Best Ezra Quotes & Sayings

Gods' payment is the best payment. — Ezra Taft Benson

Obamas finest speeches do not excite. They do not inform. They dont even really inspire. They elevate ... He is not the Word made flesh, but the triumph of word over flesh ... Obama is, at his best, able to call us back to our highest selves. — Ezra Klein

Outside the station of Santa Maria Novella Isabella has to stand aside while a line of prisoners are marched into the terminus by armed Fascist guards. They pass within touching distance of her, carrying bags and bundles. There are old people and some children too. They all seem swamped by their clothes, disembodied by them somehow. Then she catches the eye of Ezra, a young Jewish man who once worked in the arts material shop where she buys most of her pigments and brushes. He is almost at the back of the line. The veins are high and urgent on his hand. His trousers are held up with a dirty piece of string. His cobalt blue eyes hold hers for the barest beat of a moment but some essence of his being conveys itself to her and her blood quickens in sympathy for him. She has the feeling of looking into the eyes of a ghost. — Glenn Haybittle

If you really want to receive joy and happiness, then serve others with all your heart. Lift their burden, and your own burden will be lighter. — Ezra Taft Benson

If someone wants to marry you outside the temple, whom will you strive to please - God or a mortal? If you insist on a temple marriage, you will be pleasing the Lord and blessing the other party. — Ezra Taft Benson

Great minds have sought you--lacking someone else.
You have been second always. Tragical?
No. You preferred it to the usual thing — Ezra Pound

Getting socially outcast can be the best and most informative thing that can ever happen to you because you have to learn who you are separate from the pack. — Ezra Miller

Man is at his best when complimented by the influence of a good woman. — Ezra Taft Benson

Housing Works is the coolest thrift store in the world, because not only are they the best thrift store - they're not the most thrifty thrift store - but they have amazing stuff and all of their proceeds go directly to kids, mostly homeless kids, living with AIDS and HIV in New York, in the metropolitan area. — Ezra Miller

In justice to human society it may perhaps be said of almost all the polities and civil institutions in the world, however imperfect, that they have been founded in and carried on with very considerable wisdom. — Ezra Stiles

I go to great pains to find the best yogurt and granola. — Ezra Koenig

I'll say that this is probably the best time for poetry since the T'ang dynasty. All the rest of the world is going to school on American poetry in the twentieth century, from Ezra Pound to W. S. Merwin, and for very good reason. We have soaked up influence in the last century like a sponge. It's cross-pollination, first law of biology, that the more variety you have the more health you have. — Sam Hamill

Poetry is a sort of inspired mathematics, which gives us equations, not for abstract figures, triangles, squares, and the like, but for the human emotions. If one has a mind which inclines to magic rather than science, one will prefer to speak of these equations as spells or incantations; it sounds more arcane, mysterious, recondite.
— Ezra Pound

I feel the most natural thing is for music to come that way because it's sort of like poetry. Though I do think with poets that I like, like Charles Olson or Ezra Pound, they were rewriting constantly, until the poem becomes a diamond.But with music I don't really feel that way. — Stephen Malkmus

We must not lose hope. Hope is an anchor to the souls of men. Satan would have us cast away that anchor. — Ezra Taft Benson

We will not know Him, until we become like him. — Ezra Taft Benson

I testify to you that God's pay is the best pay that this world or any other world knows anything about. — Ezra Taft Benson

Only with gun violence do we respond to repeated tragedies by saying that mourning is acceptable but discussing how to prevent more tragedies is not. But that's unacceptable. As others have observed, talking about how to stop mass shootings in the aftermath of a string of mass shootings isn't 'too soon.' It's much too late. — Ezra Klein

It's not a good idea to conceptualize a static relationship with long-standing policies, like health care. — Ezra Klein

It is my firm belief that the God of Heaven raised up the founding fathers and inspired them to establish the Constitution of this land. This is part of my religious faith. To me this is not just another nation. It is a great and glorious nation with a divine mission to perform for liberty-loving people everywhere. — Ezra Taft Benson

Truly a man does not live by bread alone. A good name is still to be preferred over great riches. Especially is it to be preferred to the appearance of riches, acquired with nothing down and nothing to pay for two months. — Ezra Taft Benson

I want to go where I can be of the most service to the general enterprise. — Ezra Cornell

Our desires, be they spiritual or temporal, should be rooted in a love of the Lord. — Ezra Taft Benson

There must be a renewal of the spirit of our forefathers, an
appreciation of the American way of life, a strengthening of muscle and sinew and the character of the nation. America needs guts as well as guns.
National character is the core of national defense. — Ezra Taft Benson

