Rule Of Life Quotes & Sayings

41. The Means to attain Happy Life

MARTIAL, the things that do attain
The happy life be these, I find:
The richesse left, not got with pain;
The fruitful ground, the quiet mind:

The equal friend; no grudge, no strife;
No charge of rule, nor governance;
Without disease, the healthful life;
The household of continuance:

The mean diet, no delicate fare;
True wisdom join'd with simpleness;
The night discharged of all care,
Where wine the wit may not oppress.

The faithful wife, without debate;
Such sleeps as may beguile the night;
Contented with thine own estate
Ne wish for death, ne fear his might. — Henry Howard

Our prayer life and rule of prayer will be shaped by the different stages of our spiritual journey as well. Many people who have just come to know Christ find that their words flow easily. Prayer is a joy for them. But, as with romantic relationships, there is a natural movement beyond this honeymoon phase. When feelings of intense connection with God ebb, we have a new opportunity to engage God - not based on cool spiritual vibes but as an expression of our genuine love for God. Times of spiritual dryness are normal for almost everyone, even if we haven't sinned and to the best of our knowledge haven't done anything to wall off our relationship with God. God may allow this dryness so that we can mature in our relationship with him and learn to seek him not for an ecstatic spiritual experience but out of a deeper love and commitment. — Ken Shigematsu

In life loyalty is something that you earn and Doreen had more than earned my loyalty over the years. But marriage is a rogue state with its own rules, and one of them is pledging your loyalty to somebody before you can be fully sure that they deserve it, so you stand their ground. You mess with him? You mess with me. That's the new rule. A husband is instant family. He gets the loyalty of a blood tie without doing any of the work. — Kate Kerrigan

Shit, man, democracy failed before it started.

Who thought it was a good idea to let the masses of fucktards decide anything?

[Guess I've got more faith in people.]

People? The election of 2044 -- Curls Bellberry, a boy band presidency on the platform that the Earth is flat and that he'd nuke New York to save Social Security. There's a good reason he was the last president.

Problem with letting people pick a leader is they gravitate towards confident sociopaths no matter how stupid they are.

It's the perception of qualification that fools people.

At least by having corporate executives rule us we get folks who are good at business.

Life hurts, the world is fucked, and that's not going to change. . . — Rick Remender

Pure creativity is magnificent expressly because it is the opposite of everything else in life that's essential or inescapable (food, shelter, medicine, rule of law, social order, community and familial responsibility, sickness, loss, death, taxes, etc.). Pure creativity is something better than a necessity; it's a gift. It's the frosting. Our creativity is a wild and unexpected bonus from the universe. — Elizabeth Gilbert

Basketball Rule #4

If you miss
enough of life's
free throws
you will pay
in the end. — Kwame Alexander

Do not copy my style! The first rule of writing is write about what you know, not what you think you know. So, think about what you've done in your life and write about that. — Jackie Collins

Mexico is a country without political freedom, without freedom of speech, without a free press, without a free ballot, without a jury system, without political parties, without any of our cherJ ished guarantees of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It is a land where there has been no contest for the office of president for more than a generation, where the executive rules all things by means of a standing army, where political offices are sold for a fixed price. I found Mexico to be a land where the people are poor because they have no rights, where peonage is the rule for the great mass, and where actual chattel slavery obtains for hundreds of thousands. — John Kenneth Turner

Light is safety; light is life
The first rule of the Arclight. — Josin L. McQuein

One of the big no-nos in cyberspace is that you do not go into a social activity, a chat group or something like that, and start advertising or selling things. This etiquette rule is an attempt to separate one's social life, which should be pure enjoyment and relaxation, from the pressures of work. — Judith Martin

Make this simple rule the guide of your life: to have no will but God's. — Francois Fenelon

Now come: that thou mayst able be to know
That minds and the light souls of all that live
Have mortal birth and death, I will go on
Verses to build meet for thy rule of life,
Sought after long, discovered with sweet toil. — Lucretius

