Quotes & Aphorisms from Allen to Zapata

Quotes & Aphorisms from:  http://www.geocities.com/SouthBeach/3797/quotes.html

A

"Anybody can win unless there happens to be a second entry."
- George Ada

"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound as they fly by."
- Douglas Adams

"Unus, sed leo!" [One, but a lion!]
- Aisopos (Fabulae 194)

"»Stay« is a charming word in a friend's vocabulary."
- Bronson Allcott

"The difference between sex and death is that with death you can do it alone and no one is going to make fun of you."
- Woody Allen

"Is sex dirty? Only when it's being done right."
- Woody Allen

"Sex between a man and a woman can be wonderful, provided you can get between the right man and the right woman."
- Woody Allen

"Love is the answer, but while you are waiting for the answer, sex raises some pretty good questions."
- Woody Allen

"The good people sleep much better at night than the bad people. Of course, the bad people enjoy the waking hours much more."
- Woody Allen

"The only competition worthy of a wise man is with himself."
- Washington Allston

"Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich by promising to protect each from the other."
- Oscar Ameringer

"Doing easily what others find difficult is talent; doing what is impossible for talent is genius."
- Henri-Frederic Amiel

"Women like silent men. They think they're listening."
- Marcel Archard

"Noli turbare circulos meos!" [Do not disturb my circles!]
- Archimedes

"That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind."
- Neil Armstrong (On first stepping on the moon, July 20, 1969)

"The ingrained idea that, because there is no king and they despise titles, the Americans are a free people is pathetically untrue...There is a perpetual interference with personal liberty over there that would not be tolerated in England for a week."
- Margot Asquith

"Execute every act of thy life as though it were thy last."
- Marcus Aurelius

"A wrongdoer is often a man that has left something undone, not always he that has done something."
- Marcus Aurelius

"One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other."
- Jane Austen

B

"It is impossible to love and to be wise."
-Francis Bacon

"It's the good girls who keep diaries; the bad girls never have the time."
-Tallulah Bankhead

"I'll come up and make love to you at five o'clock. If I'm late, start without me."
- Tallulah Bankhead

"Karate is a form of martial arts in which people who have had years and years of training can, using only their hands and feet, make some of the worst movies in the history of the world."
- Dave Barry

"An error doesn't become a mistake until you refuse to correct it."
- Orlando A. Battista

"When one door closes another door opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the ones which open for us."
- Alexander Graham Bell

"I hope I never get so old I get religious."
- Ingmar Bergman

"A kiss is a lovely trick designed by nature to stop speech when words become superfluous."
- Ingrid Bergman

"Committee - a group of men who keep minutes and waste hours."
- M. Berle

"Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils."
-Hector Berlioz

"To retain respect for sausages and laws, one must not watch them in the making."
- Otto von Bismarck

"It is better that ten guilty persons escape than one innocent suffer."
- Sir William Blackstone

"An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made, in a narrow field."
- Niels Bohr

"Feeding the starving poor only increases their number."
- Ben Bova

"Life may have no meaning. Or even worse, it may have a meaning of which I disapprove."
- Ashleigh Brilliant

"My opinions may have changed, but not the fact that I am right."
- Ashleigh Brilliant

"Whenever people say »we mustn't be sentimental«, you can take it they are about to do something cruel. And if they add, »we must be realistic«, they mean they are going to make money out of it."
- Brigid Brophy

"I am not a vegetarian because I love animals; I am a vegetarian because I hate plants."
- A. Whitney Brown

"Too bad all the people who know how to run the country are busy driving taxicabs and cutting hair."
- George Burns

"An expert is one who knows more and more about less and less."
- Nicholas Murray Butler

"When you have told anyone you have left him a legacy, the only decent thing to do is to die at once."
- S. Butler

"He who loves not his country can love nothing."
- Lord Byron

"The best of prophets of the future is the past."
- Lord Byron

C

"The optimist proclaims we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true."
- James B. Cabell

"Veni, vidi, vici." [He came, he saw, he conquered.]
- Gaius Julius Caesar

"Alea iacta est." [The die is cast.]
- Gaius Julius Caesar

"Et tu, Brute!" [You too, Brutus!}
- Gaius Julius Caesar (last words)

"Faber est suae quisque fortunae." [Each man is the smith of his own fortune.]
- Appius Claudius Caecus

"It is better to be defeated on principle than to win on lies."
- Arthur Calwell

"An honest politician is one who when he is bought will stay bought."
- Simon Cameron

"You can get much farther with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone."
- Al Capone

"If you are ever in doubt as to whether to kiss a pretty girl, always give her the benefit of the doubt."
- Thomas Carlyle

