Horsley Quotes & Sayings

I do not understand a man who does not want to know all that he can know. Why would anyone choose ignorance? If he chooses ignorance because he is lay, then he is a fool, for the ignorant are put to hard labor digging and hauling stones for masters who tell them they need no knowledge. If a man must labor from dawn to dusk to avoid a blow on the head and to earn a cup of grain, he has no time to gain knowledge and remains a slave to masters. I think, therefore, that is is a worthy vocation to free a man enough that he can learn who he is and what he is capable of, where he came from and what philosophies steer his life. — Kate Horsley

Dandyism is a lie which reveals the truth, and the truth is that we are what we pretend to be. — Sebastian Horsley

The motivation of all artists is 'Look at me, Mum'. — Sebastian Horsley

To be worthy of assassination takes more than some crappy little book. — Sebastian Horsley

I went for a private sitting with a clairvoyant and got some really good messages off him, but one thing that did frighten me was when he said, 'I can see a lot of fist fighting with you. — Stephen Richards

I learned regret in the ruins of Tarbfhlaith. I regretted that ambition had ruled my heart instead of affection for my kin. And with the lesson of regret came the gratitude for having life still to move my lips and limbs, and to speak kind words to and embrace those I may not see again on this sweet-smelling earth. I learned that I cannot wait to love what is in my presence, for it or I may well be gone tomorrow. To some, such as Giannon, this lesson poisons the heart with bitterness. But such bitterness has no value and is, in fact, cowardly. For bitterness risks nothing. — Kate Horsley

I like to remind myself that every morning I'm making a choice to live. — Sebastian Horsley

The problem with compassion is that it is not photogenic. — Sebastian Horsley

The crowd were totally behind him and it spurred him on, I was right in the heat of battle. There was only one to win; I dug deep and summoned up every bit of strength, I had in me to put in to one punch to see if I could hit the jackpot. I drew him to the ropes and put everything in to a cracking right uppercut and just missed, bastard! — Stephen Richards

Another time, I was at the bar getting a drink and this geezer is stood at the bar with a ciggie in his mouth, trying his best to look rock hard. He takes a drag and points his finger in my face and drawls, 'Don't I know you?'
He was looking snake-eyed at me like a typical big screen gangster.
I stood in front of him and drawled back, 'I don't know, but they call me Richy Horsley,' and then bang, I batter him with a left hook that landed with a strange dull thud. Mr Movie Gangster was stood there leaning against the bar and staring out in to space, knocked out standing up. — Stephen Richards

I didn't want to tell Mother I worked as a journalist. She thought I was a prostitute. Locking yourself in a room and inventing characters and conversations which do not exit is no way for a grown man to behave. — Sebastian Horsley

Despotism is the only form of government which may with safety to itself, neglect the education of its infant poor. — Samuel Horsley

Perhaps it is weariness that causes seers not to act on what they see; for whereas the wisdom of the world can be vast, it includes the many futilities. Ideas do not have legs with which to run and hands with which to craft. They are wisps of smoke floating into a universe of pain and ignorance that overwhelm the capacity of one small human body and the mind trapped inside it. — Kate Horsley

You may look back on your life and accept it as good or evil. But it is far, far harder to admit that you have been completely unimportant; that in the great sum of things all a man's endless grapplings are no more significant than the scuttlings of a cockroach. The universe is neither friendly nor hostile. It is merely indifferent. This makes me ecstatic. I have reached a nirvana of negativity. I can look futility in the face and still see promise in the stars. — Sebastian Horsley

I had a burning desire in me to win and started to get him on the back foot. I was looking for that one special shot when I put him down with the famous Horsley Muckspreader right hand ... an unstoppable force. Incredibly, he got up and took the count and the ref waved us to continue. — Stephen Richards

At first, we both miss a few sharp bursts of wild punches and then, BANG! I catch him with a full swing left hook and he goes down like a ferret down a hole after a rabbit. When that punch landed, I broke my hand, again, and simultaneously broke his jaw. I wonder if that is an entry into the Guinness Book of records? — Stephen Richards

He spouted out, 'Richy, I've just been talking to a bloke from Blackpool on the phone, there's a boxing show tomorrow night and they are desperate for a heavyweight. Will you fight?'
I retorted, 'Are you joking. I haven't trained for four months; I'll be blowing after thirty seconds.'
He pleaded, 'Howay, man. It'll be a night out down Blackpool. — Stephen Richards

