Quotes & Sayings About Negligence

There are lots of those who speak but few who do. However, no one should distort the word of God by his own negligence, but it is better to confess your own weakness, not hiding the truth of God, so that together with the breaking of the commandments you do not also appear guilty of an untrustworthy explanation of the word of God. — Maximus The Confessor

Ineptitude and negligence directed British policies in India more than any cynical desire to divide and rule, but the British were not above exploiting rivalries. — Pankaj Mishra

Success produces confidence; confidence relaxes industry, and negligence ruins the reputation which accuracy had raised. — Ben Jonson

Where there are many beauties in a poem I shall not cavil at a few faults proceeding either from negligence or from the imperfection of our nature. — Horace

Discipline can only be obtained when all the officers are imbued with the sense of their awful obligation to their men and to their country that they cannot tolerate negligence. Officers who fail to correct errors or to praise excellence are valueless in peace and dangerous misfits in war. — George S. Patton

The poet must be alike polished by an intercourse with the world as with the studies of taste; one to whom labour is negligence, refinement a science, and art a nature. — Isaac D'Israeli

One should every day think over and make an effort to implant in his mind the saying, "At that time is right now." It is said that it is strange indeed that anyone is able to pass through life by one means or another in negligence. — Tsunetomo Yamamoto

I don't think they're terrible parents. They love us. I think they're negligent parents. That's not the same thing. — Justine Larbalestier

One can get used to ugliness, but never to negligence. — Coco Chanel

It was not said amiss by Antisthenes, when people told him that one Ismenias was an excellent piper, "It may be so," said he, "but he is but a wretched human being, otherwise he would not have been an excellent piper." And king Philip, to the same purpose, told his son Alexander, who once at a merry-meeting played a piece of music charmingly and skilfully, "Are you not ashamed, son, to play so well?" For it is enough for a king or prince to find leisure sometimes to hear others sing, and he does the muses quite honor enough when he pleases to be but present, while others engage in such exercises and trials of skill. He who busies himself in mean occupations produces, in the very pains he takes about things of little or no use, an evidence against himself of his negligence and indisposition to what is really good. — Plutarch

To let friendship die away by negligence and silence is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to throw away one of the greatest comforts of this weary pilgrimage." ~Samuel Johnson — Edward M. Hallowell

For the Christian, ignorance is not bliss; it is negligence and carelessness. — Pedro Okoro

Where you are now is as a result of either your choice or someone's choice. If you neglect the ideas of choosing the ultimate things for yourself, someone will hire you by choosing the average thing for you. — Israelmore Ayivor

Under these circumstances, if they meet with no one who understands the matter, these persons fall away, and abandon the right road; or become weak, or at least put hindrances in the way of their further advancement, because of the great efforts they make to proceed in their former way of meditation, fatiguing their natural powers beyond measure. They think that their state is the result of negligence or of sin. All their own efforts are now in vain, because God is leading them by another and a very different road, that of contemplation. Their first road was that of discursive reflection, but the second knows no imagination or reasoning. 4. It behooves those — San Juan De La Cruz

A State can sue for negligence as well as fraud damages. — Barbara Ann Radnofsky

I know that every difficulty we face in life, even those that come from our own negligence or even transgression, can be turned by the Lord into growth experiences, a virtual ladder upward. I certainly do not recommend transgression as a path to growth. It is painful, difficult, and so totally unnecessary. It is far wiser and so much easier to move forward in righteousness. But through proper repentance, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and obedience to His commandments, even the disappointment that comes from transgression can be converted into a return to happiness. — Richard G. Scott

Hereafter we all have to be redeemed. The world is pulling with a thousand strings. We sin because of indifference and negligence and heap new guilt on the old original one. Our life is a
chain of sin and expiation controlled by a destiny that can not be understood. — Joseph Goebbels

Candidate Obama was either exceptionally naive or willfully disingenuous when he vowed to change the way Washington works. The very promise of Hope and Change was rooted in uprooting the Washington modus operandi. But instead of rejecting it, he embraced it all - the secrecy, the closed doors, the political favors, the near-criminal negligence. — Reince Priebus