"I am amazed at radio DJ:s today. I am firmly convinced that AM stands for Absolute Moron. I will not begin to tell you what FM stands for."
- Jasper Carrott

"Praeterea censeo Carthaginem esse delendam!" [Furthermore I believe Carthage should be destroyed!]
- Cato

"A proverb is a short sentence based on long experience."
- Miguel de Cervantes

"And so I leave this world, where the heart must either break or turn to lead."
- Nicolas-Sebastien Chamfort (Suicide note)

"Be wiser than other people, if you can, but do not tell them so."
- Lord Chesterfield

"Old age isn't so bad when you consider the alternative."
- Maurice Chevalier

"He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains a fool forever."
- Chinese proverb

"The man who strikes first admits that his ideas have given out."
- Chinese Proverb

"Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness."
- Chinese Proverb

"You cannot prevent the birds of sorrow from flying over your head, but you can prevent them from building nests in your hair."
- Chinese Proverb

"An archaeologist is the best husband a woman can have. The older she gets the more interested he is in her.
- Agatha Christie

"It is a good thing for the uneducated man to read books of quotations. Bartlett's Familiar Quotations is an admirable work, and I studied it intently. The quotations when engraved upon the memory give you good thoughts. They also make you more anxious to read the authors and look for more."
- Winston Churchill (Roving Commissions: My Early Life, 1930)

"I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat"
- Winston Churchill (Speech to the House of Commons, May 13, 1940)

"We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strenght in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender"
- Winston Churchill (Speech to the House of Commons, June 4, 1940)

"Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duty, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Commonwealth and the Empire last for a thousand years, men will still say, »This was their finest hour«"
- Winston Churchill (Speech to the House of Commons, June 18, 1940)

"Never in the field of human conflicts was so much owed by so many to so few"
- Winston Churchill (Speech to the House of Commons, August 20, 1940

"Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning"
- Winston Churchill (November 10, 1942)

"From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe."
- Winston Churchill (Speech at Westminster College, March 5, 1946)

"Everyone has his day and some days last longer than others."
- Winston Churchill

"The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter."
- Winston Churchill

"A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject."
- Winston Churchill

"An aphorism is not an aphorism unless you know what it means."
- Winston Churchill

"I have taken more good from alcohol than alcohol has taken from me."
- Winston Churchill

"We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give."
- Winston Churchill

"When you have to kill a man it costs nothing to be polite."
- Winston Churchill

"I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals."
- Winston Churchill

"Writing a book is an adventure: to begin with it is a toy and amusement; then it becomes a master, and than it becomes a tyrant; and the last phase is just as you are about to be reconciled to your servitude- you kill the monster and fling him to the public."
- Winston Churchill

"I am ready to meet my maker, but whether my maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter."
- Winston Churchill

"We are all worms, but I do believe that I am a glow-worm."
- Winston Churchill

"Good night, then; sleep to gather strength for the morning, for the morning will come. Brightly will it shine on the brave and true, the kindly, on all who suffer for the cause, and gloriously upon the tombs of heroes. Thus will shine the dawn."
- Winston Churchill

"Nemo enim fere saltat sobrius, nisi forte insanit." [None dances sober, unless he is completly insane.]
- Marcus Tullius Cicero (Pro Murena 13)

"Ut sementem feceris, ita metes." [As you sow, so shall you reap.]
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Silent leges inter arma." [During war, the laws are silent.]
- Marcus Tullius Cicero (Pro Milone 11)

"Acti labores jucundi." [Work that has been done is pleasant.]
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Nihil tam absurde dici potest, quod non dicatur ab aliquo philosophorum." [Nothing can be said that is so absurd that it has not been said by some philosopher.]
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Errare humanum est, ignoscere divinum." [To err is human, to forgive divine.]
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Omnium rerum principia parva sunt." [Everything has a small beginning.]
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Nemo enim est tam senex qui se annum non putet posse vivere." [Surely, nobody is so old that he does not think that it is possible to live one [more] year.]
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"An unjust peace is better than a just war."
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Nobody can give you wiser advice than yourself"
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"It is a frail mind that does not bear prosperity as well as adversity with moderation."
- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"America is the only nation in history which miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to degeneration without the usual interval of civilisation."
- Georges Clemenceau

"Advice is like snow; the softer it falls, the longer it dwells upon, and the deeper it sinks into the mind."
- Samuel Coleridge

"When you have nothing to say, say nothing."
- Charles Caleb Colton

"I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand."
- Confucius

"Our greatest glory is not in never falling but in rising every time we fall."
- Confucius

"The problem with political jokes is they get elected."
- Henry Cote

D

"The first half of our lives is ruined by our parents, and the second half by our children."
- Clarence Darrow

