Quotes & Sayings About Little Presents

My little girl, Anja, is really excited. We had a baby shower yesterday and she took the presents from everyone for me and was telling them, 'No, it's my baby.' — Alessandra Ambrosio

Really, seeing the amount we give in charity, the wonder is there are any poor left. It is a comfort that there are. What should we do without them? Our fur-clad little girls! our jolly, red-faced squires! we should never know how good they were, but for the poor? Without the poor how could we be virtuous? We should have to go about giving to each other. And friends expect such expensive presents, while a shilling here and there among the poor brings to us all the sensations of a good Samaritan. Providence has been very thoughtful in providing us with poor. — Jerome K. Jerome

Yes, NFL players deserve to be paid well. Unfortunately, economic realities are forcing everyone to make tough choices and the NFL is no different. These are not easy negotiations, but the outcome can be positive. If both sides give a little, everyone, including fans, will get a lot and the game will improve through innovation. Even in difficult economic times, a new CBA presents us with the opportunity to secure the future of our game. — Roger Goodell

The warm night claimed her. In a moment it was part of her. She walked on the grass, and her shoes were instantly soaked. She flung up her arms to the sky. Power ran to her fingertips. Excitement was communicated from the waiting trees, and the orchard, and the paddock; the intensity of their secret life caught at her and made her run. It was nothing like the excitement of ordinary looking forward, of birthday presents, of Christmas stockings, but the pull of a magnet - her grandfather had shown her once how it worked, little needles springing to the jaws - and now night and the sky above were a vast magnet, and the things that waited below were needles, caught up in the great demand. ("The Pool") — Daphne Du Maurier

I would not take one cup of coffee from a grower ... There's not a good one. I hate them. A few presents, a little talk, then the noose. That's how capitalism works. — Cesar Chavez

I'd sleep in a little, work out, do laundry, run errands, buy presents for people with birthdays coming up. I like it when I don't have to be anywhere, and anything I do is my choice. — Carrie Underwood

Look round this universe. What an immense profusion of beings, animated and organized, sensible and active! You admire this prodigious variety and fecundity. But inspect a little more narrowly these living existences, the only beings worth regarding. How hostile and destructive to each other! How insufficient all of them for their own happiness! How contemptible or odious to the spectator! The whole presents nothing but the idea of a blind Nature, inpregnated by a great vivifying principle, and pouring forth from her lap, without discernment or parental care, her maimed and abortive children. — David Hume

And once again Mr. Sherlock Holmes is free to devote his life to examining those interesting little problems which the complexity of human life so pletifuly presents. — Arthur Conan Doyle

It was the beginning of the greatest Christmas ever. Little food. No presents. But there was a snowman in their basement. — Markus Zusak

Firstly," said Ponder, "Mr Pessimal wants to know what we do here."
"Do? We are the premier college of magic!" said Ridcully.
"But do we teach?"
"Only if no alternative presents itself," said the Dean. "We show 'em where the library is, give 'em a few little chats, and graduate the survivors. If they run into any problems, my door is always metaphorically open."
"Metaphorically, sir?" said Ponder.
"Yes. But technically, of course, it's locked."
"Explain to him that we don't do things, Stibbons," said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. "We are academics. — Terry Pratchett

Ever since I was little, I've loved making hand-made cards and presents and arts & crafts for people. — Sarah Kay

What a man can do and suffer is unknown to himself till some occasion presents itself which draws out the hidden power. Just as one sees not in the water of an unruffled pond the fury and roar with which it can dash down a steep rock without injury to itself, or how high it is capable of rising; or as little as one can suspect the latent heat in ice-cold water. — Arthur Schopenhauer

Here's a little nugget I've learned in life about the secret to being a good friend: when words won't suffice, lend an ear. When you can't march into a courtroom or a conference room or a classroom and lay the smack down, lend your shoulder to cry on. When you don't have money for expensive presents, offer your simple presence. And when you don't know what else to do for someone, pray for him or her. It does matter. It is enough. It will be remembered for years to come. — Mandy Hale

When we are afraid of ourselves and afraid of the seeming threat the world presents, then we become extremely selfish. We want to build our own little nests, our own cocoons, so that we can live by ourselves in a secure way. — Chogyam Trungpa

Winter dark, five o'clock in the morning by the little gold carriage clock on the bedroom mantelpiece. The clock, an English one ('Better than a French one', her mother had instructed), had been one of her parents' wedding presents. When the creditors came to call after the society portraitist's death his widow hid the clock beneath her skirts, bemoaning the passing of the crinoline. Lottie appeared to chime on the quarter, disconcerting the creditors. Luckily they were not in the room when she struck the hour. — Kate Atkinson

