Arndt Quotes & Sayings

By daily contrition, and habitual mortification of the flesh, man is day by day RENEWED, bearing heavenly fruits and celestial graces, of an inexplicable sweetness. Contrariwise, the pleasure of the world bringeth heaviness of heart, vexation of spirit, and a wounded conscience: yea, so great hence is the calamity of the soul, and so heavy the loss of the heavenly gift (a loss which necessarily flows from the pleasures of the flesh, and from worldly delights) that he who duly calls the same to mind, cannot be exceedingly fear and dread any of the fleshly and worldly joys, which serve but to divert him from those that are spiritual and heavenly, and to quench in him the most sweet grace of devotion that brings the soul into the kingdom of God. — Johann Arndt

Heart-suffering because of sin is the best proof that the Holy Spirit dwells in your heart. — Johann Arndt

Tears are the messengers of true love. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

But since the world, which thou art to strive against, is not without thee, but within thee, it follows, that it is also to be conquered not without, but within thee. — Johann Arndt

Who has never exploded in a fury does not know love either. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

In terms of writing characters or stories, at least initially, there's no difference between live-action and animation. A good story is a good story, whatever the medium. — Michael Arndt

Happy man, who is dead to the world, and alive to God! separated from the world, and collected into Christ! Blessed is the man into whose heart such Divine graces are infused, as withdraw it wholly from every tendency to inferior things, and exalt it to the supernal light and glory in the heavens. To obtain which, it is needful to pray daily and instantly to God: seeing it is not possible for a Christian to live without it, — Johann Arndt

I like to begin every screenplay with a burst of delusional self-confidence. It tends to fade pretty quickly, but (for me, at least) there doesn't seem to be any other way to start writing a script. — Michael Arndt

Who you think you are is only a thought. — Michael Arndt

If you write a bunch of different characters with a bunch of different opinions, you end up with these long scenes of everyone standing around talking. — Michael Arndt

If you only know something one way, then you don't really know it. — Michael Arndt

One of my favorite films is 'Late Spring' by Yasujiro Ozu. To me, it represents film as art. — Michael Arndt

Adversity challenges the masks we hide behind, revealing sides of ourselves we have not yet comfortably with the world outside. It is why we dislike adversity, because we have to face what we don't yet understand about ourselves. — Michael Arndt

Sorrow eats your heart and courage. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

They managed to sleep together, but there wasn't enough for dreaming. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

The best writing really does come from the deepest, most private part of you. — Michael Arndt

In live-action, writing, production, and editing happen in discrete stages. In animation, they overlap - happening simultaneously. This allows a real dialogue to occur between the writer, the director, the actors, and the editor, and it makes the writing process a lot more collaborative and a lot less lonely. — Michael Arndt

The truth is despite the hard work and juggling required to keep the different facets of the frantic life afloat, the "superwoman" has one marvelous compensation. Being busy and being seen to be busy lets you off the hook. Buys you a way out of all aspects of your many roles you secretly despise ... like cleaning cupboards ... or entertaining your husband's business friends. When you combine wife, mother, career and all, each role become the perfect excuse for avoiding the worst aspects of the other. — Bettina Arndt

Take your time.
Stay away from the easy going.
Never take the same way twice.
Gunny Arndt's rules for successful reconnaissance; Guadalcanal 1942 — GYSGT Charles C. Arndt

Give me ... a compassionate heart, quickly moved to grieve for the woes of others and to active pity for them, even as our Lord Jesus Christ beheld our poverty and hasted to help us. Give me grace ever to alleviate the crosses and difficulties of those around me, and never to add to them; teach me to be a consoler in sorrow, to take thought for the stranger, the widow, and the orphan; let my charity show itself not in words only but in deed and truth. — Johann Arndt

Only those who feel little in the eyes of God, can hope to be mighty in the eyes of men. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

Every problem offers an opportunity for a solution. if you are in the right frame of mind to find it. — Michael Arndt

Who has no own conviction dissipates himself in the imitation of others. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

Let therefore this PURE LOVE OF CHRIST prompt thee to all that is good; let this be the motive of mortifying thy flesh with all its desires: and let the remembrance of that death which he most willingly accepted for thee, make thee willing to lay down thy life for him; and out of sincere gratitude for all his inestimable benefits, to accept the cross at his hand, and to resist sin and the world even unto blood. — Johann Arndt

