Stand Upright Quotes & Sayings

I think penguins are the most human of all the birds, which may be why people love them. They're cute, they stand upright and they look like they're wearing tuxedos. — Shia Labeouf

The Jewel
There is this cave
In the air behind my body
That nobody is going to touch:
A cloister, a silence
Closing around a blossom of fire.
When I stand upright in the wind,
My bones turn to dark emeralds. — James Wright

Of the three women in Subhash's life - his mother, Gauri, Bela - there remained only one. His mother's mind was now a wilderness. There was no shape to it any longer, no clearing. It had been overtaken, overgrown. She'd been converted permanently by Udayan's death. That wilderness was her only freedom. She was locked inside her home, taken out once each day. Deepa would prevent her from endangering herself, from embarrassing herself, from making further scenes. But Gauri's mind had saved her. It had enabled her to stand upright. It had cleared a path for her. It had prepared her to walk away. — Jhumpa Lahiri

They have so fundamentally flawed techniques it's ridiculous. They shoot the ball flat. They all stand upright, there's just so many things they do incorrectly. — Rick Barry

Moral Education is the source of that spiritual equilibrium on which everything else depends and which may be compared to that physical equilibrium or sense of balance, without which it is impossible to stand upright or to move into any other position. — Maria Montessori

All sanity depends on this: that it should be a delight to feel heat strike the skin, a delight to stand upright, knowing the bones moving easily under the flesh. — Doris Lessing

Emily and Fanny are doing their best to remain poker-stiff, firmly staring in their upright palanquins. But two hours on an elephant is as much as either of them can stand, and - after four times as long as that - they pine, they simply ache for the opportunity to complain, even more than the chance to rest. — Philip Hensher

When the retching stopped, he assisted her to stand upright and backed her into the car — Sandra Brown

Such men knew their worth, but did not flaunt it. Such men could look anybody in the eye without flinching; even a poor man, a man with nothing, could stand upright in the presence of those who had wealth or power. People did not know, Mma Ramotswe felt, just how much we had in those days - those days when we seemed to have so little, we had so much. She — Alexander McCall Smith

The fossil record is always there, whether or not you discover it. The brittle ghosts of the past. Memory is not like the surface of the water - either troubled or still. Memory is layered. What you were was another life, but the evidence is somewhere in your rock - your trilobites and ammonites, your struggling life-forms, just when you thought you could stand upright. — Jeanette Winterson

Belize, with the help of God and the support of its people, will stand upright and will do its duty and help bring peace, stability and prosperity to our region and to wider circles of our planet Earth. — George Cadle Price

It is impossible to stand upright when one plants his roots in the shifting sands of popular opinion and approval. Needed is the courage of a Daniel, an Abinadi, a Moroni, or a Joseph Smith in order for us to hold strong and fast to that which we know is right. They had the courage to do not that which was easy but that which was right.
We will all face fear, experience ridicule, and meet opposition. Let us
all of us
have the courage to defy the consensus, the courage to stand for principle. Courage, not compromise, brings the smile of God's approval. Courage becomes a living and an attractive virtue when it is regarded not only as a willingness to die manfully but also as the determination to live decently. As we move forward, striving to live as we should, we will surely receive help from the Lord and can find comfort in His words — Thomas S. Monson

If you cannot stand a spoon upright in the cup, then the coffee is too weak. — Lawrence Block

Language is incarnate. It's the way our bodies evolved - to stand upright, to walk - that enables us to speak at all. And it's our senses that give us reasons to talk. We want to verify with others what we seem to perceive. It's also our bodies that give our words urgency: the tiny ticking clocks in each of our cells. Words, then, are born of worlds. But they also take us places we can't go: Constantinople and Mars, Valhalla, the Planet of the Apes. Language comes from what we've seen, touched, loved, lost. And it uses knowable things to give us glimpses of what's not. The Word, after all, is God. Some — Alena Graedon

May you grow up to be righteous, may you grow up to be true. May you always know the truth and see the lights surrounding you. May you always be courageous, stand upright and be strong. May you stay forever young. — Bob Dylan

Tis hard for an empty bag to stand upright. — Benjamin Franklin

A 21st century poet is a woman who can speak her mind and stand upright like a mountain with her convictions, but can adapt like water in an ever changing season without losing her genuine elements. — Roseville Nidea

