Who Is That Quotes & Sayings

I'm not talking about the blood ecstasy. I'm talking about my being able to fill that emotion void she has. You know her as well as I do, maybe better. She aches with it. She needs to be accepted for who she is so badly. And I was able to do that. Do you know good that felt? To be able to show someone that, yes, you are someone worth sacrificing for? That you like them for their faults and that you respect them for their ability to rise above them? — Kim Harrison

Shooting in New York is the shiznit, if I may be so bold. It was great. New York is a character. People who live here know that. — Robin Williams

It is of the first order of importance to remember this, that the shaman is more than merely a sick man, or a madman; he is a sick man who has healed himself, who is cured, and who must shamanize in order to remain cured. — Terence McKenna

The number of interrogators who have been bamboozled since the dawn of history by the body language and appealing manner of pretty prisoners is, to be precise, 43,123,465; in the time it has taken to write this sentence, that number has increased by 314. — William R. Johnson

The Quantified Self movement argues that the self is nothing but mathematical patterns. These patterns are so complex that the human mind has no chance of understanding them. So if you wish to obey the old adage and know thyself, you should not waste your time on philosophy, meditation or psychoanalysis, but rather you should systematically collect biometric data and allow algorithms to analyse them for you and tell you who your are and what you should do. — Yuval Noah Harari

Prayer is that which conveys a message to God, who is either known or knowing, more or less by definition. Poetry is that which conveys a message to a stranger. — G.C. Waldrep III

Of all the things that are beyond my power, I value nothing more highly than to be allowed the honor of entering into bonds of friendship with people who sincerely love truth. For, of things beyond our power, I believe there is nothing in the world which we can love with tranquility except such men. — Baruch Spinoza

I believe that a lot of people in our society today, people who have been hurt and even people who haven't been hurt, get their worth and value from what they do, what they look like, what they own, what kind of job they have, what kind of house they live in, how much money they have, what social circles they're in, what level of education they have, especially even how other people respond to them. They feel better about themselves if everybody is giving a smiling nod to the way they look and all their choices. — Joyce Meyer

Science is more than a body of knowledge. It is a way of thinking; a way of skeptically interrogating the universe with a fine understanding of human fallibility.
If we are not able to ask skeptical questions, to interrogate those who tell us that something is true, to be skeptical of those in authority, then, we are up for grabs for the next charlatan (political or religious) who comes rambling along. — Carl Sagan

For it is the very commodities selected for maximum price-fixing that the regulators most want to keep in abundant supply. But when they limit the wages and the profits of those who make these commodities, without also limiting the wages and profits of those who make luxuries or semiluxuries, they discourage the production of the price-controlled necessities while they relatively stimulate the production of less essential goods. — Henry Hazlitt

Dictionopolis is the place where all the words in the world come from. They're grown right here in our orchards."
"I didn't know that words grew on trees," said Milo timidly.
"Where did you think they grew?" shouted the earl irritably. A small crowd began to gather to see the little boy who didn't know that letters grew on trees.
"I didn't know they grew at all," admitted Milo even more timidly. Several people shook their heads sadly.
"Well, money doesn't grow on trees, does it?" demanded the count.
"I've heard not," said Milo.
"Then something must. Why not words?" exclaimed the undersecretary triumphantly. The crowd cheered his display of logic and continued about its business. — Norton Juster

When they killed him, Mother wouldn't hold her peace, so they slit her throat. I was stupid then, being only nine, and I fought to save them both. But the thorns held me tight. I've learned to appreciate thorns since. The thorns taught me the game. They let me understand what all those grim and serious men who've fought the Hundred War have yet to learn. You can only win the game when you understand that it IS a game. Let a man play chess, and tell him that every pawn is his friend. Let him think both bishops holy. Let him remember happy days in the shadows of his castles. Let him love his queen. Watch him loose them all. — Mark Lawrence

An historian is a kind detective in search of the fact - remote or otherwise - that brings to a set of events apparently unconnected with each other, the link that unites them, their justification, their logic.

