People Are Petty Quotes & Sayings

If we have chosen the position in life in which we can most of all work for mankind, no burdens can bow us down, because they are sacrifices for the benefit of all; then we shall experience no petty, limited, selfish joy, but our happiness will belong to millions, our deeds will live on quietly but perpetually at work, and over our ashes will be shed the hot tears of noble people. — Karl Marx

If there are 10 people there, two or three are going to recognize you. — Richard Petty

Can it be, thought I, that my sole mission on earth is to destroy the hopes of others? Ever since I began to live and act, fate has somehow associated me with the last act of other people's tragedies, as if without me no one could either die or give way to despair! I have been the inevitable character who comes in at the final act, involuntarily playing the detestable role of the hangman or the traitor. What has been fate's object in all this? Has it destined me to be the author of middle-class tragedies and family romances
or a purveyor of tales for, say, the Reader's Library? Who knows? Are there not many who begin life by aspiring to end it like Alexander the Great, or Lord Byron, and yet remain petty civil servants all their lives? — Mikhail Lermontov

Isn't that a little Old Testament for a nun?" "Ex-nun. And let me tell you, that serenity crap from The Sound of Music? Bullshit. Inside the cloister, the sisters are just as petty as people on the outside. There are some you love and some you hate. I did my share of spitting in the Holy Water font before another nun used it. It was totally worth the twenty rosaries I said for penance. — Jodi Picoult

If the stars are sublime, why should the earth be therefore petty? It is part of a sublime system. If the earth is to be called petty, then the stars must be called petty too. They may not even be inhabited. Perhaps they mean the movement of the vast system going on for ever, while men die. The indestructibility of matter. But if matter is indestructible, it is not what the people who use the phrase mean by matter. If matter is not conscious, man is more than matter. If a small, no matter how small, conscious thing is called petty in comparison with big, no matter how big, unconscious things, everything is made a question of size, which is absurd.... — Dorothy M. Richardson

Ego trips by coteries of self-exalting people are treated in the media as idealism, rather than the petty tyranny it is. — Thomas Sowell

The final relationship that cannot be ignored is with disrupters:
They are individuals who cause trouble for sport - inciting opposition
to management for a variety of reasons, most of them petty.
Usually these people have good performance - that's their cover - and so
they are endured or appeased.
A company that manages people well takes disrupters head-on.
First they give them very tough evaluations, naming their bad behaviour
and demanding it change.
Usually it won't. Disrupters are a personality type.
If that's the case, get them out of the way of people trying to do their
jobs.
They're poison. — Jack Welch

It is a mistake to talk of the twilight of age, or the blurred sight of old people. The long day grows clearer at its close, and the petty fogs of prejudice which rose between us and our fellows in youth melt away as the sun goes down. At last we see God's creatures as they are. — Rebecca Harding Davis

A third of the people who rush to psychiatrists for help could probably cure themselves if they could only do as Margaret Yates did: get interested in helping others. My idea? No, that is approximately what Carl Jung said. And he ought to know - if anybody does. He said: "About one third of my patients are suffering from no clinically definable neurosis, but from the senselessness and emptiness of their lives." To put it another way, they are trying to thumb a ride through life - and the parade passes them by. So they rush to a psychiatrist with their petty, senseless, useless lives. Having missed the boat, they stand on the wharf, blaming everyone except themselves and demanding that the world cater to their self-centered desires. — Dale Carnegie

Petty things become unimportant when people are impassioned about a purpose higher than self. — Stephen Covey

Every happy man should have some one with a little hammer at his door to knock and remind him that there are unhappy people, and that, however happy he may be, life will sooner or later show its claws, and some misfortune will befall him
illness, poverty, loss, and then no one will see or hear him, just as he now neither sees nor hears others. But there is no man with a hammer, and the happy go on living, just a little fluttered with the petty cares of every day, like an aspen-tree in the wind
and everything is all right. — Anton Chekhov

Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of leaders ... and millions have been killed because of this obedience ... Our problem is that people are obedient allover the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves ... (and) the grand thieves are running the country. That's our problem. — Howard Zinn

If our sins were only pardoned or forgiven, we would only go from being negative to being neutral. But with justification, God goes a step further and declares us to be righteous - to be 'justified'. He decides to treat us as perfectly good and righteous, like Jesus was in his earthly life. So, in that single declaration from God, we go not only from negative to neutral but also from neutral to positive. It is as if he is not only saying "Go, you're free", but also "Come near, you're actually good" - not because we are naturally good people, but because Jesus is good, and because God the judge makes that decision to treat us as though we share Jesus' goodness and righteousness. — Scott Petty

We are prudent people. We are afraid to let go of our petty reality in order to grasp at a great shadow. — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

temples can wield great power, for they can motivate the masses to ignore self-preservation in the name of a holy cause. They have moral power, as well, ideally. But most are run by petty people with odd ideas about a civil society. — Terry Mancour

