|
"No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong."
|
Albert Einstein
|
|
"...it was customary among men to overstate the virtues of their own country."
|
| Cormac McCarthy, The Crossing
|
|
"There is no royal road to Geometry."
|
| Euclid of Alexander (365 - 300 BC) in response to King Ptolemy about an easy way to learn mathematics
|
|
"For the introducer [of change] has all those who benefit from the old orders as enemies, and he has lukewarm defenders in all those who might benefit from the new orders."
|
| Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince 1513
|
Let a hundred flowers blossom,
and let a hundred schools of thought contend.
|
| Mao Tse-tung (great sound bite, but he didn't mean it)
|
|
I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us that the less we use our power, the greater it will be.
|
| --Thomas Jefferson
|
|
We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.
|
| Plato (427 BC-347 BC)
|
|
I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.
|
| --Thomas Jefferson
|
"No arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is as formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women."
"The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help."
"The taxpayer: That's someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take the civil service examination."
"I've laid down the law, though, to everyone from now on about anything that
happens: no matter what time it is, wake me, even if it's in the middle of a Cabinet meeting."
|
| Ronald Reagan
|
|
Of course it was! The bite is always the biggest fish. There is something
very charming-something of which the cynic knows nothing at all-about this
propensity of ours to attribute superlative qualities to the unrealized. It
is a species of philosophic chivalry. It is a courtesy that we extend to
the unknown. We do not know whether the joys that never visited us were
really great or small, so we gallantly allow them the benefit of the doubt.
The geese that came waddling over the hill are geese, all of them, and as
geese we write them down; but the geese that never came over the hill are
swans every one, and no swans that we have fed beside the lake glided hither
and thither half as gracefully.
|
| Mushrooms on the Moor, by Frank W. Boreham
|
|
There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement.
|
| Lord Kelvin, 1900, addressing physicists at the British Association for the Advancement of Science
|
|
I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.
|
| Albert Einstein
|
|
Successful businesses measure and count things. I think that’s a safe assumption on top of which we can drop the following hypothesis: unsuccessful business either measure nothing, the wrong things, too many things, or finally, they measure the right things but they don’t communicate the measurements efficiently.
|
| Dick Costolo
|
|
We are all Greeks. Our laws, our literature, our religion, our arts, have their root in Greece.
|
| Percy Bysshe Shelley English poet (1792 - 1822)
|
|
The same sun that melts the wax can harden clay.
|
| "How Can We See That Far"
|
|
One cannot step twice in the same river.
|
| Heraclitus (ca. 540 - ca. 480 BCE)
|
|
Our biggest cost is not power, or servers, or people. It's lack of utilization. It dominates all other costs.
|
| Jeff Bezos
|
|
The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk.
|
| G.W.F. Hegel (1770 - 1831)
|
|
Truth, when we are fortunate enough to find it, is like bad-tasting medicine. It rarely comes as a pleasant surprise, because if it surprises us, it means we've been denying it for some time and have a lot of beliefs based on falsehood. It's hard to give up those beliefs.
|
| Orson Scott Card
|
|
There is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new...
|
| Niccolo Macchiavelli, The Prince
|
|
The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt.
|
| Bertrand Russell
|
|
The behavior of any bureaucratic organization can best be understood by assuming that it is controlled by a secret cabal of its enemies.
|
| Robert Conquest's Second Law of Politics
|
|
The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.
|
| Samuel Johnson
|
|
Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great Pillars of human happiness these firmest props of the duties of Men and citizens.
|
| George Washington
|
|
When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.
|
| Jonathan Swift, "Thoughts on Various Subjects, Moral and Diverting"
|
|
Gehazi traded being a prophet for money and leprosy.
|
| Dr. Matt Cassady
|
|
It is possible to commit no mistakes -- and still lose. That is not a weakness. That is "life".
|
| Patrick Stewart as Capt. Picard in "Star Trek The Next Generation", episode "Peak Performance"
|
|
If you make a means an end, it will enslave you and then destroy you.
|
| Dr. Matt Cassady
|
|
American Christians tend to confuse America with the New Israel, instead of with Babylon.
|
| --Whitehorse Inn
|
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
|
| --T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets: "Little Gidding"
|
|
"We are dwarfs perched on the shoulders of giants. We see thus more and further than they do, not because our sight is more acute or our height taller, but because they lift us into the air and elevate us with all their gigantic height."
|
| Bernard de Chartres, died 1125, quoted by Isaac Newton
|
|
"IT people are like construction contractors. They would rather build a road than worry about where it goes."
|
| Paraphrased from Robert Townsend, American business writer and former President, Avis rent-a-car,Inc.
|
|
"We have considered ourselves of too much importance in the scale of
nations. It has led us into great errors. Instead of yielding to
circumstances which human power cannot control, we have imagined that
our own destiny and that of other nations was in our hands, to be
regulated as we thought proper."
|
Virgina Federalist Daniel Sheffey on
the eve of the war of 1812 from The War of 1812 A Forgotten Conflict
by Donald Hickey p300
(In the War of 1812, the White House is burned and the USA is fortunate to get a stalemate from the war).
|
|
We all know that electric blankets can't give us love, but on a very,
very cold night, it's really hard to tell the difference.
|
| random musing by Mitch Fincher
|
|
Join the company of lions rather than assume the lead among foxes.
