Quotes by American Authors - Page 2328

And no child deserved to die for defending her father, no matter who she was
Janice Hardy
If you see ten troubles coming down the road you can be sure that nine will run into the ditch before they reach you.
Calvin Coolidge
Mountains should be climbed with as little effort as possible and without desire. The reality of your own nature should determine the speed. If you become restless, speed up. If you become winded, slow down. You climb the mountain in an equilibrium between restlessness and exhaustion. Then, when you’re no longer thinking ahead, each footstep isn’t just a means to an end but a unique event in itself. This leaf has jagged edges. This rock looks loose. From this place the snow is less visible, even though closer. These are things you should notice anyway. To live only for some future goal is shallow. It’s the sides of the mountain which sustain life, not the top. Here’s where things grow.But of course, without the top you can’t have any sides. It’s the top that defines the sides. So on we go—we have a long way—no hurry—just one step after the next—with a little Chautauqua for entertainment -- .Mental reflection is so much more interesting than TV it’s a shame more people don’t switch over to it. They probably think what they hear is unimportant but it never is.
Robert M. Pirsig
When men start affording more rights to women, maybe we'll be nicer to the ones we don't like. But for now, I know that I myself am too busy trying to preserve my rights and faculties to take care of a man's fragile ego.
Leanna Renee Hieber
But as I peeked at my brother's inert body....I was aware only of what a strange thing it was to be male. Society discriminated against women, no question. But what about the discrimination of being sent war? Which sex was really thought to be expendable.
Jeffrey Eugenides
Eric has said that I carry close to my chest a ball of barbed wire that I sometimes throw at other people.
Weike Wang
The heroine might be unsure. And the reader. But I don’t think the author should be.
Paul Park
What if this is a horrible mistake?" I croaked. "Oh, it'll be horrible fine, just a bunch of pretentious rich people with shelves of expensive books they've never read.
Ruta Sepetys
You unlock the door to greater levels of excellence and success when you accept who you are. It is from the point of acceptance that we can create a masterful life.
Steve Maraboli
My main nurturing instinct toward children is mild sadism--picking them up and threatening to drop them--which is why I am a good uncle but would make a poor father.
Thomm Quackenbush
Civilization could not exist without tremors of desire and without the counteracting, negation force of disciplined denial. Nor would the gyratory pulsations of a lively civilization exist devoid of the convulsive chemistry of union and repellency. We are born with a desire to be immortal. Cursed with the knowledge that we must die, people live their orthodox lives out by displaying reckless abandon as to the outcome of human life or nervously hounded by utter despondency nipping their heels. How we resolve this decidedly human complex of carrying out our daily lives while burden by our inescapable mortality determines our essential character. The collation of similar values adopted by our community determines who we are as a people.
Kilroy J. Oldster
The most thoroughly and relentlessly damned, banned, excluded, condemned, forbidden, ostracized, ignored, suppressed, repressed, robbed, brutalized and defamed of all 'Damned Things' is the individual human being. The social engineers, statisticians, psychologists, sociologists, market researchers, landlords, bureaucrats, captains of industry, bankers, governors, commissars, kings and presidents are perpetually forcing this 'Damned Thing' into carefully prepared blueprints and perpetually irritated that the 'Damned Thing' will not fit into the slot assigned it. The theologians call it a sinner and try to reform it. The governor calls it a criminal and tries to punish it. The psychologist calls it a neurotic and tries to cure it. Still, the 'Damned Thing' will not fit into their slots.
Robert Anton Wilson
The best way to take control over a people and control them utterly is to take a little of their freedom at a time, to erode rights by a thousand tiny and almost imperceptible reductions. In this way, the people will not see those rights and freedoms being removed until past the point at which these changes cannot be reversed.
Pat Miller
The depressed and the suicidal are often lonely and inhibited. Discussions of inhibition in this context usually emphasize fear of rejection.
David L. Conroy
Kindness is a magical magnet which can change your heart and perceptions without actually touching you.
Debasish Mridha
Loneliness is painful. But suffering is not wrong in and of itself. It's part of the human experience, and in a way brings us closer to all people.
