Common What Do You Say Quotes & Sayings

Here's the problem with Common Core. The Department of Education, like every federal agency, will never be satisfied. They will not stop with it being a suggestion. They will turn it into a mandate.In fact, what they will begin to say to local communities is, you will not get federal money unless do you things the way we want you to do it. And they will use Common Core or any other requirements that exists nationally to force it down the throats of our people in our states. — Marco Rubio

Some experts say we are moving back to the pre-antibiotic era. No. This will be a post-antibiotic era. In terms of new replacement antibiotics, the pipeline is virtually dry. A post-antibiotic era means, in effect, an end to modern medicine as we know it. Things as common as strep throat or a child's scratched knee could once again kill. — Margaret Chan

The common approach is, metaphorically speaking, to go out onto the sidewalk and to pick up all the banana skins, so that no one slips. Me, I go down early in the morning and drop more banana skins. People say, 'Well, why would you be doing that?' And I tell them, 'Teaching is not about trying to prevent people from falling down, it's about trying to get them to use their eyes.' If you take the banana skins away, you're saying that life is banana-skin free. Well, it is not. Life is full of banana skins.
I try to teach people to use their eyes, to look where they're stepping. It's my responsibility to respect people, to help them learn the lessons life teaches. When you slip on a banana skin and fall down, discuss what happened and learn from it. I think that it is actually unwise to get in between people and what life is trying to teach them, but we all have a responsibility for each other. — Johann Christoph Arnold

The preamble to the Constitution states: "We, the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare ... " It doesn't say "guarantee the general welfare." And it certainly doesn't say "give welfare benefits to all the people in the country who aren't doing so well even if the reason they aren't doing so well is because they're sitting on their butts in front of the TV". — P. J. O'Rourke

Why science? Many people, with the best intentions, like to give parents advice about raising a child, including parents, non-parents, health visitors, friends, celebrities, bloggers and next-door neighbours. Unfortunately, much of this advice can be completely wrong or based on archaic ideas and practices that have since been disproved or debunked. Some of this advice can even be damaging. In addition, some parents say that they advocate using 'common sense' or 'intuition' in raising their children, but what do those things mean? How is intuition classified, when it differs so greatly from one person to another? Some people do the 'common sense' thing only to find out it was wrong later in life, which is why it is altogether better to be guided by the latest scientific research. In order to learn how to filter the good advice from the bad, I believe that new parents need science-based evidence in their corner. You'll find it in this book. — Zion Lights

One must avoid snobbery and misanthropy. But one must also be unafraid to criticise those who reach for the lowest common denominator, and who sometimes succeed in finding it. This criticism would be effortless if there were no "people" waiting for just such an appeal. Any fool can lampoon a king or a bishop or a billionaire. A trifle more grit is required to face down a mob, or even a studio audience that has decided it knows what it wants and is entitled to get it. And the fact that kings and bishops and billionaires often have more say than most in forming appetites and emotions of the crowd is not irrelevant, either. — Christopher Hitchens

Character is the starting point from which we go on. When I say a man has character, I mean that when you go to that man and say, 'What are the facts in this case?' he will tell you the truth, justly, truly, and wisely as he knows, with the minimum of exhibitionism and the maximum of devotion to the common cause. — Douglas Southall Freeman

People say 'Why would you learn Dutch? Nobody speaks it. Why not French?' Even the Dutch say that to me! I say because I want to live here, I think it's only common courtesy that I speak the language. — Anthony Geary

Think what you're doing! When you say I, I, I want to exist, it is not you alone that says this. Everything says it, absolutely everything that has the faintest trace of consciousness. It follows, then, that this desire of yours is just the part of you that is not individual - the part that is common to all things without distinction. — Arthur Schopenhauer

You'd think people had better things to gossip about," said Ginny as she sat on the common room floor, leaning against Harry's legs and reading the Daily Prophet. "Three Dementor attacks in a week, and all Romilda Vane does is ask me if it's true you've got a Hippogriff tattooed across your chest."
Ron and Hermione both roared with laughter. Harry ignored them.
What did you tell her?"
I told her it's a Hungarian Horntail," said Ginny, turning a page of the newspaper idly. "Much more macho."
Thanks," said Harry, grinning. "And what did you tell her Ron's got?"
A Pygmy Puff, but I didn't say where. — J.K. Rowling