You cannot imagine what great delights this profession affords. It's as if, in every incunablum, consumed by worms and steeped in boredom, in every inarticulate scrawl, in every collection of forgotten chronicles, there presides a mischievous sprite, winking at you, who at the appropriate time confers on you your reward in the form of renewed wonder. — Jacques Yonnet

Did anybody ever come back from the dead any single one of the millions who got killed did any one of them ever come back and say by god i'm glad i'm dead because death is always better than dishonor? did they say i'm glad i died to make the world safe for democracy? did they say i like death better than losing liberty? did any of them ever say it's good to think i got my guts blown out for the honor of my country? did any of them ever say look at me i'm dead but i died for decency and that's better than being alive? did any of them ever say here i am i've been rotting for two years in a foreign grave but it's wonderful to die for your native land? did any of them say hurray i died for womanhood and i'm happy see how i sing even though my mouth is choked with worms? — Dalton Trumbo

As people get their opinions so largely from the newspapers they read, the corruption of the schools would not matter so much if the Press were free. But the Press is not free. As it costs at least a quarter of a million of money to establish a daily newspaper in London, the newspapers are owned by rich men. And they depend on the advertisements of other rich men. Editors and journalists who express opinions in print that are opposed to the interests of the rich are dismissed and replaced by subservient ones. — George Bernard Shaw

The crisis of democracy in the West is not the result of falling in love with another system. In Europe and America people who are disillusioned with democracy do not dream about the Chinese model or any other form of authoritarian rule. They do not dream about government that controls Internet and puts in prison those daring to disagree. — Ivan Krastev

Rejoice for those around you who transform into the Force. Mourn them, do not. Miss them, do not. Attachment leads to jealousy. The shadow of greed, that is. Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose — George Lucas

I mean, people who say that the Tea Party isn't a grassroots movement, I think, are incorrect. I think in some respects, it is a grassroots movement. — Matt Taibbi

Our world is fast succumbing to the activities of men and women who would stake the future of our species on beliefs that should not survive an elementary school education. — Sam Harris

He could be anywhere by now, so that is where I look for him. Anywhere...
There are times when I don't recognize this woman who plays with such self-possession. She is something that I have faked. She is William Tyne's daughter, I supposed; his idea of her. I put her forward when I am performing so that he will approach me. I strive to make her taller than she is, more graceful, less unsure. I don't think other people have to try so hard in their lives. Or do they? Are we all living like this? So close to this mesh of nerves?
So I played for my father another concerto, though he was never one for sitting still in a chair. He would make an exception for me, though, his firstborn. He would see the progress I have made. — Claire Kilroy

Sometimes people - especially people over 40 - underestimate what they really are capable of. They believe they're not capable of doing something great. I tell people who are over 40, "I don't want your best. I want better than that. I want better than what you perceive your best is." — Jack LaLanne

We Americans claim to be a peace-loving people. We hate bloodshed; we are opposed to violence. Yet we go into spasms of joy over the possibility of projecting dynamite bombs from flying machines upon helpless citizens. We are ready to hang, electrocute, or lynch anyone, who, from economic necessity, will risk his own life in the attempt upon that of some industrial magnate. Yet our hearts swell with pride at the thought that America is becoming the most powerful nation on earth, and that she will eventually plant her iron foot on the necks of all other nations.
Such is the logic of patriotism. — Emma Goldman

The proverb has it that Hunger is the best cook. The Law makes afflicted consciences hungry for Christ. Christ tastes good to them. Hungry hearts appreciate Christ. Thirsty souls are what Christ wants. He invites them: "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Christ's benefits are so precious that He will dispense them only to those who need them and really desire them. — Martin Luther

A writer is the one who loves to write ... on and about anything ... And this clears that I am a writer!! — Anamika Mishra

The greatest astonishment of my life was the discovery that the man who does the work is not the man who gets rich — Andrew Carnegie

I'm persuaded today that the only way you can get into another country with a different culture from your own is to find a local partner who knows the market. Discovering this felt like small children discovering that if you put a bobby pin into an electric plug you get a shock! — Roberto Civita

They're just the little people. Unknown all their lives and forgotten as soon as they die. If anyone talks about them, they're simply called the victim. But the killers, that's something else! They don't work or pay taxes or obey the law or live quiet lives of frustration. That's not news. Instead they kill. That makes them special. Charles Manson will be remembered and written about a hundred years from now, just as Jack the Ripper is remembered a hundred years after his crimes. Everybody wants a little recognition. More things are done for sheer recognition than for money or sex, as far as I can see. But the only ones who get it are the killers. Who knows all the names of Manson's victims? Or Jack the Ripper's victims? Or Charles Starkweather's victims? Or Caryl Chessman's victims? Who cares? They were just people. — Shane Stevens

