Quotes & Sayings About Not Agreeing

OK, I say again, not really understanding what it is I am agreeing to, what it is precisely I am accepting. But I am accepting something. The truth of my circumstances? The reality I have until now avoided? It's much worse than I imagined and also somehow better. — Bill Clegg

among men and not among angels; among men as intelligent, as determined and as independent as myself, who, not agreeing with me, do not choose to yield up their opinions to mine. Mutual concessions is our only resort, or mutual hostilities."* — Thom Hartmann

When someone disagrees with me, I do not have to immediately start revising what I just said. People don't want me to always agree with them. They can sense this is phony. They can sense I am trying to control them: I am agreeing with them to make them like me. They feel; "I don't want to exist to like you. I DON'T exist to like you." — Hugh Prather

The students nodded, emphatically agreeing with a statement which upwards of sixty-two thousand repetitions in the dark had made them accept, not merely as true, but as axiomatic, self-evident, utterly indisputable. — Aldous Huxley

Dostoevsky, like Goethe's Prometheus, creates not voiceless slaves (as does Zeus), but free people, capable of standing alongside their creator, capable of not agreeing with him and even of rebelling against him. A — Mikhail Bakhtin

The three of us had a pact, governed by signals - pinching one another, agreeing to step fiercely on each other's toes when we felt riotous laughter welling up within us. It was not that any of us doubted the efficacy of group therapy for alcoholics (it is probably the only treatment), but, oh, dear heart, alcoholics in the loony bin! — Frederick Exley

Now the worst part of the punishment is that he who refuses to rule is liable to be ruled by one who is worse than himself. And the fear of this, as I conceive, induces the good to take office, not because they would, but because they cannot help - not under the idea that they are going to have any benefit or enjoyment themselves, but as a necessity, and because they are not able to commit the task of ruling to any one who is better than themselves, or indeed as good. For there is reason to think that if a city were composed entirely of good men, then to avoid office would be as much an object of contention as to obtain office is at present; then we should have plain proof that the true ruler is not meant by nature to regard his own interest, but that of his subjects; and every one who knew this would choose rather to receive a benefit from another than to have the trouble of conferring one. So far am I from agreeing with Thrasymachus that justice is the interest of the stronger. — Plato

In an average day, you may well be confronted with some species of bullying or bigotry, or some ill-phrased appeal to the general will, or some petty abuse of authority. If you have a political loyalty, you may be offered a shady reason for agreeing to a lie or a half-truth that serves some short-term purpose. Everybody devises tactics for getting through such moments; try behaving "as if" they need not be tolerated and are not inevitable. — Christopher Hitchens

No joy for which thy hungering heart has panted, No hope it cherishes through waiting years, But if thou dost deserve it, shall be granted For with each passionate wish the blessing nears. Tune up the fine, strong instrument of thy being To chord with thy dear hope, and do not tire. When both in key and rhythm are agreeing, Lo! thou shalt kiss the lips of thy desire. The thing thou cravest so waits in the distance, Wrapt in the silences, unseen and dumb: Essential to thy soul and thy existence
Live worthy of it
call, and it shall come. — Ella Wheeler Wilcox

One man can not wage a war alone. Therefore if humanity stops agreeing to go to war; there will be only peace. — Robert F. Hartley

It would be a real failure if agreeing that it [abortion] was not an electoral issue provided an alibi for taking it seriously as a public issue. — Rowan Williams

Love does not involve emotions, then?" he asked her with a smile.
"It is not ruled by them," she told him. "Love is liking and companionship and respect and trust. Love does not dominate or try to possess. Love thrives only in a commitment to pure, mutual freedom. That is why marriage is so tricky. There are the marriage ceremony and the marriage vows and the necessity for fidelity -all of them suggestive of restraints, even imprisonment. Men talk of life sentences and leg shackles in connection with marriage, do they not? But marriage out to be just the opposite -two people agreeing to set each other free, — Mary Balogh

I also now knew that agreeing to life is the great secret to happiness, not controlling life. Too — Joe Vitale

If finding an apartment is like falling in love, buying one is like proposing on your first date and agreeing not to see each other until the wedding. — David Sedaris