What I appear, a sick and poor man, is not the worst of me. I am in a chaos of principles
groping in the dark
acting by instinct and not after example. Eight or nine years ago when I came here first, I had a neat stock of fixed opinions, but they dropped away one by one; and the further I get the less sure I am. I doubt if I have anything more for my present rule of life than following inclinations which do me and nobody else any harm, and actually give pleasure to those I love best. — Thomas Hardy

Photography of any living being, according to Taliban rule, was illegal. So when I went to Afghanistan, immediately I was worried about photographing people. But it was what I wanted: to show what life was like under the Taliban, specifically for women. — Lynsey Addario

As in walking it is your great care not to run your foot upon a nail, or to tread awry, and strain your leg; so let it be in all the affairs of human life, not to hurt your mind or offend your judgment. And this rule, if observed carefully in all your deportment, will be a mighty security to you in your undertakings. — Epictetus

Yet in reality, the likelihood of reaching the pinnacle of capitalist society today is only marginally better than were the chances of being accepted into the French nobility four centuries ago, though at least an aristocratic age was franker, and therefore kinder, about the odds. It did not relentlessly play up the possibilities open to all those with a take on the future of the potato crisp, and so, in turn, did not cruelly equate an ordinary life with a failed one.
Our era is perverse in passing off an exception as a rule. — Alain De Botton

We'll have for a president a symbolic Rebel against his own power whose election was underwritten by inhuman soulless profit-machines whose takeover of American civic and spiritual life will convince Americans that rebellion against the soulless inhumanity of corporate life will consist in buying products from corporations that do the best job of representing corporate life as empty and soulless. We'll have a tyranny of conformist nonconformity presided over by a symbolic outsider whose very election depended on our deep conviction that his persona is utter bullshit. A rule of image, which because it's so empty makes everyone terrified - they're small and going to die, after all - — David Foster Wallace

As a general rule, it is difficult for people in public life to change their minds. There is an immediate rush to portray politicians as "flip-floppers" when they shift position on anything, even if they do so following a careful consideration of an issue rather than a meeting with a pollster. — Anonymous

Truth demands progress and change, and is always for the benefit of all souls - even if you must travel through a difficult learning process or make a shift as a result of facing the truth. — Molly Friedenfeld

He then who rashly judges his brother; shakes off the yoke of God, for he submits not to the common rule of life. It is then an argument from what is contrary; because the keeping of the law is wholly different from this arrogance, when men ascribe to their conceit the power and authority of the law. It hence follows, that we then only keep the law, when we wholly depend on its teaching alone and do not otherwise distinguish between good and evil; for all the deeds and words of men ought to be regulated by it. — John Calvin

I hope progressive ways of thinking will permeate the "mainstream" more and more in the coming years. Goddess knows we have endured a very long spell (thirty plus years) of regressive thinking and hyper conservativism dominating our culture and national discourse. It necessitates risk taking and rule breaking by people in all walks of life to swing that pendulum back though. — Ani DiFranco

How was possible that a small no of men, in the span of a few hours or minutes, could decide the fate of millions of people yet unborn ? How was it possible that the outcome of those brief moments could determine who would determine who would rule whom, who would be rich or poor, master or servant, for generations to come ?
Nothing could be a greater injustice, yet such had been the reality ever since human beings first walked the earth. — Amitav Ghosh

Every Christian must be a broken person. To enter the kingdom, we must acknowledge that the inner peace we yearn for can never come by our own efforts but only by admitting we are powerless to conquer our self-centeredness and by turning over the rule of our life to Christ. Our sinful hearts show themselves through what we do and what we fail to do. We end up broken not only because we are victims but also because we have hearts of rebellion and stubborn independence. — Mark R. McMinn

The Christian goal for the world is the universal development of Biblical theocratic republics, in which every area of life is redeemed and placed under the Lordship of Jesus Christ and the rule of God's law. — David Chilton

There is nothing more dangerous in the spiritual life, than to wish to rule ourselves after our own way of thinking. — Philip Neri

