"The first half of life consists of the capacity to enjoy without the chance; the last half consists of the chance without the capacity."

Twain, Mark on joy
15 fans of this quote   

"Duties are not performed for duty's sake, but because their neglect would make the man uncomfortable. A man performs but one duty --the duty of contenting his spirit, the duty of making himself agreeable to himself."

Twain, Mark on duty
12 fans of this quote   

"He has been a doctor a year now and has had two patients, no, three, I think -- yes, it was three; I attended their funerals."

Twain, Mark on doctors
12 fans of this quote   

"Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our race. He brought death into the world."

Twain, Mark on death
17 fans of this quote   

"That is the whole secret of successful fighting. Get your enemy at a disadvantage; and never, on any account, fight him on equal terms."

Shaw, George Bernard on fights and fighting   

"Men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience."

Shaw, George Bernard on experience
9 fans of this quote   

"I can forgive Alfred Nobel for having invented dynamite, but only a fiend in human form could have invented the Nobel Prize."

Shaw, George Bernard on evil   

"An election is a moral horror, as bad as a battle except for the blood; a mud bath for every soul concerned in it."

Shaw, George Bernard on elections   

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"If all the economists were laid end to end, they would not reach a conclusion."

Shaw, George Bernard on economy and economics
7 fans of this quote   

"Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few."

Shaw, George Bernard on democracy
3 fans of this quote   

"The only service a friend can really render is to keep up your courage by holding up to you a mirror in which you can see a noble image of yourself."

Shaw, George Bernard on friends and friendship
6 fans of this quote   

"Old men are dangerous: it doesn't matter to them what is going to happen to the world."

Shaw, George Bernard on age and aging
4 fans of this quote   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"Every time I appoint someone to a vacant position, I make a hundred unhappy and one ungrateful."

Louis XIV on management   

"The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of inhumanity."

Shaw, George Bernard on indifference
10 fans of this quote   

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"Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire; you will what you imagine; and at last you create what you will."

Shaw, George Bernard on imagination
5 fans of this quote   

"You cannot be a hero without being a coward."

Shaw, George Bernard on heroes and heroism
4 fans of this quote   

"We have no more right to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth without producing it."

Shaw, George Bernard on happiness   

"Men are not governed by justice, but by law or persuasion. When they refuse to be governed by law or persuasion, they have to be governed by force or fraud, or both."

Shaw, George Bernard on government   

"I would rather be first in a little Iberian village than second in Rome."

Caesar, Julius on attitude
4 fans of this quote   

"I love the name of honor, more than I fear death."

Caesar, Julius on honor
8 fans of this quote   

"What we wish, we readily believe, and what we ourselves think, we imagine others think also."

Caesar, Julius on belief
8 fans of this quote   

"I came, I saw, I conquered."

Caesar, Julius on victory
9 fans of this quote   

"Mankind differs from the animals only by a little and most people throw that away."

Confucius on animals
16 fans of this quote   

"Chose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life."

Confucius on work
28 fans of this quote   

"Do not worry about holding high position; worry rather about playing your proper role."

Confucius on worry
5 fans of this quote   

"A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true."

Socrates on morality   

"I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good."

Socrates on potential   

"Difficulties show men what they are. In case of any difficulty, God has pitted you against a rough antagonist that you may be a conqueror, and this cannot be without toil."

Epictetus on difficulties
3 fans of this quote   

"A strict belief, fate is the worst kind of slavery; on the other hand there is comfort in the thought that God will be moved by our prayers."

Epictetus on destiny
3 fans of this quote   

"The voice of parents is the voice of gods, for to their children they are heaven's lieutenants."

Shakespeare, William on family
6 fans of this quote   

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"Glory is like a circle in the water, which never ceaseth to enlarge itself, till, by broad spreading, it disperse to naught."

Shakespeare, William on fame   

"Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we might win, by fearing to attempt.[Measure For Measure]"

Shakespeare, William on doubt
10 fans of this quote   

"I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones."

Shakespeare, William on death
8 fans of this quote   

"I believe, if we take habitual drunkards as a class, their heads and their hearts will bear an advantageous comparison with those of any other class. There seems ever to have been a proneness in the brilliant and warm-blooded to fall into this vice."

Lincoln, Abraham on alcohol and alcoholism
4 fans of this quote   

"A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gal. So with men. If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. Therein is a drop of honey which catches his heart, which, say what he will, is the highroad to his reason."

Lincoln, Abraham on friends and friendship   

"Anyone can become angry -- that is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way -- this is not easy."

Aristotle on anger
37 fans of this quote   

"No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness."

Aristotle on madness
22 fans of this quote   

"This is the reason why mothers are more devoted to their children than fathers: it is that they suffer more in giving them birth and are more certain that they are their own."

Aristotle on parents and parenting
10 fans of this quote   

"Poetry is finer and more philosophical than history; for poetry expresses the universal, and history only the particular."

Aristotle on poetry and poets
10 fans of this quote   

"I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his enemies; for the hardest victory is over self."

Aristotle on self-control
19 fans of this quote