Ah, the freshness in the face of leaving a task undone!
To be remiss is to be positively out in the country!
What a refuge it is to be completely unreliable!
I can breathe easier now that the appointments are behind me.
I missed them all, through deliberate negligence,
Having waited for the urge to go, which I knew wouldn't come.
I'm free, and against organized, clothed society.
I'm naked and plunge into the water of my imagination.
It's too late to be at either of the two meetings where I should have been at the same time,
Deliberately at the same time ...
No matter, I'll stay here dreaming verses and smiling in italics.
This spectator aspect of life is so amusing!
I can't even light the next cigarette ... If it's an action,
It can wait for me, along with the others, in the nonmeeting called life. — Fernando Pessoa

A great proportion of the wretchedness which has embittered married life, has originated in a negligence of trifles. — Thomas Sprat

When I came to again - parched, pain rampaging through my intestines - I was in my bed. The little bedside lamp illuminated two anxious faces, my sister's and Mrs. P.'s (the latter looking a shade guilty, I noted, no doubt realizing that it was effectively through her negligence that I had been forced to poison myself) [ ... ] "I think he has eaten many kidney beans." Mrs. P. shuddered. "Many kidney beans not cooked." "Beans!" I cried again deliriously. "Oh for heaven's sake," Bel said. "Charles, listen carefully, did you soak the beans before you cooked them?" "Of course I didn't soak them," I said. "What are you talking about? — Paul Murray

You mustn't force images on things.
Only gods were what you should expect perfection from.
You mustn't demand an ideal from anyone.
That is weakness. It is an evil that must be hated. It is negligence that must be punished. It spoils not only yourself, but those around you.
You are allowed to be disappointed with only yourself. You should hurt only yourself. Hate yourself for not following your ideal.
The only one you must not forgive is yourself. — Wataru Watari

I don't know how you feel, my brethren and sisters, but I'd rather be dead than to lose my liberty. I have no fear we'll ever lose it because of invasion from the outside. But I do have fear that it may slip away from us because of our own indifference, our own negligence, as citizens of this land. And so I plead with you this morning that you take an active interest in matters pertaining to the future of this country. — Ezra Taft Benson

I consider a good reputation is a great part of the human happiness. Some people, if they are very, very rich can permit themselves certain negligence to their reputations. — Aristotle Onassis

How heron comes It is a negligence of the mind not to notice how at dusk heron comes to the pond and stands there in his death robes, perfect servant of the system, hungry, his eyes full of attention, his wings pure light — Mary Oliver

Even though ... 9/11 happened because ... Bush's FBI and CIA did not detect the Al Qaeda conspiracy ... , Bush not only failed to apologize to the nation or the victims' survivors, he demonstrated his total lack of leadership by refusing to fire or even criticize those in these agencies who, like Bush, let this nation down. As in private life, to stimulate excellence, good performances have to be rewarded and gross negligence and incompetence punished. — Vincent Bugliosi

Because of ignorance and negligence we lost the most precious value-life. — Sunday Adelaja

You had to have a unanimous jury verdict, and one percent of contributory negligence barred all recovery. It was so satisfying to realize I could do it. And I'll tell you what motivated me: competitiveness. I was betting on me. That's what a contingent-fee lawyer does. — Joe Jamail

The Gospel is not an old, old story, freshly told. It is a fire in the Spirit, fed by the flame of Immortal Love; and woe unto us, if, through our negligence to stir up the Gift of God which is within us, that fire burns low. — Leonard Ravenhill

When once a man has made celebrity necessary to his happiness, he has put it in the power of the weakest and most timorous malignity, if not to take away his satisfaction, at least to withhold it. His enemies may indulge their pride by airy negligence and gratify their malice by quiet neutrality. — Samuel Johnson

Keep in mind that this appears in the same book of the Bible that approves the death sentence for a child who curses his parents, owners of oxen who injure someone through the owner's negligence, anybody who works or kindles a fire on Sunday, and anyone who has sex with an animal. — Jim Butcher