If, for my sins, or by my good fortune, I come across some giant hereabouts, a common occurrence with knights-errant, and overthrow him in one onslaught, or cleave him asunder to the waist, or, in short, vanquish and subdue him, will it not be well to have some one I may send him to as a present, that he may come in and fall on his knees before my sweet lady, and in a humble, submissive voice say, 'I am the giant Caraculiambro, lord of the island of Malindrania, vanquished in single combat by the never sufficiently extolled knight Don Quixote of La Mancha, who has commanded me to present myself before your Grace, that your Highness dispose of me at your pleasure'? — Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra

The possibility of an Oscar is something I definitely think about and the fact that I can even say that is just a blessing. It's something I would be incredibly honored to be a part of. — Common

Men spoke much in my boyhood about restricted or ruined men of genius: and it was common to say that many a man was a Great Might-Have-Been. To me it's a more solid and startling fact that any man in the street is a Great Might-Not-Have-Been. — Gilbert K. Chesterton

I hope that's a good thing,' I said, thinking he might say I reminded him of a film star- then we'd actually have something in common. I was hoping for Anne Hathaway or Julia Roberts, and not the obvious Vivien Leigh. Even Angelina Jolie would have done, though I'd never quite forgiven her for stealing Brad's heart. Talking of Brad, was Sean starting to resemble him too? No, he could never be a Brad, a Matthew McConaughey maybe at a push, but never a Brad Pitt. — Ali McNamara

I guess what I'm trying to say is, you just can't tell who you're going to end up with. You might spend your whole life dreaming about one type of person, only to find happiness with somebody completely different. Someone you figured you had nothing in common with just might turn out to be your dream guy. And you know he's your dream guy because you become a better person. He brings out all these great things in you that you never knew or believed were there. And if you're really lucky you do the same for him. It makes it even more incredible that people find each other, considering most of them are looking in the wrong places to begin with. — Kristin Walker

Six years later the lead scientist, pharmacologist Kenneth Blum, published a much more subdued assessment: Unfortunately it was erroneously reported that [we] had found the "alcoholism gene," implying that there was a one-to-one relation between a gene and a specific behavior. Such misinterpretations are common - readers may recall accounts of an "obesity gene," or a "personality gene." Needless to say, there is no such thing as a specific gene for alcoholism, obesity, or a particular type of personality. ... Rather the issue at hand is to understand how certain genes and behavioral traits are connected. — Gabor Mate

Since 'A Dangerous Method,' I've had meetings with everyone from J.J. Abrams to the producers of 'Drive.' And they all have the same thing in common; they say: 'Wow you worked with Cronenberg.' He gave me instant film cred. — Sarah Gadon

But just then, as if to avoid a certain awkwardness, Seaman began to talk not about Newell but about Newell's mother, Anne Jordan Newell. He described her appearance (pleasing), her work (she had a job at a factory that made irrigation systems), her faith (she went to church every Sunday), her industriousness (she kept the house as neat as a pin), her kindness (she always had a smile for everyone), her common sense (she gave good advice, wise advice, without forcing it on anyone). A mother is a precious thing, concluded Seaman. Marius and I founded the Panthers. We worked whatever jobs we could get and we bought shotguns and handguns for the people's self-defense. But a mother is worth more than the Black Revolution. That I can promise you. In my long and eventful life, I've seen many things. I was in Algeria and I was in China and in several prisons in the United States. A mother is a precious thing. This I say here and I'll say anywhere, anytime, he said in a hoarse voice. — Roberto Bolano

At no time in the history of man has the world been so full of pain and anguish. Here and there, however, we meet with individuals who are untouched, unsullied, by the common grief. We say of them that they have died to the world. They live in the moment, fully, and the radiance which emanates from them is a perpetual song of joy [ ... ] like the clown, we go through the motions, forever simulating, forever postponing the grand event- we die struggling to get born. We never were, never are. We are always in the process of becoming. Forever outside — Henry Miller