Juliette Fay
The key to the mystery of a great artist is that for reasons unknown, he will give away his energies and his life just to make sure that one note follows another…and leaves us with the feeling that something is right in the world.”—
Leonard Bernstein
Now-what’s our game plan?”tCoach Hedge belched. He’d already had three espressos and a plate of doughnuts, along with two napkins and another flower from the vase on the table. He would’ve eaten the silverware, except Piper had slapped his hand.t“Climb the mountain,” Hedge said. “Kill everything except Piper’s dad. Leave.”t“Thank you General Eisenhower,” Jason grumbles.
Rick Riordan
What I am suggesting is that each of us turn from the negativism that permeates our society and look for the remarkable good among those with whom we associate, that we speak of one another’s virtues more than we speak of one another’s faults, that optimism replace pessimism, that our faith exceed our fears. When I was a young man and was prone to speak critically, my father would say: “Cynics do not contribute, skeptics do not create, doubters do not achieve.
Gordon B. Hinckley
We lied to ourselves thinking in our minds we knew everything. We were deceived in believing that youthful enthusiasm could replace wizened maturity.
Anna M. Aquino
Today you go into make a modern recording with all this technology. The bass plays first, then the drums come in later, then they track the trumpet and the singer comes in and they ship the tape somewhere. Well, none of the musicians have played together. You can’t play jazz music that way. In order for you to play jazz, you’ve got to listen to them. The music forces you at all times to address what other people are thinking and for you to interact with them with empathy and to deal with the process of working things out. And that’s how our music really could teach what the meaning of American democracy is.
Wynton Marsalis
I have already lost the knowledge of the word whose sound has the shape of a soul. But perhaps it's not too late. Come with me. Hurry now. We still have a chance to be young.
Dexter Palmer
John Loengard, the picture editor at Life, always used to tell me, ”If you want something to look interesting, don’t light all of it.
Joe McNally
Life is like crossing a river. If you take a huge step-aim for too bigger dreams-then the current will knock you off your feet and carry you away. The way to do it is small steps, you will take hold of life. You will get there in the end.
Louis Sachar
It's easy to smile just to make other people feel better. But when a person fakes happy, it has edges. Regular people may not see, but the people who count, they can see edges and lines where smile ends and the real you, the sadness (me) or the anger (Grandma) begins.
Heidi W. Durrow
Maybe that was the trouble. She got the first and biggest share of everything – first whack at the new clothes and the biggest part of any special treat. Hazel never had to grab for anything and she was soft.
Carson McCullers
Dare to dream big. Never fear to fail. Take actions with love.
Debasish Mridha
... money should not be spent according to what the West considers the most dramatic kind of suffering.
William Easterly
If you want people to to think, give them intent, not instruction.
L. David Marquet
The best that could be left behind by any man: children who had been brought up to behave responsibly and to believe in something beyond their own self gratification. (The Americans
John Jakes
Immediately Chelsea latched onto her wrist and pulled Veronica’s hand toward the cup. “Nonsense.” Chelsea’s eyes narrowed in on Veronica. Her eyes turned black and her mouth opened slightly, revealing her fangs. “Now drink up, researcher. Don’t let a good drink go to waste.
Isaiyan Morrison
No man is more cheated than the selfish man.
Henry Ward Beecher
We'll all be better off the day we stop letting unhappy, unsuccessful people tell us how to be happy and successful. You already know the way... follow it.
Steve Maraboli
The idea [passing the 17th amendment] benefited from a unique political and cultural atmosphere that consumed a nation during the late 19th and early 20th centuries-a progressive populism promoting simultaneously radical egalitarianism and centralized authoritarianism.
Mark Levin
Winter, spring, and summer, passed away during my labours; but I did not watch the blossoms or the expanding leaves — sights which before always yielded me supreme delight, so deeply was I engrossed in my occupation.
Gris Grimly
In a way, art is a theory about the way the world looks to human beings. It’s abundantly obvious that one doesn’t know the world around us in detail
James Gleick
The Republic is weak and broken." I narrow my eyes. "But it is still your country. Fight for it. This is your home, not theirs.
Marie Lu
Obviously, a lot of people involved with Volkswagen's emissions were aware of the diesel car software cheat. One has to wonder how many of them tried to stop it and perhaps were demoted or lost their jobs over trying to prevent the secret Volkswagen car emissions fraud?