Governors being accustomed to hear of more crimes than they can punish, and more wrongs than they can redress, set themselves at ease by indiscriminate negligence, and presently forget the request when they lose sight of the petitioner. — Samuel Johnson

The rest of the question-and-answer period was pretty standard stuff, with a few hardballs thrown in just to keep things interesting. Where did the senator stand on the death penalty? Given that most corpses tended to get up and try to eat folks, he didn't see it as a productive pursuit. What was his opinion on public health care? Failure to keep people healthy enough to stay alive bordered on criminal negligence. Was he prepared to face the ongoing challenges of disaster preparedness? After the mass reanimations following the explosions in San Diego, he couldn't imagine any presidency surviving without improved disaster planning. — Mira Grant

Liberals have a new wish every time their latest wish is granted. Conservatives should make them spell out their principles and ideals. Instead of doing this, conservatives allow liberals to pursue incremental goals without revealing their ultimate destination. So, thanks to the negligence of their opponents, liberals control the terms of every debate by always demanding 'more' while never defining 'enough.' The predictable result is that they always get more, and it's never enough. — Joseph Sobran

Its not easy to steer life without errors; at times forced by propensity; at times by Karma; at times negligence pushes one to make mistakes ... — Dinesh Kumar

A miscalculation is not negligence, nor prudence a crime. I am a scientist. I base my action or inaction upon probability and evidence. There is a reason we call science a discipline! Inferior minds bolt or build pyres to roast the witches in their midst! — Rick Yancey

In the lead up to the Iraq war and its later conduct, I saw at a minimum, true dereliction, negligence and irresponsibility, at worse, lying, incompetence and corruption. — Anthony Zinni

Where families suffer from disasters that are preventable, this is a measure of a whole nation's neglect. A society imperils its own future when, out of negligence or contempt, it overlooks the need of children to be reared in a family ... or when, in the midst of plenty, some families cannot give their children adequate food and shelter, safe activity and rest, and an opportunity to grow into full adulthood as people who can care for and cherish other human beings like themselves. — Margaret Mead

Voice grew, and the fierce expression became outraged. He grabbed my shoulder again, and all the grabbing was making me uncomfortable. "The tyranny of evil men cannot be hidden from the light of truth! We have not only uncovered evidence of a specific crime, but also of gross incompetence, negligence, and a police department all too willing to obfuscate the truth in an attempt to hide their own shortcomings." Still cameras were clicking and videocameras were panning, and they seemed to be panning toward me. — Robert Crais

However, in a later interview, housed in the archives of the Imperial War Museum, London, Beesly was less judicious. "As an Englishman and a lover of the Royal Navy," he said, "I would prefer to attribute this failure to negligence, even gross negligence, rather [than] to a conspiracy deliberately to endanger the ship." But, he said, "on the basis of the considerable volume of information which is now available, I am reluctantly compelled to state that on balance, the most likely explanation is that there was indeed a plot, however imperfect, to endanger the Lusitania in order to involve the United States in the war." So much was done for the Orion and other warships, he wrote, but nothing for the Lusitania. He struggled with this. No matter how he arranged the evidence, he came back to conspiracy. He said, "If that's unacceptable, will someone tell me another explanation to these very very curious circumstances? — Erik Larson

I can breathe easier now that the appointments are behind me.
I missed them all, through deliberate negligence,
Having waited for the urge to go, which I knew wouldn't come.
I'm free, and against organized, clothed society.
I'm naked and plunge into the water of my imagination. — Fernando Pessoa

Every one should consider himself as intrusted not only with his own conduct, but with that of others; and as accountable, not only for the duties which he neglects, or the crimes that he commits, but for that negligence and irregularity which he may encourage or inculcate. Every man, in whatever station, has, or endeavours to have his followers, admirers, and imitators, and has therefore the influence of his example to watch with care. — Samuel Johnson

Just a plate of negligence with a side of hope for dessert. — Jes Fuhrmann

In persons grafted in a serious trust,
Negligence is a crime. — William Shakespeare

