Notable quotes, excerpts, and profound lines.

[Hamlet53]

“True beauty is something that attacks, overpowers, robs, and finally destroys.”

― Yukio Mishima

[astrangerhere]

“Literature is strewn with the wreckage of those who have minded beyond reason the opinion of others.”

— Virginia Woolf in A Room of One’s Own

[WT Sharpe]

.....Have you ever loved a woman?
.....Your mother .... is she living? .... Have you been much with
.....her? and has she been much with you?
.....Do you not see that these are exactly the same to all in all nations
.....and times all over the earth?
..........— Walt Whitman (1819 – 1892), U.S. poet. Leaves of Grass: "I Sing the Body Electric."

[Billi]

Some quotes by Stefan Zweig, Beware of the Pity (Ungeduld des Herzens, 1939)

There are two kinds of pity. One, the weak and sentimental kind, which is really no more than the heart's impatience to be rid as quickly as possible of the painful emotion aroused by the sight of another's unhappiness, that pity which is not compassion, but only an instinctive desire to fortify one's own soul agains the sufferings of another; and the other, the only one at counts, the unsentimental but creative kind, which knows what it is about and is determined to hold out, in patience and forbearance, to the very limit of its strength and even beyond.

It is not the healthy, the confident, the proud, the joyous, the happy, that one must love - they have no need of one's love! Arrogant and indifferent, they accept love only as homage that is theirs to command, as their due. The devotion of another is to them a mere embellishment, an ornament for the hair, a bracelet on the arm, not the whole meaning and bliss of their lives. Only those with whom life has dealt hardly, the wretched, the slighted, the uncertain, the unlovely, the humiliated, could really be helped by love. He who devotes his life to them atones to them for what life has taken from them. They alone know how to love and be loved as one should love - gratefully and humbly.

And some more lighthearted:

On the whole, more men had perhaps escaped into the war than from it.

If you are going to sell yourself, you should at least get a good price.

Why is it that the stupidest people are always the most good-natured?

Those whom fate has dealt hard knocks remain vulnerable for ever afterwards.

[Billi]

And a greeting to the thread opener by my favourite quote-giver:

The king is gone but he's not forgotten!

[Hamlet53]

"You see, loneliness is the price we have to pay for being born in this modern age, so full of freedom, independence, and our own egotistical selves.” from Kokoro by Natsume Sōseki

[WT Sharpe]

.....You may never have proof of your importance, but you are more important than you think. There are always those who couldn’t do without you. The rub is that you don’t always know who. I recall an old Sufi story of a good man who was granted one wish by God. The man said he would like to go about doing good without knowing about it. God granted his wish. And then God decided that it was such a good idea, he would grant that wish to all human beings. And so it has been to this day.
..........— Robert Fulghum (1937 - ), American author and essayist. All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, 15th Anniversary Edition, 2003 (first published in 1988).

[Billi]

Tom, as this is not your first time quoting from this book (and as I have never heard before about this book): is the rest of "All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten" as good as these great quotes promise? Would you recommend reading it? Thanks.

[WT Sharpe]

To be sure, the title essay, "All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten", is far and away the best in the book, but the entire book's worth reading, in my opinion. The quality of the essays does seem to be a bit uneven, however. They're not all gems.

[hard-boiled pat]

"When the guy with asthma finally came in from the fire escape, Parker rabbit-punched him and took his gun away."

-Richard Stark, The Mourner


One of the best opening lines i've come across.

[BenG]

"The problem with quotes on the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity."
--Abraham Lincoln

[sun surfer]

"So George says. He says that the Miss Alans must go to the wall. Yet it does seem so unkind."

"There is only a certain amount of kindness in the world," said George, watching the sunlight flash on the panels of the passing carriages.

"Yes!" exclaimed Mrs. Honeychurch. "That's exactly what I say. Why all this twiddling and twaddling over two Miss Alans?"

"There is a certain amount of kindness, just as there is a certain amount of light," he continued in measured tones. "We cast a shadow on something wherever we stand, and it is no good moving from place to place to save things; because the shadow always follows. Choose a place where you won't do harm-yes, choose a place where you won't do very much harm, and stand in it for all you are worth, facing the sunshine."


-A Room with a View by E.M. Forster

[carpetmojo]

"Is that your own brain, or are you running it in for an idiot ..." Ronnie Scott.

[BenG]

“In short, if youth is not quite right in in its opinions, there is a strong probability that age is not much more so. Undying hope is co-ruler of the human bosom with infallible credulity. A man finds he has been wrong at every preceding stage of his career, only to deduce the astonishing conclusion that he is at last entirely right.”
— Robert Louis Stevenson, Crabbed Age and Youth (1878)

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by BenG

“In short, if youth is not quite right in in its opinions, there is a strong probability that age is not much more so. Undying hope is co-ruler of the human bosom with infallible credulity. A man finds he has been wrong at every preceding stage of his career, only to deduce the astonishing conclusion that he is at last entirely right.”
— Robert Louis Stevenson, Crabbed Age and Youth (1878)

Works for me!