No doubt, some of the champions of local government hoped to preserve such unsavory local customs as slavery or the local rule of a small group of privileged men, but many of the defenders of local government argued honestly that the states presented the best hope of securing liberty. Liberty, in the eighteenth century, meant not simply liberty from some intrusive outside power. It meant the active exercise of control over one's life, the possession of power in one's own hands. It meant government small enough and close enough to home to be directly accountable and responsive. It meant self-government, not government handed over to some remote rulers. Strictly understood, the principle of local self-government meant a share of power more or less equal to everyone else's share of power, a citizenry more or less equal in wealth and status, not one dominated by one small group or another; that is to say, it meant democracy — Charles L. Mee Jr.

There's no rule book or game plan when it comes to the grim realities of our lives. — Simone Elkeles

Most black people are anti-racist (even those who have internalized racial self-hatred) and will not argue that whites are better, superior, and should rule over us. Yet most black people are not anti-sexist (even those whose life circumstance may make it impossible for them to rigidly conform to sexist roles) and will argue the natural superiority of men, supporting their right to dominance in the family and in the world outside the home. — Bell Hooks

That is my rule of life. If fate means you to lose, give him a good fight anyhow. Do you remember Henley's magnificent lines?
'Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.' ?
That is my gospel. What do you think of it? — William McFee

One must know oneself. If this does not serve to discover truth, it at least serves as a rule of life, and there is nothing better. — Blaise Pascal

Summing up the basic rules related to drinking water and taking food: 1. Do not drink water until one hour after taking food. 2. Drink water sip by sip slowly. 3. Never drink cold water. 4. Drink ample amount of water after waking up early in the morning. And, the following rule related to food intake. 5. Consume the major part of your daily food early in the morning. Following these five guidelines of rightfully water and food intake, you can avoid any ailments that would occur to body and remain healthy throughout your life, without any need to consume any drug for ever. Please note that these general tips on how to drink & eat properly are applicable to most people, but of course, everyone's body is a unique construct. People with specific health issues should consult a physician before making any major changes in diet or food intake. — Rajiv Dixit

In fact I wonder if I should bend my own rules a little and for the sake of writing a good song it doesn't have to been so autobiographical, but that's a stupid rule to live by as some of my favourite artists' songs, they have a song that you think is about their life [which] probably even isn't, but it's a great song. — The Rocket Summer

He did not see that the continuity of an oligarchy need not be physical, nor did he pause to reflect that hereditary aristocracies have always been shortlived, whereas adoptive organizations such as the Catholic Church have sometimes lasted for hundreds or thousands of years. The essence of oligarchical rule is not father-to-son inheritance, but the persistence of a certain world-view and a certain way of life, imposed by the dead upon the living. A ruling group is a ruling group so long as it can nominate its successors. — George Orwell

How Not to Spend Your Senior Year,
Rule #3:
No matter how dire things get,
do not panic.

It will only make a bad situation even worse. Besides, by the time you've reached the hit-the-panic-button stage, it's way too late. Nothing you do will make a difference anyhow.
This is a phenomenon known to the ancients as irony. You may be more familiar with the contemporary expression of this concept: Life sucks.
Particularly weekends. — Cameron Dokey

By replacing fear of the unknown with curiosity we open ourselves up to an infinite stream of possibility. We can let fear rule our lives or we can become childlike with curiosity, pushing our boundaries, leaping out of our comfort zones, and accepting what life puts before us. — Alan Watts

Men have their virtues and their vices, their heroisms and their perversities; men are neither wholly good nor wholly bad, but possess and practice all that there is of good and bad here below. Such is the general rule. Temperament, education, the accidents of life, are modifying factors. Outside of this, everything is ordered arrangement, everything is chance. Such has been my rule of expectation and it has usually brought me success. — Napoleon Bonaparte