Imam Ali(as) said, " The body experinces six different states: health, sickness, death, life, sleep, and wakefulness, and so does the spirit. Its life is its knowledge and its death is ignorance; its sickness is doubt whereas its health is certainty; its sleep is negligence and its wakefulness is consiousness. — Ali Ibn Abi Talib

The real and effectual discipline which is exercised over a workman is that of his customers. It is the fear of losing their employment which restrains his frauds and corrects his negligence. — Adam Smith

Ultimately, it is this piece of the jury's decision that I absolutely cannot understand: how could they disregard so much evidence showing that Casey had played a large role in Caylee's death? Looking through the testimonies that we presented at trial, one thing that seems quite apparent is that, either through her own deliberate actions or through some kind of negligence, Casey was involved in her daughter's death. There is simply too much evidence tying Caylee's dead body to the car Casey was driving for me to believe that Casey herself was completely uninvolved. — Jeff Ashton

Minds that are stupid and incapable of science are in the order of nature to be regarded as monsters and other extraordinary phenomena; minds of this sort are rare. Hence I conclude that there are great resources to be found in children, which are suffered to vanish with their years. It is evident, therefore, that it is not of nature, but of our own negligence, we ought to complain. — Quintilian

The only problem they had ... was in drawing the fine differences between war-mass murder of people wearing a uniform not your own; justifiable loss-mass murder of your own troops, but with substantial gains; and criminal negligence-mass murder of your own troops, without appreciable benefit. — Richard K. Morgan

It was uncontrollable, overpowered by others, these colors within me, staring out at a black and white world; without spurning about, wanting to rule, too much negligence, they left me no choice, but to surrender. It was time, had to crash the lightning, and bow to the rain, where promises have broken, and pain still reigns. Had to give up myself and bring life to the world, had to. Dye — Anthony Liccione

The scepticism which men affect towards their higher inspirations is often not an honest doubt, but a guilty negligence, and is a sign of narrow mind and defective wisdom. — James Martineau

We need the compassion and the courage to change the conditions that support our suffering. Those conditions are things like ignorance, bitterness, negligence, clinging, and holding on. — Sharon Salzberg

comparative negligence. — Michael P. Schutt

My illness, I well knew, had been entirely brought on by myself by such negligence of my own health, as I had felt even at the time to be wrong. Had I died, it would have been self-destruction. — Jane Austen

Negligence is the rust of the soul, that corrodes through all her best resolves. — Owen Feltham

I apprehend no danger to our country from a foreign foe. Our destruction, should it come at all, will be from another quarter. From the inattention of the people to the concerns of their government, from their carelessness and negligence, I must confess that I do apprehend some danger. I fear that they may place too implicit a confidence in their public servants, and fail properly to scrutinize their conduct; that in this way they may be made the dupes of designing men, and become the instruments of their own undoing. Make them intelligent, and they will be vigilant; give them the means of detecting the wrong, and they will apply the remedy. — Daniel Webster

However smothered under former negligence, or scattered through the dull, dark mass of common thoughts - let thy genius rise as the sun from chaos. — Edward Young

For instance, in one play the palace of Lord Hosokawa, in which was preserved the celebrated painting of Dharuma by Sesson, suddenly takes fire through the negligence of the samurai in charge. Resolved at all hazards to rescue the precious painting, he rushes into the burning building and seizes the kakemono, only to find all means of exit cut off by the flames. Thinking only of the picture, he slashes open his body with his sword, wraps his torn sleeve about the Sesson and plunges it into the gaping wound. The fire is at last extinguished. Among the smoking embers is found a half- consumed corpse, within which reposes the treasure uninjured by the fire. Horrible as such tales are, they illustrate the great value that we set upon a masterpiece, as well as the devotion of a trusted samurai. — Okakura Kakuzo

What a fate: to be condemned to work for a firm where the slightest negligence at once gave rise to the gravest suspicion! Were all the employees nothing but a bunch of scoundrels, was there not among them one single loyal devoted man who, had he wasted only an hour or so of the firm's time in the morning, was so tormented by conscience as to be driven out of his mind and actually incapable of leaving his bed? — Franz Kafka