I'm not really a good reader. What I mean is, I think I'm not one of those people who can read a story and analyze it just like that. — Donald Ray Pollock

The difference between people who believe they have books inside of them and those who actually write books is sheer cussed persistence - the ability to make yourself work at your craft, every day - the belief, even in the face of obstacles, that you've got something worth saying. — Jennifer Weiner

We are falling back into allegory," said the Captain, interrupting him. "If you mean by all that that the body is the most solid of realities, then say so."
"No, not exactly," Zeno explained. "This body, our kingdom, sometimes seems to me to be made of a fabric as loosely woven and as evanescent as a shadow. I should hardly be more astonished to see my mother again (who is dead) than to come upon you around a corner as I did, your face grown older and its substance recomposed more than once in twenty years' time, with its color altered by the seasons and its form somewhat changed, but your mouth still knowing my name. Think of the grain that has grown and the creatures that have lived and died in order to sustain that Henry who is and is not the one I knew twenty years ago. — Marguerite Yourcenar

In Shara's estimation, lists form one half of the heart of intelligence, the second half being patience. Most espionage work, after all, is a matter of collecting data and categorizing it: who belongs to which group, and why; where are they now, and how are we sure, and do we have someone else in the region; and now that we have cataloged those groups, what threat level should they be categorized under; and so on, and so on, and so on. — Robert Jackson Bennett

I think that once you're born, the thing you have to do is find out who you are and live that life as well as you can. You can't spend your time wondering how things would have been if you were someone different. — Fuyumi Ono

The surest sign that you haven't any sense is to argue with one who hasn't. — Laurence J. Peter

When I think about the folks who are out there at home tonight watching ... They know that this country is not respected around the world anymore. They know that this country is pushing the middle class, the hardworking taxpayers, backwards, and they saw a president who doesn't understand their pain, and doesn't have any plan for getting away from it. — Chris Christie

He would now have comprehended that work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do, and that play consists of whaterver a body is not obliged to do. And this would help him to understand why construcing artificial flowers or performing on a tread-mill, is work, whilst rolling nine-pins or climbing Mont Blanc is only amusement. There are wealthy gentlemen in England who drive four-horse passenger-coaches twenty or thirty miles on a daily line, in the summer, because the privilege costs them considerable money; but if they were offered wages for the service that would turn it into work, then they would resign. — Mark Twain

My life had been like a painter who climbs up a road overhanging a lake that is hidden from view by a screen of rocks and trees. Through a gap he glimpses it, he has it all there in front of him, he takes up his brushes. — Marcel Proust

A wrong is just a wrong no matter who's doin' it or who it's done to. You know someone's doin' wrong and even if it has not one thing to do with you, you do what you can to right that wrong. You don't, you're no kind of person or, at least, no kind I'd wanna know. — Kristen Ashley

Imagine that the whole world belongs to you. The birch trees in New Hampshire's White Mountains are yours, and so are the cirrus clouds in the western sky at dusk and the black sand on the beaches of Hawaii's big island.
You own everything, my dear sovereign - the paintings in all the museums of the world, as well as the internet and the wild horses and the roads. Please take good care of it all, OK? Be an enlightened monarch who treats your domain with reverent responsibility. And make sure you also enjoy the full measure of fun that comes with such mastery. Glide through life as if all of creation is yearning to honor and entertain you. — Rob Brezsny

She knew her duty inside and out. The prosperity of the cash drawer brought happiness to husband and wife. Not that Madame Puta was bad looking, not at all, she could even, like so many others, have been rather pretty, but she was so careful, so distrustful that she stopped short of beauty just as she stopped short of life - her hair was a little too well dressed, her smile a little too facile and sudden, and her gestures a bit too abrupt or too furtive. You racked your brains trying to figure out what was too calculated about her and why you always felt uneasy when she came near you. This instinctive revulsion that shopkeepers inspire in anyone who goes near them who knows what's what, is one of the few consolations for being as down at heel as people who don't sell anything to anybody tend to be. — Louis-Ferdinand Celine

If Jurgen Klinsmann thinks that the best way for his team to be successful is if his young players go to Europe, there is nobody in the world who can argue with that. That is his opinion, whether you agree with it or not. — Tim Howard

