Prides Quotes & Sayings

Pedantry prides herself on being wrong by rules; while common sense is contented to be right without them. — Charles Caleb Colton

L.A. prides itself on newness or being the last frontier or just not liking old things and tearing them down to build new things. But Malibu history is interesting to me. My mom's family was one of the early families in California, so there's history going back to the 1840s or '50s. — Kim Gordon

A man who prides himself on going in a straight line through life is an idiot who believes in infallibility. — Honore De Balzac

One cannot avoid a certain feeling of disgust, when one observes the actions of man displayed on the great stage of the world. Wisdom is manifested by individuals here and there; but the web of human history as a whole appears to be woven from folly and childish vanity, often, too, from puerile wickedness and love of destruction: with the result that at the end one is puzzled to know what idea to form of our species which prides itself so much on its advantages. — Immanuel Kant

It is ironic that America, with its history of injustice to the poor, especially the black man and the Indian, prides itself on being a Christian nation. — James H. Cone

We discovered that peace at any price is no peace at all ... that life at any price has no value whatever; that life is nothing without the privileges, the prides, the rights, the joys that make it worth living and also worth giving ... and that there is something more hideous, more atrocious than war or than death; and that is to live in fear. — Eve Curie

The genetic stage of a gene pool can be identified by the personality characteristics of the local God. Jehovah of Genesis is a low-level barbarian macho punk God. He boastfully claims to have created the heaven and the stars and the world, but provides no technical details or replicable blueprints. His preoccupations, whims, anxieties, jealousies, rules and hatred of women are primitive mammalian brain. His petty prides are primate. — Timothy Leary

The one thing that remains permanently behind the times, especially because it prides itself on its steadfastness, is the human heart, most of all that of the conscientious man. The mind is never so hard, dry, and twisted as when it has a slight chronic heart condition. — Robert Musil

It is also an absolute mistake to believe that the State can be anything other than a civitas diaboli if it does not resurrect itself as Imperium, and it is also a mistake to want to build the Imperium on the basis of economic, military, industrial or even 'intellectual' or nationalist factors. The Imperium, according to the primordial conception rooted in Tradition, is something transcendent, and it can only be attained by those who have the power to transcend the lives of petty men and their appetites, their sentimentalisms, their national prides, their 'values', and their phobias. — Julius Evola

America is a country that prides itself on being able to identify a 'straight shooter' or 'the genuine article' when it comes to our leaders. As a nation, we can 'feel it in our gut' when someone is giving us a bum steer. — Adam McKay

A skunk is better company than a person who prides himself on being 'frank'. — Robert A. Heinlein

If you stroke a cat, it will purr; and, as inevitably, if you praise a man, a sweet expression of delight will appear on his face; and even though the praise is a palpable lie, it will be welcome, if the matter is one on which he prides himself. — Arthur Schopenhauer

A man doesn't like to have his ego popped, especially when he prides himself on his sagacity, and then to be proved wrong by a man who claims he doesn't know anything. — E.A. Bucchianeri

He who prides himself on giving what he thinks the public wants is often creating a fictitious demand for low standards which he will then satisfy. — John Reith, 1st Baron Reith

We are a country that prides itself on power and wealth, yet there are millions of children who go hungry every day. It is our responsibility, not only as a nation, but also as individuals, to get involved. So, next time you pass someone on the street who is in need, remember how lucky you are, and don't turn away. — Lesley Boone

The United States prides itself on being the richest country in the world. Yet we can't balance the budget, pay for education, or take care of the aged and infirm. — Paul Hawken

Chicago, a town that's accustomed to its racial wounds and prides itself on a certain lack of sentiment. — Barack Obama

To discuss a Martin Amis book, you must first discuss the orchestrated release of a Martin Amis book. In London, which rightly prides itself on the vibrancy of its literary cottage industry, Amis is the Steve Jobs of book promoters, and his product rollouts are as carefully managed as anything Apple dreams up. — Graydon Carter

Or society places a supreme value on control
hiding what you feel. Our culture mocks "primitive cultures" and prides itself on supression of natural instincts and impulses. — Jim Morrison

Love prides itself not only in the one who loves, but also in the beloved. — Khalil Gibran

There is 'a time to be born' - and born again, free of accumulated, encrusted sores of fears and prejudices, old hates, of cancerous wounds, old prides. And there is a time to die - a time for the blue, unburied child of our young years to be decently interred - and to get on with the living. — Josephine Winslow Johnson