Remember, empathy need not lead to sympathetically giving in to the other side's demands - knowing how someone feels does not mean agreeing with them. — Daniel Goleman

Not that she'd have a choice in the matter, but it made her feel a little better to pretend she would. To pretend she'd tell him to fuck off instead of agreeing to almost anything he wanted because she needed her drugs. And fuck, she didn't just need those now. She needed protection. Needed this sleazy drug-dealing pimp with his pornographic decor and his appalling pajamas. — Stacia Kane

Women's liberation did not see the female's potential in terms of the male's actual; the visionary feminists of the late sixties and early seventies knew that women could never find freedom by agreeing to live the lives of unfree men. — Germaine Greer

True brokenness is a lifestyle - a moment-by-moment lifestyle of agreeing with God about the true condition of my heart and life - not as everyone else thinks it is but as He knows it to be. — Nancy Leigh DeMoss

I could never divide my selfe from any man upon the difference of an opinion, or be angry with his judgement for not agreeing with mee in that, from which perhaps within a few days I should dissent my selfe ... — Thomas Browne

A: Snowden has enough information to cause more damage to the US government in a minute alone than anyone else has ever had in the history of the United States. But that's not his goal. [His] objective is to expose software that people around the world use without knowing what they are exposing themselves without consciously agreeing to surrender their rights to privacy. [He] has a huge number of documents that would be very harmful to the US government if they were made public. — Glenn Greenwald

True love has nothing to do with liking someone, agreeing with him or her or being compatible. It is a love of unity, a love of seeing God wearing all the masks, and recognising itself in them all. With this love you can feel the walls of opposition come down naturally in the acknowledgement of deep connection. Not only do the walls of opposition fall, but love is felt for every human being and for life itself. — Adyashanti

He could very likely have appealed for leniency. At least he could have saved his life by agreeing to leave Athens. But had he done this he would not have been Socrates. He valued his conscience
and the truth
higher than life. — Jostein Gaarder

gazed at his destination in the valley below. If not for the smoke curling from its chimney, he might think the cabin abandoned. Agreeing to this was the stupidest thing he'd ever done. How on earth had he been talked into it? At the time, delivering the news to Nathan's wife hadn't seemed like much. He was heading to Cheyenne anyway. The — Caroline Fyffe

If there is one thing that I take pride in, it is the fact that I never, ever make a charge without offering a substantial amount of support for it. You may ultimately end up not agreeing with me, but you will have to concede that I offered much evidence in support of my position, something that people frequently do not do. — Vincent Bugliosi

Is our Heaven your God, and is your God our Heaven?' she inquired.
'They are one and the same,' he replied ...
'There is only one true God. He has many names.'
'Then anywhere upon the round earth, by whatever seas, those who believe in any God believe in the One?' she asked.
'And so are brothers,' he said, agreeing.
'And if I do not believe in any?' she inquired willfully.
'God is patient,' he said. 'God waits. Is there not eternity?'
page 206 Pavilion of Women — Pearl S. Buck

There are no tarts in there, Charles. They were much too expensive, and Mr. Jenkins would not be reasonable. I told him I would buy a whole dozen, but he would not reduce the price by so much as a penny, so I refused to buy even one-on principle. Do you know," she confided with a chuckle, "last week when he saw me coming into his shop he hid behind the flour sacks?"
"He's a coward!" Charles said, grinning, for it was a known fact among tradesmen and shopkeepers that Elizabeth Cameron pinched a shilling until it squeaked, and that when it came to bargaining for price-which it always did with her-they rarely came out the winner. Her intellect, not her beauty, was her greatest asset in these transactions, for she could not only add and multiply in her head, but she was so sweetly reasonable, and so inventive when she listed her reasons for expecting a better price, that she either wore out her opponents or confused them into agreeing with her — Judith McNaught

Levin had often noticed in discussions between the most intelligent people that after enormous efforts, and an enormous expenditure of logical subtleties and words, the disputants finally arrived at being aware that what they had so long been struggling to prove to one another had long ago, from the beginning of the argument, been known to both, but that they liked different things, and would not define what they liked for fear of its being attacked. He had often had the experience of suddenly in a discussion grasping what it was his opponent liked and at once liking it too, and immediately he found himself agreeing, and then all arguments fell away as useless. — Leo Tolstoy

