"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Benjamin Franklin
-----------------
How about a collection of short quotes all from the deceased. Change the title to help *explain your choice.
I'm familiar with your quote of Franklin. Haven't memorized it, but its essence lurks around in my mind.
Thanks, Musick, for putting it up here.
"I had a lover's quarrel with the world."
"We love the things we love for what they are."
--Robert Frost (American Poet 1874-1963)
"Oh, isn't life a terrible thing, thank God."
--Dylan Thomas (Welsh poet 1914-1953)
"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.
--Henry David Thoreau (American writer 1817-1862)
Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the
incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few. - G. B. Shaw
Nationalism is an infantile disease, the measles of humanity. Einstein
Patriotism is a pernicious, psychopathic form of idiocy. - G. B. Shaw
Nationalism is an infantile disease, the measles of humanity. ~ Einstein
Patriotism is a pernicious, psychopathic form of idiocy. - G. B. Shaw
Not only are those two sentences clumsy they are without any cogent semantic content. I wonder? Do either of these guys have day jobs?
(the nuance, sjm, is...why are you quoting these philosophically silly fellow with their silly naive remarks? Do you enjoy having omnipotent heros? 
>the nuance, sjm, is...why are you quoting these
I see no need to defend my choices.
wa as-salaam alaikum
"Honest disagreement is often a good sign of progress."
--Mohandas Gandhi (Indian statesman)
"There is nothing more likely to start disagreement among people or countries than an agreement."
--E. B. White (American writer)
"Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again."
--Andre Gide (1869-1951 French Writer)
"An association of men who will not quarrel with one another is a thing which has never yet existed, from the greatest confederacy of nations down to a town meeting or a vestry."
--Thomas Jefferson
"The aim of argument, or of discussion, should not be victory, but progress."
--Joseph Joubert
"When all are wrong, everyone is right."
--La Lehaussee
"It is better to debate a question without settling it than to settle it without debate."
--Joseph Joubert
"No matter what side of the argument you are on, you always find people on your side that you wish were on the other."
--Jascha Heifetz
"The true spirit of conversation consists in building on another man's observation, not overturning it."
--Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton 1803-1873, British Writer
"A sudden silence in the middle of a conversation suddenly brings us back to essentials: it reveals how dearly we must pay for the invention of speech."
--E. M. Cioran 1911-, Rumanian-born French Philosopher
"Repartee is perfect when it effects its purpose with a double edge. It is the highest order of wit, as it indicates the coolest yet quickest exercise of genius, at a moment when the passions are roused."
" Reply to wit with gravity, and to gravity with wit."
--(both quotes)--Charles Caleb Colton 1780-1832, British Sportsman, Writer
"Conversation is an art in which a man has all mankind for competitors."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson 1803-1882, American Poet, Essayist
" No collection of people who are all waiting for the same thing are capable of holding a natural conversation. Even if the thing they are waiting for is only a taxi."
--Ben Elton 1959-, British Author, Performer
" The great secret of succeeding in conversation is to admire little, to hear much; always to distrust our own reason, and sometimes that of our friends; never to pretend to wit, but to make that of others appear as much as possibly we can; to hearken to what is said and to answer to the purpose."
--Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790, American Scientist, Publisher, Diplomat
"Conversation. What is it? A Mystery! It's the art of never seeming bored, of touching everything with interest, of pleasing with trifles, of being fascinating with nothing at all. How do we define this lively darting about with words, of hitting them back and forth, this sort of brief smile of ideas which should be conversation?"
--Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893, French Writer
"There is no conversation more boring than the one where everybody agrees."
--Michel Eyquem De Montaigne 1533-1592, French Philosopher, Essayist
" Not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment."
--George Sala
"Conversation has a kind of charm about it, an insinuating and insidious something that elicits secrets just like love or liquor."
--Seneca 4 B.C. – 65 A.D., Spanish-born Roman Statesman, philosopher
"Conversation should be pleasant without scurrility, witty without affection, free without indecency, learned without conceitedness, novel without falsehood."
