Quotes by American Authors - Page 660

It takes a kind of shabby arrogance to survive in our time and a fairly romantic nature to want to.
Edgar Z. Friedenberg
A bloody guy in overalls, wearing a straw hat, began chasing us. He held a saw, pointing it at us. We were gonna die! --The Body By the Tree
Yawatta Hosby
As a result of his experiments he concluded that imitation was a real evil that had to be broken before real rhetoric teaching could begin. This imitation seemed to be an external compulsion. Little children didn’t have it. It seemed to come later on, possibly as a result of school itself.That sounded right, and the more he thought about it the more right it sounded. Schools teach you to imitate. If you don’t imitate what the teacher wants you get a bad grade. Here, in college, it was more sophisticated, of course; you were supposed to imitate the teacher in such a way as to convince the teacher you were not imitating, but taking the essence of the instruction and going ahead with it on your own. That got you A’s. Originality on the other hand could get you anything – from A to F. The whole grading system cautioned against it.
Robert M. Pirsig
I started after him...and the clown looked back. I saw Its eyes, and all at once I understood who It was.""Who was it, Don?" Harold Gardner asked softly."It was Derry," Don Hagarty said. "It was this town.
Stephen King
If you couldn't sense heat, you'd not be alive. And if that heat never grew uncomfortable, you would never move. And if you were stagnant—unchallenged by unpredictable flares—you would never grow capable of shielding yourself from harsher flames. So yes, life was meant to drag you straight through the fire.
Richelle E. Goodrich
He told me that if I hung up, he'd do it. He would commit suicide. He told me that if I called the cops he would kill every single one of them and I knew that he had the potential and the means to do it
Sierra D. Waters
A student is engaging, attentive, notes details, and shows effort in learning.
Sandra M. Michelle
Pay attention to the intricate patterns of your existence that you take for granted.
Doug Dillon
That no man can truly imagine being happy and that's why happiness isn't for sale here.
Robin Hobb
Summer was over in twenty minutes that day. Finished. At four o'clock in the afternoon the roses were quiet on their stems, full-blown, fulfilled; the water in the pool was warm; the leaves on the trees quiet, too, and green. The cat lay with his belly to the sun, steeped in heat.
Elizabeth Enright
Kelli Farrell talks about the difference between girls and boys who struggle to get through high school: "Girls, especially those whose moms are head of household, get the message that men come and go, that they're going to have to take care of themselves and their kids. They're ready for the opportunity to step up. By the last year or two in high school, many boys have already steeled themselves for failure. They've checked out intellectually, mentally, and emotionally.
Peg Tyre
Could you hold the chainsaw a bit closer to your mouth, please?
Chuck Palahniuk
A man must have a good deal of vanity who believes, and a good deal of boldness who affirms, that all the doctrines he holds are true, and all he rejects are false.
Benjamin Franklin
...when the black populations of the world have a future, so will the Western nations have a future-and not till then. But the terrible probability is that the Western populations, struggling to hold on to what they have stolen from their captives, and unable to look into their mirror will precipitate a chaos throughout the world which, if it does not bring life on this planet to an end, will bring about a racial war such as the world has never seen, and for which generations yet unborn will curse our names forever.
James Baldwin
It's not that difficult you see, To be all that you can be;For the true secret to success, Is simply this...ALWAYS do your best.
Danielle Pierre
prayer is the one discipline in the Christian faith that makes us feel entirely dependent on God and thus sets us up for profound disappointment when God doesn’t respond to our needs and requests.
Gerald L. Sittser
I tell young people: Do not think of yourself, think of others. Think of the future that awaits you, think about what you can do and do not fear anything.
Rita Levi-Montalcini
Life is a cosmic grab-bag. At this moment, somewhere in the world, someone is losing a child, skiing down a mountain, having an orgasm, getting a haircut, lying on a bed of pain, singing on a stage, drowning, getting married, starving in a gutter. In the end, aren't we all that same person? An aeon is a thousand million years, and an aeon ago every atom in our bodies was a part of a star. Pay attention to me, God. We are all a part of your universe, and if we die, part of your universe dies with us.
Sidney Sheldon
We choose our next world through what we learn in this one. Learn nothing, and the next world is the same as this one, all the same limitations and lead weights to overcome.
Richard Bach
Serving others means being willing to make sacrifices for their good.
Jim George
Why is there ever this perverse cruelty in humankind, that makes us hurt most those we love best?
Jacqueline Carey
The sun was as flirty as Scarlett O'Hara with the Tarleton twins, breaking through the clouds in spectacular bursts that seemed like personal favors and then retreating for hours, days, and making us all ache for just a glimpse.
Lorna Landvik
My body needs laughter as much as it needs tears. Both are cleansers of stress.
Mahogany SilverRain
I don't think it matters who you love, just as long as you love. Who cares whether it's a man or a woman? Why does that have anything more to do with the person inside than the color of someone's skin? Personally, I'm pretty fucking disappointed that I seem to be one hundred percent heterosexual.
Jane Green
To the short-sighted, through the fog, God must be a monster.
Criss Jami
Promises are like assholes," Elsbeth pipes up. "They stink when you put your nose in them.
Jake Bible
Now they will rest before shouldering the endless work they were created to do down here in paradise.
Toni Morrison
I figured it was probably best for me to leave that bicycle back there for a real emergency.
Suzanne Brockmann
I have been seized by the power of a great affection.
Brennan Manning
What about mold," Tom reminded her. "Fuzziness on a girl is never attractive.
Lia Habel
I believe that it is impossible for two individuals not committed to their own and each other’s well being to sustain a healthy and enduring relationship.
