Unforeseen Quotes & Sayings

I have always attached great importance to the manner in which an experiment is set up and conducted ... the experiment should be set up to open as many windows as possible on the unforeseen. — Frederic Joliot-Curie

But that was what research and development were like. Full of semi-triumphs and perplexing unforeseen consequences like the whole violent hiccuping thing when conjuring up fire - or the propensity for fillings to fall out of bystanders' teeth when attempting to tease a rainstorm out of a cloud. — Jasper Fforde

Unspoken words between you and I,
Present in the eyes of knowing,
Lost in the realm of unforeseen beauty,
I am yours. — Truth Devour

Play enables us to rearrange our capacities and our very identity so that they can be used in unforeseen ways — Stephen Nachmanovitch

The word he used was not "wallowing," there being no animals on Anarres to make wallows; it was a compound, meaning literally "coating continually and thickly with excrement." The flexibility and precision of Pravic lent itself to the creation of vivid metaphors quite unforeseen by its inventors. — Ursula K. Le Guin

Unforeseen surprises are the rule in science, not the exception. Remember: Stuff happens. — Leonard Susskind

Properties of divine decrees Let us now consider some of the properties of the divine decrees. First, they are eternal. To suppose any of them to be made in time is to suppose that some new occasion has occurred; some unforeseen event or combination of circumstances has arisen, which has induced the Most High to form a new resolution. This would argue that the knowledge of the Deity is limited, and that He is growing wiser in the progress of time - which would be horrible blasphemy. — Arthur W. Pink

We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur. — Dan Quayle

Sometimes a spontaneous action can have all kinds of unforeseen consequences. — Leslie Hachtel

In so many ways, his family's life feels like a string of accidents, unforeseen, unintended, one incident begetting another. — Jhumpa Lahiri

Of the many unforeseen consequences of typography, the emergence of nationalism is, perhaps, the most familiar — Marshall McLuhan

The arrival of the unforeseen reveals the depths of one's heart. — Wm. Paul Young

Collaborations are the black holes of knowledge regimes. They willingly produce nothingness, opulence and ill behavior. And it is their very vacuity that is their strength ... It does not entail the transmission of something from those who have to those who do not, but rather the setting in motion of a chain of unforeseen accesses. — Florian Schneider

One-dimensional opinions can create enormous errors in our thoughts, behaviors, and actions. These errors can have unforeseen consequences in our lives and the lives of organizations, communities, and nations. — Debasish Mridha

To get up in the morning, wash and then wait for some unforeseen variety of dread or depression.
I would give the whole universe and all of Shakespeare for a grain of ataraxy. — Emil Cioran

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe's couplets:
Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it! — William Hutchison Murray

Most people believe they have a clear idea of what's right and wrong. Many say they know how they'll act, or how they'll handle an extreme situation. But to be honest, no one knows. Not really. Even if you say, 'I'll never do this or that.' it actually might not be true. Because no one of us truly knows what we'll do when the circumstances become so overwhelming and complex that we can't even tell right from wrong. And then there are the totally unforeseen situations, when life deals cards you never expected, or when something's that's considered wrong morphs into something right and your mind determines that what once was the rule is not written in stone. — Lurlene McDaniel

He had not yet lived long enough to have discovered that nothing is more close at hand then the impossible, and that what must be looked for is always the unforeseen. — Victor Hugo

When you read the account of a murder - or, say, a fiction story based on murder - you usually begin with the murder itself. That's all wrong. The murder begins a long time beforehand. A murder is the culmination of a lot of different circumstances, all converging at a given moment at a given point. People are brought into it from different parts of the globe and for unforeseen reasons. [ ... ] The murder itself is the end of the story. It's Zero Hour."
He paused.
"It's Zero Hour now. — Agatha Christie

Hostility to art is also hostility to the new, to the unforeseen. — Robert Bresson

Well, my lord," she started to answer, then was surprised to find herself tongue-tied. With Trestin watching, she was free to enjoy Roman's company without worry she might lose her head, and that presented something of an unforeseen problem. What did one say to a rake? "I've come to London - "
A flaxen brow rose. He slid a glance at her. "You've come to London? Why, I must be deep in your confidence to have merited so intimate a revelation as that. Pray, what other secrets can you share? Are you by chance out of doors? Is it Tuesday? — Emma Locke

A wise woman never yields by appointment. It should always be an unforeseen happiness. — Stendhal