The most-asked question when someone describes a novel, movie or short story to a friend probably is, 'How does it end?' Endings carry tremendous weight with readers; if they don't like the ending, chances are they'll say they didn't like the work. Failed endings are also the most common problems editors have with submitted works. — Nancy Kress

I am not qualified to deal with this. Why does everyone I meet seem to have mental problems?
Ah ... but did they have mental problems before meeting you? Who's the common denominator here, Dan?
I do not have mental problems! I say to the voice in my head, perfectly aware how damning it would sound were I to say it aloud. — Eoin Colfer

One had said, 'You say you come from Ghaanna? Then we have a lot in common!' Sissie didn't know what to do with the statement, uncertain of whether it was a threat or a promise.
'We had chiefs like you,' the Scot went on, 'who fought one another and all, while the Invader marched in.' Sissie thanked her, but also felt strongly that their kinship had better end right there. — Ama Ata Aidoo

This is why I say that the individual's most potent weapon is a stubborn belief in the triumph of common decency. — Paul Rusesabagina

I want to say unequivocally that while I cherish every person who comes from anywhere, who comes here legally and seeks to pursue happiness, and I hope all of them decide to stay and become American citizens, but I want them to become American. And part of becoming American involved English. It is vital historically to assert and establish that English is the common language at the heart of our civilization. — Newt Gingrich

Coughs seem very common here, especially among the children, though people look strong and healthy, but in the absence of proper statistics one cannot undertake to say whether the district is a healthy one or not. — Edward Burnett Tylor

none can shake off a sense of having free will. The best we can do is to reason that we are determined based on observing the common law of causality among things in the world and applying this law to ourselves. But we cannot feel ourselves as determined. (One philosopher has said, and possibly more have thought to themselves: "Can one really believe in determinism without going insane?") Being determined in thought and deed is not experientially noticeable, only abstractly deducible. It would be impossible for someone to say "I am nothing but a human puppet. — Thomas Ligotti

The one thing that Jessica [Johnson] and Miles[Morales] have in common is that there's a great many people in the audience who were desperate for that kind of material. They didn't say anything, didn't tell anybody. — Brian Michael Bendis

We will ensure a place for you in heaven, but we will make this place a hell." Religious exploiters
"Follow us for a greater economy and other superficial dreams, and we will make sure it never happens, ever." Political Class
"I search for happiness in all the wrong places because I have been conditioned to believe that happiness is somewhere outside (can't find it within)." Common Man
"You are absolutely free to do anything only if you do what we say." Society — Saurabh Sharma

It's funny when so many people I meet tell me that I'm a complicated and mysterious person they can't understand. The problem isn't in me but in them. When I say something, I do it. The problem is that they don't believe I will, and they don't believe anyone can do what I say I will. That's their confusion. But actually, I'm a simple person, as I always match my own words. That's how you must see it. Just cut through "common sense" and move forward, and achieve! Let others worry about the how. — Robin Sacredfire

There's some instinctive attraction that draws you, as a writer, to your subject. And the attraction usually has to do with some primal personal thing that, of course, you have no idea about. In the end, the piece always comes down to the one or two sentences you struggle over. The sentences where you try to say explicitly what it is that the two of you, subject and writer, have in common. Those are the sentences that you just bang your head against the wall over until you get them right. It's very hard to make that distillation but that is actually what your job is. Without trying to pin the person like a butterfly to the wall, to sum it up. If I can do that, then I feel satisfied. To give the subject a reality in the form of a sentence that is like a piece of rock crystal or a prism. — Judith Thurman

Lookee here, Pip, at what is said to you by a true friend. Which this to you the true friend say. If you can't get to be on common through going straight, you'll never get to do it through going crooked. So don't tell no more on 'em, Pip, and live well and die happy. — Charles Dickens