I was now well prepared to be a career criminal. I had the proper training and a natural feel for the business. I had a respect for the old-liners like Angelo and Don Frederico. I had been a witness to both murder and betrayal and had my appetite whetted for acts of revenge.
I just didn't have the stomach for any of it.
I didn't want my life to be a lonely and sinister on, where even the closest of friends could overnight turn into an enemy who needed to be eliminated. If I went the way Angelo had paved, I would earn millions, but would never be allowed to taste the happiness and enjoyment such wealth often brings. I would rule over a dark world, a place where treachery and deceit would be at my side and never know the simple pleasures of an ordinary life. p368. — Lorenzo Carcaterra

There was one big rule in life - the things you worried about never happened, and the things that happened were never the ones you expected. Not that this bit of advice helped Johnny much. It simply meant that he spent more time guessing at what the unexpected disasters in his life would be. — John Bellairs

And the stains would never wash out. That's what Lukas was saying. She would always have hurt her father. Was that the way to phrase it? Always have had. It was immortal tense. A new rule of grammar. — Hugh Howey

People who desire to acquire success need to have knowledge — Sunday Adelaja

There must be a rule of thumb in pop-culture archaeology that states that the allure of any topic is inversely related to its assigned importance in the affairs of humanity. The more trivial the subject, the dearer it is to most of its partisans and the more worthy of scholarship. The smallest things in life often mean the most to people. — Paul Di Filippo

That's my second rule of life," Dan said. "There's always a guy named Joe. — Jude Watson

And gone the Godless destiny of death and desperation, and gone the madness of a life committed to uncare, and gone the tears and terror of the brutal days and endless nights where time alone would rule. — Ken Wilber

Master, I'm afraid. I am, truly. This place scares me. At home, I know who I am, what to do. I'm the Warden's daughter, I know where I stand. But this is a dangerous place, full of pitfalls. All my life, I've known it was waiting for me, but now I'm not sure I can face it. They'll want to absorb me, make me one of them, and I won't change. I won't! I want to stay me."
Jared sighed and she saw his dark gaze was fixed on the veiled window.
"Claudia, you're the bravest person I know. And no one will change you. You will rule here, though it won't be easy ... — Catherine Fisher

Abbott says, 'Biggest ... difference ... between ... people ... is ... quality ... of ... attention.' And since a person's quality of attention is one of the few things about her that a human can control, then she better damn well do it, say I. Put that together with the Golden Rule in a nutshell, and you've got my philosophy of life. Abbott's too. And you don't need religion for that. — Russell Banks

Loving your work doesn't mean finding a job you can tolerate for eight hours a day, but rather a job that gets you flying out of bed in the morning like a Jack Russell who just had a firecracker stuffed up his ass. — Ari Gold

The first rule of self control is never to put yourself in a position where you have to practice self control — Venancio Cadle Gomani Jr.

It's like a rule of life that yer automatically happier when you don't gotta worry about something. — Patrick Ness

Yes, she is in love with him, and yes, in spite of his qualms and inner hesitations, he loves her back, however improbable that might seem to him. Note here for the record that he is not someone with a special fixation on young girls. Until now, all the women in his life have been more or less his own age. Pilar therefore does not represent an embodiment of some ideal female type for him
she is merely herself, a small piece of luck he stumbled across one afternoon in a public park, an exception to every rule. — Paul Auster

I love acting. I think that's the best job in the world, but I don't really enjoy the career of it so much. You don't have as much control over your life or the material as you do, well, certainly when you're a director or a producer, so while I love acting, I prefer to make my living as a filmmaker, but my rule on acting is if somebody asks me to do a part, I'll do it. — David Hayter

Both friend and enemy reside within us. One lives by the rule of compassion, the other by the rule of hard knocks. Though potential influence of either extreme is inevitable, our actions bear witness to the one we embrace. — T.F. Hodge

I do not wonder that, where the monastick life is permitted, every order finds votaries, and every monastery inhabitants. Men will submit to any rule, by which they may be exempted from the tyranny of caprice and of chance. They are glad to supply by external authority their own want of constancy and resolution, and court the government of others, when long experience has convinced them of their own inability to govern themselves. — Samuel Johnson

I keep waiting for the roof to cave in. I was raised to follow the Golden Rule, you know, treat people the way you wish to be treated. That's kind of the way I live my life. Maybe someone up there likes me for that. — Matt LeBlanc