Nay, we sometimes proceed so far as to trust in ourselves, and depend on our own power, strength, and abilities. Then it is that God in mere mercy interposes, and breaks us in pieces; humbles, and confounds us, and so empties us of ourselves, that we may be filled with all the fullness of God. Which we cannot be, without being first emptied of that arrogance and self-conceit which stand in perfect opposition to the grace of God. Hence it appears that hope is a MILITANT VIRTUE, fighting against all that confidence in ourselves; all that self-exaltation upon the score of our own gifts, merits, righteousness, prosperity, honours, and riches, in which the natural man reposes all his confidence. The business of hope is to oppose and conquer all these delusions of the devil, and to seek its rest in the sanctuary of God. — Johann Arndt

It certainly is the duty of every true Christian, to esteem himself a stranger and pilgrim in this world; and as bound to use earthly blessings, not as means of satisfying lust or gratifying wantonness, but of supplying his absolute wants and necessities. — Johann Arndt

I figured I'd probably write 50 scripts in my life. Out of those 50, I figured maybe five would be produced, and that maybe one or two would be successful. So I always kind of expected I'd write at least one successful film in my life. [ ... ] The way it all came together was kind of like Murphy's law in reverse - I don't expect that kind of experience again any time soon. — Michael Arndt

The brave man, indeed, calls himself lord of the land, through his iron, through his blood. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

My thing is that most scripts arent bad scripts, theyre just not finished yet. — Michael Arndt

My God, there are so many mediocre screenplays out there. — Michael Arndt

For even these are no less bestowed on him of pure grace, than are righteousness and salvation themselves. — Johann Arndt

Yet, so far from laboring to know the forbidden tree of worldly pleasures and its various fruits, man gives himself up to a careless and thoughtless state of life, and yields to the lust of the flesh, not considering that this lust is really the forbidden tree. — Johann Arndt

Writing a great script - not just a good one, but a great one - is almost an impossible task. — Michael Arndt

The fluidity of thought is based on the flexibility of beliefs and the emotional boundaries surrounding them. — Michael Arndt

Consider then, O man! whether there can be anything more wretched and poor, more naked and miserable, than man when he dies, if he be not clothed with Christ's righteousness, and enriched in his God. — Johann Arndt

Women hope men will change after marriage but they don't; men hope women won't change but they do. — Bettina Arndt

Changing how you think costs you no money and it takes no special talent. It does take a commitment on your part to be different. — Michael Arndt

Besides God, nothing should live in man; besides God, nothing should in man put forth itself: nothing but God himself should appear, operate, will, love, think, speak, act and triumph in him. For if any thing else besides God does move and work in man, then man cannot be the image of God; but he is become the image of THAT whatever it be, which now moveth and worketh in him. If man therefore would continue the image of God, there is a necessity for him to surrender up himself wholly to God. — Johann Arndt

Even in the early nineteenth century, people like Goethe had little good to say about grumbling, coarsely behaved nationalist romantics of the Arndt or Jahn variety. By contrast, Germany's greatest author enjoyed the witty company of intelligent Jews. "As a rule they are more keenly curious and apt to contribute than any German nationalist," Goethe wrote. "Their ability to understand things quickly and analyze them in depth, as well as their native wit, makes them a much more receptive audience than you can find among the real and true Germans with their slow and dull minds. — Gotz Aly

The good husbands understand and offer to help. "All you have to do is ask" they say. But even helpful husbands have to be thanked, their contributions acknowledged, credit given. All those pleases and thank yous. Being grateful takes time and energy. It's often easier to do it yourself. — Bettina Arndt

I can write two scripts concurrently, but I usually prefer to do one at a time. However, I also usually have 5 or 6 story ideas that are percolating in my head at any one time, so it can get a little crowded in there. — Michael Arndt

Freedom is where you can live, as pleases a brave heart; where you can live according to the customs and laws of your Fathers; where you are made happy by that which made your most distant ancestors happy. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

The way you think either stands in your way or assists you in achieving your goals. — Michael Arndt

We have the freedom to excel or inhibit our potential. You are the grand designer of your thoughts and emotions. At some level or another you are the one who chooses which thoughts to accept and which ones to ignore. That can be a very empower realization. — Michael Arndt