Superman tends to stand very upright, and he's very symmetrical, and those are actually the most difficult poses for me to draw. — Jim Lee

Stand upright, speak thy thoughts, declare The truth thou hast, that all may share; Be bold, proclaim it everywhere: They only live who dare. — Voltaire

Reelfoot is, and has always been, a lake of mystery.
In places it is bottomless. Other places the skeletons of the cypress-trees that went down when the earth sank, still stand upright so that if the sun shines from the right quarter, and the water is less muddy than common, a man, peering face downward into its depths, sees, or thinks he sees, down below him the bare top-limbs upstretching like drowned men's fingers, all coated with the mud of years and bandaged with pennons of the green lake slime. — Irvin S. Cobb

True marriage enabled the two partners to stand upright as properly formed human beings. Through the union, each partner acquired his missing leg. For anyone who had the experience of using two legs, life wasn't worth living if one had to manage on a single one. — Vincent Eri

The greatest victory for man is not that his dreams were fulfilled but it is that to stand upright even when none of his dreams were fulfilled! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

Standing upright is not a talent because a brainless wooden beam can stand upright too! The important thing is to be flexible! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

Everything we feel and do is somehow oriented "lifeward," and the least deviation away from this direction toward something beyond is difficult or alarming. This is true even of the simple act of walking: one lifts one's center of gravity, pushes it forward, and lets it drop again - and the slightest change, the merest hint of shrinking from this letting-oneself-drop-into-the-future, or even stopping to wonder at it - and one can no longer stand upright! — Robert Musil

For we always seem to ourselves righteous and upright and wise and holy - this pride is innate in all of us - unless by clear proofs we stand convinced of our own unrighteousness, foulness, folly, and impurity. — John Calvin

following morning with her age-addled body so stiff she was barely able to stand upright without assistance? No, Edie needed taking care of, someone to watch over her. 'Oooh, good for you!' Nancy said, sounding — Alexandra Brown

The tombstone is about the only thing that can stand upright and lie on its face at the same time. — Mary Wilson Little

In the golden tent of early morning when the sky has turned its back when the sky has turned its back and isn't listening when the scallops stand upright on their hinges ... — Andre Alexis

Sometimes I would hold it in for days so that I could have a really big one and also because it felt good in itself. When I really did have to shit, so much that I could barely stand upright but had to bend forward, I had such a fantastic feeling in my body if I didn't let nature take its course, if I squeezed the muscles in my butt together as hard as I could and, as it were, forced the shit back to where it came from. But this was a dangerous game, because if you did it too many times the turd ultimately grew so big it was impossible to shit it out. Oh Christ, how it hurt when such an enormous turd had to come out! It was truly unbearable, I was convulsed with pain, it was as if my body were exploding with pain, AAAAAAGGGHHH!! I screamed, OOOOOHHH, and then, just as it was at its very worst, suddenly it was out.
Oh, how good that was! — Karl Ove Knausgard

It is a strange pressure to be across from a man who wants something that you don't want to give. It's like standing in a forceful current, which at first you think is not too strong, but the longer you stand, the more tired you become, the harder it is to stay upright. — Stephanie Danler

40. My adepts stand upright; their head above the heavens, their feet below the hells.
41. But since one is naturally attracted to the Angel, another to the Demon, let the first strengthen the lower link, the last attach more firmly to the higher. — Aleister Crowley

WILLIAM ROPER: So now you'd give the Devil benefit of law!
THOMAS MORE: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
ROPER: I'd cut down every law in England to do that!
MORE: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you -where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast -man's laws, not God's -and if you cut them down- and you're just the man to do it -d'you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil the benefit of the law, for my own safety's sake. — Robert Bolt

I ask no favors for my sex, I surrender not our claim to equality. All I ask of our brethren is that they will take their feet from off our necks, and permit us to stand upright on the ground which God has designed us to occupy. — Sarah Moore Grimke