We can sometimes find a person again, but we cannot abolish time. And so on until the unforeseen day, gloomy as a winter night, when one no longer seeks that girl, or any other, when to find her would actually scare one. For one no longer feels that one has attractions enough to please, or strength enough to love. Not, of course, that one is in the strict sense of the word impotent. And as for loving, one would love more than ever. But one feels that it is too big an undertaking for the little strength one has left. — Marcel Proust

I was not so insane as to attempt to bend events to conform to my policies. On the contrary, I bent my policies to accord with the unforeseen shape of the events. — William Duggan

It is preposterous to suppose that the people of one generation can lay down the best and only rules of government for all who are to come after them, and under unforeseen contingencies. — Ulysses S. Grant

And as Lindbergh's election couldn't have made clearer to me, the unfolding of the unforeseen was everything. Turned wrong way round, the relentless unforeseen was what we schoolchildren studied as "History," harmless history, where everything unexpected in its own time is chronicled on the page as inevitable. The terror of the unforeseen is what the science of history hides, turning a disaster into an epic. — Philip Roth

Accident is simply unforeseen order. — Novalis

Considering the unforeseen events of this world, we should be taught that no human condition should inspire men with absolute despair. — Henry Fielding

Courage is the resolution to face the unforeseen. — Agatha Christie

Education is the point at which we decide whether we love the world enough to assume responsibility for it, and by the same token save it from that ruin which except for renewal, except for the coming of the new and the young, would be inevitable. And education, too, is where we decide whether we love our children enough not to expel them from our world and leave them to their own devices, nor to strike from their hands their chance of undertaking something new, something unforeseen by us, but to prepare them in advance for the task of renewing a common world. — Hannah Arendt

I began to trust the world again, not to give me what I wanted, for I saw that it could not be trusted to do that, but to give unforeseen goods and pleasures that I had not thought to want. — Wendell Berry

The efficacy of religion lies precisely in what is not rational, philosophic, nor eternal; its efficacy lies in the unforeseen, the miraculous, the extraordinary. Thus religion attracts more devotion according as it demands more faith - that is to say, as it becomes more incredible to the profane mind. — Henri Frederic Amiel

A discovery is generally an unforeseen relation not included in theory. — Claude Bernard

As to moral courage, I have very rarely met with the two o'clock in the morning kind. I mean unprepared courage, that which is necessary on an unexpected occasion, and which, in spite of the most unforeseen events, leaves full freedom of judgement and decision. — Napoleon Bonaparte

Triumphs against the natural order of living exact unforeseen payments. At the same time that man attempts to straighten a crooked nature, he is striving to annihilate space, which seems but another phase of the war against substance. We ignore the fact that space and matter are shock absorbers; the more we diminish them the more we reduce our privacy and security. — Richard M. Weaver

A short story relies on those values that make poetry and jazz what they are: tension, rhythms, inner beat, into unforeseen within foreseen parameters — Julio Cortazar

She didn't get angry with anyone, because that would mean having to react, having to do battle with the enemy and then having to face unforeseen consequences, such as vengeance. — Paulo Coelho

Without a revolution of the inner life, however slow, all our big designs are worthless. The work we have to do is with ourselves if we're ever going to be at peace with each other ... the good that flows from it will shape our societies in an unprogrammed, unforeseen way, under the control of no single group of people or set of ideas. — Ian McEwan

A vast number of people bemoan the lack of love in their lives and one must wonder if it's because they're looking for a "type" or have a list of requirements that someone else has to meet first, in which case it's no wonder that they miss out, because when you love, it's not that all that you were looking for is found in another, it's that the person you love ends up making you see they are what you wanted all along; love, after all, is usually found in unforeseen places with the most unexpected people. — Donna Lynn Hope

I'm not used to girls, or familiar with their customs. I feel awkward around them, I don't know what to say. I know the unspoken rules of boys, but with girls I sense that I am always on the verge of some unforeseen, calamitous blunder. — Margaret Atwood

Home purchases that are very highly leveraged or unaffordable subject the borrower and lender to a great deal of risk. Moreover, even in a strong economy, unforeseen life events and risks in local real estate markets make highly leveraged borrowers vulnerable. — Ben Bernanke

Whoever cannot seek the unforeseen sees nothing for the known way is an impasse. — Heraclitus

I am the creature you have not seen. I am you. I am me. The echo unforeseen. Sometimes in front, sometimes behind, A constant companion, for we are entwined. — John Tiffany