In this country, two things stand first in rank: your flag and your mail. You all know what honor you pay to your flag, but you should know, also, that your mail, - just that ordinary postal card - is also important. But a postal card, or any form of mail, is not important, in that way, until you drop it through a slot in this building, and with a stamp on it, or into a mail box outdoors. Up to that instant it is but a common card, which anybody can pick up and carry off without committing a criminal act. But as soon as it is in back of this partition, or in a mail box, a magical transformation occurs; and anybody who now should willfully purloin it, or obstruct its trip in any way, will find prison doors awaiting him. What a frail thing ordinary mail is! A baby could rip it apart, but no adult is so foolish as to do it. That small stamp which you stick on it, is, you might say, a postal official, going right along with it, having it always in his sight. — Ernest Vincent Wright

No, I mean, I don't think I like him"
"Oh." That was something different. "Have you tried?" What a stupid question.
"Yes! So hard! I keep waiting for a moment to come when he'll say or do something in common, but it never happens. I think he's handsome, but that's not enough to build a whole relationship on. I don't even know if he's attracted to me. Do you have any idea what kind of things he, you know, likes? — Kiera Cass

Phil. Look what you are doing! When you say, I - I - I want to exist you alone do not say this, but everything, absolutely everything, that has only a vestige of consciousness. Consequently this desire of yours is just that which is not individual but which is common to all without distinction. — Arthur Schopenhauer

Men who give up the common goal of all things that exist, thereby cease to exist themselves. Some may perhaps think it strange that we say that wicked men, who form the majority of men, do not exist; but that is how it is. I am not trying to deny the wickedness of the wicked; what I do deny is that their existence is absolute and complete existence. Just as you might call a corpse a dead man, but couldn't simply call it a man, so I would agree that the wicked are wicked, but could not agree that they have unqualified existence. — Boethius

Hamilton had a complaint. "Why did you have to tell the cops I'm your boyfriend? That's gross, Amy. We're related!"
Amy was disgusted. "We had a common ancestor, like, five hundred years ago. Besides, if they think we're together, we only have to come up with one story, and I can do all the talking."
"Hey, I got an early acceptance to Notre Dame," Hamilton said defensively. "I can talk."
"Of course you can," Amy soothed. "It's what you say that might get us into trouble. — Gordon Korman

I'll make you a little confession. I am not ashamed to use the word class. I will also plead guilty to another charge. The charge is that people belonging to my class think they're better than other people. You're damn right we're better. We're better because we do not shirk our obligations either to ourselves or to others. We do not whine. We do not organize a minority group and blackmail the government. We do not prize mediocrity for mediocrity's sake. Oh I am aware that we hear a great many flattering things nowadays about your great common man - you know, it has already been revealing to me that he is perfectly content so to be called, because that is exactly what he is: the common man and when I say common I mean common as hell. — Walker Percy

I think it's degrading of you, Flora,' cried Mrs Smiling at breakfast. 'Do you truly mean that you don't ever want to work at anything?'
Her friend replied after some thought: 'Well, when I am fifty-three or so I would like to write a novel as good as "Persuasion", but with a modern setting, of course. For the next thirty years or so I shall be collecting material for it. If anyone asks me what I work at, I shall say "Collecting material." No one can object to that. Besides, I shall be.'
Mrs Smiling drank some coffee in silent disapproval.
'If you ask me,' continued Flora, 'I think I have much in common with Miss Austen. She liked everything to be tidy and pleasant and comfortable around her, and so do I. You see Mary,' - and here Flora began to grow earnest and to wave one finger about - 'unless everything is tidy and pleasant and comfortable all about one, people cannot even begin to enjoy life. I cannot endure messes. — Stella Gibbons

Do you defend niggers, Atticus?" I asked him that evening.
"Of course I do. Don't say nigger, Scout. That's common."
"'s what everybody at school says."
"From now on it'll be everybody less one
"
"Well if you don't want me to grow up talkin' that way, why do you send me to school? — Harper Lee

A common measure of poverty is how much money you have in relation to other people - that is useful as far as it goes, but that excludes the case of, say, a hunter in the rainforest who has no money but is not poor. And there can be a number of people with money but who can consider themselves unwanted or invisible or estranged from society. — William T. Vollmann