Self-abuse is an infringement on one's own destiny caused by either ignorance about oneself or negligence of one's purpose! — Israelmore Ayivor

Negligence in prayer withers the inner man. Nothing can be a substitute for it, not even Christian work. Many are so preoccupied with work that they allow little time for prayer. Hence they cannot cast out demons. Prayer enables us first inwardly to overcome the enemy and then outwardly to deal with him. — Watchman Nee

I discovered that my obsession for having each thing in the right place, each subject at the right time, each word in the right style, was not the well-deserved reward of an ordered mind but just the opposite: a complete system of pretense invented by me to hide the disorder of my nature. I discovered that I am not disciplined out of virtue but as a reaction to my negligence, that I appear generous in order to conceal my meanness, that I pass myself off as prudent because I am evil-minded, that I am conciliatory in order not to succumb to my repressed rage, that I am punctual only to hide how little I care about other people's time. I learned, in short, that love is not a condition of the spirit but a sign of the zodiac. — Gabriel Garcia Marquez

in acting according to the will of God revealed in his word, and in the whole worship of him, both internal and external: and this is to be done "with fear", not with fear of man, nor with servile fear of God, but with a godly and filial fear, with a reverential affection for him, and in a way agreeable to his mind and will; with reverence and awe of him, without levity, carelessness, and negligence; — John Gill

Well, but it's criminal negligence, really. These kids have to grow up and run things. Larger things than a ball field, I mean. What kind of world will they really be able to make? — Barbara Kingsolver

Many who have undertaken the work of the ministry, do so obstinately proceed in self-seeking, negligence, pride, and other sins, that it is become our necessary duty to admonish them. If we saw that such would reform without reproof, we would gladly forbear the publishing of their faults. But when reproofs themselves prove so ineffectual, that they are more offended at the reproof than at the sin, and had rather that we should cease reproving, than that themselves should cease sinning, I think it is time to sharpen the remedy. For what else should we do? To give up our brethren as incurable were cruelty, as long as there are further means to be used. — Richard Baxter

When a man's life is destroyed or damaged by some wound or privation of soul or body, which is due to other men's actions or negligence, it is not only his sensibility that suffers but also his aspiration toward the good. Therefore there has been sacrilege towards that which is sacred in him. — Simone Weil

Because they claim to be concerned with the welfare of whole societies, governments arrogate to themselves the right to pass off as mere abstract profit or loss the human unhappiness that their decisions provoke or their negligence permits. It is a duty of an international citizenship to always bring the testimony of people's suffering to the eyes and ears of governments, sufferings for which it's untrue that they are not responsible. The suffering of men must never be a mere silent residue of policy. It grounds an absolute right to stand up and speak to those who hold power. — Michel Foucault

Preserving everything is a form of negligence that causes a new kind of damage: the loss of what matters in a glut of the insignificant. To preserve everything is to lose everything. — Gabriel Zaid

I love language, words, and all the lovely, exciting, and heart wrenching things you can do with them. Pick the right ones, put them in the right order, and you've created a moment in time where the reader forgets about the late car payment, the dirty dishes, the impending workweek. You have created a state of bliss. Or negligence, depending on your perspective. — Darynda Jones

The Devil endeavours by every means to keep men in error, in the enticement of the passions, in darkness of mind and heart; in pride, avarice, covetousness, envy, hatred, wicked impatience and irritation; in evil despondence, in the abominations of fornication, adultery, theft, false-witness, blasphemy, negligence, slothfulness, and sluggishness. — John Of Kronstadt

The basis of your religion is injustice. The Son of God the pure, the immaculate, the innocent, is sacrificed for the guilty. This proves his heroism, but no more does away with man's sin than a school boy's volunteering to be flogged for another would exculpate a dunce from negligence. — Lord Byron

They that have grown old in a single state are generally found to be morose, fretful and captious; tenacious of their own practices and maxims; soon offended by contradiction or negligence; and impatient of any association but with those that will watch their nod, and submit themselves to unlimited authority. — Samuel Johnson