Central governments have always been the greatest danger to mankind. Now there are none - small communities are the new rule of life. Some things are better left alone by everyone. — Terry Brooks

It's ok sometimes, to let go the rule of who is right and who is wrong, when it comes to bringing a smile back on the face of a loved one. — Arti Honrao

The matron glanced at the old man and suppressed a smile. "He is absolutely miserable."
"I enjoy miserable. It gives one a contrast to all the delectabilities of life. But is he housebroken, inpala? He is rather rumpled. He will look well on my ship, but will he wash well? Do professors fray as a general rule? I will not have my ship looking ragged."
"They do tend to fade after a few years of hard use. — Michelle Franklin

There are times when I wouldn't rule violence out. I personally don't like violence at all. But it wasn't until we had the Trafalgar Square riots that the Poll Tax went out in Britain. When people take to the streets and fight the police, it's the one thing the government can't control. You can march round in circles for the rest of your life and they can ignore it, but once you start damaging property and fighting with the police, they can't. Even though they tar you with a brush and say you're a set of bastards, they have to actually tone down what they are doing. — Alice Nutter

Personally I don't endorse the notion of mortality. It's fine for other folk, but I disapprove of the concept for me and my loved ones. Seems unfair that we're not allowed to vote on the matter and not one of us is excused. Who made up that rule? - Kinsey Millhone — Sue Grafton

A good rule of thumb for many things in life holds that things take longer to happen than you think they will, and then happen faster than you thought they could. — Lawrence Summers

[My wife] is a great student of the Bible. Her life is ruled by the Bible more than any person I've ever known. That's her rule book, her compass. — Billy Graham

When I was teaching basketball, I urged my players to try their hardest to improve on that very day, to make that practice a masterpiece.
Too often we get distracted by what is outside our control. You can't do anything about yesterday. The door to the past has been shut and the key thrown away. You can do nothing about tomorrow. It is yet to come. However, tomorrow is in large part determined by what you do today. So make today a masterpiece. You have control over that.
This rule is even more important in life than basketball. You have to apply yourself each day to become a little better. By applying yourself to the task of becoming a little better each and every day over a period of time, you will become a lot better. Only then will you will be able to approach being the best you can be. It begins by trying to make each day count and knowing you can never make up for a lost day. — John Wooden

People trust too much in themselves. What they take for truth, they let rule their lives, and if I set out to find a way to live so I will be in control of my life, then I actually lose control, because the thing I have decided on, my truth, becomes the ruler and I become it's servant. And how can I be free to evolve if I'm submitting myself to a ruler, any ruler, even if that ruler is me? — Steve Toltz

If we wish to influence our own life in a particular direction, which is constantly threatened by the danger of the emergence of alien life-forms, and protect it from deterioration, then we must either allow Nature to rule or, if we wish to intervene, we must first acquaint ourselves with the simplest principles of life. — Viktor Schauberger

Books," says E. P. Whipple, "are lighthouses erected in the great sea of time." "As a rule," said Benjamin Disraeli, "the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information. — Orison Swett Marden

Of all the paradoxes of Lincoln's life, none is more powerful than the fact that the man who would come to be known throughout the world - from American schoolrooms to the tribal councils of the Caucasus Mountains - was deeply mysterious to the people who knew him best. "Those who have spoken most confidently of their knowledge of his personal qualities," wrote the Pennsylvania Republican Alexander McClure, "are, as a rule, those who saw least of them below the surface. — Joshua Wolf Shenk

He was regarded merely as an eccentric employee of indifferent merit, and his post of deputy chief clerk was the highest he would ever reach. Well aware of this, he made it a rule never to show any zeal, except in special circumstances. It is true that in these cases his zeal was clothed with a spirit of vengeance directed against the whole human race - this being his second favourite occupation. Petitbidois would have liked to hold the reins of power. This being beyond his sphere, he utilized the small driblets of authority which came his way for the purpose of casting ridicule upon established law and order, by making it act as a sort of unintelligent and, if possible, malicious Providence. 'The world is an idiot place anyway,' he would say, 'so why worry? Life is just a lottery. Let us leave the decision to chance. — Gabriel Chevallier