I shall approach. Before taking off his hat, I shall take off my own. I shall say, "The Marquis de Saint Eustache, I believe." He will say, "The celebrated Mr. Syme, I presume." He will say in the most exquisite French, "How are you?" I shall reply in the most exquisite Cockney, "Oh, just the Syme."'
'Oh shut it ... what are you really going to do?'
'But it was a lovely catechism! ... Do let me read it to you. It has only forty-three questions and answers, some of the Marquis's answers are wonderfully witty. I like to be just to my enemy.'
'But what's the good of it all?' asked Dr. Bull in exasperation.
'It leads up to the challenge ... when the Marquis as given the forty-ninth reply, which runs
'
'Has it ... occurred to you ... that the Marquis may not say all the forty-three things you have put down for him?'
'How true that is! ... Sir, you have a intellect beyond the common. — G.K. Chesterton

Okay, okay. So. First things first. Aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh! Second thing: I should probably say "thank you" for saving my life. Say it and then follow it up with something funny like ... okay. Spinach joke. Spinach joke. Shit. Um ... Oh, I know! What do anal sex and spinach have in common? If you're forced to have either as a child, you won't want it as an adult. Holy fucking Christ. What the fuck is wrong with me? There is no way I can make a spinach/molesting joke! I am a monster. Think of something else. Think of anything else! — T.J. Klune

Then he say something that really surprise me cause it so thoughtful and common sense. When it come to what folks do together with they bodies, he say, anybody's guess is as good as mine. But when you talk about love I don't have to guess. I have love and I have been love. And I thank God he let me gain understanding enough to know love can't be halted just cause some peoples moan and groan. — Alice Walker

Will you let me say, here and now, that the one thing which frustrated the whole attack from first to last was the remarkable solidarity and public spirit displayed by your college as a body. I think that was the last obstacle that X expected to encounter in a community of women. Nothing but the very great loyalty of the Senior Common Room to the College and the respect of the students for the Senior Common Room stood between you and a most unpleasant publicity. It is the merest presumption in me to tell you what you already know far better than I do; but I say it, not only for my own satisfaction, but because this particular kind of loyalty forms at once the psychological excuse for the attack and the only possible defense against it. — Dorothy L. Sayers

Let's say I take a picture of the Eiffel Tower in front of the casino in Las Vegas. That type of pattern might suggest I'm just a tourist. But if my next one is of another dam or electrical station, someone might say 'Well, that's kind of strange'. What do the different pieces of the puzzle mean when you put them together? And one of the advantages of geographic profiling in geography is a common denominator for so many different types of information sources. — Kim Rossmo

True courtesy," he continued, "earns the name. It is courtesy that is truthful. When the plebeian kneels to the monarch, he is offering his neck. He offers it because he knows his ruler can take it if he wishes. Common people like that say-or rather, they used to say, in older and better times - that I have no love of truth. But the truth is that it is precisely truth that I love, an open acknowledgment of fact. — Gene Wolfe

In the whole course of our work at the theatre we have been, I may say, drenched with advice by friendly people who for years gave us the reasons why we did not succeed ... All their advice, or at least some of it, might have been good if we had wanted to make money, to make a common place of amusement. — Lady Gregory

For people never say anything the same way twice; no two of them ever say it the same. The greatest imaginative writer that ever brooded in a lavender robe and a mellowed briar in his teeth, couldn't tell you, though e try for a lifetime, how the simplest strap-hanger will ask the conductor to be let off at the next stop ...
It is all for the taking. All the manuals by frustrated fictioneers on how to write can't give you the first syllable of reality, at any cot, that any common conversation can. All the classics, read and re-read, can't help you catch the ring of truth as does the word heard first-hand. — Nelson Algren

I think both freedom of religion and freedom of expression are both fundamental human rights, everyone has not only the freedom and the right but the obligation to say what Pope Francis thinks for the common good ... we have the right to have this freedom openly without offending. — Pope Francis

There are two kinds of comprehensive doctrines, religious and secular. Those of religious faith will say I give a veiled argument for secularism, and the latter will say I give a veiled argument for religion. I deny both. Each side presumes the basic ideas of constitutional democracy, so my suggestion is that we can make our political arguments in terms of public reason. Then we stand on common ground. That's how we can understand each other and cooperate. — John Rawls