If you want to see how far we have not come from the cave and the woods, from the lonely and dangerous days of the prarie or the plain, witness the reaction of a modern suburban family, nearly ready for bed, when the doorbell rings or the door is rattled. They will stop where they stand, or sit bolt upright in their beds, as if a streak of pure lightning has passed through the house. Eyes wide, voices fearful, they will whisper to each other, "There's someone at the door," in a way that might make you believe they have always feared and anticipated this moment - that they have spent their lives being stalked. — Alice McDermott

Without boat or a light, what could he do to save Annie if she should, by whatever miracle it might be, answer him? And he damns himself, with a willingness that startles him, for turning the boat loose, for having taken no precaution to keep the matches dry. Taking the matches out of his pocket, he finds that the heads are either already gone, or they crumble as soon as he touches them to see if they are there. But he continues to take the dead sticks out of his pocket one at a time and to stand them upright inside the sweatband of his hat. It is though his mind, which like his body has begun to work apart from his will, is gambling that absurdity will be more bearable than reasonableness. — Wendell Berry

it is hard for an empty sack to stand upright — Benjamin Franklin

Just as a stool requires three legs to stand upright so the taekwondoist must cultivate basic skills, meaningful forms, and effective sparring in order to have both feet firmly planted in the art — Doug Cook

Like tired dogs they stand there,
because they use up all their strength
in remaining upright in one's memory. — Franz Kafka

He picked up three long fresh stalks of timothy and braided them together. He upended the scythe and thrust the handle deep enough into the soft earth so it would stand upright. He tied the braided grass to one of the grips and slipped the whetstone into the loops so it would stay. Then he walked off into the woods. — Theodore Sturgeon

Tragedies of this world behave like the storms of the vast oceans! While you are inside this storm, let your mind stand upright like a lighthouse! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

Think of the actual physical elements that compose our bodies: we are 98 percent hydrogen and oxygen and carbon.
That's table sugar.
You are made of the same stuff as table sugar.
Just a couple of tiny differences here and there and look what happened to the sugar: it can stand upright and send tweets. — Augusten Burroughs

I had grown up. I had learned that being a woman was knowing when to stand firm and when to compromise. I had learned to laugh and weep; I had learned that I was weak as well as strong. I had learned to love. I was no longer a rigid, upright tree that would not flex and bow, even though the gale threatened to snap it in two; I was the willow that bends and shivers and sways, and yet remains strong. — Juliet Marillier

We shall not lie on our backs at the Red Castle and watch the vultures wheeling over the valley where they killed the grandson of Genghiz. We will not read Babur's memoirs in his garden at Istalif and see the blind man smelling his way around the rose bushes. Or sit in the Peace of Islam with the beggars of Gazar Gagh. We will not stand on the Buddha's head at Bamiyan, upright in his niche like a whale in a dry-dock. We will not sleep in the nomad tent, or scale the Minaret of Jam. And we shall lose the tastes - the hot, coarse, bitter bread; the green tea flavoured with cardamoms; the grapes we cooled in the snow-melt; and the nuts and dried mulberries we munched for altitude sickness. Nor shall we get back the smell of the beanfields, the sweet, resinous smell of deodar wood burning, or the whiff of a snow leopard at 14,000 feet. — Bruce Chatwin

In insurance, as elsewhere, the reaction of weak managements to weak operations is often weak accounting. ("It's difficult for an empty sack to stand upright.") — Warren Buffett

The craft, trade, agriculture, science, a large part of the art - all this can only stand on a broad base , on a consolidated, strong and healthy mediocrity. Served in their services and the science of their work - and even the arts. We cannot wish for better: it belongs to such an average sort of person - it is under displace exceptions - it has nothing aristocratic about something and still les in their anarchic instincts - The power of the center is then held upright by the trade, especially the money market: the instinct of great financiers goes against all extremes, - the Jews are the reason for the time being conserve power in our so insecure and threatened Europe. — Friedrich Nietzsche

It is a most blessed thing to have no props and no buttresses, but to stand upright on the Rock of Ages, upheld by the Lord alone. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Do you think integrity is the monopoly of the artist? And what, incidentally, do you think integrity is? The ability not to pick a watch out of your neighbor's pocket? No, it's not as easy as that. If that were all, I'd say ninety-five percent of humanity were honest, upright men. Only, as you can see, they aren't. Integrity is the ability to stand by an idea. That presupposes the ability to think. Thinking is something one doesn't borrow or pawn. — Ayn Rand

