Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
The task of leadership is not to put greatness into people, but to elicit it, for the greatness is there already.
Civilisation is a conspiracy.
It's a great life, if you don't weaken.
Without humility there can be no humanity.
Pessimism is the one ism which kills the soul.
The best prayers have often more groans than words.
Peace is that state in which fear of any kind is unknown.
An atheist is a man who has no invisible means of support.
The book trade is a spiritual barometer of a nations well-being.
[W]ithout humour you cannot run a sweetie-shop, let alone a nation.
To live for a time close to great minds is the best kind of education.
Leadership is only courage and wisdom, and a great carefulness of self.
Every man at the bottom of his heart believes that he is a born detective.
We can pay our debts to the past by putting the future in debt to ourselves.
He disliked emotion, not because he felt lightly, but because he felt deeply.
A fool tries to look different: a clever man looks the same and is different.
The robe of flesh wears thin, and with the years God shines through all things.
I believe everything out of the common. The only thing to distrust is the normal.
It struck me that Albania was the sort of place that might keep a man from yawning.
I always try to suit my clothes to my company. It is the only way to be inconspicuous.
There may be peace without joy, and joy without peace, but the two combined make happiness.
That is the supreme value of history. The study of it is the best guarantee against repeating it.
Prayer opens the heart to God, and it is the means by which the soul, though empty, is filled by God.
Wise men never grow up; indeed, they grow younger, for they lose the appalling worldly wisdom of youth.
The true definition of a snob is one who craves for what separates men rather than for what unites them.
Civilization is a conspiracy. Modern life is the silent compact of comfortable folk to keep up pretences.
Young girls passed me with romance still in their eyes, and others, a little older, with the romance dead.
To see what is right and not to do it is cowardice. It is never a question of who is right but what is right.
Most true points are fine points. There never was a dispute between mortals where both sides hadn't a bit of right.
The task of leadership is not to put greatness into humanity, but to elicit it, for the greatness is already there.
I believe that all wisdom consists in caring immensely for a few right things, and not caring a straw about the rest.
Bethink you of the blessedness. Every wife is like the Mother of God and has the hope of bearing a saviour of mankind.
The charm of fishing is that it is the pursuit of what is elusive but attainable, a perpetual series of occasions for hope.
London is like the tropical bush -- if you don't exercise constant care the jungle, in the shape of the slums, will break in.
I believe that every man has in his soul a passion for treasure-hunting, which will often drive a coward into prodigies of valour.
"What would you call the highest happiness, Lewie?" he asked. "The sense of competence," was the answer, given without hesitation.
Fortunately for mankind the brain in a life of action turns more to the matter in hand than to conjuring up the chances of the future.
Any large-scale organization must lose some of the merits of its rudimentary beginnings. Quantity will have a coarsening effect on quality.
Civilisation needs more than the law to hold it together. You see, all mankind are not equally willing to accept as divine justice what is called human law.
I was a peaceful sedentary man, a lover of a quiet life, with no appetite for perils and commotions. But I was beginning to realise that I was very obstinate.
The Church of Christ is an anvil which has worn out many hammers. Our opponents may boast of their strength, but they do not realize what they have challenged.
I would have been content with any job however thankless, in any quarter however remote, if I had a chance of making a corner of the desert blossom and the solitary place glad.
The vows we take in the holy place bind us till we are purged of them at Inanda's Kraal. Till then no blood must be shed and no flesh eaten. It was the fashion of our forefathers.
He who would valiant be against all disaster; let him in constancy follow the Master. There's no discouragement shall make him once relent; his first avowed intent to be a pilgrim.
Our sufferings have taught us that no nation is sufficient unto itself, and that our prosperity depends in the long run, not upon the failures of our neighbors but their successes.
But some love not the method of your first; Romance they count it, throw't away as dust; If I should meet with such, what should I say; Must I slight them as they slight me, or nay
If those extra-social brains are so potent, why after all do they effect so little? A dull police-officer, with the machine behind him, can afford to laugh at most experiments in anarchy.
I am an ordinary sort of fellow, not braver than other people, but I hate to see a good man downed, and that long knife would not be the end of Scudder if I could play the game in his place.
History gives us a kind of chart, and we dare not surrender even a small rushlight in the darkness. The hasty reformer who does not remember the past will find himself condemned to repeat it.
You see only the productions of second-rate folk who are in a hurry to get wealth and fame. The true knowledge, the deadly knowledge, is still kept secret. But, believe me, my friend, it is there.