No weakness of the human mind has more frequently incurred animadversion, than the negligence with which men overlook their own faults, however flagrant, and the easiness with which they pardon them, however frequently repeated. — Samuel Johnson

Without a little negligence, life would be intolerable. — Mason Cooley

When Renee and I talked about it years later, we agreed on one point: We were insane. Renee always said, "If any of our kids want to get married when they're twenty-five, we'll have to lock them in the attic." We were just kids, and everybody who came to the wedding party was guilty of shameful if not criminal negligence
look at the shiny pretty toaster, isn't it cute to see the babies playing with it in the bathtub? Jesus, people! — Rob Sheffield

The gnosis of God is intermediate between immoderation, which is ascribing human characteristics to God, and negligence, which is denying any attributes to God ... The Truth lies in the balance between the two extremes. — Ibn Ata Allah

Fate had a cruel sense of humor. It had been all his fault, anyway, whatever Mick or Gillia told him. Careless preoccupation and utter stupidity. Boyhood ignorance and negligence. He was only getting what he deserved, over and over again, for the rest of his life. If only in his dreams. — V.S. Carnes

Marriages are always moving from one season to another. Sometimes we find ourselves in winter
discouraged, detached, and dissatisfied; other times we experience springtime, with its openness, hope, and anticipation. On still other occasions we bask in the warmth of summer
comfortable, relaxed, enjoying life. And then comes fall with its uncertainty, negligence, and apprehension. The cycle repeats itself many times throughout the life of a marriage, just as the seasons repeat themselves in nature. — Gary Chapman

There are not the weeds the ones that drown the good seed, but the negligence of the peasant. — Confucius

Remember that nothing will supply the want of prudence, and that negligence and irregularity long continued will make knowledge useless, wit ridiculous, and genius contemptible. — Samuel Johnson

My friend, I am not what I seem. Seeming is but a garment I wear - a care-woven garment that protects me from thy questionings and thee from my negligence. The "I" in me, my friend, dwells in the house of silence, and therein it shall remain for ever more, unperceived, unapproachable. — Kahlil Gibran

Don't give yourself to negligence,
Don't devote yourself to sensual pleasure,
Vigilant and absorbed in meditation
One attains abundant happiness. — Gautama Buddha

There is no nation on earth powerful enough to accomplish our overthrow. Our destruction, should it come at all, will be from another quarter. From the inattention of the people to the concerns of their government, from their carelessness and negligence.
I must confess that I do apprehend some danger. I fear that they may place too implicit a confidence in their public servants, and fail properly to scrutinize their conduct; that in this way they may be made the dupes of designing men, and become the instruments of their own undoing. — Daniel Webster

I could produce innumerable instances from my own memory and observation, of events imputed to the profound skill and address of a minister, which, in reality, were either mere effects of negligence, weakness, humour, passion, or pride, or, at best, but the natural course of things left to themselves.Swift'sThoughts on the present Posture of Affairs.5. Manner — Samuel Johnson

The observance of Lent is the very badge of Christian warfare. By it we prove ourselves not to be enemies of Christ. By it we avert the scourges of divine justice. By it we gain strength against the princes of darkness, for it shields us with heavenly help. Should men grow remiss in their observance of Lent, it would be a detriment to God's glory, a disgrace to the Catholic religion, and a danger to Christian souls. Neither can it be doubted that such negligence would become the source of misery to the world, of public calamity, and of private woe. — Pope Benedict XIV

It is criminal negligence to leave suckers lying around to tempt honest men. — Wilson Mizner

Things worthwhile generally don't just happen. Luck is a fact, but should not be a factor. Good luck is what is left over after intelligence and effort have combined at their best. Negligence or indifference are usually reviewed from an unlucky seat. The law of cause and effect and causality both work the same with inexorable exactitudes. Luck is the residue of design. — Branch Rickey

Think'st thou there is no tyranny but that Of blood and chains? The despotism of vice
The weakness and the wickedness of luxury
The negligence
the apathy
the evils Of sensual sloth
produces ten thousand tyrants, Whose delegated cruelty surpasses The worst acts of one energetic master, However harsh and hard in his own bearing. — Lord Byron

