Right Attitudes

Always read stuff that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.
—P. J. O’Rourke (American Journalist)

The famous dictum which states that all men are equal will find its illustration in the colonies only when the colonized subject states he is equal to the colonist.
—Frantz Fanon (Algerian Political Theorist)

No one ever discovers the depths of his own loneliness.
—Georges Bernanos (French Novelist, Polemicist)

In the dark colony of night, when I consider man’s magnificent capacity for malice, madness, folly, envy, rage, and destructiveness, and I wonder whether we shall not end up as breakfast for newts and polyps, I seem to hear the muffled cries of all the words in all the books with covers closed.
—Leo Rosten (American Humorist)

When strong, be merciful, if you would have the respect, not the fear of your neighbors.
—Chilon of Sparta (Spartan Magistrate)

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. Then give up. There’s no use in being a damn fool about it.
—Stephen Leacock (Canadian Humorist)

There is only one ultimate and effectual preventive for the maladies to which flesh is heir, and that is death.
—Harvey Williams Cushing (American Neurosurgeon, Biographer)

The poverty of the future will be ignorance, and the social differences of the years to come will be established, rather than by money, by the culture of those who know something and those who know nothing.
—Luciano De Crescenzo (Italian Film Actor, Director, Engineer)

Man will never be enslaved by machinery if the man tending the machine be paid enough.
—Karel Capek (Czech Novelist)

I think if you look at people, whether in business or government, who haven’t had any moral compass, who’ve just changed to say whatever they thought the popular thing was, in the end they’re losers.
—Michael Bloomberg (American Businessperson)

The trouble with organizing a thing is that pretty soon folks get to paying more attention to the organization than to what they’re organized for.
—Laura Ingalls Wilder (American Author of Children’s Novels)

You can’t accomplish anything worthwhile if you inhibit yourself. If life teaches you nothing else, know this for sure: When you get the chance, go for it.
—Oprah Winfrey (American TV Personality)

Happiness and sadness run parallel to each other.
When one takes a rest,
the other one tends to take up the slack.
—Hazelmarie ‘Mattie’ Elliott (American Author)

The sleep of reason produces monsters.
—Francisco Goya (Spanish Artist)

The real and lasting victories are those of peace and not of war.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (American Philosopher)

There are obviously two educations. One should teach us how to make a living and the other how to live.
—James Truslow Adams (American Historian)

Why should we strive, with cynic frown, to knock their fairy castles down?
—Eliza Cook (English Poet)

Experience has taught me that there is one chief reason why some people succeed and others fail. The difference is not one of knowing, but of doing. The successful man is not so superior in ability as in action. So far as success can be reduced to a formula, it consists of this: doing what you know you should do.
—Roger Babson (American Economist)

Not to go back is somewhat to advance. And men must walk, at least, before they dance.
—Alexander Pope (English Poet)

Testimony is like an arrow shot from a long bow; its force depends on the strength of the hand that draws it.—But argument is like an arrow from a cross bow, which has equal force if drawn by a child or a man.
—Robert Boyle (Irish Scientist, Philosopher)

The world of achievement has always belonged to the optimist.
—J. Harold Wilkins (American Businessman)

My clearest recollection of a long-ago interview with Thomas A. Edison is of a single sentence that was painted and hung on a wall in his room. In effect, the sentence was, “It is remarkable to what lengths people will go to avoid thought.” That is tragically true. Some of think, more of us think we think, and most of us don’t even think of thinking. The result is a somewhat cockeyed world.
—Channing Pollock (American Playwright, Critic)

Finance would be better if it was taught by the psychology and history departments at universities.
—Morgan Housel (American Financial Journalist, Investor)

Be the master of your will, and the slave of your conscience.
—Yiddish Proverb

Life is not so important as the duties of life.
—John Randolph (American Politician)

The timid man calls himself cautious, the sordid man thrifty.
—Publilius Syrus (Syrian-born Latin Writer)

Glory comes too late, after one as been reduced to ashes.
—Martial (Ancient Roman Latin Poet)

Like what you do, if you don’t like it, do something else.
—Paul Harvey (American Broadcaster)

Reason conquers all.
—Marcus Manilius (Roman Poet)

There’s no thrill in easy sailing when the skies are clear and blue, there’s no joy in merely doing things which any one can do. But there is some satisfaction that is mighty sweet to take, when you reach a destination that you thought you’d never make.
—Edgar Guest (English-born American Poet)

Creativity is almost always: unlearned. Ask young children, “Are you creative?” They’ll all raise a hand. By age 16, none of them will because they’ve had their creativity gently squeezed out of them by those who think conventionally.
—John Cleese (British Comic Actor, Writer)

It’s not the having, it’s the getting.
—Elizabeth Taylor (American Actress)

Differences of opinion give me but little concern; but it is a real pleasure to be brought into communication with any one who is in earnest, and who really look to God’s will as his standard of right and wrong, and judges of actions according to their greater or less conformity.
—Thomas Arnold (English Educationalist)

Home is where you come to when you have nothing better to do.
—Margaret Thatcher (British Head of State)

Every moment that I am centered in the future, I suffer a temporary loss of this life.
—Hugh Prather (American Christian Author)

When all think alike, no one is thinking very much.
—Walter Lippmann (American Journalist)

If we cannot end now our differences, at least we can make the world safe for diversity.
—John F. Kennedy (American Head of State)

Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.
—Kenny Rogers (American Singer-Songwriter)

Every beginning is a consequence. Every beginning ends something.
—Paul Valery (French Critic, Poet)

A beautiful literature springs from the depth and fullness of intellectual and moral life, from an energy of thought and feeling, to which nothing, as we believe, ministers so largely as enlightened religion.
—William Ellery Channing (American Theologian, Poet)

Cease not to be the sculptor of thine own image.
—Plotinus (Ancient Greek Philosopher, Mystic)