I do not see how my agreeing to marry a scruffy old brute will have the power to keep a fire-breathing dragon locked beneath a mountain. And if I don't agree to marry him, will I truly be fed to the dragon? That is savage, and inhumane, and crazy. — Bethany Wiggins

Why would any guy want to be only friends with a girl? It's like agreeing to be near a chocolate cake and never eat it. It's like sitting in a racing car but not driving it. Only wimps do that. — Chetan Bhagat

Galileo did not want to agree. He never wanted to agree; agreeing was something other people did, with him, after they had disagreed. — Kim Stanley Robinson

God said, "Thou shalt not kill" - does the theft of a little money make it quite all right for us to do so? If it's said that this commandment applies only to illegal killing, what's to prevent human beings from similarly agreeing among themselves to legalize certain types of rape, adultery, or perjury? Considering that God has forbidden us even to kill ourselves, can we really believe that purely human arrangements for the regulation of mutual slaughter are enough, without any divine authority, to exempt executioners from the sixth commandment? Isn't that like saying that this particular commandment has no more validity than human laws allow it? - in which case the principle can be extended indefinitely, until in all spheres of life human beings decide just how far God's commandments may conveniently be observed. — Thomas More

The U.S. has the power to block all anti-Israel moves in the Security Council, not just some of them, and to do so without agreeing to unfair, damaging compromises. — Elliott Abrams

But as no two (theoreticians) agree on this (skin friction) or any other subject, some not agreeing today with what they wrote a year ago, I think we might put down all their results, add them together, and then divide by the number of mathematicians, and thus find the average coefficient of error. (1908) — Hiram Maxim

Forgiveness does not mean condoning or agreeing with a horrendous act. It is a decision to no longer attack one's self. — Gerald G. Jampolsky

It is extremely important to be able to make negative assertions. We must be able to say what is 'not me' in order to have a 'me'. What we like has no meaning unless we know what we don't like. Our yes has no meaning if we never say no. My chosen profession has no passion if 'just anyone would do'. Our opinions and thoughts mean very little if there is nothing we disagree with. — Henry Cloud

Third, we could, while denouncing them both as illegal, have acquiesced in them both and thus remained neutral with both sides, although not agreeing with either as to the righteousness of their respective orders. — George William Norris

For as we forgive, we are forgiven; as we condemn others, we are ourselves condemned. Thus in patience condemn not, neither find fault; not condoning, not agreeing, but let thine own life so shine that others, seeing thy patience, knowing thy understanding, comprehending thy peace, may take hope. — Edgar Cayce

My belief in God is personal, I do not need to browbeat anyone into agreeing with me, because I believe what I believe and I try to live by it. My belief in God is about trying to be the best person I can be in this life ... — Dorothy Koomson

The effect of the people's agreeing that there must be central planning, without agreeing on the ends, will be rather as if a group of people were to commit themselves to take a journey together without agreeing where they want to go; with the result that they may all have to make a journey which most of them do not want at all. — Friedrich August Von Hayek

If you make the effort to work through the ideas I'll be setting out in this book, then even if you do not end up agreeing with me that the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, and the natural law conception of morality are rationally unavoidable, you will understand how reasonable people could be convinced of this. — Edward Feser

We needed to be uncompromising with our workforce, to expect 100 percent of our employees to comply 100 percent of the time with complex and ever-changing government mandates. Striving to comply with every law does not mean agreeing with every law. But, even when faced with laws we think are counter-productive, we must first comply. Only then, from a credible position, can we enter into a dialogue with regulatory agencies to demonstrate alternatives that are more beneficial. If these efforts fail, we can then join with others in using education and/or political efforts to change the law. — Charles Koch