Every art always deals with human beings, it is a human manifestation and presents human beings. To paraphrase Marx: "The root of all art is man." When the film close-up strips the veil of our imperceptiveness and insensitivity from the hidden little things and shows us the face of objects, it still shows us man, for what makes objects expressive are the human expressions projected on to them. The objects only reflect our own selves, and this is what distinguished art from scientific knowledge (although even the latter is to a great extent subjectively determined). When we see the face image of things, we do what the ancients did in creating gods in man's image and breathing a human soul into them. The close-ups of the film are the creative instruments of this mighty visual anthropomorphism. — Gerald Mast

Today, you are as old as you have ever been and as young as you will ever be! It is never too late, or too early to start working toward your goals and your dreams. Every moment, every situation, and every turn of events presents you with an opportunity to build the self you are capable of being, and the life you are worthy of living. It's just a matter of accepting, implementing ideas, taking action and actively expressing the purpose that is uniquely YOU.
Every word you speak and every action you take should be intended to make tomorrow a little bit better. There is no such timer, clock or watch that measures quality time. You are given 24 hours a day and it is up to you as to how you will use it! — John Geiger

My mother told me," the boy replied, turning a page of the catalog. "Haven't you seen Santa at the mall and all the kids who sit on his knee and tell him what they want for Christmas?" "My mother says they're just men in Santa suits." "Do you get presents on Christmas morning?" "Yes." "And you don't think Santa brings them." "Nope. My mother brings them." "What about the Easter Bunny?" "There's no such thing as the Easter Bunny." The two little girls at the table behind them heard this and started to cry. Their parents glared at Harriman and the boy — Billy Wells

Leading up to Christmas, there was talk of Santa. But I'd never even heard of Santa. Bunty, one of the workers who I grew to love, tried to explain, 'He brings little angels like you, presents. — Stephen Richards

There you have it! - How they anticipate my wishes, how they grant friendship's little attentions, which are worth a thousand times more than breathtaking presents that merely prove the giver's vanity and humiliate us. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

We drove in a kind of wholesome silence, carrying our whole long marriage, all the hope and kindness that it represented, with us. What it felt like was sitting in Sunday school singing "Jesus loves me," sitting in the little chairs, surrounded by sunlight and bright drawings, and having those first inklings of doubt, except that doubt presents itself simply as added knowledge, something new, for the moment, to set beside what is already known. — Jane Smiley

I must thank you,' said Sherlock Holmes, 'for calling my attention to a case which certainly presents some features of interest. I had observed some newspaper comment at the time, but I was exceedingly preoccupied by that little affair of the Vatican cameos, and in my anxiety to oblige the Pope I lost touch with several interesting English cases. — Arthur Conan Doyle

You know, whenever women make imaginary female kingdoms in literature, they are always very permissive, to use the jargon word, and easy and generous and self-indulgent, like the relationships between women when there are no men around. They make each other presents, and they have little feasts, and nobody punishes anyone else. This is the female way of going along when there are no men about or when men are not in the ascendant. — Doris Lessing

We can trace back our existence almost to a point. Former time presents us with trains of thoughts gradually diminishing to nothing. But our ideas of futurity are perpetually expanding. Our desires and our hopes, even when modified by our fears, seem to grasp at immensity. This alone would be sufficient to prove the progressiveness of our nature, and that this little earth is but a point from which we start toward a perfection of being. — Humphry Davy

He might have been considered a very eligible bachelor, had he worked a little less, and ventured into society a little more. But Pritchard loathed large groups of mixed company, where every man is required to act as a kind of envoy for his sex, and presents his own advantages playfully, under the scrutiny of the room. Large crowds made him stifled and irritable. He preferred close company, and kept few friends - to whom he was fiercely loyal, — Eleanor Catton

... a tiny room, furnished in early MFI, of which every surface was covered in china ornaments and plaster knick-knacks whose only virtue was that they were small, and therefore of limited individual horribleness. Cumulatively, they were like an infestation. Little vases, ashtrays, animals, shepherdesses, tramps, boots, tobys, ruined castles, civic shields of seaside towns, thimbles, bambis, pink goggle-eyed puppies sitting up and begging, scooped-out swans plainly meant to double as soap dishes, donkeys with empry panniers which ought to have held pin-cushions or perhaps bunches of violets -- all jostled together in a sad visual cacophony of bad taste and birthday presents and fading holiday memories, too many to be loved, justifying themselves by their sheer weight of numbers as 'collections' do. — Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