He who prides himself upon wealth and honor hastens his own downfall. — Laozi

Our time prides itself on having finally achieved the freedom from censorship for which libertarians in all ages have struggled ... The credit for these great achievements is claimed by the new spirit of rationalism, a rationalism that, it is argued, has finally been able to tear from man's eyes the shrouds imposed by mystical thought, religion, and such powerful illusions as freedom and dignity. Science has given us this great victory over ignorance. But, on closer examination, this victory too can be seen as an Orwellian triumph of an even higher ignorance: what we have gained is a new conformism, which permits us to say anything that can be said in the functional languages of instrumental reason, but forbids us to allude to ... the living truth ... so we may discuss the very manufacture of life and its 'objective' manipulations, but we may not mention God, grace, or morality. — Joseph Weizenbaum

We don't come to the table to fight or to defend. We don't come to prove or to conquer, to draw lines in the sand or to stir up trouble. We come to the table because our hunger brings us there. We come with a need, with fragility, with an admission of our humanity. The table is the great equalizer, the level playing field many of us have been looking everywhere for. The table is the place where the doing stops, the trying stops, the masks are removed, and we allow ourselves to be nourished, like children. We allow someone else to meet our need. In a world that prides people on not having needs, on going longer and faster, on going without, on powering through, the table is a place of safety and rest and humanity, where we are allowed to be as fragile as we feel. — Shauna Niequist

A man who prides himself on being better than his fellow-men thinks it a disgrace if he does not do something more than they do, whereby his superiority may be apparent. — Saint Bernard

We academic scientists move within a certain sphere, we can go on being useless up to a point, in the confidence that sooner or later some use will be found for our studies. The mathematician, of course, prides himself on being totally useless, but usually turns out to be the most useful of the lot. He finds the solution but he is not interested in what the problem is: sooner or later, someone will find the problem to which his solution is the answer. — John Desmond Bernal

..every time scientists try to observe the quantum world they disturb it. And because at least one quantum of energy must always be involved, there is no way the size of this disturbance can be reduced.

Our acts of observing the universe, our attempts to gather knowledge, are no longer strictly objective because in seeking to know the universe we act to disturb it. Science prides itself on objectivity, but now Nature is telling us we never see a pure, pristine and objective quantum world. In every act of observation the observing subject enters into the cosmos and disturbs it in an irreducible way.

Science is like photographing a series of close ups with your back to the sun. No matter which way you move, your shadow always falls across the scene you photograph. No matter what you do, you can never efface yourself from the photographed scene. — F. David Peat

'Billy Elliot' prides itself on being a family show, and it made sense to specifically cater to a family audience with an earlier evening curtain time. — Eric Fellner

The sinner prides himself on his independence, completely overlooking the fact that he is the weak slave of the sins that rule his members. — A.W. Tozer

Grey's chalky, flat, impassive face, dead eyes and squeaky monotone are now virtually emblematic of extreme mainstream pornography. For the uninitiated: her pornographic videos are something like plumbing tutorials by Eli Roth. Some women pride themselves on their quilting; Grey prides herself on choking on oversized genitals. — Antonella Gambotto-Burke

A lot of things can go out of order in a lonely house over a lonely autumn and the start of winter, without other people in the village knowing, especially if that village prides itself on an independent spirit. — Kathleen Winter

Am I seriously the only one of us who prides herself on being a truly authentic person? — Hannah

The problem that we have is the President himself- a President who prides himself on his own weakness and incompetence and whose love of false prophets and strange women knows no bounds and has no end. A President who is as confused and as clueless as the comic character called Chancey Gardner in the celebrated 1970's Peter Seller's Hollywood blockbuster titled Being There — Femi Fani-Kayode

The arts world prides itself on its diversity, inclusivity, open-mindedness and constant efforts to reach out to all. Yet at the very moment when Britain decides its future, hardly anyone in the arts seems to understand, let alone agree with, the opinion of at least half the population. — Richard Morrison

He who prides himself an extraordinary person by his deeds is rejected by the world; he who has independent ideas is hated by the mass. — Shang Yang

Pinkie." He placed the pad of his index finger over her mouth. "There is nothing more important in this world to me than you and there never will be. Not our children. Not the any of the packs or prides. Only you. — Aline Hunter

Everyone goes to the same exhibitions and the same parties, stays in the same handful of hotels, eats at the same no-star restaurants, and has almost the same opinions. I adore the art world, but this is copycat behavior in a sphere that prides itself on independent thinking. — Jerry Saltz

Nature does not turn out her work according to a single pattern; she prides herself upon her power of variation ... — Seneca The Younger

One of the basics of a good system of innovation is diversity. In some ways, the stronger the culture (national, institutional, generational, or other), the less likely it is to harbor innovative thinking. Common and deep-seated beliefs, widespread norms, and behavior and performance standards are enemies of new ideas. Any society that prides itself on being harmonious and homogeneous is very unlikely to catalyze idiosyncratic thinking. Suppression of innovation need not be overt. It can be simply a matter of peoples walking around in tacit agreement and full comfort with the status quo. — Nicholas Negroponte

Man prides himself on being the only animal who can modify his nature, yet when he chooses to do so he is called a phony. — Anton Szandor LaVey