A scattering of pinpoint lights shows up in the blackness ahead. A town or village straddling the highway. The indicator on the speedometer begins to lose ground. The man glances in his mirror at the girl, a little anxiously as if this oncoming town were some kind of test to be met.
An illuminated road sign flashes by:
CAUTION!
MAIN STREET AHEAD - SLOW UP
The man nods grimly, as if agreeing with that first word. But not in the way it is meant.
The lights grow bigger, spread out on either side. Street lights peer out here and there among the trees. The highway suddenly sprouts a plank sidewalk on each side of it. Dark store-windows glide by.
With an instinctive gesture, the man dims his lights from blinding platinum to just a pale wash. A lunch-room window drifts by. ("Jane Brown's Body") — Cornell Woolrich

Forgiveness is not a moral issue.
It is an energy dynamic ...
Forgiveness means that you do not carry the baggage of an experience.
When you choose not to forgive,
the experience that you do not forgive sticks with you.
When you choose not to forgive,
it is like agreeing to wear dark, gruesome sunglasses that distort everything,
and it is you who are forced every day
to look at life through those contaminated lenses
because you have chosen to keep them. — Gary Zukav

Stop agreeing with everything I say! It's not as if you're going to solve everything by admitting your mistakes. Whether or not you admit then or not, mistakes are mistakes."
"It's true," I said. It -was- true. — Haruki Murakami

The first time he consulted me, I caught a glimpse of my salvation. He made a gift to me of the very thing that I - too corrupted by my bourgeoise blood to renounce it- could not be, merely by tacitly agreeing to be my client, simply by frequenting my waiting room on a regular basis, with his ordinary docile manner of a patient who makes no fuss. Later he gave me another gift, magnanimously, that of his conversation. Worlds hitherto unknown to me suddenly appeared, and the very thing that my flame had always coveted so ardently, and had despaired of ever obtaining, was suddenly mine, thanks to him, vicariously. — Muriel Barbery

I would not have majored in English and gone on to teach literature had I not been able to construct a counterargument about the truthfulness of fiction; still, as writers turn away from the industrious villages of George Eliot and Thomas Hardy, I learn less and less from them that helps me to ponder my life. In time, I found myself agreeing with the course evaluations written by my testier freshman students:'All the literature we read this term was depressing.' How naive. How sane. — Mary Rose O'Reilley

What profit is there in agreeing that universal friendship is good, and talking of the solidarity of the human race as a grand ideal? Unless these thoughts are translated into the world of action, they are useless. The wrong in the world continues to exist just because people only talk of their ideals, and do not strive to put them into practice. If actions took the place of words, the world's misery would very soon be changed into comfort. — Baha'u'llah

Unity is not agreeing with each other about God. Rather it is agreeing with God about each other. — Anonymous

Anyway," Rita said, leaning back away from Cody. "It would save some money. Which we will need for the new pool cage, because they are very pricey." "All right," I said, not completely sure what I was agreeing to do. — Jeff Lindsay

I would do it [study UFOs], but before agreeing to do it, we must insist upon full access to discs recovered. For instance in the L.A. case, the Army grabbed it and would not let us have it for cursory examination. — J. Edgar Hoover

My girlfriend was agreeing not to remove anyone's vital organs with a salad fork for my sake. It was a sweet moment. Too — Elliott James

It's not a date. We're just agreeing to eat at the same table. — Barbra Streisand

Reflecting on my experience, I find myself agreeing with the eminent Cambridge philosopher, Dr C. D. Broad, 'that we should do well to consider much more seriously than we have hitherto been inclined to do the type of theory which Bergson put forward in connection with memory and sense perception. The suggestion is that the function of the brain and nervous system and sense organs is in the main eliminative and not productive. Each person is at each moment capable of remembering all that has ever happened to him and of perceiving everything that is happening everywhere in the universe. The function of the brain and nervous system is to protect us from being overwhelmed and confused by this mass of largely useless and irrelevant knowledge, by shutting out most of what we should otherwise perceive or remember at any moment, and leaving only that very small and special selection which is likely to be practically useful.' According — Aldous Huxley

I began to wonder if becoming a Christian did not work more like falling in love than agreeing with a list of true principles. — Donald Miller

