John T > John's Quotes

“I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.”
― Anonymous, The Holy Bible: King James Version

“There is no such thing as luck. There is only adequate or inadequate preparation to cope with a statistical universe.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, Have Space Suit—Will Travel

“That which issues from the heart alone,
Will bend the hearts of others to your own.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, First Part

“Never confuse Motion with Action.”
― Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

“I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
― Maya Angelou

“The greatest enemy of clear language is insincerity.”
― George Orwell

“Raise your words, not voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.”
― Rumi

“[our various selves] are all names we wear. Until we don't.”
― Ariana Brown

“You can fool some people some times but you cant fool all the people all the time”
― Bob Marley

“Crowns do queer things to the heads beneath them.”
― George R.R. Martin, A Clash of Kings

“It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness. A handsome woman talks nonsense, you listen and hear not nonsense but cleverness. She says and does horrid things, and you see only charm. And if a handsome woman does not say stupid or horrid things, you at once persuade yourself that she is wonderfully clever and moral.”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kreutzer Sonata

“Be like the sun for grace and mercy. Be like the night to cover others' faults. Be like running water for generosity. Be like death for rage and anger. Be like the Earth for modesty. Appear as you are. Be as you appear.”
― Rumi

“Grant me one hour on love’s most sacred shores
To clasp the bosom that my soul adores,
Lie heart to heart and merge my soul with yours.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, First Part

“You are aware of only one unrest;
Oh, never learn to know the other!
Two souls, alas, are dwelling in my breast,
And one is striving to forsake its brother.
Unto the world in grossly loving zest,
With clinging tendrils, one adheres;
The other rises forcibly in quest
Of rarefied ancestral spheres.
If there be spirits in the air
That hold their sway between the earth and sky,
Descend out of the golden vapors there
And sweep me into iridescent life.
Oh, came a magic cloak into my hands
To carry me to distant lands,
I should not trade it for the choicest gown,
Nor for the cloak and garments of the crown.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, First Part

“People are more than just the way they look.”
― Madeleine L'Engle, A Wrinkle in Time

“The cure for pain is in the pain.”
― Rumi

“Wild dreams torment me as I lie. And though a god lives in my heart, though all my power waken at his word, though he can move my every inmost part - yet nothing in the outer world is stirred. thus by existence tortured and oppressed I crave for death, I long for rest.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, Part One

“When scholars study a thing, they strive to kill it first, if it's alive; then they have the parts and they've lost the whole, for the link that's missing was the living soul.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“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

“Love does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction.”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Airman's Odyssey

“Words are easy, like the wind; faithful friends are hard to find.”
― William Shakespeare, The Passionate Pilgrim

“I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it.”
― Mark Twain

“I've often heard it said a preacher
might learn with a comedian for a teacher.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, Part One

“Every generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it.”
― George Orwell

“Qui plussait, plus se tait. French, you know. The more a man knows, the less he talks.”
― Madeleine L'Engle, A Wrinkle in Time

“Sometimes I’m terrified of my heart; of its constant hunger for whatever it is it wants. The way it stops and starts.”
― Poe

“Who could be so lucky? Who comes to a lake for water and sees the reflection of moon.”
― Rumi

“If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”
― George Orwell

“Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Eleonora

“Loving the same man or woman all your life, why, that's like supposing the same candle could last you all your life”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kreutzer Sonata