Increasingly she's finding it harder to tell the 'real' NYC from translations like Zigotisopolis ... as if she keeps getting caught in a vortex taking her farther back in time into the virtual world. Certainly unforeseen in the original business plan, there arises now a possibility that DeepArcher is about to overflow out into the perilous gulf between screen and face. — Thomas Pynchon

Life includes unforeseen incidents that prove critical to promote personal growth. Life rarely gives us what we want. We are lucky if life gives us what we need in order to fulfill the path that was in place at our birthing. — Kilroy J. Oldster

No matter what she was doing-baking cookies, walking around the lake on a beautiful day, making love to her husband-she felt rushed and jittery, as if the last few grains of sand were at that very moment sliding through the narrow waist of an hourglass. Any unforeseen occurrence-road construction, an inexperienced cashier, a missing set of keys-could plunge her into a mood of frantic despair that could poison an entire day. — Tom Perrotta

The more the climate is forced to change, the more likely it is to hit some unforeseen threshold that can trigger quite fast, surprising and perhaps unpleasant changes. — Richard Alley

The truths of life are not discovered by us. At moments unforeseen, some gracious influence descends upon the soul, touching it to an emotion which, we know not how, the mind transmutes into thought. — George Gissing

We are not, of course, optimistic about our chances of success. Some form of ecocatastrophe, if not thermonuclear war, seems almost certain to overtake us before the end of the century. (The inability to forecast exactly which one - whether plague, famine, the poisoning of the oceans, drastic climatic change, or some disaster entirely unforeseen - is hardly grounds for complacency.) — John Holdren

There is a second way in which God has "made foolish the wisdom of the world." Granted that through God's wise providence the world has not known him, God determined that some men and women would come to know him - but through a means utterly unexpected and unforeseen by the "wise" people of the world. "God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe" (1:21). We — D. A. Carson

Life is not fair. The moment one believes in total bliss, it gets shredded by circumstance and unforeseen accidents — Audrey Carlan

To be strong in the Force is one thing. But to believe oneself to be all-powerful is to invite catastrophe. Remember, that even in the ethereal realm we inhabit, the unforeseen can occur. — James Luceno

Nothing is more imminent than the impossible ... what we must always foresee is the unforeseen. — Victor Hugo

We can never go back again, that much is certain. The past is still close to us. The things we have tried to forget and put behind us would stir again, and that sense of fear, of furtive unrest, struggling at length to blind unreasoning panic - now mercifully stilled, thank God - might in some manner unforeseen become a living companion as it had before. — Daphne Du Maurier

Technology always has unforeseen consequences, and it is not always clear, at the beginning, who or what will win, and who or what will lose ... — Neil Postman

She never came back after mid-term break; according to the Automator, 'unforeseen circumstances' had forced her to extend her holiday. Every day Howard sees her classes trooping despondently from the Geography Room to the study hall, or carrying votive bundles of cardboard and paper to the recycling bins, their faces anxious, hopeful, like Indians doing a rain dance. He knows how they feel. Since mid-term he's existed in a constant state of tension, braced against every moment as the one that might finally restore her. Even out of school, even on his own, shopping in the supermarket, sitting at the traffic lights, he finds himself holding his breath. But the days are a series of ghost pregnancies, delivering nothing. — Paul Murray

Even if it cannot be
proven that a fetus is an actual living human person, there is no doubt that it is a potential living human person. In other words, a fetus is a developing person. It is not in a frozen state of potentiality. The fetus is in dynamic process-without interference or unforeseen calamity, it surely will become a fully actualized living human person. — R.C. Sproul

The moment you commit and quit holding back, all sorts of unforeseen incidents, meetings, and material assistance will rise up to help you. The simple act of commitment is a powerful magnet for help. — Napoleon Hill

Instead of worrying over unforeseen misfortune, set out with all your soul to rejoice in the unforeseen blessings of all your coming days. — Orison Swett Marden

If there was one thing a competent fighting force did not need, Hux knew, it was unforeseen outbursts of individuality. — Alan Dean Foster

Always try to associate yourself closely with and learn as much as you can from those who know more than you, who do better than you, who see more clearly than you. Apart from the rewards of friendship, the association might pay off at some unforeseen time - that is only an accidental byproduct. The important thing is that the learning will make you a better person. — Dwight D. Eisenhower

The boldness of asking deep questions may require unforeseen flexibility if we are to accept the answers. — Brian Greene