Yes, she doesn't really look like either of us, does she? Perhaps she's a girl who's fallen madly in love with me and persists in following me wherever I go."
"My talent is shape-shifting, Will, not acting," said Tessa, and at that Jem laughed out loud. — Cassandra Clare

Look at the children of the land leaving in droves, leaving their own land with bleeding wounds on their bodies and shock on their faces and blood in their hearts and hunger in their stomachs and grief in their footsteps. Leaving their mothers and fathers and children behind, leaving their umbilical cords underneath the soil, leaving the bones of their ancestors in the earth, leaving everything that makes them who and what they are, leaving because it is no longer possible to stay. They will never be the same again because you cannot be the same once you leave behind who and what you are, you just cannot be the same. — NoViolet Bulawayo

I think on some level, role models are overrated If you require a role model who looks just like you to be something you wanna be and you can't find one, is that a reason to not be what you wanna be? No! — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

When the soul opens its shell, it liberates the fundamental center that is the spirit. And once born, the spirit spreads its wings and flies with all the freedom of love, going to nestle in the heart where resides true Divine love. Love is God in full flight, and it is found inside our own selves. It is the bird coming back to its nest, the spirit returning to its reality, and the creature to the Creator, all coming together in the domain of the One who is and always was. — Alex Polari De Alverga

[Credit is a system whereby] a person who can't pay, gets another person who can't pay, to guarantee that he can pay. — Charles Dickens

The vulgar look upon a man, who is reckoned a fine speaker, as a phenomenon, a supernatural being, and endowed with some peculiargift of Heaven; they stare at him, if he walks in the park, and cry, that is he. You will, I am sure, view him in a juster light, and nulla formidine. You will consider him only as a man of good sense, who adorns common thoughts with the graces of elocution, and the elegancy of style. The miracle will then cease. — Lord Chesterfield

The irony is that when we're standing across from someone who is hidden or shielded by masks and armor, we feel frustrated and disconnected. That's the paradox here: Vulnerability is the last thing I want you to see in me, but the first thing I look for in you. If — Brene Brown

There is nothing God loves more than keeping promises, answering prayers, performing miracles, and fulfilling dreams. That is who He is. That is what He does. And the bigger the circle we draw, the better, because God gets more glory. — Mark Batterson

We are one human race, and there must be understanding among all men. For those who look at the problems of today, my big hope is that they understand. That they understand that the population is quite big enough, that they must be informed that they must have economic development, that they must have social development, and must be integrated into all parts of the world. — Sebastiao Salgado

My greatest obstacle has to be accepting that the business that I chose to be part of is based on rejection and constantly trying to prove yourself. Letting go of seeing my accent and the way I speak as a limitation. Accepting it as who I am and where I came from. — Roselyn Sanchez

When I'm in London, it feels like I am that character who is 'Tom Odell.' — Tom Odell

I think what we need is better understanding of how to do risk analysis of a CDO, but that they still can perform a very valuable function because they can aggregate these risks and pass them around so that mortgages or other kinds of loans can be packaged and sold to investors all over the world, who in most times, would justify a small amount of each one. — Robert F. Engle

Sitting there, watching the shades of evening settle slowly on the drab little town, it seemed to me that nothing but blind blundering vengeance, howsoever camouflaged, awaits all those who dare to step out of its stifling confines. It is a confrontation whose outcome is as certain as the end of solitary boats beating against a maelstrom. — Arun Joshi

Every church has a marketing plan! The only difference is that some are better than others! When I think of marketing I think of building a relationship with those within reach of your ministry who know nothing about your church or are disconnected from your people. — Gary Rohrmayer

Te is thus the natural miracle of one who seems born to be wise and humane, comparable to what we call "perfect specimens" of flowers, trees, or butterflies - though sometimes our notions of the perfect specimen are too formal. Thus Chuang-tzu enlarges on the extraordinary virtue of being a hunchback, and goes on to suggest that being weird in mind may be even more advantageous than being weird in body. He compares the hunchback to a vast tree which has grown to a great old age by virtue of being useless for human purposes because its leaves are inedible and its branches twisted and pithy.5 Formally healthy and upright humans are conscripted as soldiers, and straight and strong trees are cut down for lumber; wherefore the sage gets by with a perfect appearance of imperfection, such as we see in the gnarled pines and craggy hills of Chinese painting. — Alan W. Watts