No one who has ever known what it is to lose faith in a fellow-man whom he has profoundly loved and reverenced, will lightly say that the shock can leave the faith in the Invisible Goodness unshaken. With the sinking of high human trust, the dignity of life sinks too; we cease to believe in our own better self, since that also is part of the common nature which is degraded in our thought; and all the finer impulses of the soul are dulled. — George Eliot

It's very common to say that Star Wars in the late '70s, that was kind of perfect for Cold War culture and the aftermath of Vietnam in the '60s to have an upbeat, hopeful, cartoonish tale of a hero's journey. I think those explanations are easy to offer and almost always wrong. — Cass Sunstein

A price decline is of no real importance to the bona fide investor unless it is either very substantial say, more than a third from cost or unless it reflects a known deterioration of consequence in the company's position. In a well-defined bear market many sound common stocks sell temporarily at extraordinary low prices. It is possible that the investor may then have a paper loss of fully 50 per cent on some of his holdings, without any convincing indication that the underlying values have been permanently affected. — Benjamin Graham

Idle Jeffrey, when asking his cousin for money: "I fear I have not a mercenary tendency."

The Chancellor of the Exchequer and his cousin, Plantagenet Palliser: "Men must have mercenary tendencies or they would not have bred. The man who plows, so he may live, does so because, luckily, he has mercenary tendencies."

Jeffrey: "Just so, but you see I am less lucky than the plowman."

Palliser: "There is no vulgar error so vulgar, that is to say common or erroneous, as that by which men have been taught to say that mercenary tendencies are bad. The desire for wealth is the source of all progress. Civilization comes from what men call greed. Let your mercenary tendencies be combines with honesty, and they cannot take you astray. — Anthony Trollope

And here's the shock
when you risk it, when you do the right thing, when you arrive at the borders of common sense and cross into unknown territory, leaving behind you all the familiar smells and lights, you do not experience great joy and huge energy.
You are unhappy. Things get worse.
It is a time of mourning. Loss. Fear. We bullet ourselves through with questions. And then we feel shot and wounded.
And then all the cowards come out and say, 'See, I told you so.'
In fact, they told you nothing. — Jeanette Winterson

They say officials love to serve the people, so why do they treat the common folk as enemies? Heavy taxes and under-the-table levies, like ravenous beasts, force the farmers to head for the hills. The common folk have a bellyful of grievances, but they dare not let them out. For the moment they open their mouths, electric prods close them fast. — Mo Yan

But is Christian faith the place to turn for logic? Is not logic the domain of scholars and philosophers? The British philosopher John Locke condemns this common misconception: "God has not been so sparing to men to make them barely two-legged creatures, and left it to Aristotle to make them rational."[2] In other words, Locke recognized that logic existed and people reasoned and used the critical faculties of their minds before any philosopher came along to teach about it. God created logic and reasoning as he created man, and he created it for man, and therefore, we should find it reasonable that God's Word has something to say - if not a lot to say - about logic, rationality, and good judgment. — Joel McDurmon

Some subjects are timeless, and I would say that food is one of them. Yet only by comparing notes this way can We of the World Who Have Known Real Hunger actually get together and form our own sort of imaginary club. Our members today would be from everywhere, from Africa, from Europe, from Asia, everywhere. But regardless of our assorted languages, regardless of our assorted politics, the members would have something far more in common than the members of most clubs do. Would would at least know that the universal implement we all have, the stomach, usually behaves the same way under duress and causes us all to have much the same kinds of dreams. — Gregory Boyington

It's our responsibility for the village to say, 'Hey we're going to create these programs,' whether it's sports, creative arts, music, we need some things to give young people positive things to do, and that's including jobs. — Common

What would it mean if there were a theory that explained everything? And just what does "everything" actually mean, anyway? Would this new theory in physics explain, say the meaning of human poetry? Or how economics work? Or the stages of psychosexual development? Can this new physics explain the currents of ecosystems, or the dynamics of history, or why human wars are so terribly common? — Ken Wilber

It is the obvious which is so difficult to see most of the time. People say 'It's as plain as the nose on your face.' But how much of the nose on your face can you see, unless someone holds a mirror up to you? — Isaac Asimov