If someone thinks I'm posh, it just shows how lowly they are. Some people think I went to Eton. I'm far too stupid to get into Eton. — Sebastian Horsley

Where your attention goes, your energy flows. — Kevin Horsley

I don't talk, I quote. I can't help it. It's better to be quotable than honest. — Sebastian Horsley

Self-pity is the most destructive of all narcotics. — Sebastian Horsley

He was very cock sure of himself. He came at me and threw a big slow right, but he was so slow that he had telegraphed it to me and I'm ready for it and block it. I put a couple of big jabs on him and he went down like the Titanic, maybe quicker. — Stephen Richards

Everyone in the place seen me nut him apart from the ref, it caught him on the blind side. I tried to nut him on the eyebrow so it would split open, but I got him on the forehead. The crowd turned right against me, but I made it to the last bell and lost on a unanimous decision. — Stephen Richards

That was the trouble with working the doors, too many crybabies; you were always in a 'no win' situation. — Stephen Richards

Eventually, it was around midnight, I was told to get ready and put the gloves on. I felt physically depleted and drained of energy, and had no get-up-and-go left in me. I wanted a bed badly, not a boxing ring. — Stephen Richards

There's a lot of noise about me that stops a lot of people from listening, but the good side is if you expose yourself like that, you're left with only good people who can see through you-you get rid of all the wankers. — Sebastian Horsley

The universe is neither friendly nor hostile. It is merely indifferent. This makes me ecstatic. — Sebastian Horsley

Usually with a couple of these shots the word 'Goodnight' would show up on their forehead, but he was still on his feet, but backed up and then I battered him with a flurry of combinations: right, left, right, right, right and a sweet right hand and he went down. For good measure, I booted him in the head and turned around and walked fast in to the pub away from the scene. — Stephen Richards

I excused myself to the woman I was with and made my way over to these men. I stopped to ask my friend Buller to watch my back. The thing is, people like this can't be talked to, and so I wasn't going to mess around with this crazed windmill and his sidekick, Don Quixote.
I hit the mouthy crazed windmill with a thumping right, a left, right, smack on the chin; he fell apart and was out for the count before he hit the deck.
I turned to Don Quixote and off he shot like the Disney cartoon character of Speedy Gonzales. — Stephen Richards

An artist has to go to every extreme, to stretch his sensibility through excess and suffering in order to feel and to communicate more. — Sebastian Horsley

We build our character as a carapace to keep away the fear of the abyss. That's what our character is for. — Sebastian Horsley

I keep the shutters closed because I like to work in a hermetic environment. I like mirrors. When you look out of the window, all you see is ugliness, but when you look in the mirror all you see is beauty. — Sebastian Horsley

I might be old, but I'm still desirable. — Sebastian Horsley

The problem I've got is that I really, really like drugs. I love everything about them. It is horrific being sober all the time-utterly awful. — Sebastian Horsley

When I got off him, I spat the blood that was swamping my mouth in to his face, I looked down at him and it really looked like he was dying ... shit!
The ambulance arrived in about a minute and they got an oxygen mask straight on him and I could see the life draining out of him. You see, this is the problem; we are only human and flesh and blood. — Stephen Richards

If I hear that people are litigious, I immediately dismiss them. — Sebastian Horsley

the greatest trick of kings is to fool the poor into thinking we have common cause with the rich simply because we live on the same bog. Then the poor get their heads split open in the battles they fight so the rich can keep their wine cellars well stocked. — Kate Horsley

My first sparring session with him saw him bullying me around the ring, so I thought fuck this, and when he came back in close, I threw the boxing code of conduct out of the window and hit him with a cracking right hand in to the balls! That sapped the energy out of him and that was the end of that. In the end, I could take anything he threw at me and then I'd come back with mine, which he didn't like and people would comment on how much I'd 'come on'. — Stephen Richards

In a split second he went for me, he never tried to punch me though, he went to grab me so he could use his strength for some rough and tumble, but as fast as he came rushing at me, I equally as fast unleashed a furious right uppercut (if you can deliver a uppercut properly you'll never go far wrong because when they land, your legs cave in) on to his chin and his legs went from under him like a baby deer. They say, the bigger you are, the harder you fall, that is correct! He hit the deck like a broken lift. — Stephen Richards