In face of this modern nihilism, Christians are often lacking in courage. We tend to give the impression that we will hold on to the outward forms whatever happens, even if God really is not there. But the opposite ought to be true of us, so that people can see that we demand the truth of what is there and that we are not dealing merely with platitudes. In other words, it should be understood that we take this question of truth and personality so seriously that if God were not there we would be among the first of those who had the courage to step out of the queue. — Francis A. Schaeffer

I don't believe that God is a fussy faultfinder in dealing with theological ideas. He who provides forgiveness for a sinful life will also surely be a generous judge of theological reflection. Even an orthodox theologian can be spiritually dead, while perhaps a heretic crawls on forbidden bypaths to the sources of life. — Helmut Thielicke

The ignorant mass looks upon the man who makes a violent protest against our social and economic iniquities as upon a wild beast, a cruel, heartless monster, whose joy it is to destroy life and bathe in blood; or at best, as upon an irresponsible lunatic. Yet nothing is further from the truth. As a matter of fact, those who have studied the character and personality of these men, or who have come in close contact with them, are agreed that it is their super-sensitiveness to the wrong and injustice surrounding them which compels them to pay the toll of our social crimes. The most noted writers and poets, discussing the psychology of political offenders, have paid them the highest tribute. Could anyone assume that these men had advised violence, or even approved of the acts? Certainly not. Theirs was the attitude of the social student, of the man who knows that beyond every violent act there is a vital cause. — Emma Goldman

If anyone is going to see the gospel as true and good, satanic blindness and natural deadness must be overcome by the power of God. This is why the Bible says that even though the gospel foolishness to many, yet 'to those who are called ... Christ [is] the power of God and the wisdom of God' (1 Corinthians 1:24). The 'calling' is the merciful act of God to remove natural deadness and satanic blindness, so that we see Christ as true and good. The merciful act is itself a blood-bought gift of Christ. Look to him, and pray that God would enable you to see and embrace the gospel of Christ. — John Piper

There are types of people who want to have leverage over other people's lives. For no other reason than they feel the need to have leverage. I find this to be a certain type of sickness of the mind. You could argue that they wish you no harm, however, the desire to simply have leverage over another - whether this is mental, emotional or physical - is, I think, a sickness of the mind. I can honestly say right now that I, 100%, have no manipulative intentions to gain leverage over any other person that I know. — C. JoyBell C.

EJ cries, "We've been best friends since kindergarten. You can't become a babe slayer and leave me in the dust! I don't have an older sister. I'm disadvantaged. All I got is Emmy, who can only drop preschool wisdom like, 'No pull Barbie's hair!'"
"That's probably some early girl wisdom. Nobody likes to get their hair pulled," I say. "Except this one chick in my porno; I think she's into it. I cant really tell, though. I wish they would slow down. — Brent Crawford

Books never cease to astonish me. When I was a child, I knew
in the incontestable way that children know things
that God was an author who'd imagined me, which is why I (and everyone else) existed: to populate His narrative. My task was to imagine God in return: this was all He and I owed each other. — Martha Cooley

The first thought was this: that he was a foolish old man, because all his life he'd been looking for something and it was only when Anna joined him in the bar that evening that he realized that home is not something you find outside yourself; home is something you carry inside you, and it's made from the memories of the people you love, and the people who have loved you. — Marcus Sedgwick

Academic freedom is being lost by a great many people who dare to challenge Darwinism. That's a terrifying situation. That's contrary to the principles of science. — Ben Stein

The physicist is like someone who's watching people playing chess and, after watching a few games, he may have worked out what the moves in the game are. But understanding the rules is just a trivial preliminary on the long route from being a novice to being a grand master. So even if we understand all the laws of physics, then exploring their consequences in the everyday world where complex structures can exist is a far more daunting task, and that's an inexhaustible one I'm sure. — Martin Rees

The good news is that I believe every woman who wants to can find a great partner. You're just going to need to get rid of the idea that marriage will make you happy. It won't. Once the initial high wears off, you'll just be you, except with twice as much laundry.
Because ultimately, marriage is not about getting something
it's about giving it. Strangely, men understand this more than we do. Probably because for them marriage involves sacrificing their most treasured possession
a free-agent penis
and for us, it's the culmination of a princess fantasy so universal, it built Disneyland. — Tracy McMillan