"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die tomorrow."
- James Dean

"Cogito, ergo sum." [I think, therefore I am]
- Rene Descartes

"We spend the first twelve months of our children's lives teaching them to walk and talk and the next twelve telling them to sit down and shut up."
-Phyllis Diller

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."
- Benjamin Disraeli

"When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."
- Arthur Conan Doyle

"Use what talent you possess: the woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best."
- Henry van Dyke

E

"Imagination is more important than knowledge"
- Albert Einstein

"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education"
- Albert Einstein

"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources"
- Albert Einstein

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen"
- Albert Einstein

"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds"
- Albert Einstein

"Before God we are all equally wise - and equally foolish"
- Albert Einstein

"Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the Gods"
- Albert Einstein

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious; It is the source of all true art and science"
- Albert Einstein

"We should take care not to make the intellect our god; it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality"
- Albert Einstein

"As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality"
- Albert Einstein

"Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. THAT'S relativity."
- Albert Einstein

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."
- Albert Einstein

"Generations to come will find it difficult to believe that a man such as Gandhi ever walked the face of this earth"
- Albert Einstein

"Not until we dare to regard ourselves as a nation, not until we respect ourselves, can we gain the esteem of others, or rather only then will it come of its own accord"
- Albert Einstein

"A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to enhance all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."
- Albert Einstein

"I never think of the future - it comes soon enough."
- Albert Einstein

"The important thing is not to stop questioning."
- Albert Einstein

"The release of atomic energy has not created a new problem. It has merely made more urgent the necessity of solving an existing one."
- Albert Einstein

"The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible."
- Albert Einstein

"The hardest thing in the world to comprehend is the income tax."
- Albert Einstein

"If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?"
- Albert Einstein

"Two things are infinite: The universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe."
- Albert Einstein

"We are going to have peace even if we have to fight for it."
- Dwight D. Eisenhower

"Every man I meet is in some way my superior."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The true test of civilization is, not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the crops but the kind of man that the country turns out."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"A smooth sea never made a skillful mariner."
- English proverb

"We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak."
- Epictetus

"A mathematician is a device that turn coffee into theorems"
- Paul Erdes

"There's a difference between beauty and charm. A beautiful woman is one I notice. A charming woman is one who notices me."
- John Erskine

"Millions long for immortality but do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon."
- Susan Ertz

"Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish."
- Euripides

"Cowards do not count in battle; they are there, but not in it."
- Euripides

"Whoso neglects learning in his youth, loses the past and is dead for the future."
- Euripides

F

"Setting an example for your children takes all the fun out of middle age."
- William Feather

"I am free of all prejudices. I hate everyone equally."
- W.C. Fields

"If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Then give up. No use being a damned fool about it."
- W.C. Fields

"Always carry a flagon of whiskey in case of snakebite and furthermore always carry a small snake."
- W.C. Fields

"There are three faithful friends - an old wife, an old dog and ready money."
- Benjamin Franklin (Poor Richard's Almanac, 1738)

"Lost time is never found again."
- Benjamin Franklin (Poor Richard's Almanac, 1748)

"There never was a good war or a bad peace."
- Benjamin Franklin (Letter to Josiah Quincy, September 11, 1783)

"In this world, nothing is certain but death and taxes."
- Benjamin Franklin

"Any fool can criticise, condemn, and complain, and most fools do."
- Benjamin Franklin

"The great question...which I have not been able to answer...is, »What does a woman want?«"
- Sigmund Freud (From E.Jones' Life and Work of S.F., 1955)

"Not he who has much is rich, but he who gives much."
- Erich Fromm

"A bank is a place where they lend you an umbrella in fair weather and ask for it back when it begins to rain."
- Robert Frost

"A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman's birthday but never remembers her age."
- Robert Frost

"A jury consists of twelve persons chosen to decide who has the better lawyer."
- Robert Frost

"The world is full of willing people; some willing to work, the rest willing to let them."
- Robert Frost

"A liberal is a man too broad-minded to take his own side in a quarrel."
- Robert Frost

"The brain is a wonderful organ. It starts working the moment you get up in the morning and does not stop until you get into the office."
- Robert Frost

"Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper."
- Robert Frost

"In three words I can sum up everything that I have learned about life. It goes on."
- Robert Frost

"Don't be an agnostic. Be something."
- Robert Frost

"Freedom lies in being bold."
- Robert Frost

G

"Nothing is so admirable in politics as a short memory."
- John Kenneth Galbraith

"I could prove God statistically."
- George Gallup

"Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes. Always."
- Mahatma Gandhi

"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind."
- Mahatma Gandhi

"Love is the strongest force the world possesses, and yet it is the humblest imaginable."
- Mahatma Gandhi

"Throughout the history of mankind there have been murderers and tyrants; and while it may seem momentarily that they have the upper hand, they have always fallen."
- Mahatma Gandhi

"When rats leave a sinking ship, where exactly do they think they're going?"
- Douglas Gauck

"How can you expect to govern a country that has two hundred and forty-six kinds of cheese?"
- Charles de Gaulle (attrib.)