Benedict sets up a community, a family. And families, the honest among us will admit, are risky places to be if perfection is what y ou are expecting in life. — Joan D. Chittister

I never change.
MRS. CHEVELEY: (elevating her eyebrows) Then life has taught you nothing?
LADY CHILTERN: It has taught me that a person who has once been guilty of a dishonest and dishonorable action may be guilty of it a second time, and should be shunned.
MRS. CHEVELEY: Whould that rule apply to everyone?
LADY CHILTERN: Yes, to everyone, without exception.
MRS. CHEVELEY: Then I am sorry for you, Gertrude, very sorry for you. — Oscar Wilde

Winter again. The summer people have gone. The early morning walks are solitary once more. Fog wraps the ocean and sky like a wet, gray glove. Sprinting through the frosty dune grass, my dog Buddy emerges soaked and grinning. He's become a man-child, his boundless puppy love and mindless exuberance caroming off the walls in a muscular body. He lives by one rule: To be alive is to be gloriously happy. Not a bad way to be, I often remind myself.

Comfortable in the ebb and flow of each other's idiosyncracies and needs, he keeps me company while I work, I join him often in his play. His unflagging high spirits urge me to cram activity and joy into every waking moment as he does. By so doing, I tell myself, I will multiply my allotted time by dog years and dilate the remaining seasons accordingly. A good way to look at life, I figure. — Lionel Fisher

Feydeau's one rule of playwriting:
Character A: My life is perfect as long as I don't see Character B.
Knock Knock.
Enter Character B. — John Guare

How I treat a brother or sister from day to day, how I react to the sin-scarred wino on the street, how I respond to interruptions from people I dislike, how I deal with normal people in their normal confusion on a normal day may be a better indication of my reverence for life than the antiabortion sticker on the bumper of my car. — Brennan Manning

The rule of my life is to make business a pleasure, and pleasure my business. — Aaron Burr

I tried to code myself by applying each law and rule of the humans on me... what did it happen?

- More like a problems... errors... and glitches were on the way. — Deyth Banger

It is desire that engenders belief; if we fail as a rule to take this into account, it is because most of the desires that create beliefs end only with out own life. — Marcel Proust

The poor man retains the prejudices of his forefathers without their faith, and their ignorance without their virtues; he has adopted the doctrine of self-interest as the rule of his actions, without understanding the science which puts it to use; and his selfishness is no less blind than was formerly his devotedness to others. If society is tranquil, it is not because it is conscious of its strength and its well-being, but because it fears its weakness and its infirmities; a single effort may cost it its life. Everybody feels the evil, but no one has courage or energy enough to seek the cure. The desires, the repinings, the sorrows, and the joys of the present time lead to no visible or permanent result, like the passions of old men, which terminate in impotence. — Alexis De Tocqueville

I felt overwhelmed. I didn't expect a first kiss to be so ... life altering. In a few brief moments, the rule book of my universe had been rewritten. Suddenly I was a brand new person. I was as fragile as a newborn, but instead of the doctor placing me in my mother's arms, he'd put me in Ren's. What would Ren do with me? Would he draw me near, soothe me, and teach me about this new world or would he reject me and tell the doctor there must be some mistake. There was no way to know. What a breakable and delicate thing a heart was, no wonder I'd kept mine locked away. — Colleen Houck

Make it a rule of life never to regret and never to look back. Regret is an appalling waste of energy; you can't build on it; it's only good for wallowing in. — Katherine Mansfield

Darwin's theory shows the truth of naturalism: we are animals like any other; our fate and that of the rest of life on Earth are the same. Yet, in an irony all the more exquisite because no one has noticed it, Darwinism is now the central prop of the humanist faith that we can transcend our animal natures and rule the Eart. — John Gray