I think it's OK to play to your strengths, and if I have a quality of Englishness that people like, I won't hide that. I'm probably not going to play a junkie and that's OK because there are other people who will do it better. A view that's been held for a long time is that the best way to prove oneself as an actor is to play the grittiest roles out there. I don't agree with that. — Rosamund Pike

The artist, who must venture into the studio and risk there, and then venture into the marketplace and risk again, is obliged to learn how her defences work, so that she can drop and raise her guard instantly. — Eric Maisel

I say to Israel, the Lord will never permit me or any other man who stands as president of this Church to lead you astray. It is not in the program. It is not in the mind of God. If I were to attempt that the Lord would remove me out of my place, and so He will any other man who attempts to lead the children of men astray from the oracles of God and from their duty. — Wilford Woodruff

The idea of gas engines was by no means new, but this was the first time that a really serious effort had been made to put them on the market. They were received with interest rather than enthusiasm and I do not recall any one who thought that the internal combustion engine could ever have more than a limited use. All the wise people demonstrated conclusively that the engine could not compete with steam. They never thought that it might carve out a career for itself. That is the way with wise people
they are so wise and practical that they always know to a dot just why something cannot be done; they always know the limitations. That is why I never employ an expert in full bloom. If ever I wanted to kill opposition by unfair means I would endow the opposition with experts. They would have so much good advice that I could be sure they would do little work. — Henry Ford

I believe that there are people who think as I do, who have thought as I do, who will think as I do. There are those who will live, unconscious of me, but continuing my attitude, so to speak, as I continue, unknowingly, the similar attitude of those before me. I could write and write. All it takes is a motion of the hand in response to a brain impulse, trained from childhood to record in our own American brand of hieroglyphics the translations of external stimuli. How much of my brain is wilfully my own? How much is not a rubber stamp of what I have read and heard and lived? Sure, I make a sort of synthesis of what I come across, but that is all that differentiates me from another person? - - - That I have banged into and assimilated various things? That my environment and a chance combination of genes got me where I am? — Sylvia Plath

Instead, it is the reality that the God-forsaken one experienced in an eminent way because no one can even approximately experience the abandonment by God as horribly as the Son, who shares the same essence with the Father for all eternity. — Hans Urs Von Balthasar

But what we have here is not a nice girl, as generally understood. For one thing, she's not beautiful. There's a certain set to the jaw and arch to the nose that might, with a following wind and in the right light, be called handsome by a good-natured liar. Also, there's a certain glint in her eye generally possessed by those people who have found that they are more intelligent than most people around them but who haven't yet learned that one of the most intelligent things they can do is prevent said people ever finding this out. — Terry Pratchett

They just change. Their body changes. Their abilities - the things they do that make them who they are - leave, sometimes temporarily, sometimes forever. Every day they wake up with that big what if?
And nothing is scarier than a life filled with what ifs - living by day without predictability and control. Some people end up losing feeling. Some have uncontrollable spasms. Some can't function. Some end up blind or in a wheelchair. Some end up bedridden and paralyzed.
It's hard to know who "some people" will be. — Lindsey Leavitt

Daniel is asleep. A care assistant, a different one today is swishingaroundthe room with a mop that smells of pine cleaner.

Elisabeth wonders what's doing to happen to all the care assistants. She realizes she hasn't so far encountered a single care assistant here who isn't from somewhere else in the world. That morning on the radio she;d heard a spokesperson say, but it's not just that we;ve been rhetorically and practically encouraging the opposite of integration for immigrants to this country. It's that we've been rhetorically and practically encouraging ourselves not to integrate. We've been doing this as a matter of self-policing since Thatcher taught us to be selfish and not just to think but to believe that there's no such thing as society.