Never worry about what others have; worry about what you have and refuse to use. Someone else will also worry about what you have when you begin to make use of it! — Israelmore Ayivor

Badly drawn, badly written and badly printed - a strain on young eyes and young nervous systems - the effect of these pulp-paper nightmares is that of a violent stimulant. Their crude blacks and reds spoil the child's natural sense of color; their hypodermic injection of sex and murder makes the child impatient with better, though quieter, stories. Unless we want a coming generation even more ferocious than the present one, parents and teachers throughout America must band together to break the 'comic' magazines.

But the antidote to the 'comic' magazine poison can be found in any library or good bookstore. The parent who does not acquire that antidote for his child is guilty of criminal negligence. — Sterling North

I am a writer, a professional journalist with serious credentials in Crime, Craziness, and Politics. I have mingled with dangerous criminals and attended many trials ... from Hell's Angels, Black Panthers and Chicano street fighters to Roxanne Pulitzer and even Richard Nixon, back in the good old days before he was run out of the White House for fraud, perjury, graft, and criminal negligence. — Hunter S. Thompson

Hurricane [Katrina] hit the Gulf Coast and destroyed much of the Gulf Coast - that was an act of God ... Now what happened to New Orleans, that was a complete failure of the federal government. Complete negligence by the feds. — James Carville

The popularity of disaster movies expresses a collective perception of a world threatened by irresistible and unforeseen forces which nevertheless are thwarted at the last moment. Their thinly veiled symbolic meaning might be translated thus: We are innocent of wrongdoing. We are attacked by unforeseeable forces come to harm us. We are, thus, innocent even of negligence. Though those forces are insuperable, chance will come to our aid and we shall emerge victorious. — David Mamet

[It] is indispensable that some provision should be made for defending the Community agst [against] the incapicity, negligence or perfidy of the chief Magistrate. — James Madison

Under a socialist mode of production all personal incentives which selfishness provides under capitalism are removed, and a premium is put upon laziness and negligence. Whereas in a capitalist society selfishness incites everyone to the utmost diligence, in a socialist society it makes for inertia and laxity. — Ludwig Von Mises

Here, then, is the real problem of our negligence. We fail in our duty to study God's Word not so much because it is difficult to understand, not so much because it is dull and boring, but because it is work. Our problem is not a lack of intelligence or a lack of passion. Our problem is that we are lazy. — R.C. Sproul

On March 8 Danton mounted the tribune of the Convention. The patriots never forgot the shock of his sudden appearance, nor his face, harrowed by sleepless nights and the exhaustion of traveling, pallid with strain and suffering. Complex griefs caught sometimes at his voice, as he spoke of treason and humiliation; once he stopped and looked at his audience, self-conscious for a moment, and touched the scar on his cheek. With the
armies, he has seen malice, incompetence, negligence. Reinforcements must be massive and immediate. The rich of France must pay
for the liberation of Europe. A new tax must be voted today and collected tomorrow. To deal with conspirators against the Republic there must be a new court, a Revolutionary Tribunal: from that, no right of appeal. — Hilary Mantel

The directors of such companies, however, being the managers rather of other people's money than of their own, it cannot well be expected, that they should watch over it with the same anxious vigilance with which the partners in a private copartnery frequently watch over their own ... Negligence and profusion, therefore, must always prevail, more or less, in the management of the affairs of such a company. — Adam Smith

As the flint contains the spark, unknown to itself, which the steel alone can awaken to life, so adversity often reveals to us hidden gems, which prosperity or negligence would forever have hidden. — Josh Billings

If a man prays God for some virtue, and at the same time gives himself up to negligence, acquiring no definite means to gain this virtue, and making no effort towards it, truly this man tempts God, rather than prays. Thus the divine James says: 'The effectual prayer of a righteous man avails much' (Jms. 5:16). What avails to make prayer effective? is when, besides begging a saint to pray for him about something, the man also prays about it himself and with all diligence does everything necessary for obtaining his request. — Lorenzo Scupoli