Blessed is he who understandeth what it is to love Jesus, and to despise himself for Jesus' sake. He must give up all that he loveth for his Beloved, for Jesus will be loved alone above all things. The love of created things is deceiving and unstable, but the love of Jesus is faithful and lasting. He who cleaveth to created things will fall with their slipperiness; but he who embraceth Jesus will stand upright for ever. Love Him and hold Him for thy friend, for He will not forsake thee when all depart from thee, nor will he suffer thee to perish at the last. — Thomas A Kempis

It's a beautiful, distinctive art, and shoes are like the foundations. If the foundations aren't right, the building won't stand upright, and if a woman's balance isn't right, nothing else is. — Jimmy Choo

No one expects the doormat to stand upright, shake itself off, and amble down the street to seek its own happiness. — Lynn Coady

First she said we were to keep clear of the Sirens, who sit and sing most beautifully in a field of flowers; but she said I might hear them myself so long as no one else did. Therefore, take me and bind me to the crosspiece half way up the mast; bind me as I stand upright, with a bond so fast that I cannot possibly break away, and lash the rope's ends to the mast itself. If I beg and pray you to set me free, then bind me more tightly still. — Homer

...I had always believed prayer ought to be conducted on our feet rather than on our knees, since God seems in all other departments of life to require us to stand upright and account for ourselves. — Charles Frazier

Thank you," Archer said again. She kept walking, listening for any sign of him moving to attack her back. "I knew you were a good woman," he said. Celaena halted. Turned. There was a hint of triumph in his eyes. He thought he'd won. Manipulated her again. One foot after another, she walked back toward him with predatory calmness. She stopped, close enough to kiss him. He gave her a wary smile. "No, I'm not," she said. Then she moved, too fast for him to stand a chance. Archer's eyes went wide as she slid the dagger home, jamming it up into his heart. He sagged in her arms. She brought her mouth to his ear, holding him upright with one hand and twisting the dagger with the other as she whispered, "But Nehemia was. — Sarah J. Maas

Here, my good man. Could you tell me whereabouts Horatio Street ... good heavens.
Thus called upon, he took courage; the sursum corda of an extravagant belch straightened him upright, and he answered,
Whfffck? Whether this was an approach to discussion he had devised himself, or a subtle adaptation of the Socratic method of questioning perfected in the local athenaeums which he attended until closing time, was not to be known; for the answer was,
Stand aside. — William Gaddis

Therefore, if we would listen to the voice of God15 with due reverence, the soul must stand upright, and not lean on the affections of sense for support. As the prophet Habakkuk says of himself, "I will stand upon my watch, and fix my step upon the munition, and I will behold to see what may be said to me."16 To stand upon the watch is to cast off all desires; to fix the step, is to cease from reflections of sense, that I may behold and understand what God will speak to me. Thus out of this night springs first the knowledge of one's self, and on that, as on a foundation, is built up the knowledge of God. "Let me know myself," says St. Augustine, "and I shall then know Thee, O my God," for, as the philosophers say, one extreme is known by another. — San Juan De La Cruz

PW spent time with Sigel in a New York recording studio shortly before he went away on his federal gun possession charge. He paged through a book of promotional photos of himself, one of which was shot shortly after 911. It featured him holding a copy of the Bible upright in one palm while the Koran rose from the other the Twin Towers. Some of the record company people, they wouldn't let me put this out, ... They said it would be too controversial. But this picture is saying 'Look, they can stand together. Don't have to be no fight.' — Beanie Sigel

But is it really possible to please the world!' says some doubting reader. It is indeed. Nay, it is not only very possible, but very easy. The ways are crooked, and sometimes foul and low. What then? A man need but crawl upon his hands and knees, know when to close his eyes and when his ears, when to stoop and when to stand upright; and if by the world is meant that atom of it in which he moves himself, he shall please it, never fear. — Charles Dickens

"Stand still" - keep the posture of an upright man, ready for action, expecting further orders, cheerfully and patiently awaiting the directing voice; and it will not be long ere God shall say to you, as distinctly as Moses said it to the people of Israel, "Go forward." — Charles Spurgeon