Then the other spokesperson in the dialogue said, well, you would say that. Get over it. Grow up. Your time's over. Democracy. You lost. — Ali Smith

The Saudis and Emiratis blame all of this on Iran. I think they'd have to grant, that as has been said, that the Houthis are an internally generated movement in Yemen and the Saudis were supposed to be dealing with the Houthis, who started out in essence along their border. So one of the things that we're seeing is a complete failure of Saudi policy toward Yemen over the past 10 years, but the Saudis totally believe that the reason the Houthis are able to succeed militarily is the amount of money, advice, and guns they are receiving from Iran. — Elliott Abrams

God language can tie people into knots, of course. In part, that is because 'God' is not God's name. Referring to the highest power we can imagine, 'God' is our name for that which is greater than all and yet present in each. For some the highest imaginable power will be a petty and angry tribal baron ensconced high above the clouds on a golden throne, visiting punishment on all who don't believe in him. But for others, the highest power is love, goodness, justice, or the spirit of life itself. Each of us projects our limited experience on a cosmic screen in letters as big as our minds can fashion. For those whose vision is constricted (illiberal, narrow-minded people), this can have horrific consequences. But others respond to the munificence of creation with broad imagination and sympathy. Answering to the highest and best within and beyond themselves, they draw lessons and fathom meaning so redemptive that surely it touches the divine. — Forrest Church

The story is told of Socrates walking through the market in Athens, with its groaning abundance of options, and saying to himself, "Who would have thought that there could be so many things that I can do without?"4 — Os Guinness

Hateful to me as the gates of Hades is that man who hides one thing in his heart and speaks another. — Homer

...people who struggle against tyranny are more psychologically healthy than those who are docile and simply conform to current ways of thinking...there is much evidence that some of the most creative people in history were driven individuals who were terribly unhappy and out of sync with their social context. Creativity itself is a form of deviant behavior that requires individuals to break from usual assumptions and understandings in developing entirely new perspectives and approaches. — David Mechanic

Someone with a low degree of epistemic arrogance is not too visible, like a shy person at a cocktail party. We are not predisposed to respect humble people, those who try to suspend judgement. Now contemplate epistemic humility. Think of someone heavily introspective, tortured by the awareness of his own ignorance. He lacks the courage of the idiot, yet has the rare guts to say "I don't know." He does not mind looking like a fool or, worse, an ignoramus. He hesitates, he will not commit, and he agonizes over the consequences of being wrong. He introspects, introspects, and introspects until he reaches physical and nervous exhaustion.
This does not necessarily mean he lacks confidence, only that he holds his own knowledge to be suspect. I will call such a person an epistemocrat; the province where the laws are structured with this kind of human fallibility in mind I will can an epistemocracy. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

He can't shake the feeling that this place is some sort of pyramid scheme, and that those who fail to understand that will be left empty-handed. But there's no obvious reason for this feeling of his. Maybe he's ungrateful by nature. — Margaret Atwood

It never ceases to amaze me how many Christians, in the North and the South, continue to refer to the former as the "developed" and the latter as the "developing" world. When we in the South use this term to describe ourselves, we are evaluating ourselves by a set of cultural values that are alien to our own cultures, let alone to a Christian world-view! All our normative images and yardsticks of "development" are ideologically loaded. Who dictates that mushrooming TV satellite dishes and skyscrapers are signs of "development"? Who, apart from the automobile industry and the advertising agencies, seriously believes that a country with six-lane highways and multi-story car-parks is more "developed" than one whose chief mode of transport is railways? Does the fact that there are more telephones in Manhattan, New York, than in the whole of sub-Saharan Africa, mean that human communication is more developed in the former than the latter? — Vinoth Ramachandra

Ecologist Paul Ehrlich stressed that people who hold opposing opinions need to engage in open discussion with well-reasoned dissent. Positions should be questioned and criticized, not the people who hold them. Personal attacks preclude open discussion because, once someone is put on the defensive, fruitful exchanges are impossible, at least for the moment. — Marc Bekoff

I know not where we go from here. I do not think this is the end, but a new beginning, a new chapter in our tale. Told by minstrels who reveal not their sources. I know not if we have achieved victory this day. But I will forever know that I was honored to call each and everyone of you my brother. — Guy T. Simpson Jr.