Books proliferate, and occasionally sell in very large numbers, which claim to have found the rule, or small set of rules, which will guarantee business success. But business is far too complicated, far too difficult an activity to distil into a few simple commands ... It is failure rather than success which is the distinguishing feature of corporate life. — Paul Ormerod

A man must make the Bible his rule of conduct. He must make its leading principles the compass by which he steers his course through life. By the letter or spirit of the Bible he must test every difficult point and question. "To the law and to the testimony! What saith the Scripture?" He ought to care nothing for what other people may think right. He ought not to set his watch by the clock of his neighbour, but by the sun-dial of the Word. — J.C. Ryle

Of course I loved Remy, loved him like a brother, like the best friend and consummate protector he had been, but I loved Rule like it was my mission in life. I loved him like it was inevitable, — Jay Crownover

Oh, alas, alas for his debauched children, flesh of his flesh, heir to all his failings and none of his strenghts! ... was it hard to judge a ten-year-old boy in this way? Yes, of course it was, but these were not boys. They were little gods, the despots of the future: born, unfortunately, to rule. He loved them. They would betray him. They were the lights of his life. They would come for him while he slept. The little assfuckers. He was waiting for their moves. — Salman Rushdie

Each restorational advancement of the Army of the Lord has established denominational forts that are given responsibility to maintain the purity and power of that truth ... New recruits are now being drafted and trained and older soldiers and generals are being put through intensified training for the next advancement of the Church Army. They are being purified by the Baptism of Fire ... Are you ready? Where do you start? What will you do? A new government must be established, a new way of life for those millions of people. You are now ready to rule and reign on your overcomer's throne! — Bill Hamon

If death were the exception and not the rule, and we were not so swiftly to follow, these separations would be intolerably sad. We know no more of our next change of life than we knew of this before we were born into it; but that which we call death is merely change, who can doubt? — Celia Thaxter

Get through a draft as quickly as possible. Hard to know the shape of the thing until you have a draft. Literally, when I wrote the last page of my first draft of Lincoln's Melancholy I thought, Oh, shit, now I get the shape of this. But I had wasted years, literally years, writing and re-writing the first third to first half. The old writer's rule applies: Have the courage to write badly. — Joshua Wolf Shenk

It is essential to institute a legal framework that would ensure justice and improve the quality of life in Burma immediately, because the greatest suffering among the people at the moment is caused by lack of justice and lack of the rule of law. — Aung San Suu Kyi

to follow one's instincts with due regard to the policeman round the corner, had not acted very well there: it was because Cronshaw had done this that he had made such a lamentable failure of existence. It seemed that the instincts could not be trusted. Philip was puzzled, and he asked himself what rule of life was there, if that one was useless, and why people acted in one way rather than in another. They acted according to their emotions, but their emotions might be good or bad; it seemed just a chance whether they led to triumph or disaster. Life seemed an inextricable confusion. Men hurried hither and thither, urged by forces they knew not; and the purpose of it all escaped them; they seemed to hurry just for hurrying's sake. — William Somerset Maugham

Every time, it's the same thing, I feel like crying, my throat goes all tight and I do the best I can to control myself but sometimes it gets close: I can hardly keep myself from sobbing. So when they sing a canon I look down at the ground because it's just too much emotion at once: it's too beautiful, and everyone singing together, this marvelous sharing. I'm no longer myself. I am just one part of a sublime whole, to which the others also belong, and I always wonder at such moments why this cannot be the rule of everyday life, instead of being an exceptional moment, during a choir. — Muriel Barbery

... there is no quicker way of growing old than undue indulgence in regular habits. Indeed it seems probable that the reason why so many people die sooner than they should is because they have organised their lives in such a way that there is nothing left for them to do. Change, as is well-known, is not only a law of Nature, but the very breath of existence. And if you rule change out of your life there no longer seems any reason why you should continue altogether. — Franklin Lushington