--William Shakespeare 1564-1616, British Poet, Playwright, Actor
"She has lost the art of conversation, but not, unfortunately, the power of speech."
--George Bernard Shaw 1856-1950, Irish-born British Dramatist
" A good memory and a tongue tied in the middle is a combination which gives immortality to conversation."
--Mark Twain 1835-1910, American Humorist, Writer
"There is no such thing as conversation. It is an illusion. There are intersecting monologues, that is all."
--Rebecca West 1892-1983, British Author
" It is all right to hold a conversation but you should let go of it now and then."
--Richard Armour 1906-1989, American Poet
"Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory."
--Leonardo da Vinci
""It does not require many words to speak the truth."
-- Chief Joseph, Nez Perce tribe
""As I grow older, I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do."
-- Andrew Carnegie
"If you have learned how to disagree without being disagreeable, then you have discovered the secret of getting along -- whether it be business, family relations, or life itself."
--Bernard Meltzer 1914-1999, American Law Professor
"So let's leave it alone 'cause we can't see eye-to-eye
There ain't no good guys, there ain't no bad guys
There's only you and me and we just disagree"
--Dave Mason, British songwriter (not dead yet, but)
"You talkin' to me!!?
--Robert DeNiro, American Actor (not dead yet, either, but)
Pay no attention to Caesar; Caesar doesn't have the slightest idea what's *really going on.
-- Bokonon
Those who *do study history are condemned to realize they are repeating it.
-- Wait a minute, I'm not dead yet. Don't read that one for another twenty, thirty years or so.
"Wait a minute, I'm not dead yet."
--Faldage, American Nitpicker
American Nitpicker
short quotes all from the deceased
Following the rules is not a nit, waterbug.
Following the rules is not a nit, waterbug....after quoting himselfSo you're dead, then?
"We don't need no steenkin' rules!"
--musick, American Musician (not dead, either, but)
"You ain't seen nothin', yet!"
--Al Jolson, American Entertainer (dead)
"Nits make lice."
-Colonel J.M. Chivington, 19th Century US Cavalry Officer
dead, then?
There is still much for you to learn, young Luke.
-- Obi-wan Kenobi
"Let us not persevere in the wrong for the sake of consistency"
Franklin Pierce
""It does not require many words to speak the truth."
-- Chief Joseph, Nez Perce tribe
Gossip is vice enjoyed vicariously.
Elbert Hubbard
"Wait a minute, I'm not dead yet."Akshually®, I just liked the intriguing paradox of your statement...your title as Nitpicker has absolutely nothing to do with anything here.
--The Waterbug
"There are four questions of value in life... What is sacred? Of what is the spirit made? What is worth living for, and what is worth dying for? The answer to each is the same. Only love."
--Don Juan DeMarco
Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader were engaged in mortal light-sabre combat. Vader, realizing that he was beginning to flag a bit, decided that he needed to disengage in order to regain some of his strength. He hit upon the stratagem of confusing his young opponent.
Sabres crossed, they wrestled back and forth across the platform. Suddenly Vader spoke. "Luke, Luke, I know what you're getting for Christmas!"
Luke paused, confusion writ large upon his handsome features. "How can you possibly know that, Vader?"
Vader replied in his rasping voice, "Luke, I felt your presents."
Patriotism is the notion that one's country is the best because one was born in it.
-- Somebody if he ain' dead yet's gone be quick as somebody elks finds out who he is.
My Country right or wrong; when right, to be kept right; when wrong, to be put right.
-- Carl Shurz
The unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable.
Oscar Wilde
"Nice guys finish last!"
--Leo Durocher (dead; and long-time manager of the Chicago Cubs, who usually finished dead last...go figgur
)
>Patriotism is the notion that one's country is the best because one was born in it.
I first read this as attributed to GBS, and last I checked, he was pushing up daisies, so you're OK.
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/g/q107008.html
"We love life, not because we are used to living but because we are used to loving."
--Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900 German philosopher)
"It is not easy to see how the more extreme forms of nationalism can long survive when men have seen the Earth in its true perspective as a single small globe against the stars."
--Arthur C. Clarke (not dead yet, but too good to pass up)
"Each man must for himself alone decide what is right and what is wrong, which course is patriotic and which isn't. You cannot shirk this and be a man. To decide against your conviction is to be an unqualified and excusable traitor, both to yourself and to your country, let me label you as they may."
--Mark Twain, (1835-1910, American Writer)
"Nationalism" has no worth outside of that which is good.
The swinging of flags by nations that have never directed light towards the realization of the community of man (name your country) are a blight upon earth.
We, the United States of America, the leading directment of the idea that all people are one, have through time, clearly demonstrated our understanding that people of the world belong to a single group of sapient individuals... with everyone wondering...? why the heck are we here?
________________ ~~~ Johnny "Guitar" Watson
(as he would have said it before he died.)
"Nice guys finish seventh!" not last!
actually i was just reading about your 'quote' WO'N-- Durocher never said it.. what he said, at a time when the 'league' had seven member teams was "Nice guys finish seventh" but at the number of teams in the baseball league grew, it didn't have the same meaning, and it got recast as Nice guys finish last!" which captured the idea he was expressing..
faldage isn't the only one who can nit pick!
"Quotation: The act of repeating erroneously the words of another. The words erroneously repeated."
--Ambrose Bierce
"Perish the man who said our good things before us."
--Donatus
Excerpt from "Nice Guys Finish Seventh"
Why We Misquote:
http://makeashorterlink.com/?H3E7126F1(from the excerpt)
>W. C. Fields's best remembered saying is "Any man who hates dogs and children can't be all bad." Fields didn't say it. These words were said about Fields, by Leo Rosten, as he introduced the comedian at a 1939 Masquers banquet in Los Angeles. Rosten, then a young sociologist studying the movie industry, found himself seated on the dais. After the meal he was invited to say a few words about the guest of honor. Unable to think of anything else, Rosten blurted out, "The only thing I can say about Mr. W. C. Fields, whom I have admired since the day he advanced upon Baby LeRoy with an icepick, is this: Any man who hates babies and dogs can't be all bad." According to Rosten his quip brought down the house. He later called it "one of those happy 'ad libs' God sends you." Two weeks later Rosten's line was mentioned in Time Magazine. At the time few people had heard of Leo Rosten. As a result, it didn't take long for Rosten's words to get put in a better-known mouth: that of Fields himself. It's stayed there ever since.
* "Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing" was the slogan of UCLA football coach Red Sanders, not Vince Lombardi.
* "The opera ain't over till the fat lady sings" was adapted from an older saying: "Church ain't out till the fat lady sings."
* "Elementary, my dear Watson," does not appear in any of Arthur Conan Doyle's books about Sherlock Holmes.
* Calvin Coolidge didn't say, "The business of America is business."
* Leo Durocher never said "Nice guys finish last." <
And, BTW, James Cagney never said, "You dirty rat!" and Cary Grant never said, "Judy, Judy, Judy!"
And, of course, as we all know, Humphrey Bogart never said, "Play it again, Sam."
And, as an extra added bonus, all these folks are
dead...so I'm cool with the rule!
It was Durocher's wife that said, "nice guys finish last."
What Durocher said was in response to someone asking him why he wasn't a nice guy. He said something like:
See those guys over there (The Brooklyn Dodgers, if memory serves)? They're nice guys. They're in seventh place (which wasn't last since there *were eight teams in the league (unless that was the same year that someone else suggested that the Dodger's *weren't in the league)).
Immortality is not everybody's thing
Kurt Schwitters
(my translation)
George Bernard Shaw 1856-1950, Irish-born British DramatistWhat the heck does this mean?
Either:
(a)GBS was born and brought up in Ireland, so that makes him simply "Irish".