Jesus says, "You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye" (Matthew 7:5). You see these dynamics when David arrives at King Saul's camp, bringing food for his older brothers. David is surprised to hear Goliath taunting the Israelites and their God. He is shocked that no one has the courage to challenge Goliath and blurts out, "Who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?" (1 Samuel 17:26). David reacts to the split between Israel's public faith and its battlefield ... — Paul Miller

Of all the questions about the future of leadership that we can raise for ourselves, we can be certain in our answer to only one: 'Who will lead us?' The answer, of course, is that we will be lead by those we have taught, and they will lead us as we have shown them they should. — William C. Richardson

A lot of people probably don't realize how difficult it is to stick to that lawyer speak when you're not a lawyer. I see everyone on 'The Good Wife' - everyone, people who have been there since day one - struggling with that language because it is just not how people talk. — Carrie Preston

Clary raised her eyebrows at Jace. "You hate bergamot?"
Jace had wandered over to the narrow bookshelf and was examining its contents. "You have a problem with that?"
"You may be the only guy my age I've ever met who knows what bergamot is, much less that it's in Earl Grey tea."
"Yes, well," Jace said, with a supercilious look, "I'm not like other guys. Besides," he added, flipping a book off the shelf, "at the Institute we have to take classes in basic medicinal uses for plants. It's required."
"I figured all your classes were stuff like Slaughter 101 and Beheading for Beginners. — Cassandra Clare

So it is inevitable that life will be not just very short but very miserable for those who acquire by great toil what they must keep by greater toil. — Seneca.

When I see someone not performing, I am frank enough to tell the person that it's not working out. I request him or her to leave or change jobs within the group. But I see many of our senior colleagues, including my brothers, sons and nephews, empathetic towards non-performers. They don't want to face the issue. They tend to become comfortable with such people and they get protection. They tend to choose people who become personally loyal to them rather than to the company. I think it's important to be professional about such matters. Protecting a non-performer is not good for the business and also the person being protected. This is unprofessional too. The non-performer may be in the wrong job and thus not doing what he or she is best at doing. Empathy that results in protection would lead to a negative result for the employee as well. He or she might be better off in another job within the group or elsewhere. — Subhash Chandra

No, I don't think I've been defiled. But I haven't been saved, either. There's nobody who can save me right now, Mr. Wind-Up Bird. The world looks totally empty to me. Everything I see around me looks fake. The only thing thay isn't fake is that gooshy thing inside me. — Haruki Murakami

Look at your life. Look at the ways in which you define who you are and what you're capable of achieving. Look at your goals. Look at the pressures applied by the people around you and the culture in which you were raised. Look again. And again. Keep looking until you realize, within your own experience, that you're so much more than who you believe you are. Keep looking until you discover the wondrous heart, the marvelous mind, that is the very basis of your being. — Tsoknyi Rinpoche

Who speaks of art speaks of poetry. There is not art without a poetic aim. There is a species of emotion particular to painting. There is an effect that results from a certain arrangement of colors, of lights, of shadows. It is this that one calls the music of painting — Edouard Vuillard

You do not comprehend. It is not the victim who concerns me so much. It is the effect on the character of the slayer."
"What about war?"
"In war you do not exercise the right of private judgement. That is what is so dangerous. Once a man is imbued with the idea that he knows who ought to be allowed to live and who ought not - then he is halfway to becoming the most dangerous killer there is - the arrogant killer who kills not for profit - but for an idea. He has usurped the functions of le bon Dieu. — Agatha Christie

The jailer is you. You're the only person who has the key to your cell. You're the only one who can open the door that leads to freedom. — Norman Vincent Peale

For one who thinks food in itself is the source of life, eating is the communion with the dying world, it is communion with death. Food itself is dead, it is life that has died and it must be kept in refrigerators like a corpse. — Alexander Schmemann

Grace is loving people for who they are, where they are. It's loving people *before* they change, not just *after* they change. And that grace is the difference between holy and holier-than-thou. Holiness, in its purest form, is irresistible. That's why sinners couldn't be kept away from Jesus. Hypocrisy has the opposite effect. It's as repulsive to the irreligious as the Pharisees' religiosity was to Jesus. — Mark Batterson

Sometimes, what people choose to write down on paper is more important than what they say.
Caleb didn't know what Sarah meant. But I knew. I wrote in my journal every night. And when I read what I had written, I could see myself there, clearer than when I looked in the mirror. I could see all of us: Papa, who couldn't always say the things he felt; Caleb, who said everything; and Sarah, who didn't know that she had changed us all. — Patricia MacLachlan

Maybe there are just some men like that in the world, I thought. Men who have to be in charge, who have to punish those who awaken feelings in them which they cannot control. Men who will lure you with tenderness till you believe that you are safe then slap you down. Men whom it is impossible for anyone to love without losing their dignity. Men who have to damage those who love them most. But, then, I had fallen on love with one, so what did that make me? — Helen Fielding