To be clear, geoengineering won't solve global warming. It's not a 'techno-fix.' It would be enormously risky and almost certainly lead to troubling unforeseen consequences. — Jamais Cascio

The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing, in so far as it stands ready against the accidental and the unforeseen, and is not apt to fall. — Marcus Aurelius

It was old President Diaz who said that nothing ever happens in Mexico until it happens. Things rock along from day to day, and then all at once you are caught up in a rush of unforeseen events. — Charles Portis

Let hopes and sorrows, fears and angers be, And think each day that dawns the last you'll see; For so the hour that greets you unforeseen Will bring with it enjoyment twice as keen. — Horace

But there was never any knowing or any certitude; the time to come always had more than one possible direction. One could not even give up hope. The wind would blow, the sand would settle, and in some as yet unforeseen manner time would bring about a change which could only be terrifying, since it would not be a continuation of the present. — Paul Bowles

My sudden, unforeseen capitulation had knocked me backward, and I had nothing to hold on to. My internal weather was eerily calm, as if in a tornado's aftermath, birdsong, sunshine, supersaturated colors, wreckage all around, and myself, dazed and limping. — Kate Christensen

A trend is a trend is a trend. But the question is, will it bend? Will it alter its course through some unforeseen force and come to a premature end? — Alexander Cairncross

Act boldly and unforeseen forces will come to your aid. — Dorothea Brande

In the end, it all comes down to how you cope with the unforeseen. — Jeffrey Archer

THE MAGIC OF MAKING A START Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation) there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would not otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance which no man would have dreamed would come his way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe's couplets: Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, magic, and power in it. Begin it now. — Steven Pressfield

Sitting here, and thus, she had attained to a state which she could never have desired, not even conceived. And being so unforeseen, so alien to her character and upbringing, her felicity had an absolute perfection; no comparison between the desired and the actual could tear holes in it, no ambition whisper, But this is not quite what you wanted, is it? — Sylvia Townsend Warner

The human mind is a lucky little local, passing accident which was totally unforeseen, and condemned to disappear with this earth and to recommence perhaps here or elsewhere the same or different with fresh combinations of eternally new beginnings. We owe it to this little lapse of intelligence on His part that we are very uncomfortable in this world which was not made for us, which had not been prepared to receive us, to lodge and feed us or to satisfy reflecting beings, and we owe it to Him also that we have to struggle without ceasing against what are still called the designs of Providence, when we are really refined and civilized beings. — Guy De Maupassant

The truth is that people never realize their lives are about to change in unforeseen ways
that's just the nature of unforeseen ways. — Will Schwalbe

Creation exists only in the unforeseen made necessary. — Pierre Boulez

If the demand for self-knowledge is willed by fate and is refused, this negative attitude may end in real death. The demand would not have come to this person had he still been able to strike out on some promising by-path. But he is caught in a blind alley from which only self-knowledge can extricate him. If he refuses this then no other way is left open to him. Usually he is not conscious of his situation, either, and the more unconscious he is the more he is at the mercy of unforeseen dangers: he cannot get out of the way of a car quickly enough, in climbing a mountain he misses his foothold somewhere, out skiing he thinks he can negotiate a tricky slope, and in an illness he suddenly loses the courage to live. The unconscious has a thousand ways of snuffing out a meaningless existence with surprising swiftness. — C. G. Jung

The superior person gathers his weapons together in order to provide against the unforeseen. — Confucius

If the mind is to emerge unscathed from this relentless struggle with the unforeseen, two qualities are indispensable: first, an intellect that, even in the darkest hour, retains some glimmerings of the inner light which leads to truth; and second, the courage to follow this faint light wherever it may lead. — Carl Von Clausewitz

Americans, more than most people, believe that history is the result of individual decisions to implement conscious intentions. For Americans, more than most people, history has been that ... This sense of openness, of possibility and autonomy, has been a national asset as precious as the topsoil of the Middle West. But like topsoil, it is subject to erosion; it requires tending. And it is not bad for Americans to come to terms with the fact that for them too, history is a story of inertia and the unforeseen. — George Will

Don't you know by now?" Thomas said, touching his lips to my hair. "It's somewhere in the unforeseen when the best, most important moments of our lives seem to happen. — Jamie McGuire

Mercy is God's loving response to sinners; and mercy is our loving response to others - and to ourselves - in circumstances of need. To this I would add that mercy, as an experience of love, has an unexpected quality - something unforeseen or unanticipated. We talk about mercy when we feel or offer forgiveness, when we find or give help and assistance, but we also speak about "mercy" when we are surprised by good deeds that catch us unawares and transform our lives for the better. — Mathew N. Schmalz