Or: (b) We're going back to his (I just read) Yorkshire roots, and he's "British", or perhaps even "English".
UK convention would generally be for nationality to be determined by place of birth rather than by blood, certainly nowadays. Ergo GBS was an Irish Dramatist (and Writer). Naturally he was perfectly entitled to draw attention to his English blood as he saw fit.
Nitpicker Too"Mine is the right to be wrong" - Ian Anderson, Scotlish Musician, Marvelously Extreme Flautist. Also NDY.
from today's Daily Word:
Everything you've learned in school as `obvious' becomes less and less
obvious as you begin to study the universe. For example, there are no
solids in the universe. There's not even a suggestion of a solid. There are
no absolute continuums. There are no surfaces. There are no straight lines.
-R. Buckminster Fuller, engineer, designer, and architect (1895-1983)
Jazzo?
George Bernard Shaw 1856-1950, Irish-born British Dramatist
What the heck does this mean?Dunno, shona...wondered the same myself...this one quote site has all these strange multi-faceted bio lines....I can't seem to find it again, though. If I do, I'll edit-in the url here.
"There was never yet philosopher
That could endure the toothache patiently."
--Wm Shakespeare (very dead)
Yesterday my son found a little red 3" X 5" ruled sheet notebook that my mother (still extant) had given me some 20 odd years ago with the hope that the hand written sayings inside would lead to me to a better life. Being me and being real smart I had put the little notebook aside and forgot it.
Now I realize that if I had followed her sayings I might today be on MTV or at least be driving a silver Mercedes Benz.
I'm pretty sure mother got the red book idea from the
Little Red Book of Saying that proved so successful for
Chairman Mao Zedong (mother wasn't picky about stealing an idea) but many of the thoughts inside Mom's book have value even in the world of today. I offer them here in the hope that they will help you folk become rich, or failing that, at least become better people.
Way To Go by Dorothy Grider Washington*** Don't wait for your ship to come in swim out and meet it.
*** Don't worry about losing your memory. Just forget about it.
*** Trust in God. But Lock your car.
*** Never laugh at anyones dreams.
*** When I count my blessings I count you twice.
*** Whatever the problem - Please give me two minutes for an alibi.
*** The wise do sooner what fools do later.
*** Goldfish don't like jello.
*** Living is like licking honey off a thorn.
*** Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get.
*** You can't have a good day in bad underwear.
*** If you can't say anything good about someone sit right here by me.
*** Smile big.
*** There is no elevator to success - you have to take the stairs.
*** Gods greatest gift - "your child".
*** Make haste slowly.
*** The eleventh commandment: Thy Shall Laugh.
*** Animals don't gripe.
*** Yes, a woman is the beginning of everything great.
-
Abe Lincoln*** Half the sky is held up by women.
*** You rest you rust.
*** You can't be mad when you sing.
*** Refrigerators hum in B-flat.
*** Lord, grant me patience - and I need it right now.
*** There is not a right way to do a wrong thing.
*** You have not because you ask not. -
James Chap 4 - verse 2.
*** Some cause happiness where ever they go, others when ever they go.
(My Mother brought happiness wherever she went, she stills does, but please excuse me, now I must go and watch TV.) ___ ___~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Living is like licking honey off a thorn. 
-----------------
Reading is like thinking with someone else's head instead of with one's own.
Arthur Schopenhauer
Enough said.
Thanks for sharing your mom with us, milum!
>>
Living is like licking honey off a thorn. Yeah, I'm down with that one too, Musick.
And an unattributed piece of advice I recently picked up:
"What would you do if you weren't afraid?"(That one is fast on its way to becoming my next tattoo...)
>>Living is like licking honey off a thorn.
"I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!"
--P. B. Shelley
(That one is fast on its way to becoming my next tattoo...)
mmmm... I wonder what the previous one *said.