We will simply say here that, as a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in our view, the richest source that nature can offer art. Rubens so understood it, doubtless, when it pleased him to introduce the hideous features of a court dwarf amid his exhibitions of royal magnificence, coronations and splendid ceremonial.
The universal beauty which the ancients solemnly laid upon everything, is not without monotony; the same impression repeated again and again may prove fatiguing at last. Sublime upon sublime scarcely presents a contrast, and we need a little rest from everything, even the beautiful.
On the other hand, the grotesque seems to be a halting-place, a mean term, a starting-point whence one rises toward the beautiful with a fresher and keener perception. The salamander gives relief to the water-sprite; the gnome heightens the charm of the sylph. — Victor Hugo

A friendship can weather most things and thrive in thin soil; but it needs a little mulch of letters and phone calls and small, silly presents every so often - just to save it from drying out completely. — Pam Brown

For our Selves will always do pretty well if we don't pay them too much attention. Our Selves are like some little children who will be happy enough so long as they are left to their own games, but when we begin to interfere with them, and make them presents of too nice playthings, or too many sweet things, they begin at once to fret and spoil. — George MacDonald

My gaze returns to earth and when it does, it's her eyes I see. Not the way I used to see them - around every corner, behind my own closed lids at the start of each day. Not in the way I used to imagine them in the eyes of every other girl I laid on top of. No, this time it really is her eyes. A photo of her, dressed in black, a cello leaning against one shoulder like a tired child. Her hair is up in one of those buns that seem to be a requisite for classical musicians. She used to wear it up like that for recitals and chamber music concerts, but with little pieces hanging down, to soften the severity of the look. There are no tendrils in this photo. I peer closer at the sign. YOUNG CONCERT SERIES PRESENTS MIA HALL. — Gayle Forman

A play presents a self-enclosed little world for the audience to examine. It's an opportunity to look objectively at a group of people, to assess them, to react to them, and to measure oneself against them, to ask 'Am I like that?' — Wallace Shawn

If you want to give a tangible present, but you know the recipient wants cash, give a little bit of both. This strategy is helpful for occasions that involve a public opening of presents, like a bridal or baby shower. You can give something that can be wrapped and opened, along with a card containing a check. — Jean Chatzky

I recognized that Christianity had taught me that sacrifice is the way of life. I forgot the neighbor who raped me, but I could see that when theology presents Jesus' death as God's sacrifice of his beloved child for the sake of the world, it teaches that the highest love is sacrifice. To make sacrifice or to be sacrificed is virtuous and redemptive.

But what if this is not true? What if nothing, or very little, is saved? What if the consequence of sacrifice is simply pain, the diminishment of life, fragmentation of the soul, abasement, shame? What if the severing of life is merely destructive of life and is not the path of love, courage, trust, and faith? What if the performance of sacrifice is a ritual in which some human beings bear loss and others are protected from accountability or moral expectations? — Rebecca Ann Parker

I always listen," Ranger said. "I don't always agree. I have a problem right now that I can't seem to solve by myself. I need you to help me find my daughter. And there's an even bigger problem involved. I feel a financial and moral obligation to my daughter. I send child support, I send birthday and Christmas presents, I visit when I'm invited. But I've kept myself emotionally distanced. I'm not emotionally distanced from you. I couldn't live with myself if something happened to you because I was using you to find someone . . . even if that someone was my daughter. So I have to make every effort to keep you safe." "You're a little smothering. — Janet Evanovich

I used to have nightmares when I was a little kid that I woke up prematurely and opened all the Christmas presents. And then I would be so relieved when I woke up and I realized that I hadn't done it. — Claire Danes

The heroic hours of life do not announce their presence by drum and trumpet, challenging us to be true to ourselves by appeals to the martial spirit that keeps the blood at heat. Some little, unassuming, unobtrusive choice presents itself before us slyly and craftily, glib and insinuating, in the modest garb of innocence ... Then it is that you will be summoned to show the courage of adventurous youth. — Benjamin Cardozo

I mean, what is an un-birthday present?"
A present given when it isn't your birthday, of course."
Alice considered a little. "I like birthday presents best," she said at last.
You don't know what you're talking about!" cried Humpty Dumpty. "How many days are there in a year?"
Three hundred and sixty-five," said Alice.
And how many birthdays have you?"
One. — Lewis Carroll

Santa Claus and all his little presents tend to get in the way of God's message."
"As can religion," Santa replied. — Brom

Oh, when I was a kid, I was poor. Christmas, I got no presents. Well, there was one Christmas, on our front lawn - Prancer and Dancer - they dropped off a little something. — Rodney Dangerfield

The ancients had little doubt about the true shape of the earth: "It's [the world's] shape has the rounded appearance of a perfect sphere. This is shown first of all by the name of 'orb' which is bestowed upon it by the general consent of mankind ... Our eyesight also confirms this belief, because the firmament presents the aspect of a concave hemisphere equidistant in every direction, which would be impossible in the case of any other figure." — Pliny The Elder