Steven Magee
Happiness comes in many forms. Whether through a passion for something or someone, it makes no difference. The results are the same: you live.
Megan Duke
Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. Nor was it wise to tempt angels, even of the fallen sort.
Cassandra Clare
There is more than one way to lose your life; quickly through violence, or fettered-away and wasted around dreadful, toxic people.
Bryant McGill
Over and over again I have said that there is no way out of the present impasse. If we were wide awake we would be instantly struck by the horrors which surround us ... We would drop our tools, quit our jobs, deny our obligations, pay no taxes, observe no laws, and so on. Could the man or woman who is thoroughly awakened possibly do the crazy things which are now expected of him or her every moment of the day?
Henry Miller
In my entire life, I never once heard either of my parents say they were stressed. That was just not a phrase I grew up being allowed to say. That, and the concept of "Me time".
Mindy Kaling
Life is a journey. If you can’t walk, journey with your thoughts and imaginations.
Debasish Mridha
To grow—overcome and go beyond your barrier.
Debasish Mridha
Who gets to be best-liked in any community? Who is the most trusted? Why, the man who does the dirty job, of course, and does it with a smile. The man who does the job you couldn't bring yourself to do.
Stephen King
I feel like I'm going to HURL. Which, even if I wanted to do, I couldn't do, because I haven't eaten. I can't even drag myself out of my room. And while I'd be able to muster the strength to roundhouse Fang until he begged for MERCY, I'de be mush around an Eraser.
James Patterson
We are taught you must blame your father your sisters your brothers the school the teachers-you can blame anyone but never blame yourself. It's never your fault. But it's always your fault because if you want to change you're the one who has got to change. It's as simple as that isn't it?
Katharine Hepburn
All love shifts and changes. I don't know if you can be wholeheartedly in love all the time.
Julie Andrews
I like bars just after they open for the evening. When the air inside is still cool and clean and everything is shiny and the barkeep is giving himself that last look in the mirror to see if his tie is straight and his hair is smooth. I like the neat bottles on the bar back and the lovely shining glasses and the anticipation. I like to watch the man mix the first one of the evening and put it down on a crisp mat and put the little folded napkin beside it. I like to taste it slowly. The first quiet drink of the evening in a quiet bar—that's wonderful.
Raymond Chandler
You know how really big guys are always nicknamed Tiny?" She didn’t wait for any response, afraid she’d chicken out. "Guess that would make you Master Munchkin, huh?
Cherise Sinclair
Elizabeth: "Maybe he'll surprise you."Meghann: "Birdie, they all surprise me. Last week, I hugged my date at the door and felt a bra strap.
Kristin Hannah
It was my turn to be silent while a small family of moments crossed my path, single file, from the left, sticking their tongues out at me.
Roger Zelazny
Put McCall and I together and nothing can stop us." ...That's what he wanted. A woman to stand by him and conquer whatever they set their mind to.
Robin Bielman
Do not assume that people are seeing you. The more you can clarify, optimize, and engage your fans and strangers with branded marketing and merchandise, the better chance you have of being seen and then heard.
Loren Weisman
The Pentacle - The ancients envisioned their world in two halves - masculine and feminine. Their gods and goddesses worked to keep a balance of power. Yin and Yang. When male and female were balanced, there was harmony in the world. When they were unbalanced there was chaos.
Dan Brown
Temples and churches have become social centers. They have lost their original purpose because the minds of the people are more attracted to worldly things than to prayer. The lips repeat the prayer mechanically like a phonograph record, but the mind wanders to other places. (23-24)
Swami Satchidananda
Last of all, this book owes perhaps its biggest debt to the ultimate models for Kira and Heron and every other awesome girl in the Partials series: my two daughters. May you always have heroines to inspire you, role models to look up to, and the freedom and courage to make your own choices, no matter how simple or scary or hard or eternal they may be.
Dan Wells
If you can love yourself deeply, you will never feel alone.
Debasish Mridha
The more you give, the more you want to do it—as do others around you. It's like going to the gym. If you've been working out your kindness muscles, you get stronger at it. — Nipun Mehta
Adam M. Grant