Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
We [the United States] are the world's only superpower right now, so everyone notices every bit of what we do or don't do.
Man becomes aware of the Sacred because it manifests itself, shows itself, as something wholly different from the Profane.
Men are so simple and so much inclined to obey immediate needs that a deceiver will never lack victims for his deceptions.
He who makes war his profession cannot be otherwise than vicious. War makes thieves, and peace brings them to the gallows.
All the States and Governments by which men are or ever have been ruled, have been and are either Republics or Princedoms.
He who would foresee what is to happen should look to what has happened: for all that is has its counterpart in time past.
....those who become princes through their skill acquire the pricipality with difficulty, buy they hold onto it with ease.
Nature that framed us of four elements, warring within our breasts for regiment, doth teach us all to have aspiring minds.
After an acquaintance of ten minutes many women will exchange confidences that a man would not reveal to a lifelong friend
It is only too clear that man is not at home within this universe, and yet that he is not good enough to deserve a better.
In stirring up tumult and strife, the worst men can do the most, but peace and quiet cannot be established without virtue.
Modest fame is not to be despised by the highest characters. [Lat., Modestiae fama neque summis mortalibus spernenda est.]
The powerful hold in deep remembrance an ill-timed pleasantry. [Lat., Facetiarum apud praepotentes in longum memoria est.]
American individualism, much celebrated and cherished, has developed without its essential corrective, which is belonging.
In countries where associations are free, secret societies are unknown. In America there are factions, but no conspiracies.
It is heartrending to read the entries in many an old family Bible - the records of suffering, distress, and blasted hopes.
I guess the most surprising discovery was how long Gandhi remained loyal to the ideal of the British Empire, even in India.
Make it new is the message not just of modern art but of modern consumerism, of which modern art is largely a mirror image.
I started to write book reviews as a means of recording my thoughts about what I'd read before all memory of them vanished.
Active valour may often be the present of nature; but such patient diligence can be the fruit only of habit and discipline.
But the power of instruction is seldom of much efficacy, except in those happy dispositions where it is almost superfluous.
Europe is secure from any future irruptions of Barbarians; since, before they can conquer, they must cease to be barbarous.
Liberals do not appear to address potential solutions with anything like the far right's aura of God-given self-confidence.
One who imitates what is bad always goes beyond his model; while one who imitates what is good always comes up short of it.
If the French noblesse had been capable of playing cricket with their peasants, their chateaux would never have been burnt.
Nonbelievers may hear all the notes of science, but without a theistic context and perspective they will not hear the song.
Politics is an act of faith; you have to show some kind of confidence in the intellectual and moral capacity of the public.
A boy's will is his life, and he dies when it is broken, as the colt dies in harness, taking a new nature in becoming tame.
History is the most aristocratic of all literary pursuits, because it obliges the historian to be rich as well as educated.
Some day science may have the existence of mankind in power, and the human race can commit suicide by blowing up the world.
When one meddles with the direction of a revolution, the problem is not how to make it go but how to keep it under control.
I do take the threat of terrorism seriously. You cannot eliminate that threat or diminish that threat by bombing a country.
I am an anarchist, and according to anarchist principles nation states become obstacles to a true humanistic globalization.
Almost all people have this potential for evil, which would be unleashed only under certain dangerous social circumstances.
[T]hat is the triumph of history - truth absolute is not at hand; the original with which to match the copy does not exist.
Anyone can write one book: even politicians do it. Starting a second book reveals an intention to be a professional writer.
Unfortunately, once an economy is geared to expansion, the means rapidly turn into an end and "the going becomes the goal."
History should not be written to make the present generation feel good but to remind us that human affairs are complicated.
Every life is different; being pro-life is not only about saving the fetus, being pro-life is about all the stages of life.
I've never met anybody quite like [Bill Shawn]. He created - and I'm sure it was conscious - an aura about him of quietude.
Since it is difficult to join them together, it is safer to be feared than to be loved when one of the two must be lacking.
Any historian worth their salt should be aware of wars, conflicts, catastrophes. They happen. This is part of the panorama.
If the term discussion has always seemed to me to imply mild warnings of wasted time, workshop sets off a clangorous alarm.
Only liberals know how to make you freer on the job, which is where most of us suffer the gravest indignities in our lives.
Among the conservative Greek opinion there would be no regrets that Alexander the Greek leader was invading the barbarians.
I had met American artists and just couldn't believe their energy. London was always such a struggle to get anything going.
Men cannot improve a society by setting fire to it: they must seek out its old virtues, and bring them back into the light.
To plunder, to slaughter, to steal, these things they misname empire; and where they make a wilderness, they call it peace.
Every great example of punishment has in it some injustice, but the suffering individual is compensated by the public good.
In the Roman commonwealth, even on the conversion of the monarchy into a republic, the old was as far as possible retained.