The way I figured it, keeping quiet was safe. Words could betray you if you choose the wrong ones, or mean less if you used too many. — Robyn Schneider

My best guess is that my garbled allusion to Ezra Pound in the following must have come from my parents' reading aloud. The Askari fell off the ostrich In the rain Huge sing Goddamn And what became of the ostrich? Huge sing Goddamn — Richard Dawkins

One of the standards on which your happiness is based, now and in your future, is moral purity. — Ezra Taft Benson

There is much reading material that is available which is either time-wasting or corrupting. The best yardstick to use in discerning the worth of true knowledge and learning is to go first and foremost to the words of the Lord's prophets. — Ezra Taft Benson

All I know for sure is that issues like race, like class, are always best approached with compassion and open-mindedness. — Ezra Koenig

God our Father, Jesus, our Elder Brother and our Redeemer, and the Holy Ghost, the Testator, are perfect. They know us best and love us most and will not leave one thing undone for our eternal welfare. Should we not love them for it and honor them first? — Ezra Taft Benson

Above all else, children need to know and feel they are loved, wanted, and appreciated. They need to be assured of that often. Obviously, this is a role parents should fill, and most often the mother can do it best. — Ezra Taft Benson

We urge you to do all within your talent and means to build the kingdom of God on Earth. Always strive to sustain, support and do what is best for the kingdom of God. — Ezra Taft Benson

That government is best which governs the least, so taught the courageous founders of this nation. This simple declaration is diametrically opposed to the all too common philosophy that the government should protect and support one from the cradle to the grave. The policy of the Founding Fathers has made our people and our nation strong. The opposite leads inevitably to moral decay. — Ezra Taft Benson

Every newspaper in the country covers stories that other newspapers cover. Every industry is filled with people who are competing to do the best job providing a particular service. — Ezra Klein

Have good associates or don't associate at all. Be careful in the selection of your friends. If in the presence of certain persons you are lifted to nobler heights, you are in good company. But if your friends or associates encourage base thoughts, then you had best leave them. — Ezra Taft Benson

Adequate early rest is best ... "Early to bed and early to rise" is still good counsel. — Ezra Taft Benson

Study the scriptures and study the mortals who have been most consistently accurate about the most important things. When your freedom and your eternal welfare are at stake, your information best be accurate. — Ezra Taft Benson

But you know what? When I die, everybody is invited to come take a selfie at my funeral. Except for my enemies. They're not invited to the funeral, period. — Ezra Koenig

Be right, and then be easy to live with, if possible, but in that order. — Ezra Taft Benson

Happy and successful homes cannot be built on immorality. — Ezra Taft Benson

I have tried to write Paradise
Do not move
Let the wind speak
that is paradise.
Let the Gods forgive what I
have made
Let those I love try to forgive
what I have made. — Ezra Pound

The American political system is not good at trading sacrifice now to prevent crises later. — Ezra Klein

Mothers, take time to be a real friend to your children. Listen to your children, really listen. Talk with them, laugh and joke with them, sing with them, cry with them, hug them, honestly praise them. Yes, regularly spend unused one-on-one time with each child. Be a real friend to your children. — Ezra Taft Benson

His in-laws, Erastus and Eloise Oppenheimer, lived in Ezra, Texas, a town tucked so deep in the woods of East Texas that time, civil rights, and wireless Internet couldn't find it. — Sharon Bayliss

There are certain basic principles regarding the proper role of government. If principles are correct, then they can be applied to any specific proposal with confidence ... The true statesman values principle above popularity, and works to create popularity for those political principles which are wise and just. — Ezra Taft Benson

Young people especially sometimes feel that the standards of the Lord are like fences and chains, blocking them from those activities that seem most enjoyable in life. — Ezra Taft Benson

The Declaration of Independence ... is much more than a political document. It constitutes a spiritual manifesto - revelation, if you will - declaring not for this nation only, but for all nations, the source of man's rights. Nephi, a Book of Mormon prophet, foresaw over 2,300 years ago that this event would transpire. The colonies he saw would break with Great Britain and that 'the power of the Lord was with [the colonists],' that they 'were delivered by the power of God out of the hands of all other nations' (1 Nephi 13:16, 19). The Declaration of Independence was to set forth the moral justification of a rebellion against a long-recognized political tradition - the divine right of kings. At issue was the fundamental question of whether men's rights were God-given or whether these rights were to be dispensed by governments to their subjects. This document proclaimed that all men have certain inalienable rights. In other words, these rights came from God. — Ezra Taft Benson

