Right Attitudes

First, I do not sit down at my desk to put into verse something that is already clear in my mind. If it were clear in my mind, I should have no incentive or need to write about it. We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand.
—Cecil Day-Lewis (British Poet, Critic)

The proper office of a friend is to side with you when you are in the wrong. Nearly anybody will side with you when you are in the right.
—Mark Twain (American Humorist)

There shall be eternal summer in the grateful heart.
—Celia Thaxter (American Poet)

While there is perhaps a province in which the photograph can tell us nothing more than what we see with our own eyes, there is another in which it proves to us how little our eyes permit us to see.
—Dorothea Lange (American Photographer)

Words today are like the shells and rope of seaweed which a child brings home glistening from the beach and which in an hour have lost their luster.
—Cyril Connolly (British Literary Critic)

How much a dunce that has been sent to roam, excels a dunce that has been kept at home.
—William Cowper (English Anglican Poet)

Thinking should become your capital asset, whatever ups and downs you may come across in your life.
—A. P. J. Abdul Kalam (Indian Head of State, Scientist)

In the real world, equal respect for all cultures doesn’t translate into a rich mosaic of colorful and proud peoples interacting peacefully while maintaining a delightful diversity of food and craftwork. It translates into closed pockets of oppression, ignorance, and abuse.
—Ayaan Hirsi Ali (Dutch Politician, Activist)

When I think of vision, I have in mind the ability to see above and beyond the majority.
—Chuck Swindoll (American Christian Pastor)

Perfect works are rare, because they must be produced at the happy moment when taste and genius unite; and this rare conjuncture, like that of certain planets, appears to occur only after the revolution of several cycles, and only lasts for an instant.
—Francois-Rene de Chateaubriand (French Writer, Statesman)

I’m carrying on a tradition. But I’d rather be a first-rate version of myself than a second-rate version of somebody else. I’m proud of my parents, and the only way that I can prove it to them is to take what they gave me and work my head off.
—Liza Minnelli (American Singer, Actress)

Let gratitude be the pillow upon which you kneel to say your nightly prayer. And let faith be the bridge you build to overcome evil and welcome good.
—Maya Angelou (American Poet)

Be glad of life because it gives you to chance to love and to work and to play and to look up at the stars.
—Henry van Dyke Jr. (American Author, Educator, Clergyman)

Individualism is cherished because it produces freedom, but the gift is conditional.
—Garrett Hardin (American Ecologist)

The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for whites or women for men.
—Alice Walker (American Novelist, Activist)

Prejudice renders a man’s virtue his habit, and not a series of unconnected acts. Through just prejudice, his duty becomes a part of his nature.
—Edmund Burke (British Philosopher, Statesman)

History has now been for the first time systematically considered, and has been found, like other phenomena, subject to invariable laws.
—Auguste Comte (French Philosopher)

When crisis hits, we don’t turn against each other. No, we listen to each other, we lean on each other, because we are always stronger together.
—Michelle Obama (American First Lady)

It’s very, very hard to affect culture. And you can get surprised thinking you’re farther down the path of change than you really are because, frankly, most of us like the way things are.
—Carol Bartz (American Businesswoman)

You need people who can walk their companies into the future rather than back them into the future.
—Warren Bennis (American Management Consultant)

The story of a man’s soul, however trivial, can be more interesting and instructive than the story of a whole nation.
—Mikhail Lermontov (Russian Novelist, Poet)