The unforeseen, that strange, haughty power which plays with man, had seized Gauvain and held him fast. — Victor Hugo

Astronomy may be revolutionized more than any other field of science by observations from above the atmosphere. Study of the planets, the Sun, the stars, and the rarified matter in space should all be profoundly influenced by measurements from balloons, rockets, probes and satellites ... In a new adventure of discovery no one can foretell what will be found, and it is probably safe to predict that the most important new discovery that will be made with flying telescopes will be quite unexpected and unforeseen. (1961) — Lyman Spitzer

The popularity of disaster movies expresses a collective perception of a world threatened by irresistible and unforeseen forces which nevertheless are thwarted at the last moment. Their thinly veiled symbolic meaning might be translated thus: We are innocent of wrongdoing. We are attacked by unforeseeable forces come to harm us. We are, thus, innocent even of negligence. Though those forces are insuperable, chance will come to our aid and we shall emerge victorious. — David Mamet

Life is full of uncertainties, perhanps one day some unforeseen circumstance would bring her into his life once more — Murasaki Shikibu

Depreciation of money can benefit debtors only when it is unforeseen. If inflationary measures and a reduction of the value of money are expected, then those who lend money will demand higher interest in order to compensate their probable loss of capital, and those who seek loans will be prepared to pay the higher interest because they have a prospect of gaining on capital account. — Ludwig Von Mises

True economy consists in always making the income exceed the out-go. Wear the old clothes a little longer if necessary; dispense with the new pair of gloves; mend the old dress: live on plainer food if need be; so that, under all circumstances, unless some unforeseen accident occurs, there will be a margin in favor of the income. — P.T. Barnum

I began to realize that life, despite moments of happiness and joy, is really about discovering priorities and dealing with unforeseen vagaries, differences, obstacles, inconveniences, and imperfections. — Maureen McCormick

Let's Talk is a practical guide that will greatly help young
adults at the workplace to navigate through unforeseen and
vulnerable social situations. Harsh Goenka — Mukta Mahajani

You did what you should have done. Accept that sometimes the consequences are harsh and unforeseen. Accept that you cannot always allow for every result. There is nothing wrong in this. — Terry Brooks

Nothing ever happens in Mexico until it happens. — Porfirio Diaz

Adventure, my dear, is as much a state of mind as anything else. One can travel the world and never find the excitement to be found within arm's reach.
Remain true to yourself, but understand happiness may not always be found in the plans we have laid out for ourselves, but rather in the unforeseen turns life takes us. Do not close your mind, or your heart, to the unexpected twists of life. It is those unexpected paths that could well lead to the greatest adventures of all. — Victoria Alexander

Students engaged in direct experience with materials, unforeseen obstacles, and serendipitous discoveries may result in understanding never anticipated by the teacher. — Sylvia Libow Martinez

Nothing is lost upon a man who is bent upon growth; nothing wasted on one who is always preparing for - life by keeping eyes, mind and heart open to nature, men, books, experience - and what he gathers serves him at unexpected moments in unforeseen ways. — Hamilton Wright Mabie

Every entrepreneur faces trade-offs when founding and growing their company. As we discovered at YouTube, those early decisions have far-reaching impacts and lead to unforeseen pitfalls down the road. Noam Wasserman uses vivid anecdotes and deep research to expertly outline the key early choices that define a startup, making The Founder's Dilemmas an invaluable alternative to real-world trial and error. — Chad Hurley

A common civility to an impertinent fellow, often draws upon one a great many unforeseen troubles; and if one doth not take particular care, will be interpreted by him as an overture of friendship and intimacy. — Joseph Addison

Human ability is an unequal match for the violent and unforeseen vicissitudes of the world. — Hugh Blair

The moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves as well. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen accidents, meetings and material assistance that no one could have dreamed would come their way. Whatever you can do or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now. - Goethe, by attribution — Gregory Maguire

The unforeseen is the most beautiful gift life can give us. That is what we must think of multiplying in our domain. That is what should have been talked about in this assembly, and no one has said a word about it ... Art is inconceivable without risk, without inner sacrifice; freedom and boldness of imagination can be won only in the process of work, and it is there the unforeseen I spoke of a moment ago must intervene, and there no directives can help. — Boris Pasternak