What would you do if you weren't afraid?
i guess i have lived most of my life life with a similar sentement... There is nothing wrong with being afraid... but being afraid is not a excuse not to do something.
i have been at time extremely anxious. but, i tried not to let fear control my actions.
i remember, late one night, christmas eve, walking across a university campus, on the edge of a rough neighborhood.
as i walked, i thought i heard foot steps behind me.. i walked a little faster, and sure enough, someone was following me.. we were coming close to the quad, and while the walk up until now was lonely it was in sight of a major city street,(but this road was growing more distant with each step) the quad closed in, there were building, and narrow passages, and much of the area was too far from the street... and most of the dorms were dark and unoccupied, being this was christmas week.
so i abruptly halted, and swung myself around 180 degrees, and headed straight towards the person who was following me..
it turned out to be someone i knew, and he was afraid to break the stillness of the night, and call out, and was uncertain if it was me...he told me i gave him the fright of his life when i turn heels and started walking to him, and more over, he asked, what if it wasn't me? what if it was someone who was out to hurt you?
i replied, Hopefully, i would have given them the fright of their life, and scared them into thinking differently, since i was not what they expected..
i have found facing fear head on... it almost always easier than running away.
more than What would you do if you weren't afraid?--i would say, act, even if your are afraid.
"America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between." -- Oscar Wilde
"There is no such thing as a moral book or an immoral book. Books are well written or badly written. That is all." Oscar Wilde
Hemingway:
There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.
...But in modern war you will die like a dog for no good reason.
In reply to:
i remember, late one night, christmas eve, walking across a university campus, on the edge of a rough neighborhood.
as i walked, i thought i heard foot steps behind me.. i walked a little faster, and sure enough, someone was following me..
oftroy: We've had duplicate experiences...sorta.
My experience would read just like yours up to that point. And when I turned around, it wasn't a friend, but a teen with a knife. My arms were full of decorations I'd bought on the Eve Last Minute Sale. And I'd decided to detour up an alley, one behind Linden Row where Poe had lived while in Richmond. The teen had followed me in the darkness, had caught up with me, and I was thunderstruck. All I remember saying is, "It's Christmas Eve. My family's waiting for me." He said, "Kiss me." So I kissed him, ran up the alley, ran up the back steps, went into the apartment by the back entrance, broke down and cried--there was no family waiting there--called the police, they came, I broke down and cried some more, and that was that. I learned not to walk in dark alleys by myself. I was only about 22 years old, but I should have known better in the middle of the city. It was the memory of the sight of the knife that really did me in emotionally.
Oh, WW, i am so glad you are OK-- and i wonder if your turning round, facing the person, and interacting with him didn't change the situation. you went from being persued, to taking charge. you saw him, and you didn't confont him, but you did make a statement. i suspect if he had a knife out, he was planning at the least to rob, if not to sexually assault you. and instead, you acted, and your actions changed the situation-- and as scary as it was, i hope you see that. I hope what you have taken away ifrom the experience is courage, and not fear.
I take this to mean that although he was born in Ireland, he had the good sense to get out when he could and moved to London.
>I take this to mean that although he was born in Ireland ...
Ouch
GBS was as well known for being Irish as for being a dramatist. At the time he was writing for the stage, he was living and working in Britain. Much of his wry humour was directed at life in Britian from the perspective of someone who regarded himself as an outsider. I suppose that the site authors were trying to get all that over in a line. I'm not sure that it is particularly easy or successful to produce such thumbnail sketches.
http://classiclit.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/gbshaw.htmhttp://www.workinghumor.com/quotes/gb_shaw.shtml
"What would you do if you weren't afraid?"Reminds me of one of my favourites:
"Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they
aren't out to get you."
My personal motto is "What the hell am I waiting for?" I have no idea if anyone else said it first an' I'm not dead yet. Sorta the point.
My personal motto is "What the hell am I waiting for?" I have no idea if anyone else said it first an' I'm not dead yet. Sorta the point.
Yeah that's easy for you to say, you're the Consuelo.
Some of the rest of us sit around waiting the world to recognize our true worth, while most of us sit around hoping and praying that they don't.