Here's the plan: We do everything, all the traditions, and we do it grander than anyone ever dreamed! Here are the houselights, which will require extra generators so we don't smash the power grid, the holiday music CDs that will need waterproof outdoor concert speakers, the train set with extra boxes of tracks to connect all the rooms of the house, the toys where we forget the batteries, several gingerbread house kits we'll combine to form a mansion, DVDs of all the classic Christmas specials to run nonstop, mistletoe for all the doorways, the manger scene with a little Jesus that glows in the dark to emphasize the Holy Spirit third of the Trinity because he's the shy one who gets the least press, and all the presents we'll wrap together and give each other as Secret Santas. — Tim Dorsey

The practice which obtains amongst the Americans of fixing the standard of their judgment in themselves alone, leads them to other habits of mind. As they perceive that they succeed in resolving without assistance all the little difficulties which their practical life presents, they readily conclude that everything in the world may be explained, and that nothing in it transcends the limits of the understanding. Thus they fall to denying what they cannot comprehend; which leaves them but little faith for whatever is extraordinary, and an almost insurmountable distaste for whatever is supernatural. — Alexis De Tocqueville

At her birthday, my seven-year-old daughter will say that she wants these big cakes and certain expensive toys as presents, and I can't say no to her. It would just break my heart. But when I was little, for birthdays we just played outside and we were happy if we got any cake. — Goran Ivanisevic

There can be little question that the tall building presents one of the most difficult challenges to the architect. — Martin Filler

We go on in her room, where we like to set. I get up in the big chair and she get up on me and smile, bounce a little. "Tell me bout the brown wrapping. And the present." She so excited, she squirming. She has to jump off my lap, squirm a little to get it out. Then she crawl back up.
That's her favorite story cause when I tell it, she get two presents. I take the brown wrapping from my Piggly Wiggly grocery bag and wrap up a little something, like piece a candy, inside. Then I use the white paper from my Cole's Drug Store bag and wrap another one just like it. She take it real serious, the unwrapping, letting me tell the story bout how it ain't the color a the wrapping that count, it's what we is inside. — Kathryn Stockett

We all tell little lies about ourselves, Our past, our presents. We think some of them are minuscule, unimportant, And others, large and incriminating. But they are the same. Only God Has enough of the story to judge our souls. — Sarah McCoy

Librarians are serious people, seldomgiven to idle jocularity. The reason for this, I believe, is because we are overwhelmed by the enormous number of good books waiting to be read, leaving little time for frivolity. My personal list of must-read books presents a daunting challenge; I can't even imagine the pressure our head librarian must be under. — Lynn Austin

Sublime upon sublime scarcely presents a contrast, and we need a little rest from everything, even the beautiful. — Victor Hugo

There is something about Christmas that requires a rug rat. Little kids make Christmas fun. I wonder if could rent one for the holidays. When I was tiny we would by a real tree and stay up late drinking hot chocolate and finding just the right place for the special decorations. It seems like my parents gave up the magic when I figured out the Santa lie. Maybe I shouldn't have told them I knew where the presents really came from. It broke their hearts.
I bet they'd be divorced by now if I hadn't been born. I'm sure I was a huge disappointment. I'm not pretty or smart or athletic. I'm just like them- an ordinary drone dressed in secrets and lies. I can't believe we have to keep playacting till I graduate. It's a shame we just can't admit that we have failed at family living, sell the house, split up the money, and get on with our lives. Merry Christmas. — Laurie Halse Anderson

Nobody spoke for a minute; then Meg said in an altered tone, "You know the reason Mother proposed not having any presents this Christmas was because it is going to be a hard winter for everyone; and she thinks we ought not to spend money for pleasure, when our men are suffering so in the army. We can't do much, but we can make our little sacrifices, and ought to do it gladly. But I am afraid I don't," and Meg shook her head, as she thought regretfully of all the pretty things she wanted. — Louisa May Alcott

Life presents itself as a continual deception, in small matters as well as in great. If it has promised, it does not keep its word, unless to show how little desirable the desired object was; hence we are deluded now by hope, now by what was hoped for. If it has given, it did so in order to take. The enchantment of distance shows us paradises that vanish like optical illusions, when we have allowed ourselves to be fooled by them. Accordingly, happiness lies always in the future, or else in the past, and the present may be compared to a small dark cloud driven by the wind over the sunny plain; in front of and behind the cloud everything is bright, only it itself always casts a shadow. Consequently, the present is always inadequate, but the future is uncertain, and the past irrecoverable. — Arthur Schopenhauer

Paris presents one incessant round of amusement & dissipation but very little, I believe - even for its inhabitants of that society - which interests the heart. Every day, you may see something new, magnificent & beautiful; every night, you may see a spectacle which astonishes & enchants the imagination. — John Marshall