Museums are just a lot of lies, and the people who make art their business are mostly imposters. We have infected the pictures in museums with all our stupidities, all our mistakes, all our poverty of spirit. We have turned them into petty and ridiculous things. — Pablo Picasso

You have been reproaching other people all your life - you have been always sure you yourself are right: it is because you have not a mind large enough to see that there is anything better than your own conduct and your own petty aims. — George Eliot

We are no petty people. We are one of the great stocks of Burke; we are the people of Swift, the people of Emmet, the people of Parnell. We have created most of the modern literature of this country. We have created the best of its political intelligence. — William Butler Yeats

In books and movies infidelity always looks so compelling, so right. Here are people who defy petty convention and are rewarded with only the tastiest bits of human experience. — David Sedaris

There are petty-minded people who cannot endure to be reminded of their ignorance because, since they are usually quite blind to all things, quite foolish, and quite ignorant, they never question anything, and are persuaded that they see clearly what in fact they never see at all, save through the darkness of their own dispositions. — Madeleine De Souvre, Marquise De ...

Over half a century on and they're still complaining about it. Compare it to the fact that Garden State didn't win an Oscar and they seem a little petty if you ask me. I guess that just goes to show what kind of people they really are. — Zach Braff

What most people want to keep under wraps (from reporters) is trivial: petty jealousies, professional feuds, etc. By contrast, most of the things they have thought about most seriously all their lives they are perfectly winning to uncover. — Thomas Boswell

We [people] are made separate by the things we do or do not do. Responsibilities of all types curb us. Desire betrays us. No wound is ever truly petty. And there are so many ways to be locked apart from the rest of the world. — Jill Alexander Essbaum

Sorry, but I have to be who I am. Everyone else is taken ... So be your self! Speak your truth - if there are people around you who tempt you with non-existence blast through that and give them the full glory of who you are. Do not withhold yourself from the world. Do not piss on the incandescent gift of your existence. Do not drown yourself in the petty fog and dustiness of other people's ancient superstitions, unbeliefs, aggressions, culture and crap! No! Be a flare! We were born that way. Born perfectly happy being inconvenient to our parents. We shit, piss, cry, wake up at night, throw up on their shoulders, scream ... We are, in essence, in our humanity, perfectly comfortable with inconveniencing others. That's how we're born, how we grow and develop. I choose to inconvenience the irrational. — Stefan Molyneux

If the masses started to accept UFOs, it would profoundly affect their attitude towards life, politics, everything. It would threaten the status quo. Whenever people come to realize that there are larger considerations than their own petty lives, they are ripe to make radical changes on a personal level, which would eventually lead to a political revolution in society as a whole — John Lennon

Deny everything and you will easily pass for a man of ability; it's a well known trick. Simple hearted people are quite ready to conclude that you are worth more than what you deny. And that's often an error. In the first place, you can pick holes in anything; and secondly, even if you are right in what you say, it's the worse for you, your intellect, directed by simple negation, grows colorless and withers up. While you gratify your vanity, you are deprived of the true consolations of thought;life--the essence of life--evades your jaundiced and petty criticism, and you end by scolding and becoming ridiculous. Only one who loves has the right to censure and find fault. — Ivan Turgenev

I think standing and fighting and working alongside all of these people that raise their right hand and serve their nation ... really wipes away the distractions of some of the petty things we think are important at home. — Pete Hegseth

We have, alas, belittled the cross, imagining it merely as a mechanism for getting us off the hook of our own petty naughtiness or as an example of some general benevolent truth. It is much, much more. It is the moment when the story of Israel reaches its climax; the moment when, at last, the watchmen on Jerusalem's walls see their God coming in his kingdom; the moment when the people of God are renewed so as to be, at last, the royal priesthood who will take over the world not with the love of power but with the power of love; the — N. T. Wright

Nobody went out to pasture, and a lot of people are doing their best work. Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, and Sting are at the top of their game. I mean, Tony Bennett is the coolest guy I ever met! We have to figure out how to break out of this age ghetto. — Bonnie Raitt

People are very hungry for something new. I think they are interested in being called to be a part of something larger than the sort of small, petty, slash-and-burn politics that we have been seeing over the last several years. — Barack Obama

Writers are interesting people, but often mean and petty. — Lillian Hellman

I think the measure of advancement depends on where you are stood and from what distance you look. A thousand years ago, we farmed the fields, built towns and defended our land with swords and spears. It is little different now, save for the number of people we have to protect. We still kill with a sharp edge or point of metal, blood runs red still, sons ride off to war and parents grieve. If you look at the Empire in its whole, then it is peaceful. If you look closely, you will see the small wars, the bandits and rebellions. Look more closely still and you'll see the petty crimes, the struggle to survive, the rich bleeding the poor. Even the soil can turn against its farmers, yielding few crops. Or the weather, a late frost killing the early crops. There is strife and conflict everywhere in the Empire. Everywhere you find men, you find conflict. — G.R. Matthews