No matter how much the original Rule of St. Francis has changed, I think his spirit and his inspiration are still the fundamental thing in Franciscan life. And it is an inspiration rooted in joy, because it is guided by the prudence and wisdom which are revealed only to the little ones - the glad wisdom of those who have had the grace and the madness to throw away everything in one uncompromising rush, and to walk around barefooted in the simple confidence that if they get into trouble, God will come and get them out of it again. — Thomas Merton

For how can some idea of God come into your mind without your immediately thinking (since you are His creation) that by the right of creation you are subject to His rule? That your life ought to be devoted to His service? That all that you plan or say or do should be related to Him? If this is so, it clearly follows that your life is wickedly corrupt unless it is ruled in obedience to His holy will. — John Calvin

Only a handful of Germans in the Reich had the slightest conception of the eternal and merciless struggle for the German language, German schools, and a German way of life. Only today, when the same deplorable misery is forced on many millions of Germans from the Reich, who under foreign rule dream of their common fatherland and strive, amid their longing, at least to preserve their holy right to their mother tongue, do wider circles understand what it means to be forced to fight for one's nationality. — Adolf Hitler

There will surely always be people with straight hair and blue eyes, as there have been for all history. But some of these straight-haired people with blue eyes have been "black," and this points to the great difference between their world and ours. We did not choose our fences. They were imposed on us by Virginia planters obsessed with enslaving as many Americans as possible. They are the ones who came up with a one-drop rule that separated the "white" from the "black," even if it meant that their own blue-eyed sons would live under the lash. The result is a people, black people, who embody all physical varieties and whose life stories mirror this physical range. — Ta-Nehisi Coates

A basic rule of life for reporters is that you should spend your time talking with and learning about people who are not sending you press releases, rather than those who are. — James Fallows

Step back in time; look closely at the child in the very arms of his mother; see the external world reflected for the first time in the yet unclear mirror of his understanding; study the first examples which strike his eyes; listen to the first words which arouse within him the slumbering power of thought; watch the first struggles which he has to undergo; only then will you comprehend the source of his prejudices, the habits, and the passions which are to rule his life. The entire man, so to speak, comes fully formed in the wrappings of his cradle. — Alexis De Tocqueville

There is no list of rules. There is one rule. The rule is: there are no rules. Happiness comes from living as you need to, as you want to. As your inner voice tells you to. Happiness comes from being who you actually are instead of who you think you are supposed to be. Being traditional is not traditional anymore. It's funny that we still think of it that way. Normalize your lives, people. You don't want a baby? Don't have one. I don't want to get married? I won't. You want to live alone? Enjoy it. You want to love someone? Love someone. Don't apologize. Don't explain. Don't ever feel less than. When you feel the need to apologize or explain who you are, it means the voice in your head is telling you the wrong story. Wipe the slate clean. And rewrite it. No fairy tales. Be your own narrator. And go for a happy ending. One foot in front of the other. You will make it. — Shonda Rhimes

What senseless violence does is to prolong the lease of life of the British or foreign rule. — Mahatma Gandhi

It is time that we allow the Word of God, not the glamorized lies of Hollywood to become the cornerstone of our convictions, thoughts, and attitude. It is time we trade the emptiness of pop culture entertainment for the real-life adventure of a Christ-built existence. Only then will truth reign and rule in our lives. Only then will our lives make an eternal impact for His glory. — Leslie Ludy

I am about tribal feminine power. As a leader, I may stumble but my essence lives to the future
of my people, of my literature, of my art. And when a tribesman turn against its leader, that tribe will become two. It may faulter my course, but it will not stifle my ending. I rule only among my believers. — Kristie LeVangie

I should have known. I should have known from the beginning. I was raised in another world. A world where royal blood is not a license to rule, a world whose wizards do more than sneer from their high towers, a world where life is not so cheap, where justice does not come as a knife in the night, a world where we know that the texture of a race's skin shouldn't matter -
And yet for you, born in this world, to question what others took for granted; for you, without ever touching the Sword, to hear the scream that had to be stopped at all costs -
"I don't trust you either," Hirou whispered, "but I don't expect there's anyone better," and he closed his eyes until the end of the world. — Eliezer Yudkowsky