Oration Station Quotes & Sayings

When a man devotes himself body and spirit to a single object, if he has training and aptitude, no matter how mediocre he may be in ordinary affairs, he will produce something so nearly akin to a work of genius as to deceive half the judges who think themselves competent to decide between genius and talent.
("The Phantom Model") — Hume Nisbet

The ideal audience the poet imagines consists of the beautiful who go to bed with him, the powerful who invite him to dinner and tell him secrets of state, and his fellow-poets. The actual audience he gets consists of myopic schoolteachers, pimply young men who eat in cafeterias, and his fellow-poets. This means, in fact, he writes for his fellow-poets. — W. H. Auden

One who has given up any hope of winning a fight or has clearly lost it wants his style in fighting to be admired all the more. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Beauty is a primeval phenomenon, which itself never makes its appearance, but the reflection of which is visible in a thousand different utterances of the creative mind, and is as various as nature herself. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

I've spent a lot of Thanksgivings on the road with my band, so anytime that I can spend Thanksgiving with my family in a traditional aspect, eating sweet potatoes and cranberries and stuffing and all the trappings of Thanksgiving and then get on a treadmill the next day extra long, I'm happy. — Richie Sambora

Striving for excellence motivates you; striving for perfection is demoralizing. — Harriet B. Braiker

Why are you doing this?" Clary said. "Sebastian, why are you saying all these things?"
"Because I finally can," Sebastian said. "You've no idea what it's been like, being around the lot of you these past few days, having to pretend I could stand you. That the sight of you didn't make me sick. You," he said to Jace, "every second you're not panting after your own sister, you're whining on and on about how daddy didn't love you. Well, who could blame him? And you, you stupid bitch"-he turned to Clary-"giving that priceless book away to a half-breed warlock; have you got a single brain cell in that tiny head of yours? And you-" He directed his next sneer at Alec. "I think we all know what's wrong with you. They shouldn't let your kind in the Clave. You're disgusting. — Cassandra Clare

A tightrope walker uncertain if he could make it to the other side probably would not. A race car driver wondering if he was taking a turn too fast was likely to lose control. If a man feared death, whether his own or the taking of another's, death would surely come calling. — Roy L. Pickering Jr.

People overthink flowers. They are afraid to mix and match, so they don't do anything! — Clinton Smith

A first impulse was never a crime. — Pierre Corneille

There are certain times when most people are in a disposition of being informed, and 'tis incredible what a vast good a little truth might do, spoken in such seasons. — Alexander Pope

Pollution is a necessary result of the inability of man to reform and transform waste. — Patti Smith

You must speak the vision of your project in a way that convinces people to pay for it. If they won't pay for it, that is the artist's fault. It is my fault. It is your fault. It is not the executive's fault or the world's. — Jill Soloway

Sun Tzu does not need my praise. His work has lived for over two thousand years, and will surely live for another two thousand without any help from me. — Martin Van Creveld