"If you can count your money, you don't have a billion dollars."
- J.P. Getty

"It is better to give than to lend, and it costs about the same."
- Sir Philip Gibbs

"Architecture is frozen music"
- Johann Wolfgang Goethe (Letter to J.P.Eckermann, October 20, 1828)

"Nothing is more significant of men's character than what they find laughable."
- Johann Wolfgang Goethe

"An oral contract isn't worth the paper it's writen on."
- S. Goldwyn

"When authorities warn you of the sinfulness of sex, there is an important lesson to be learned. Do not have sex with the authorities."
- Matt Groening

"When a man steals your wife, there is no better revenge than to let him keep her."
- Sacha Guitry

H

"The dance is a poem of which each movement is a word."
- Mata Hari

"What is a committee? A group of the unwilling, picked from the unfit, to do the unnecessary."
- Richard Harkness

"In times like these, it is helpful to remember that there have always been times like these."
- Paul Harvey

"Doing what we please is not freedom, is not liberty; rather, it is the abuse of true liberty and freedom."
- Cardinal Hayes

"I'm gonna live forever, or die trying."
- Joseph Heller (Catch 22)

"The enemy is anybody who's going to get you killed, no matter which side he is on."
- Joseph Heller (Catch 22)

"When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen."
- Ernest Hemingway

"Plain women know more about men than beautiful ones do. But beautiful women don't need to know about men. It's the men who have to know about beautiful women."
- Katherine Hepburn

"Love and a cough cannot be hid."
- George Herbert

"Girls are like pianos. When they're not upright, they're grand."
- Benny Hill

"I never said all actors are cattle; what I said was all actors should be treated like cattle."
- Alfred Hitchcock

"The most precious thing that exists the whole world over is our own people. And for these people, and with these people, we shall struggle and we shall fight, and never slacken, and never tire, and never falter, and never doubt."
- Adolf Hitler, 1933

"Strength lies not in defense but in attack."
- Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf, 1933)

"The great masses of the people...will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one."
- Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf, 1933)

"The victor will never be asked if he told the truth."
- Adolf Hitler

"What luck for the rulers that men do not think."
- Adolf Hitler

"Success is the sole earthly judge of right and wrong."
- Adolf Hitler

"Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer." [One people, one empire, one leader.]
- Adolf Hitler

"When you're away, I'm restless, lonely, wretched, bored, dejected; only here's the rub, my darling dear, I feel the same when you're near."
- Samuel Hoffenstein

"Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt."
- H. Hoover

"Carpe diem." [Seize the day.]
- Horatius

"A man is as good as he has to be, and a woman is as bad as she dares."
- Elbert Hubbard

"Boys will be boys, and so will a lot of middle-aged men."
- Kin Hubbard

"Behind every successful man stands a surprised mother-in-law."
- Hubert Humphrey

"Maybe this world is another planet's Hell."
- Aldous Huxley

"Experience is not what happens to you. It is what you do with what happens to you."
- Aldous Huxley

J

"Let us cross over the river and sit in the shade of the trees."
- General Thomas 'Stonewall' Jackson (Last words, Chancellorsville, 1863)

"A deo rex, a rege lex." [From God - the king, from the king - the law.]
- Jakob I

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal..."
- Thomas Jefferson (Declaration of Independence, 1776)

"It is to secure our rights that we resort to government at all."
- Thomas Jefferson (to Francois D'Ivernois, 1795)

"The will of the people... is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be our first object."
- Thomas Jefferson (to Benjamin Waring, 1801)

"I may err in my measures, but never shall deflect from the intention to fortify the public liberty by every possible means, and to put it out of the power of the few to riot on the labors of the many."
- Thomas Jefferson (to John Tyler, 1804)

"It is more honorable to repair a wrong than to persist in it."
- Thomas Jefferson (Address to Cherokee Nation, 1806)

"Everyone must act according to the dictates of his own reason."
- Thomas Jefferson (to Samuel Miller, 1808)

"The care of human life and happiness and not their destruction is the first and only legitimate object of good government."
- Thomas Jefferson (to Maryland Republicans, 1809)

"Where the press is free, and every man able to read, all is safe."
- Thomas Jefferson (to Charles Yancey, 1816)

"We are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate any error so long as reason is left to combat it."
-Thomas Jefferson (To William Roscoe, 1820)