Bell Hooks
The chemist who can extract from his heart's elements compassion respect longing patience regret surprise and forgiveness and compound them into one can create that atom which is called love.
Kahlil Gibran
Peace comes at a price, often only at the end of a hard-fought battle.
Toni Sorenson
So, you want to be in a relationship and you’re tired of being single, right? But let me ask you an important question: Do you have a healthy relationship with yourself? I get it! Everybody wants to be in love and feel loved, but trust me, SELF-LOVE is far more important. How is YOUR mind, YOUR body, YOUR spirit? Listen, it’s okay to be single! You may not want to be single, but sometimes it’s best. Learn to commit to yourself, first. Be good to yourself, take care of yourself, and love yourself! You’ve got to like and love who YOU are before you can give your very best to that special someone. Don’t be in a rush and don’t be desperate. Work on yourself first and be at peace.
Stephanie Lahart
Between the beach and the big breaking waves about a quarter mile off was a stretch of bumpy, glistening reef, its usual blanket of water pulled back by a celestial hand.
Mary Ellen Hannibal
As we see the beauty of God and feel His weightiness in our hearts, our hearts begin to desire Him more than we desire sin. Before the Bible says, "Stop sinning," it says, "Behold your God.
J.D. Greear
Teach the child, not just the curriculum.
Tamara L. Chilver
At least with pets, and for all I know, people too, intelligence and quick-wittedness have nothing to do with a talent for being loved, or being kind, nothing at all, less than nothing.
Charles Baxter
I have learned that bitterness, resentment and self-pity do nothing to lift the gloomy clouds of a spiritual February in my life. If anything, these sins only harden the soil of my heart, making it difficult for new growth to spring forth at God’s appointed time.
Katherine J Walden
In the middle of all the world's incessant noise, her message was music, and music was a thing that I'd mostly lived my life without. In the ten years since I'd last seen Miranda she'd come to somehow stand in for all the things I didn't have in life that were thought to make us human, all the absent music and touch and sympathy; in my mind she lived a separate life apart from her real one, and there she grew more pure and perfect with each passing day . . . In my mind Miranda had become a miracle.
Dexter Palmer
You know when you feel good and you know when you feel bad. As a result, you are experiencing and displaying a wide range of energies, aren’t you? Some bring you up, while some bring you down. Start paying attention to your unique energy.
Susan C.Young
The physical relief of having fully drained boobs cannot be overstated.
Cassi Clark
She started to speak, but then stopped. Anything she could think of to say seemed a mistake. In fact, speech in general seemed a mistake. It struck her all at once that dealing with other human beings was an awful lot of work. from Back When We Were Grownups.
Anne Tyler
I'd like to look below my eyes and see not language staring back at me, not sentences or single words or awkward pen lines, but a surface clear and burnished as glass.
William H. Gass
Everyone is a lonely victim of life's complexity.
Ted Dekker
As Kipling said, that’s another story...
Harper Lee
The doors will be opened to those who are bold enough to knock.
Tony Gaskins
To find meaning in our lives we need consistent exposure to kids, elders and animals... cuz kids and animals aren't looking for it, and elders are the closest to finding it.
Gregor Collins
A woman once held a Canary in the palm of her hand and stroked her and whispered a careful warning. The canary, seeking some freedom to fly, went into the mine while the woman watched in worry. The mine was filled with toxic gases and the Canary began to sing. She flew into danger, realized the threats around her, and wished to return to a place of refuge.
Donna Lynn Hope
If every Christian family in the United States would simply commit to pray and ask God if HE wants to use them to bless a child without a family, well, we'd change the world. If we can get the church to think about adoption not in terms of the desires of adults but in terms of the needs of children, I think we'd see on a much grander scale how God sets the lonely in families.
Kelly Rosati
It's a thin line between what we're calling acceptable and not acceptable. As a leader, you're supposed to know when not to cross it. But how do you know? Does the army teach us how to control our emotions? Does the army teach us how to deal with a friend bleeding out in front of you? No.
David Finkel
No system that implies control of society by privilege seekers has ever ended any other way but collapse
William E. Dodd
Because all actions and expressionsstem from the mind, it is vital to know themind as well as decide in what way we’ll use it. Everyone has heard of psychosomatic illness, and most of us acknowledge that psychosomatic sicknesses can and do occur. But whatabout psychosomatic wellness?
H.E. Davey
I know perfectly well he's a god, too. But what I think is he'll be much godlier after he's dead.
Ursula K Le Guin
She wished she had a set of greeting cards at the ready, but Hallmark probably didn’t make any that said Thank you for giving up your life so that me and my friends could escape! It was SO appreciated. XOXO!
Gina Damico
See, Brutus, for me, it’s not good enough to just guess as to whether there’s a heaven or how to get there. I’m not going to take Julian’s word for it, or Aaron’s word for it, or anyone else’s word for it. I’m going to find out for myself whether I believe there’s a heaven or not, and then I’m going to spend the rest of my life doing everything I possibly can to get there. We don’t get that long on earth, and heaven is forever, so if there’s anything I can do, anything at all, even if it takes my entire life, then it’s worth it,” Elena said.
Brad Francis
I love him, and he loves me. And being together makes even the little things better.
Trisha Leigh
If the seed doesn't get planted, it can't become a toxic thornbush. We must guard our minds and our hearts, starting with our eyes.
Craig Groeschel
Brigan, could you attempt, at least, to make yourself presentable? I know this is a war, but the rest of us are trying to pretend it’s a party.
Kristin Cashore
If we all want the peace and flooded the world with love, peace will wait for us at the shore.
Debasish Mridha