I don't really know what Americans are like. I've no idea. I know a few things about them. In my imagination, they have warm peachy hearts, whereas the English have horrible spiteful withered hearts - success in England inspires envy - in America, it inspires hope. — Sebastian Horsley

Why shouldn't I be allowed to say stupid, outrageous things? — Sebastian Horsley

He lost a few teeth and wet himself in to the next century. I looked up at his mates and none of them would look me in the face. — Stephen Richards

Power does not willingly give up its place to truth. — Kate Horsley

The films of Saturday Night Fever and Grease were all the rage and I'll admit, I went to see Grease at the local ABC Cinema with a few of my mates. You'd be surprised at how many so-called 'hard' lads that would be stood in the queue waiting to see Grease. — Stephen Richards

Why hang about in long drawn out fights, you want them to be over as quick as possible and I was blessed with a pitiless punch that sorted the men out from the boys. The only drawback to having such a vicious punch is that my hands have been broken so many times over the years. — Stephen Richards

I'd only gone and whacked his front teeth out and they'd stuck in my hand, I still have the scar to this very day. A few weeks later, I got banged up for it; he never went to the police until two weeks later. Somebody had put him wise about getting compensation from the Criminal Injuries Board. Anyway, the CPS (Crown Prosecution Service) kicked it in to touch as a 'no go' case. — Stephen Richards

I like living sparsely. In the main room, there's no furniture - no tables, no chairs, no coffee table - not even a decaffeinated coffee table. — Sebastian Horsley

Everyone says Oscar Wilde was a dandy, but he wasn't - he was an aesthete. He took pleasure in food and stuff like that. Dandyism is much more austere - much more Calvinistic, more neurotic - it oscillates between narcissism and neurosis. — Sebastian Horsley

I am a fraud. I have cobbled together my personality from hundreds of little bits. I am simultaneously the most genuine and the most artificial person you will ever meet. — Sebastian Horsley

I have wanted only one thing to make me happy. That thing is everything. — Sebastian Horsley

Getting old is horrible, but it is interesting ... one of the things I've realized is that growing old is compulsory, but growing up is optional. — Sebastian Horsley

The Midwife talked to herself now, rather than God, as she walked the road past the Big Bog, wondering if a child born female could truly live her whole life as a male. And if this were possible and offended no god, then perhaps the world had no order other than what was arbitrarily imposed by humans. — Kate Horsley

I like fat girls. A woman can never be too poor or too fat. I'd take a poor fat girl over a rich thin girl like Kate Moss. — Sebastian Horsley

Everyone used to laugh at him because he was the first one to do it. This was all new to people and it took a bit for everyone to get used to it. Then ... yes, you've guessed, I too dyed my hair and other people followed suit as well and the punk explosion was about to hit the scene in a big way. — Stephen Richards

When I reached the age of five, I was told I was adopted as a baby, at that time I was gun and holster mad, a bit of a lone ranger, as was the rage in those days. My parents, Tom and Brenda, told me they went to see all these special kids and they picked me out from them. Waiting for my reaction, I looked up at my parents and chimed, 'Did I have my guns on? — Stephen Richards

I moved in distance and as the fight unfolded, I landed a big, destructive, hard-hitting right hand (The Muckspreader) smack on the button and he collapsed in a (muck) heap on the deck, out for the count.
His mates looked at me and never said a word. The big fella was asleep and wasn't moving ... I had flattened him. — Stephen Richards

I must have been crazy for taking that fight, I should have told Anth to get on his bike, but what made it worse was I knew if I were in shape I'd have beaten him inside of two rounds. Some people reckon fighters must have a little madness in them, I reckon they might be right. — Stephen Richards

I would live in a world of Christ-like humans, but not one full of Christians, may God forgive me. — Kate Horsley

Thank God! He went down in front of the bar on the tiled floor. BANG! The fat bastard, he shattered both knees with the weight of him. My hands were in just a little bit of pain, but I was driven on to keep punching his fat head in by the gratifying squeals I was eliciting from him and, broken hands or not, with the coup de grace ... I knocked him out. — Stephen Richards