"Men are like wine - some turn to vinegar, but the best improve with age."
- Pope John XXIII

"Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't."
- Erica Jong

"The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed."
- Carl Gustav Jung (Modern Man in Search of a Soul, 1933)

"Show me a sane man and I will cure him for you."
- Carl Gustav Jung

K

"Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans -- born in this country, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace."
- John F. Kennedy (1961 Inaugural speech)

"Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty."
- John F. Kennedy (1961 Inaugural speech)

"If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich."
- John F. Kennedy (1961 Inaugural speech)

"Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate."
- John F. Kennedy (1961 Inaugural speech)

"And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."
- John F. Kennedy (1961 Inaugural speech)

"We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard..."
- John F. Kennedy (Speech at Rice University, September 12, 1962)

"All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words 'Ich bin ein Berliner'."
- John F. Kennedy (Speech in West Berlin, June 26, 1963)

"Mankind must put an end to war, or war will put an end to mankind."
- John F. Kennedy

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
- John F. Kennedy

"We have the power to make this the best generation of mankind in the history of the world - or to make it the last."
- John F. Kennedy

"Victory has a hundred fathers, but defeat is an orphan."
- John F. Kennedy

"Forgive, but never forget."
- John F. Kennedy

"Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly."
- Robert F. Kennedy

"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a nation, where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin, but by the content of their character. I have a dream today."
- Martin Luther King (Speech at Civil Rights March on Washington, August 28, 1963)

"A woman is only a woman, but a good cigar is a smoke."
- Rudyard Kipling (Departmental Ditties, 1886)

"We have forty million reasons for failure, but not a single excuse."
- Rudyard Kipling

"There can not be a crisis next week. My schedule is already full."
- Henry Kissinger

"The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a bit longer."
- Henry Kissinger

"Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build bridges even when there are no rivers."
- Nikita Krustjev

"Pick battles big enough to matter, small enough to win."
- Jonathan Kozol

"If you give a man a fish, he will have a single meal. If you teach him how to fish, he will eat all his life."
- Kwan-Tzu

L

"At age 20, we worry about what others think of us.
At 40, we don't care what they think of us.
At 60, we discover they haven't been thinking of us at all."
- Ann Landers

"It is well that war is so terrible, or we should get too fond of it."
- Robert E. Lee

"The world began without man, and it will complete itself without him."
- Claude Levi-Strauss (Tristes Tropiques, 1955)

"A house divided against itself can not stand. I believe this government can not endure permanently half-slave and half-free."
- Abraham Lincoln (June 17, 1858)

"Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing."
- Abraham Lincoln

"The probability that we may fail in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a course we believe to be just."
- Abraham Lincoln

"Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side; my great concern is to be on God's side, for God is always right."
- Abraham Lincoln

"If you would win a man to your cause, fist convince him that you are his sincere friend."
- Abraham Lincoln

"Whatever you are, be a good one."
- Abraham Lincoln

"Nothing is ever accomplished by a committee unless it consists of three members, one of whom happens to be sick and the other absent."
- H. van Loon

"Sex appeal is 50 per cent what you've got, and 50 percent what people think you've got."
- Sophia Loren

"Hier stehe ich, ich kann nicht anders. Gott helfe mir. Amen!" [Here I stand; I can do no otherwise. God help me. Amen!]
- Martin Luther (Speech at the diet of Worms)

M

"In war there is no substitute for victory."
- General Douglas MacArthur

"The church says that the Earth is flat, but I have seen the shadow on the moon and I have more faith in the shadow than in the church."
- Ferdinand Magellan

"Die Religion... ist das Opium des Volkes." [Religion...is the opium of the people]
- Karl Marx

"I am not a Marxist."
- Karl Marx

"From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs."
- Karl Marx

"I'm fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in."
- George McGovern

"We are apt to forget that a great man is thus not only great, but also a man: that a philosopher, in a life time, spends less hours pondering the destiny of the race than he gives over to wondering if it will rain tomorrow and to meditating upon the toughness of steaks.
- H.L. Mencken (The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, 1913)

"Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what she thinks of him a year afterward, and you will have the truth about him."
- H.L. Mencken (A Book of Burlesques, 1916)

"In brief, she assumed that, being a man, I was vain to the point of imbecility, and this assumption was correct, as it always is.
- H.L. Mencken (Prejudices: Second Series, 1920)

"The trouble with Communism is the Communists, just as the trouble with Christianity is the Christians.
- H.L. Mencken (Life magazine, August 5, 1946)

"Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence."
- H.L. Mencken

"Bachelors know more about women than married men do. If they didn't, they'd be married too."
- H.L. Mencken

"Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard."
- H.L. Mencken

"Conscience: an inner voice that warns us somebody is looking."
- H.L. Mencken

"There are two kinds of books: those that no one reads and those that no one ought to read."
- H.L. Mencken

"A man may be a fool and not now it -- but not if he is married."
- H.L. Mencken

"Well, in politics I'm a complete neutral. I think they're all scoundrels without exception."
- H.L. Mencken

"Continental people have sex-lives; the English have hot-water bottles."
- George Mikes

"If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
- John Stuart Mill

"When you take stuff from one writer it's plagiarism; but when you take it from many writers, it's research."
- Wilson Mizner

"No man, however great, is known to everybody and no man, however solitary, is known to nobody."
- Moore

"When you sell a man a book, you don't sell him 12 ounces of paper and ink and glue - you sell him a whole new life."
- Christopher Morley

"The big majority of Americans, who are comparatively well off, have developed an ability to have enclaves of people living in the greatest misery without almost noticing them."
- Gunnar Myrdal

N

"Marriage is the alliance of two people, one of whom never remembers birthdays and the other who never forgets."
- Ogden Nash

"Ten people who speak make more noise than ten thousand who are silent."
- Napoleon

"In politics stupidity is not a handicap."
- Napoleon

"History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon."
- Napoleon

"Bad officials are elected by good citizens who do not vote."
- George Jean Nathan

"England expects every man to do his duty."
- Lord Nelson (At the battle of Trafalgar, 1805)

"A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one at all would find fault with what he has done."
- Cardinal Newman

"What does not destroy me, makes me strong."
- Friedrich Nietzsche

"A ship is always referred to as 'she' because it costs so much to keep one in paint and powder."
- Chester Nimitz

"This is a great day for France!"
- Richard Nixon (While attending Charles de Gaulle's funeral)

O

"If women didn't exist, all the money in the world would have no meaning."
- Aristoteles Onassis

"The optimist thinks that this is the best of all possible worlds, and the pessimist knows it."
- J. Robert Oppenheimer

"There are a number of mechanical devices which increase sexual arousal, particularly in women. Chief among these is the Mercedes-Benz 380SL convertible."
- P. J. O'Rouke

"Illegal aliens have always been a problem in the United States. Ask any Indian."
- Robert Orben

"On the whole human beings want to be good, but not too good and not quite all the time."
- George Orwell

"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past."
- George Orwell

P

"If all the girls attending the Yale prom were laid end to end, I wouldn't be at all surprised."
- Dorothy Parker

"The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his."
- George S. Patton

"An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today."
- Laurence J. Peter

"Originality is the fine art of remembering what you hear but forgetting where you heard it."
- Laurence J. Peter

"Quo vadis, Domine?" [Where are you going, Lord?]
- Petrus (said to Jesus at the gates of Rome)

"Quem di diligunt adolescens moritur." [He whom the gods love, dies young.]
- Plautus (orig. in greece by Menander)

"Under capitalism man exploits man; under socialism the reverse is true."
- Polish proverb

"Navigare necesse est, vivere non est necesse." [To sail is necessary; to live is not necessary.]
- Gnaeus Pompeius

"One lives in the hope of becoming a memory."
- Antonio Porchia

"A work of kindness is seldom spoken in vain, while witty sayings are as easily lost as the pearls slipping from a broken string."
- Prentice

"They talk most who have the least to say."
- Mathew Prior

"A city is a large community where people are lonesome together."
- Herbert Prochnow

"We are healed of a suffering only by experiencing it to the full."
- Marcel Proust

Q

"I was recently on a tour of Latin America, and the only regret I have was that I didn't study Latin harder in school so I could converse with those people."
J. Danforth Quayle

"If we do not succeed, then we run the risk of failure."
J. Danforth Quayle

"What a waste it is to lose one's mind. Or not to have a mind is being very wasteful. How true that is."
J. Danforth Quayle

"The Holocaust was an obscene period in our nation's history. I mean in this century's history. But we all lived in this century. I didn't live in this century."
J. Danforth Quayle

"One word sums up probably the responsibility of any vice president, and that one word is 'to be prepared'."
J. Danforth Quayle

"We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur."
J. Danforth Quayle

"It isn't pollution that's harming the environment. It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it."
J. Danforth Quayle

"It's wonderful to be here in the great state of Chicago."
J. Danforth Quayle

"The future will be better tomorrow."
J. Danforth Quayle

"Vestis virum reddit." [The clothes make the man.]
- Marcus Fabius Quintilianus

R

"If the heart be right, it matters not which way the head lies."
- Sir Walter Raleigh (at the scaffold)

"A nuclear power plant is infinently safer than eating, because 300 people choke to death on food every year."
- Dixy Lee Ray

"Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed there are many rewards, if you disgrace yourself you can always write a book."
- Ronald Reagan

"Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear."
- Ambrose Redmoon

"Love is like an hourglass, with the heart filling up as the brain empties."
- Jules Renard

"The streets are safe in Philadelphia, it's only the people who make them unsafe."
- Frank Rizzo

"Absence diminishes little passions and increases great ones, just as the wind blows our a candle and fans a fire."
- La Rochefoucauld

"I believe that every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity, an obligation; every possession, a duty."
- John D. Rockefeller

"We can't all be heroes because someone has to sit on the curb and clap as they go by."
- Will Rogers

"One-third of the people in the United States promote, while the other two-thirds provide."
- Will Rogers

"Invest in inflation. It is the only thing going up."
- Will Rogers

"An ignorant person is one who doesn't know what you have just found out."
- Will Rogers

"My forefathers didn't come over on the Mayflower, but they met the boat."
- Will Rogers

"Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there."
- Will Rogers

"Diplomacy is the art of saying »nice doggy« until you can find a rock."
- Will Rogers

"I don't make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts."
- Will Rogers

"Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent."
- Eleanor Roosevelt

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
- Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933 inaugural address)

"I have seen war. I have seen war on land and sea. I have seen blood running from the wounded... I have seen the dead in the mud. I have seen cities destroyed... I have seen children starving. I have seen the agony of mothers and wives. I hate war."
- Franklin D. Roosevelt (Address at Chautauqua, NY, August 14, 1936)

"How rare and wonderful is that flash of a moment when we realize we have discovered a friend."
- William Rotsler

"People who know little are usually great talkers, while men who know much say little."
- Jean Jacques Rousseau

"Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet."
- Jean Jacques Rousseau

"To write a good love letter, you ought to begin without knowing what you mean to say and to finish without knowing what you have written.
- Jean Jacques Rousseau

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."
- Bertrand Russell

"Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric."
- Bertrand Russell

"War does not determine who is right - only who is left."
- Bertrand Russell

S

"A dress makes no sense unless it inspires men to want to take it off you."
- Francois Sagan

"There is only one happiness in life, to love and be loved."
- George Sand

"A man's feet should be planted in his country, but his eyes should survey the world."
- George Santayana

"The young man who has not wept is a savage, and the old man who will not laugh is a fool."
- George Santayana

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
- George Santayana

"When the rich make war it's the poor that die."
- Jean-Paul Sartre

"Oh, what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practice to deceive!"
- Sir Walter Scott (Marmion, 1808)

"Education is when you read the fine print. Experience is what you get if you don't."
- Pete Seeger

"Per aspera ad astra." [To the stars through hardship.]
- Lucius Annaeus Seneca

"Consultant: any ordinary guy more than fifty miles from home."
- E.Sevareid

"Something is rotten in the state of Denmark"
- William Shakespeare (Hamlet, Act I, Scene IV; [Marcellus] )

"To be or not to be, -that is the question
: -Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?
-To die, -to sleep
-No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heartache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, -'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd"
- William Shakespeare (Hamlet, Act III, Scene I; [Hamlet] )

"The rest is silence."
- William Shakespeare (Hamlet, Act V, Scene II; [Hamlet] )

"And oftentimes excusing of a fault
Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse."
- William Shakespeare (King John, Act IV, Scene II; [Pembroke] )

"The ripest fruit first falls."
- William Shakespeare (King Richard the Second, Act II, Scene I; [King Richard] )

"Look, how my ring encompasseth thy finger,
Even so thy breast encloseth my poor heart;
Wear both of them, for both of them are thine."
- William Shakespeare (King Richard the Third, Act I, Scene II; [Gloster to Anne] )

"A horse! a horse! my kingdom for a horse!
- William Shakespeare (King Richard the Third, Act V, Scene IV; [King Richard] )

"How far that little candle throws his beams!
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
- William Shakespeare (The Merchant of Venice, Act V, Scene I; [Portia] )

"Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;
And therefore is wing'd cupid painted blind."
- William Shakespeare (A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act I, Scene I; [Helena] )

"I have night's cloak to hide me from their sight;
And but thou love me, let them find me here:
My life were better ended by their hate,
Than death prorogued, wanting of thy love."
- William Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene II; [Romeo to Juliet] )

"Good night, good night! parting is such sweet sorrow,
That I shall say good night till it be morrow."
- William Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene II; [Juliet to Romeo] )

"Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night,
And pay no worship to the garish sun.
- William Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene II; [Juliet] )

"Good name in man and woman, dear my lord,
Is the immediate jewel of their souls:
Who steals my purse steals trash; 'tis something, nothing;
'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands:
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him
And makes me poor indeed."
- William Shakespeare (Othello, Act III, Scene III; [Iago to Othello] )

