wayfaring Stranger

“I bet that guy could steal the stink off of shit”
― James Lee Burke, A Stained White Radiance

“No matter what the other side does to you, you grin and walk through the cannon smoke. It drives them crazy.”
― James Lee Burke, In the Electric Mist with Confederate Dead

“Age is a clever thief. It takes a little from you each day, so you're not aware of your loss until it's irreversible.”
― James Lee Burke, Light of the World