Fear was keeping this loon going, as he was scrambling under the tables in this packed club, it was as if he was in a Carry On film and trying to hide from me. As the bouncers arrived, I was putting the boot in to the plonker without much success. He was like a bumblebee on speed! — Stephen Richards

I started to turn my life around for the better and try to instil a bit of stability and balance back in to it and take a back seat to violence. I wanted to leave that part of my life behind. The leopard wanted to ditch its spots! — Stephen Richards

The sciences are said, and they are truly said, to have a mutual connection, that any one of them may be the better understood, for an insight into the rest. — Samuel Horsley

In the last round I was so wiped-out that for the first time in my life I tried to get disqualified. He was throwing punches non-stop and he was dangerous with those shots and becoming a little bit too cute for my liking. I backed to the ropes and catapulted off them and nutted him. — Stephen Richards

Finally, a principal reason for the lack of attention to "unclean spirits" and Jesus' "acts of power" in the Gospel stories is surely the modern "scientific" frame of mind that developed in the wake of the Enlightenment reduction of reality to what was natural and comprehensible by reason. — Richard A. Horsley

In 1972, my idol Gordon Banks was seriously injured in a car accident and lost an eye. He was still England goalkeeper and the world's Number One. I was absolutely gutted for Banksie. His career was over prematurely. He did make a comeback in America for a time, but he said he felt like people were coming to watch a bit of a circus act: 'Roll up, roll up! The world's only one-eyed goalkeeper.' And so he retired from football for good. When he lost his eye, I wanted to give him one of mine, that's how much I thought of him. — Stephen Richards

Being well-dressed gives a feeling of inward tranquility which psychoanalysis is powerless to bestow. — Sebastian Horsley

[ ... ] life is just the misery left between abortion and euthanasia [ ... ] — Sebastian Horsley

I don't think I'm known for my gifts - I'm known for my gall. I don't want to be just a famous person - I'm too old. — Sebastian Horsley

I am not an intellectual. An intellectual is someone who looks at a sausage and thinks of Picasso, whereas I just say 'pass the mustard'. — Sebastian Horsley

It is better to listen to a crow that lives in trees than to a learned man who lives only in ideas. — Kate Horsley

I think you are born, and I think you die. I have a pragmatic nature, but I yearn to believe. — Sebastian Horsley

But really death seems the least awful thing that can happen to someone — Sebastian Horsley

Pain can be vitalising; it gives intensity in the place of vagueness and emptiness. If we don't suffer, how do we know that we live? — Sebastian Horsley

Knowledge often spoils devotion. — Kate Horsley

Teaching is a sacred art. This is why the noblest druid is not the one who conjures fires and smoke but the one who brings the news and passes on the histories. The teacher, the bard, the singer of tales is a freer of men's minds and bodies, especially when he roams without allegiance to one chieftain or another. But he is also a danger to the masters if he insists upon telling the truth. The truth will inevitably cause tremors in those who cling to power without honoring justice. — Kate Horsley

If I want to dislike women, I should be allowed to. As it happens, I love them. Women to me are privately worshipped and publicly disdained. — Sebastian Horsley

Wonder, connected with a principle of rational curiosity, is the source of all knowledge and discover, and it is a principle even of piety; but wonder which ends in wonder, and is satisfied with wonder, is the quality of an idiot. — Samuel Horsley

People who have a reputation for being evil are usually good. — Sebastian Horsley

It is noble to pity a man who is cruel because he is weak, but it is idiotic and dangerous to allow him to have power. — Kate Horsley

Think of how many boring, blameless lives are brightened by the blazing indiscretion of me. — Sebastian Horsley

It's really interesting because 50 years ago, if you didn't wear a hat everyone looked at you. It just proves that everything is fashion. — Sebastian Horsley

People either hate me or dislike me - but I realized that people aren't against you, they are for themselves. We're all prejudiced in favor of ourselves. — Sebastian Horsley

Lee Duffy was a man apart and someone who only comes around once in a lifetime, a total one off. There have been a lot of things written about him in the press and it's always been from the other side of the coin. There are always two sides to every story and Lee's family have never fully told us their side. They are very distrustful of the press after Lee was made out to be some kind of monster.
If Lee had been born and bred in London, he would have been an icon.
He was Robin Hood, Dick Turpin and Muhammad Ali rolled into one. — Stephen Richards