When I have a problem of deciding right from wrong, I always give it three tests.
First, I give it the common-sense test, and ask if it is reasonable. Then, I give it the prayer test. I ask God if it is good and edifying. Then, I give it the Scripture test. I see if the Bible has anything to say for or against it. — Billy Graham

I have had issues with depression all my life, and it's probably true to say there was a tendency towards it even when I was very young, during my schooldays. There was often - and this is quite common with comics - a sense of not feeling as if I belonged anywhere. — Jack Dee

What you did was to draw a conclusion from a descriptive sentence
That person
wants to live too'
to what we call a normative sentence: 'Therefore you ought not to kill them.' From the point of view of reason this is nonsense. You might just as well say 'There are lots of people who cheat on their taxes, therefore I ought to cheat on my taxes too.' Hume said you can never draw conclusions from is sentences to ought sentences. Nevertheless it is exceedingly common, not least in newspaper articles, political party programs, and speeches. — Jostein Gaarder

Can a sinner be turned into a saint? Can a twisted life be made right? There is only one appropriate answer - "O Lord God, You know" (37:3). Never forge ahead with your religious common sense and say, "Oh, yes, with just a little more Bible reading, devotional time, and prayer, I see how it can be done. — Oswald Chambers

I'm first generation American, and my parents were both from Nigeria. And so I always say that I'm literally an African American. So my last name is Famuyiwa, it's different. And so that was a part of my experience from people not being able to pronounce it to not sort of having sort of a shared, common history with a lot of the kids that I was growing up with because my parents were from Africa. — Terry Gross

According to Callero, "Freedom of choice and self-determination are virtuous principles, but when selfish individual interests threaten to destroy the common good, the limits of individualism are exposed."4 Unfortunately but predictably, Callero is vague when it comes to defining "the common good" - a catchphrase with many variations that has been used by murderous dictators throughout history. May we therefore say that the "common good," when pushed to extremes, results in the likes of Stalin and Hitler? — George H. Smith

The point we desperately need to grasp is that forgiveness is not the same thing as tolerance. We are told again and again today that we must be "inclusive"; that Jesus welcomed all kinds of people just as they were; that the church believes in forgiveness and therefore we should remarry divorcees without question, reinstate employees who were sacked for dishonesty, allow convicted pedophiles back into children's work-actually, we don't normally say the last of these, which shows that we have retained at least some vestiges of common sense. But forgiveness is not the same as tolerance. It is not the same as inclusivity. It is not the same as indifference, whether personal or moral. Forgiveness doesn't mean that we don't take evil seriously after all; it means that we do. — N. T. Wright

In theory, say you did have thousands of people - no, thousands of systems - enraged at a hypothetical Galactic Empire in a faraway galaxy. But they're all upset over local matters, over particular grievances, and they never get together on anything. So they get no strength in numbers, no strategic advantages from cooperation. They're easy to divide and conquer. And worst of all, no common spirit ever develops. — John Jackson Miller

We may experience moments of profound inner peace, a sense of oneness with nature, or a sense of something that is more important that we're not reaching by the usual goals of human society. Perhaps we could say there's a common heart to all the religions. — Thomas Keating

I say expressly, that the mind has not an adequate but only a confused knowledge of itself, its own body, and of external bodies, whenever it perceives things after the common order of nature; that is, whenever it is determined from without, namely, by the fortuitous play of circumstance, to regard this or that; not at such times as it is determined from within, that is, by the fact of regarding several things at once, to understand their points of agreement, difference, and contrast. Whenever it is determined in anywise from within, it regards things clearly and distinctly, as I will show below. — Baruch Spinoza

Each one of us is alone in the world. He is shut in a tower of brass, and can communicate with his fellows only by signs, and the signs have no common value, so that their sense is vague and uncertain. We seek pitifully to convey to others the treasures of our heart, but they have not the power to accept them, and so we go lonely, side by side but not together, unable to know our fellows and unknown by them. We are like people living in a country whose language they know so little that, with all manner of beautiful and profound things to say, they are condemned to the banalities of the conversation manual. Their brain is seething with ideas, and they can only tell you that the umbrella of the gardener's aunt is in the house. — W. Somerset Maugham