Why do we place such a disproportionate emphasis on sporting achievement? Why doesn't success in other fields receive similar attention ... Maybe it's because in a country that prides itself on being egalitarian, sport is intellectually and socio-economically an equal playing field. In fact, the more humble your background, the better, the underdog-turned champion is a narrative that resonates powerfully. We're far less interested in the stories of our best doctors, writers, lawyers, engineers, teachers or social workers. Their triumphs do not capture our collective imaginations. — Mia Freedman

I just think it's rather odd that a nation that prides itself on its virility should feel compelled to strap on forty pounds of protective gear just in order to play rugby. — Rupert Giles

War is the sure result of the existence of armed men. That country which maintains a large standing army will sooner or later have a war. The man who prides himself on fisticuffs is going, some day, to meet a man who considers himself the better man, and they will test the issue. — Elbert Hubbard

The individual's religion may be egotistic, and those private realities which it keeps in touch with may be narrow enough; but at any rate it always remains infinitely less hollow and abstract, as far as it goes, than a science which prides itself on taking no account of anything private at all. — William James

It is of course true that the human creature characteristically prides itself on its self-reliance. However, it would be more exact to say that the creature, knowing it can't rely upon itself, would very much like to believe that it could and is consequently never at ease with itself until it can give a practical demonstration to some other such creature of how much it can rely upon itself. — Soseki Natsume

Things change as minds change. Egos and prides vanish in the darkness of night. The false mask of vanity burns in the natural propensity to be happy. Who wants to be sad, after all? — Girdhar Joshi

Why are you here?"
His chest lifts on a deep breath. "I'm done."
"Done with what?"
"Done letting you avoid me."
I cock my head. I hadn't run him off? Could it be so simple? So easy? Poof! He's here whether I like it or not. I didn't even need to convince him that I had changed my mind? "Are you sure that's a good idea?"
Because I'm not. Like the truest coward, when presented with my self-professed goal, doubts assail me. I'm not sure I'm ready for him. Even if being with him gets me the information I need about other prides, I'm still left with the issue of manifesting whenever I'm too close to him. And I want to be close to him. Can I be with him without being with him? In my true form?
Am I capable of that kind of control?
"I'm sure," he answers in a firm voice. — Sophie Jordan

Although the patriarchal ego prides itself on being reasonable, the twentieth century has been anything but the Age of Reason. In our collective neurosis, we have raped the earth, disrupted the delicate balance of nature, and created phallic missiles of mass destruction. — Marion Woodman

Great Britain, for instance, is too big and too diverse to be home to a small-island civilization, but in modern times the English - though not, I think, other peoples of the island - have cultivated what might be called a small-island mentality: all their most tiresome history books stress, sometimes in their opening words, that their history is a function of their insularity. They still write and read histories with such titles as Our Island Story and The Offshore Islanders.4The conviction that their island "arose from the azure main" and is like a gem "set in the silver sea" resounds in national songs and scraps of verse which they hear repeatedly. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the English invested heavily in naval security. They created the cult of the "English eccentric" - which is a way of idealizing the outcome of isolation. They have projected an image as "a singular race, one which prides itself on being a little mad. — Felipe Fernandez-Armesto

Send us people with initiative, who can carry themselves and others too; such as need to be carried hamper the work and weaken those who should be spending their strength on the heathen. Weaklings should be nursed at home! If any have jealousy, prides, or talebearing traits lurking about them, do not send them, nor any who are prone to criticize. Send only Pauls and Timothys; men who are full of zeal, holiness and power. All others are hindrances. If you send us ten such men the work will be done. — Charles Studd

As in the natural life a child must have a father and a mother, so in the supernatural life of grace a true child of the Church must have God for his Father and Mary for his mother. If he prides himself on having God for his Father but does not give to Mary the tender affection of a true child, he is an impostor and his father is the devil. — Louis De Montfort

Shame is Prides cloke. — William Blake

One sticks to an opinion because he prides himself on having come to it on his own, and another because he has taken great pains to learn it and is proud to have grasped it: and so both do so out of vanity. — Friedrich Nietzsche

If I'm trading bars with somebody, it certainly is not because I have a release coming. Joe Budden prides himself on the music and not the sales aspect. — Joe Budden

Like the color of one's skin, the shape of one's genitals is a neutral biological fact that acquires meaning from society, which prides or devalues certain biological differences. — Richard Caldwell

Far too many people allow broken egos and wounded prides to convince them to seek justice before they seek understanding. — A.J. Darkholme

It is out of character for a country that prides itself on intellectual freedom to put the education of its young in the hands of the state. — David Kelley

You need a break, a complete rest, recharge your batteries.' Recharge your batteries. What the hell does that mean? Nelson prides himself on not needing batteries. He's an old-fashioned, wind-up model. — Elly Griffiths