"He lives in fame that died in virtue's cause."
- William Shakespeare (Titus Andronicus, Act I, Scene I)

"The text is old, the orator to green."
- William Shakespeare (Venus and Adonis )

"He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches."
- George Bernhard Shaw (Man and Superman, 1903)

"Do not do unto others as you would they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same."
- George Bernhard Shaw

"Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few."
- George Bernhard Shaw

"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all others because you were born in it."
- George Bernhard Shaw

"Reasonable people adapt themselves to the world. Unreasonable people tries to adapt the world to themselves. All progress, therefore, depends on unreasonable people."
- George Bernhard Shaw

"Life is a flame that is always burning itself out, but it catches fire again every time a child is born."
- George Bernhard Shaw

"Take care to get what you like or you will be forced to like what you get."
- George Bernhard Shaw

"A committee is a group of people who individually can do nothing, but as a group decide that nothing can be done."
- Alfred E. Smith

"Gnothi seuton." [Know thyself.]
- Socrates

"I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance.
- Socrates

"A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic."
- Josef Stalin

"A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you look forward to the trip."
- Cashie Stinnett

T

"The real problem is what to do with the problem solvers after the problems are solved."
- G. Talese

"I stopped believing in Santa Claus when I was six. Mother took me to see him in a department store and he asked for my autograph."
- Shirley Temple

"The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread."
- Mother Theresa

"We can do no great things, only small things with great love."
- Mother Theresa

"God's fingers touch'd him, and he slept."
- Alfred Tennyson (In Memoriam, 1850)

"Goodness is the only investment that never fails."
- Thoreau

"If love is the answer, could you rephrase the question?"
- Lily Tomlin

"Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets."
- Paul Tournier

"If you can't convince them, confuse them."
- Harry S. Truman

"It's a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it's a depression when you lose your own."
- Harry S. Truman

"A succesful man is one who makes more money than his wife can spend. A succesful woman is one who can find such a man."
- Lana Turner

"What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight - it's the size of the fight in the dog."
- Mark Twain

"Man is the only animal that blushes - or needs to."
- Mark Twain

"Of the delights of this world, man cares most for sexual intercourse, yet he has left it out of his heaven."
- Mark Twain

"The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."
- Mark Twain

"Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself."
- Mark Twain

"Principles have no real force except when one is well fed."
- Mark Twain

"Buy land, they're not making it anymore."
- Mark Twain

"A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody has."
- Mark Twain

"Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest."
- Mark Twain

"Forget and forgive. This is not difficult when properly understood. It means forget inconvenient duties, then forgive yourself for forgetting. By rigid practice and stern determination, it comes easy."
- Mark Twain

V

"The most succesful businessman is the man who holds onto the old just as long as it is good, and grabs the new just as soon as it is better."
- R.P. Vanderpoel

"Si vis pacem, para bellum." [If you want peace, prepare for war.]
- Vegetius

"Iron rusts from disuse, stagnant water loses its purity, and in cold weather become frozen: even so does inaction sap the vigors of the mind."
- Leonardo da Vinci

"As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so life well used brings happy death."
- Leonardo da Vinci

"He who thinks himself wise, Oh heavens, is a great fool."
- Voltaire

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
- Voltaire (attrib.)

W

"Sex is an emotion in motion."
- Mae West

"Too much of a good thing can be wonderful."
- Mae West

"There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about."
- Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Grey, 1891)

"In life, we are all in the gutter. Some of us just tend to look up at the stars."
- Oscar Wilde (Lady Windermere's Fan, 1892

"A cynic is a person who knows the prize of everything and the value of nothing."
- Oscar Wilde (Lady Windermere's Fan, 1892

"The youth of America is their oldest tradition. It has been going on now for three hundred years."
- Oscar Wilde (A Woman of No Importance, 1893

"Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much."
- Oscar Wilde

"I am not young enough to know everything."
- Oscar Wilde

"I think that God in creating man somewhat overestimated his ability."
- Oscar Wilde

"God gave all men a penis and a brain, but only enough blood to run one at a time."
- Robin Williams

"Only the winners decide what were war crimes."
- Gary Wills

"To sell something, tell a woman it's a bargain; tell a man it's deductible."
- E. Wilson

"Friendship is the only cement that will ever hold the world together."
- Woodrow Wilson

"When two men in business always agree, one of them is unnecessary."
- W. Wrigley J:r

Y

"Nothing is illegal if a hundred businessmen decide to do it, and that's true anywhere in the world."
- A. Young

Z

"It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees!"
- Emiliano Zapata

Quotes & Aphorisms from Allen to Zapata