Provincials Quotes & Sayings

Here's the thing: You can be materialistic and poor. You can also be content and rich. It has nothing to do with your income and it has everything to do with your heart. You don't need to earn more money in order to be generous with your money. Some people use that as an excuse to be greedy. Jesus seemed to believe that the key to generosity wasn't having more, but being content with what you already have. — Cole Ryan

In the United States, doing good has come to be, like patriotism, a favorite device of persons with something to sell. — H.L. Mencken

Moreover, the context is oppressively confined and local. None of these provincials, or their deity, seems to have any idea of a world beyond the desert, the flocks and herds, and the imperatives of nomadic subsistence. This is forgivable on the part of the provincial yokels, obviously, but then what of their supreme guide and wrathful tyrant? Perhaps he was made in their image, even if not graven? — Christopher Hitchens

Growing up, there are always those kids who are only happy when they are making someone else upset. That is unfortunately just how some people are. And their parents were fine. Some people are just born with bad wiring. — Patton Oswalt

Stella Suberman's Suggestions for Further Reading
The Peddler's Grandson: Growing Up Jewish in Mississippi, by Edward Cohen
The Provincials: A Personal History of Jews in the South, by Eli N. Evans
Insecure Prosperity, by Ewa Morawska
The Slow Way Back, by Judy Goldman — Stella Suberman

We are provincials no longer. The tragic events of the 30 months of vital turmoil through which we have just passed have made us citizens of the world. There can be no turning back. — Woodrow Wilson

The international situation is desperate, as usual. — Tom Robbins

Looked at from the standpoint of the ultimate result, there was little real difference to the Indian whether the land was taken by treaty or by war ... No treaty could be satisfactory to the whites, no treaty served the needs of humanity and civilization, unless it gave the land to the Americans as unreservedly as any successful war. — Theodore Roosevelt

Going through the customs dampened them further. Customs inspectors must have a mental twist that makes them suspicious of innocence. Dewy-eyed honeymooners, red-cheeked provincials, and helpless little old ladies lash them into frenzied investigation while slinking Orientals hugging small black bags are passed with scarcely a glance. George and Harriet stood under the letter "R" and watched reproachfully while a muttering little man flung their underclothes and dirty laundry right and left, leaving scattered heaps for them to put back in their suitcases.

"I thought the French were supposed to be so polite," said Harriet indignantly.

Maybe it can't be proven statistically, but it's a safe bet that any given American on his or her first trip to France will at some point remark with indignation that he or she had thought the French were supposed to be so polite. — Jack Iams

I led Paul out the door, and neither of us said a word while we crossed the street. Once we made it to the other side, Paul stopped to stare at the building. He was babbling incoherently. The only words I caught were "fucking uptown" and "pancreas." He still had the doorman's pen in his hand. — Tiffanie DeBartolo

What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not a goal: what is lovable in man is that he is an over-going and a down-going. — Friedrich Nietzsche

The barbarians of Germany had felt, and still dreaded, the arms of the young Caesar; his soldiers were the companions of his victory; the grateful provincials enjoyed the blessings of his reign; but the favourites, who had opposed his elevation, were offended by his virtues; and they justly considered the friend of the people as the enemy of the court. — Edward Gibbon

There is a question as to whether these rallies [2016] are going to stop in the fall. I think they should continue. They are a tremendous display of energy but also a source of energy, because people come out of them ready to fight. — Ben Wikler

Sometimes I think that the only effective and productive method of destroying speciesism would be for each uncaring human to be forced to live the life of a cow on a feedlot, or a monkey in a laboratory, or an elephant in the circus, or a bull in a rodeo, or a mink on a fur farm. Then people would be awakened from their soporific states and finally understand the horrors that are inflicted on the animal kingdom by the vilest species to ever roam this planet: the human animal! — Gary Yourofsky

So far as we have any information about man, we know that he has always and everywhere been under the influence of dominating ideas. Any one who alleges that he is not can immediately be suspected of having exchanged a known form of belief for a variant which is less known both to himself and to others. — C. G. Jung

Temporal provincials were convinced that the present was the only time that mattered, and that anything that had occurred earlier could be safely ignored. — Michael Crichton

It may be romantic to search for the salves of society's ills in slow-moving rustic surroundings, or among innocent, unspoiled provincials, if such exist, but it is a waste of time. — Jane Jacobs

We can actually reconstruct our past by examining what we think, say, feel, expect, believe, and do in an intimate relationship now. — David Richo

Be courageous, but humble,
passionate, but simple,
have beliefs, but be flexible. — Debasish Mridha

I want to make it clear that the black race did not come to the United States culturally empty-handed. The role and importance of ethnic history is in how well it teaches a people to use their own talents, take pride in their own history and love their own memories. — John Henrik Clarke

It was the union of Franks, Goths, and Roman provincials against these Asiatics that produced the basis for modern France. — Robert D. Kaplan

As once, when the armies of the empire were shattered and the strong barbarians poured in upon the soft provincials, so now the fierce weeds pressed in to destroy the pampered nursling's of man. — George R. Stewart