Attractive labels are usually attached to the most dangerous programs, often in the name of public welfare and personal security. — Ezra Taft Benson

We're actually just moving one type of deficit to another. But, the problem with this second type of deficit is that you drive on it and then it falls down. — Ezra Klein

'The Wizard of Oz' is my favorite movie. It was the first movie I can ever remember watching. — Ezra Miller

Someone - Cyril Connolly? Ezra Pound? - once said that anything that can be read twice is literature; I would say that anything that bears saying twice is quotable. — Joseph Epstein

The Lake Isle
O God, O Venus, O Mercury, patron of thieves,
Give me in due time, I beseech you, a little tobacco-shop,
With the little bright boxes
piled up neatly upon the shelves
And the loose fragrant cavendish
and the shag,
And the bright Virginia
loose under the bright glass cases,
And a pair of scales not too greasy,
And the whores dropping in for a word or two in passing,
For a flip word, and to tidy their hair a bit.
O God, O Venus, O Mercury, patron of thieves,
Lend me a little tobacco-shop,
or install me in any profession
Save this damn'd profession of writing,
where one needs one's brains all the time. — Ezra Pound

The Garden
En robe de parade.
- Samain
Like a skein of loose silk blown against a wall
She walks by the railing of a path in Kensington Gardens,
And she is dying piece-meal
of a sort of emotional anaemia.
And round about there is a rabble
Of the filthy, sturdy, unkillable infants of the very poor.
They shall inherit the earth.
In her is the end of breeding.
Her boredom is exquisite and excessive.
She would like some one to speak to her,
And is almost afraid that I
will commit that indiscretion. — Ezra Pound

Yes, as we travel through this topsy-turvy, sinful world, filled with temptations and problems, we are humbled by the expectancy of death, the uncertainty of life, and the power and love of God. Sadness comes to all of us in the loss of loved ones.
But there is gratitude also. Gratitude for the assurance we have that life is eternal. Gratitude for the great gospel plan, given freely to all of us. Gratitude for the life, teachings, and sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, whose resurrection we will commemorate in the immediate days ahead — Ezra Taft Benson

Either move or be moved. — Ezra Pound

While I was travelling and I kind of had the classic realisation - that I guess most teenagers have at some point - that time's gonna run out and that's not in my power to change that. — George Ezra

We stand a better chance with aristocracy, whether hereditary or elective, than with monarchy. — Ezra Stiles

The great task of life is to learn the will of the Lord and then do it. — Ezra Taft Benson

I've fallen prey to my fair share of moments of the phobias of others and the way that that can become an attack. — Ezra Miller

We live in an age of science and of abundance. The care and reverence for books as such, proper to an age when no book was duplicated until someone took the pains to copy it out by hand, is obviously no longer suited to 'the needs of society', or to the conservation of learning. The weeder is supremely needed if the Garden of the Muses is to persist as a garden. — Ezra Pound

As a bathtub lined with white porcelain, When the hot water gives out or goes tepid, So is the slow cooling of our chivalrous passion, O my much praised but-not-altogether-satisfactory lady. — Ezra Pound

The intellect is a very nice whirligig toy, but how people take it seriously is more than I can understand. — Ezra Pound

Think about it! God is all-knowing but you're not His only child. You're not His end all and be all. Ezra, you're good, but you ain't all that, sweetie. — Love Belvin

Let the gods speak softly of us — Ezra Pound

I have a vision of homes alerted, of classes alive, and of pulpits aflame with the spirit of Book of Mormon messages. — Ezra Taft Benson

If there is one word that describes the meaning of character, it is the word honor. Without honor, civilization would not long exist. Without honor, there could be no dependable contracts, no lasting marriages, no trust or happiness. What does the word honor mean to you? To me, honor is summarized in this expression by the poet Tennyson, "Man's word [of honor] is God in man." — Ezra Taft Benson

Youth leaders, are you holding aloft our standards, or have you compromised them for the lowest common denominator in order to appease the deceived or vile within the Church? Are the dances and music in your cultural halls virtuous, lovely, praiseworthy, and of good report (Articles of Faith 13), or do they represent a modern Sodom with short skirts, loud beat, strobe lights, and darkness? — Ezra Taft Benson

A missionary should never permit himself to see a movie or (read) cheap literature, or hear music that tends to interfere with or which dampens the spirit of missionary work. There is ample evidence that rock music is offensive to the Spirit and affects adversely the spirituality of the missionaries and thus the success of the proselyting work. — Ezra Taft Benson