I listen to people talking sometimes, that great river that is language, with all its undercurrents of grammar and nuance, and I wonder how we all learn so quickly to speak it, given that we begin when we are barely old enough to stand upright. I have no memory of finding it hard. Indeed, I have no memory of it at all. — Sarah Dunant

It was a lovely summer weather in the country, and the golden corn, the green oats, and the haystacks piled up in the meadows looked beautiful. The stork walking about on his long red legs chattered in the Egyptian language, which he had learnt from his mother. The corn-fields and meadows were surrounded by large forests, in the midst of which were deep pools. It was, indeed, delightful to walk about in the country. In a sunny spot stood a pleasant old farm-house close by a deep river, and from the house down to the water side grew great burdock leaves, so high, that under the tallest of them a little child could stand upright. The spot was as wild as the centre of a thick wood. In — Hans Christian Andersen

We need to know who we are and then stand strong — Sunday Adelaja

When our earliest human ancestors left the trees and moved to the open grasslands of the savanna, they adopted an upright stance. Possessing already this powerful visual system, they could see far into the distance (giraffes and elephants might stand taller, but their eyes are on the sides, giving them instead panoramic vision). This allowed them to spot dangerous predators far away on the horizon and detect their movements even in twilight. Given a few seconds or minutes, they could plot a safe retreat. At the same time, if they focused on what was nearest at hand, they could identify all kinds of important details in their environment - footprints and signs of passing predators, or the colors and shapes of rocks that they could pick up and perhaps use as tools. — Robert Greene

Sit down before you hurt your owies."
"I am a Dark One!" he said, managing to stand upright at last, ignoring the pain and tearing feeling on his left side. "We do not have owies! We have grievous, nearly fatal injuries!"
"Pia," Cora said( ... ). "Would you please get Alec a chair before he does more damage to, or topples over from, his grievous, nearly fatal injuries? — Katie MacAlister

God looks on the upright, as has been said; and the upright shall gaze on Him ... That mutual gaze is blessedness. They who looking up behold Jehovah are brave to front all foes and to keep calm hearts in the midst of alarms. Hope burns like a pillar of fire in them when it is gone out in others; and to all the suggestions of their own timidity or of others they have the answer, In the Lord have I put my trust; how say ye to my soul, Flee? Here I stand; I can do no otherwise. God help me. Amen. — Alexander MacLaren

No wheelchair can support damaged self-esteem until it learns to stand upright. No cane can help emotions limp along until they can walk.
A cast or brace can't protect a vulnerable spirit, and not even the strongest painkiller can stop the ache cause by a failed relationship.
No, the only way a broken heart mends itself is with stitches of time and the sticky tape of hastily rearranged dreams. — Jay Bell

Thomas More: ... And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned around on you
where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast
man's laws, not God's
and if you cut them down ... d'you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake. — Robert Bolt

When she turned I could see her face was plain and outwardly unremarkable, yet possessing of a bearing that showed inner strength and resolve. I stared at her intently with a mixture of feelings. I had realised not long ago that I was no beauty, and even at the age of nine had seen how the more attractive children gained favour more easily. But here in that young woman I could see how those principles could be inverted. I felt myself stand more upright and clench my jaw in subconscious mimicry of her pose — Jasper Fforde

She feels a splash of water on her hand and, turning, sees that the sky has become overcast with a blanket of ominous dark rose-colored cloud, and of a sudden the light fades from the lawn and the cedars.

Steerpike, who is on his way back to the Earl's bedroom, stops a moment at a staircase window to see the first decent of the rain. It is falling from the sky in long, upright, and seemingly motionless lines of rosy silver that stand rigidly upon the ground as though there were a million harp strings strung vertically between the solids of earth and sky. — Mervyn Peake

Achilles too staggered a moment. He felt his soul change colour. Blood pooled at his feet, and though he continued to stand upright and triumphant in the sun, his spirit set off on its own downward path and approached the boarders of an unknown region. — David Malouf

When I started 70 odd years ago I was told that to be a success you've got to have talent, personality and luck. I've had 99.9 percent luck and the other miniscule percentage would be having had the luck to have a little bit of talent, being able to stand upright and that's it. It's all luc. — Roger Moore