Beyond that is the fear that the United States will end up negotiating and agreeing to a deal with Iran. The Israelis do not like that either because they fear the deal will come at the expense of Israel's security interests. From an Israeli perspective, the NIE makes the risk of some sort of settlement much greater. — Trita Parsi

Why should any guy want to be only friends with a girl? It's like agreeing to be near a chocolate cake and never eat it. It's like sitting in a racing car but not driving it. — Chetan Bhagat

Being in on the secret might be a lot of fun when you're a kid, but not so much once you realize how often life hinges on everyone agreeing
at least outwardly
on the same reality. — Rosemary Clement-Moore

But they argued as lawyers do, they twisted every answer I gave until it sounded like the opposite meaning, and I became so confused and afraid I found myself agreeing to statements that I knew were not true. — S.J. Parris

The name came from, erm ... us all just agreeing on a name that we liked. There was talk of Swans at first, but there was already a band called Swans, way back in the eighties. An American band. So we thought, well, we can't have them, and I think Andy said, "well what about Doves?" We ruminated it around the three of us and went, well, it's not so bad, it's all right. — Jimi Goodwin

All those bickering worshippers, each one convinced their version is the right one. Imagine getting prayers from ten million believers, not one of them believing the same thing as the one kneeling beside him or her. Imagine all those Holy Books, not one of them agreeing on anything, yet all of them purporting to be the word of that one god. Imagine two armies annihilating each other, both in that god's name. Who wouldn't be driven mad by that? — Steven Erikson

You see, I'm a mighty proud gal and I can't for the life of me, find any valid reason why anyone should lie about their origin or anything else for that matter. Frankly, I do not ascribe to the stupid theory of white supremacy and to try to hide the fact that I am a Negro for economic or any other reasons, if I do I would be agreeing to be a Negro makes me inferior and that I have swallowed whole hog all of the propaganda dished out by our fascist-minded white citizens. — Fredi Washington

All of this was mine, simply for agreeing to marry a man I did not love but who was, in the end, the only man who had ever asked. — Melanie Benjamin

Not only does the liberal paradigm not even come close to agreeing with the social and economic reality on the ground today, worse, it has largely congealed into a political religion ... — John Steele Gordon

When a customer clicks through the license conditions to play the game, they're agreeing to add their phone as a node in a distributed server. More players equal more servers - not for themselves, I might add, we never run a server node for any given game on the same host as a client for that game, that would be asking for trouble - but at the back end, we're in the processor arbitrage market. The game programmers' biggest problems are maintaining causality and object coherency while minimizing network latency - sorry, — Charles Stross

Work - other people's work - is an intolerable idea to a cat. Can you picture cats herding sheep or agreeing to pull a cart? They will not inconvenience themselves to the slightest degree. — Louis J. Camuti

Then the 1956 Peace Prize went to Eisenhower and Khrushchev for agreeing not to build the hydrogen bomb. That agreement was now also called the Szilard Treaty. Today the H-bomb was a threshold no one dared cross without exciting hostile moves by all other powers. — Gregory Benford

I think fitting in is highly overrated. I'd rather just fit out ... Fitting out means being who you are, even when people insist that you have to change. Fitting out means taking up space, not apologizing for yourself, and not agreeing with those who seek to label you with stereotypes. — Golda Poretsky

I could never divide myself from any man upon the difference of an opinion, or be angry with his judgment for not agreeing with me in that from which perhaps within a few days I should dissent myself. — Thomas Browne

Compassion has to become a discipline. It's something that you do. It's no good thinking that you agree with compassion or not, you've just got to do it. Just like it's no good agreeing that it's possible to float, you just have to get into the pool and then you learn that it's possible. — Karen Armstrong

Without me, she can live a long, full life. She can be happy. I must leave her, in fact, for her own good.'
I didn't much like the way Francis put that. Parents are always trying to make you do things for your own good. Not boyfriends. With boyfriends, the relationship is supposed to be equal. They're supposed to let you make your own decisions.
But I couldn't tell Cathy about Francis's undead love-weasel ways. Anyway, this was more proof that Francis really was too old for. It truly was for her own good. Agreeing with Francis gave me a stomachache, so I sat there and made a face. — Justine Larbalestier