In ancient times, do you think that there was not the ignorant, and the shallow minded? And why after all should you embrace so fondly a carcass of dead thoughts. Live in the present and shape the future, do not be casting lingering looks to the distant past for the past has passed away, never again to return.
—Subramanya Bharathi (Indian Tamil Poet)
Choice means saying no to one thing so you can say yes to another.
—Dan Millman (American Children’s Books Writer)
Quarrels often arise in marriages when the bridal gifts are excessive.
—Ausonius (Latin Poet, Rhetorician)
Mourning can be very selfish. When someone you love has died, you tend to recall best those few moments and incidents that helped clarify your sense, not of the person who has died, but of your own self.
—Russell Banks (American Author)
The great biblical tradition says that loving God and loving one’s neighbor are not two separate actions but two sides of the same action. It was the prophet Amos who bore witness to the fact that divine worship is nothing but human justice being offered to God and human justice is nothing but divine worship being lived out.
—John Shelby Spong (American Episcopal Bishop)
Your home is regarded as a model home, your life as a model life. But all this splendor, and you along with it… it’s just as though it were built upon a shifting quagmire. A moment may come, a word can be spoken, and both you and all this splendor will collapse.
—Henrik Ibsen (Norwegian Playwright)
Lift up your worries and ask for grace to get through the rest of the day.
—Sarah Ban Breathnach (American Self-help Author)
Never think that Jesus commanded a trifle, nor dare to trifle with anything He has commanded.
—Dwight L. Moody (Christian Religious Leader)
Emptiness is a symptom that you are not living creatively. You either have no goal that is important enough to you, or you are not using your talents and efforts in a striving toward an important goal.
—Maxwell Maltz (American Surgeon)
All good fortune is a gift of the gods, and you don’t win the favor of the ancient gods by being good, but by being bold.
—Anita Brookner (English Novelist, Art Historian)