I wanted ... people to listen to the pulse of nature, to partake of the wholeness of life and not forget, under the pressure of their petty destinies, that we are not gods and have not created ourselves but are the children of the earth, part of the cosmos. — Hermann Hesse

If guys don't respect themselves, they don't respect other people. That's times and personalities. And all of them are not that way. But it don't take but one or two to screw up the whole crowd. — Richard Petty

Our current contempt for poverty stems from information overload--this is the enabler---our over education as privileged people-- perhaps the real culprit--and our secret assurance that we ourselves owe no one anything beyond the exhausting daily round. We will defend our lack of idealism to anyone and be horrifyingly well received in this age. Indeed, many so called financial "philosophies" are in fact nothing more than elaborate justification for one petty selfishness after the next. — John Thomas Allen

If a man were to spend years of his life trying to discover the chemical constituency of salt water without bothering to find out what has already been said on the subject in any elementary chemistry book, we should say that he was making very imperfect use of the resources available to us. Similarly, can it not be said that people, worrying themselves sick over their individual frustrations, constantly suffering from petty irritations and hypertensions, are making extremely imperfect use of the available human resources of adjustment when they fail to strengthen and quiet themselves through contact with literature, music, painting, and the other arts? — S.I. Hayakawa

People destroy beauty when they find it. (Acheron)
How so? (Artemis)
By nature, people are petty and jealous. They envy what they lack and because they don't know how to acquire something, they try to destroy anyone who has it. Beauty is one of those things they hate most in others. (Acheron) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

whatever has been or is to be narrated by me about low people, may be ennobled by being considered a parable; so that if any bad habits and ugly consequences are brought into view, the reader may have the relief of regarding them as not more than figuratively ungenteel, and may feel himself virtually in company with persons of some style. Thus while I tell the truth about loobies, my reader's imagination need not be entirely excluded from an occupation with lords; and the petty sums which any bankrupt of high standing would be sorry to retire upon, may be lifted to the level of high commercial transactions by the inexpensive addition of proportional ciphers. — George Eliot

Mansoor had seen Vikas Uncle's movies before and had never cared for them. They were serious, stiff, shot in black-and-white, the characters speaking crisp English. Nothing good happened to anyone. People lived enclosed middle-class lives, taunting each other with petty memories, and women and men argued incessantly. "They're so joyless," he had told his mother, wondering at how tragic Vikas Uncle's sensibility had been even before the blast - it was as if he were sitting at a ceremonial fire, fanning a tragedy toward himself. "But they are very acclaimed," his mother had said reverently. — Karan Mahajan

History is not made by great dreams, but by the petty wants of all respectable, moderately thievish and selfish people, that is, of everyone. All our ideas, loves, plans, heroic ideals, all these lofty things are worthless. — Karel Capek

It's funny how the music industry is enraged about the Internet and the way things are copied without being paid for. But you know why people steal the music? Because they can't afford the music. — Tom Petty

Never be petty. Do not feed resentments against anyone. I prefer good-hearted sinners to so called good people who are intolerant and devoid of compassion. Being spiritual is to have an open mind, understand and forgive, and be friends with everyone. — Paramahansa Yogananda

Artists aren't necessarily business people. And they aren't necessarily aware of all the things that go on in their names. Some just want to make some music, but there is a lot of greed
among artists as well. Whether or not we know it, we are all to blame. I think it's time - starting with the artist - to try to be a little more responsible and aware of what goes on in our
name. — Tom Petty

When I go to see people, I always kind of hope they are going to play some kind of songs I know. So you've got to know your audience. It's kind of something that is a blessing and a curse in a way. You're obligated to play some of that stuff that people know, but I don't think that's all you have to do. — Tom Petty

We're a society of brats, fighting over the same toys. That, for me, is the closest we come to be inherently evil as a people. It leads to selfishness, inflexibility, and impatience -- among so many other traits that are ugly and harmful. We're combative, competitive, petty, and suffer from one fatal flaw that I can never get my head around. We recognize behavior in others that makes us insane, while turning right around and doing the exact thing to someone else. — Trevor D. Richardson

I'll never understand why some people can't just let others live their lives, you know," Danial said. "You don't have to understand. You don't have to agree. Just leave people alone. When I look at the moon and planets and stars, all that narrow-mindedness and hate seem so petty. The universe is such a big place. One hundred thousand light years just from one end of the Milky Way to the other. One hundred. Thousand. Light years. In the time it's taken for light to travel from one end of our galaxy to the other, thousands of generations have passed. It really makes you realize how small we are, doesn't it? How short our time on earth is. — J.H. Trumble