The self is a thought that tells itself that thought is a self. — Jasun Horsley

My one concession to American sensibilities was to remove my nail polish. — Sebastian Horsley

When you change a belief you change a mental construction and, therefore, your life. — Kevin Horsley

My only criticism about Quentin Crisp is that the subversive must be ready to subvert themselves. I may dress for myself, but I undress for everybody else, whereas he never did that - he was never prepared to drop a bomb on everything he did. — Sebastian Horsley

We can't all be stars because someone has to sit on the curb and clap as I go by. — Sebastian Horsley

Poor posture and flexibility are common features in patients with CF. CF-related bone disease and abnormal respiratory mechanics lead to a high incidence of musculoskeletal pain, thoracic kyphosis, and vertebral fracture rates. All patients should have an annual musculoskeletal and postural assessment from childhood (age ~8 years), with monitoring and treatment of any musculoskeletal issues (see Chapter 9). — Alex Horsley

But I knew that I would have to live forever with what I did on that night of dying, and that if I chose to be a coward, I would have to repeat such cowardice over and over again in order to justify that it had ever occurred. — Kate Horsley

One of the many troubles of growing older is that it gets progressively harder to find a famous historical figure who hadn't yet amounted to anything by the time he was your age. — Sebastian Horsley

A woman is supposed to have curves like an old Bentley, not like some old bike. — Sebastian Horsley

I went after him and picked him off with a right, like a predator and was all over him like a rash! I was in to him with a right hand lead and out to inflict pain, but it wasn't all one-sided! This guy was on a wing and a prayer when he threw a chopping right hand that whizzed past me with him on the other end of it ... I was blessed, or something!
I had to turn it on and step it up, because if he connected with one of those shots then I was chicken fodder! I could see that his wasted efforts were tiring him by the second. I boxed him from range and kept tying him up, I was now in to a rhythm, I swung lefts and rights, all of them smashing in to his head with an unrelenting ferocity.
By now his face was covered in blood and he was about to go down when the ref stepped in and stopped it. I won; I had defeated Goliath. — Stephen Richards

Boxing in Hartlepool started on the beach at Seaton Carew where the fighters fought bare knuckle. In the early 1900s there was a boxing booth on the corner of Burbank Street known as the 'Blood Tub'.
The Blood Tub always drew the crowds and you were guaranteed a good punch up. Hartlepool was a booming ship port and someone would go round the docks and pick five coloured seamen for what was called an 'All In'. One in each corner and one in the middle and when the bell rang it was every man for himself and the winner was the one left standing after some furious toe-to-toe exchanges. That was always a big crowd puller. — Stephen Richards

I consider myself to be very correct and proper: an upright citizen. — Sebastian Horsley

The crowd started cheering as soon as they seen him, he was one of them, a local lad from Lancashire. In the first round, I tried to put him away but my punches had nothing in them, I might as well as been hitting thin air. It was then that I knew I had to really dig deep if I wanted to hear the final bell; I threw a clever little corkscrew right. A great shot, but ineffective unless it hits with some vigour, which it didn't! — Stephen Richards

After my victory at the Warriors 1, the self-proclaimed and well named Monarch of the Underworld, Dave Courtney, came up to me and commended me when he said, 'Richy, you can hit, I'm fucking glad you're not hitting me.' The way Dave said it and the expression on his face made me laugh. — Stephen Richards

As a child, I was influenced by a great deal but in particular the 1969 film Easy Rider exerted quite a bit of influence in that I longed for a Harley Davison chopper motorcycle so that I could pretend to be one of the lead characters from that particular film, either Wyatt or Billy, (played respectively by Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper).
The closest I got to realise this dream was back in 1971 when the chopper bike was the craze throughout the nation. It even had gears! The big padded seat was comfortable for your backside and you really thought you were one of the gang from Easy Rider on your Harley Davidson. — Stephen Richards

Among all the wisdom and facts I learned from Giannon, I also learned the loneliness of incarnation, in which there is inevitably a separation of souls because of the uniqueness of our faces and our experiences. And I learned also the moments when the current of my life joins the current of another life, and I can glimpse for a moment the one flowing body of water we all compose. — Kate Horsley

Use words to please, to instruct, to soothe. Then stop speaking. — Kate Horsley