How easy to be amiable in the midst of happiness and success.
—Sophie Swetchine (Russian Mystic, Writer)
The years of getting up again after a tremendous collapse, these are the good growth years of the people.
—Hans Carossa (German Novelist)
I do not think anyone can be taught anything about humor, but I do think that certain persons may be taught the mechanism of producing humorous copy that will sell to magazines and newspapers.
—Don Marquis (American Humorist, Journalist)
Absence is one of the most useful ingredients of family life, and to dose it rightly is an art like any other.
—Freya Stark (British Explorer, Writer)
A dream is a scripture, and many scriptures are nothing but dreams.
—Umberto Eco (Italian Novelist)
Great is peace, for it is to the world what yeast is to the dough.
—The Talmud (Sacred Text of the Jewish Faith)
Atheism deprives superstition of its stand ground, and compels Theism to reason for its existence.
—George Holyoake (English Social Reformer)
Thought expands, but paralyzes; action animates, but narrows.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (German Poet)
All religions have based morality on obedience, that is to say, on voluntary slavery. That is why they have always been more pernicious than any political organization. For the latter makes use of violence, the former—of the corruption of the will.
—Alexander Herzen (Russian Revolutionary, Writer)
Intrinsic is the belief that quality does not happen by accident, it must be planned!
—Joseph Juran (American Quality Scholar)
A desire to “give back” needn’t imply giving to the neediest. It could mean giving to those with the most potential to benefit.
—Marty Nemko (American Career Coach)
Use your weaknesses; aspire to the strength.
—Laurence Olivier (English Actor, Producer,, Director)
The history of progress is written in the blood of men and women who have dared to espouse an unpopular cause, as, for instance, the black man’s right to his body, or woman’s right to her soul.
—Emma Goldman (American Anarchist)
There is a certain justice in criticism. The critic is like a midwife—a tyrannical midwife.
—Stephen Spender (English Poet, Critic)
Our hearts of stone become hearts of flesh when we learn where the outcast weeps.
—Brennan Manning (American Franciscan Priest Theologian, Author)
A human being whose life is nurtured in an advantage which has accrued from the disadvantage of other human beings, and who prefers that this should remain as it is, is a human being by definition only, having much more in common with the bedbug, the tapeworm, the cancer, and the scavengers of the deep sea.
—James Agee (American Man of Letters)