Traditionally, marriage involved a kind of bartering, rather than mutual inter-dependence or role sharing. Husbands financially and economically supported wives, while wives emotionally, psychologically and socially supported husbands. He brought home the bacon, she cooked it. He fixed the plumbing, she the psyche. — Bettina Arndt

Failure can only exist from stagnant perceptions. Everything is a process of learning and if you learn something useful, you have success. — Michael Arndt

Informal conversation is probably the oldest mechanism by which opinions on products and brands are developed, expressed, and spread. — Johann Arndt

All thought is created, therefore we are all creators of whatever world we live in. — Michael Arndt

The great thing about the animation process is that is goes from, I write the lines, it goes to the actors, the actors bring a whole world to that, they bring the characters to life, then it goes to the animators, then it goes to the editor who cuts it together, and then you screen it and it goes back through the system again. — Michael Arndt

Michael Arndt, that guy - you're just supposed to say nice things about other writers, but I worship Michael Arndt. — Damon Lindelof

For true conversion doth not consist in putting away great and outward sins only, but in descending deeply into your own self, searching into the inmost recesses of the heart, the secrets and closets, all the windings and turnings thereof; changing and renewing them throughout, with the grace that is given you: and so, by faith, you are converted from self-love to Divine love; from the world and all worldly concupiscences, to a spiritual and heavenly life; and from a participation of the pomps and pleasures thereof, to participating the merits and virtues of Christ, by believing his word, and walking in his steps. — Johann Arndt

The number one metaphor I have in my mind for writing a screenplay is that ... you're trying to climb a mountain blindfolded. And the funny thing about that is, you think, 'Okay, that's hard because you're climbing up a rock face, and you don't know where you're going, and you don't know where the top is, you can't see what's below you ... ' But actually the hardest part about climbing a mountain blindfolded is just finding the mountain. — Michael Arndt

This truth is a remedy against spiritual pride, namely, that none should account himself better before God than others, though perhaps adorned with greater gifts, and endowments. — Johann Arndt

In short, all things that please the natural man in this world, are, to a true Christian, only so many crosses and temptations, allurements of sin and snares of death, that continually exercise his virtue. — Johann Arndt

You never want your second act or the whole movie to just be this relentless march towards its goal. You want things to take the audience by surprise. — Michael Arndt

Working at Pixar has been like my graduate school for screenwriting. — Michael Arndt

It has been noted that one needs only 39 digits of Pi to make a circle the size of the observable universe accurate to one atom of hydrogen. — Jorg Arndt

Nothing that is really good and God-like dies. — Ernst Moritz Arndt

Line up your thoughts up for potential, take action and success will follow. — Michael Arndt

Good writing is deceptive in that it hides its own artifice - it makes it seem easy. — Michael Arndt

Whatever man uses without the fear of God, whatever he applies to the mere gratifying of his flesh, cannot fail to operate as a poison to the soul, however pleasant and salutary it may appear to be to the body. — Johann Arndt

I had read enough mediocre scripts and was determined not to inflict another one on the world. — Michael Arndt

The obedience of Christ was far more acceptable to God, than the innocence of Adam; so that a thousand such as Adam could not have equalled Christ alone. For however he, had he continued in the state of innocence, would have left us an hereditary righteousness, of which we should have been possessed: notwithstanding, unspeakably greater, and more excellent, is our union with God in Christ, since he being made man, hath so purified and exalted the human nature in himself, that the primitive state of Adam is not once to be compared with it. — Johann Arndt

The first help to prayer is our only Mediator and Advocate, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, 1 John 2:2. He is pleading our cause before God, when we are hardly able to express what we want; who is therefore called the Word of the Father, because God, by him, has discovered his will to us; as he is also called 'the Mediator,' because he solicits our cause before God. When Moses complained that he was of slow speech, and a slow tongue, that so he might avoid carrying the commanded message to Pharaoh, God tells him, 'Aaron thy brother can speak well, he shall be to thee instead of a mouth.' Se we also, when we shall pray, are dull, and slow of speech, and therefore must fly to Christ, our heavenly Aaron, who is to us instead of a mouth. Therefore Christ commands us to pray in his name, who is our eternal High-priest, 'having an everlasting priesthood,' (Heb. 7:24,) 'interceding for us,' (Rom. 8:34,) 'in whom we have boldness,' and access with confidence by the faith of him,' Eph. 3:12. — Johann Arndt