|
| The Talmud
|
|
"I think the problem with Spartan society ... is it achieved virtue by
removing temptation, so once you put the Spartans in cities like
Ephesus or Miltous and Ionia where there's decadence available, they
just don't know how to handle it and they go berserk. And so Spartan
kings and officers were always being recalled for discipline because
they get involved with bribery and debauchery etc..."
|
| -- Kenneth Harl, Lecture 11 of the "Great Ancient Civilizations of Asia Minor"
|
|
"The better part of one's life consists of friendship."
|
| Abraham Lincoln
|
|
"Never assume the other guy will never do something you would never do."
|
| -Willie Mays quoted by Donald Rumsfeld.
|
|
"The worst mistake is to have the best ladder and the wrong wall."
|
| -Donald Rumsfeld.
|
|
If you bungle raising your children, I don't think whatever else you do
well matters very much.
|
| Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
|
|
They also serve who only stand and wait.
|
| John Milton, poet (1608-1674)
|
|
"Y'know, evil comes in many forms, whether it be a man-eating cow or Joseph Stalin, but you can't let the package hide the pudding! Evil is just plain bad! You don't cotton to it. You gotta smack it in the nose with the rolled-up newspaper of justice! Bad dog! Bad dog! And you don't do it for money. No! You do it for love! You know, I've learned something this week -- on justice and on friendship, there is no price. But there are established credit limits."
|
| The Tick
|
|
To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the
affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and
endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the
best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy
child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life
has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.
|
| Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer and philosopher (1803-1882)
|
|
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice; In practice,
there is.
|
| Chuck Reid
|
|
Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.
|
| -Steven Wright, comedian (1955- )
|
|
"Striving to better, oft we mar what's well."
|
| -William Shakespeare, "King Lear "
|
|
No man is clever enough to know all the evil he does.
|
| -La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680)
|
|
As scarce as truth is, the supply has always been in excess of the demand.
|
| -Josh Billings
|
|
There are two ways to slide easily through life: to believe everything or to
doubt everything; both ways save us from thinking.
|
| -Theodore Rubin quoted in wordsmith.org
|
Our natural reason looks at marriage and turns up its nose and says,
"Alas! Must I rock the baby? wash its diapers? make its bed? smell
its stench? stay at nights with it? take care of it when it cries?
heal its rashes and sores? and on top of that care for my spouse,
provide labor at my trade, take care of this and take care of that? do
this and do that? and endure this and endure that? Why should I make
such a prisoner of myself?"
What then does Christian faith say to this? It opens its eyes,
looks upon all these insignificant, distasteful and despised duties
in the spirit, and is aware that they are all adorned with divine
approval as with the costliest gold and jewels.
Its says, "O God, I
confess I am not worthy to rock that little babe or wash its diapers,
or to be entrusted with the care of a child and its mother. How is
it that I without any merit have come to this distinction of being
certain that I am serving thy creature and thy most precious will?
Oh, how gladly will I do so. Though the duty should be even more
insignificant and despised, neither frost nor heat, neither drudgery
nor labor will distress me for I am certain that it is thus pleasing
in thy sight."
|
| Martin Luther quoted by
Elisabeth Elliot in
The Shaping of a Christian Family,p87
|
|
"I flee who chases me, and chase who flees me."
|
| Ovid on romance
|
|
Who pardons the bad, injures the good
|
| Blue Wave/QWK v2.12
|
|
"The Bible is alive, it speaks to me; it has feet, it runs after me;
it has hands, it lays hold of me..."
|
| Martin Luther
|
"Out, out brief candle!
Life is but a walking shadow,
a poor player that struts and frets his hour
upon stage and then is heard no more.
It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury
signifying nothing"
|
| Shakespeare, MacBeth
|
Just once I would like to hear a minister and bridegroom say something like..
Reverend: " ..and Mike what token of your love do you give to Jennifer?"
Mike: " A small glass giraffe."
Reverend: "Glass traditionally has signified purity, like the pure love that
you have for Jennifer, and the giraffe signifies a far sighted protection of
one ..."
|
| Mitch Fincher
|
|
"The clarity of the new Beatles CD is incredible. Nothing like the old
LP's we had. I guess the Beatles weren't talking to me after all."
|
| Attributed to Charles Manson.
|
|
"The Nature section? It's under Science, up against the wall."
|
| Actually overheard at Bookstop.
|
"Often our feelings lie beneath the surface,
Hidden by the smiles we wear upon our faces;
emotions are concealed,
we bear our sorrows on our own,
Grownups only cry when they're alone."
|
| Noel Richards, quoted by Sheila Walsh in Never Give It Up
|
|
"I don't necessarily agree with everything I say."
|
| Marshall McLuhan.
|
|
"A man may die, nations may rise and fall, but an idea lives on.
Ideas have endurance with out death."
|
| John F. Kennedy.
|
|
"Somebody who reads only newspapers and at best books of contemporary
authors looks to me like an extremely near-sighted person who scorns
eyeglasses. He is completely dependent on the prejudices and fashions
of his times, since he never gets to see or hear anything else."
|
| Albert Einstein, Ideas and Opinions
|
Marin Luther wrote,
Our natural reason looks at marriage and turns up its nose and says,
"Alas! Must I rock the baby? wash its diapers? make its bed? smell
its stench? stay at nights with it? take care of it when it cries?
heal its rashes and sores? and on top of that care for my spouse,
provide labor at my trade, take care of this and take care of that? do
this and do that? and endure this and endure that? Why should I make
such a prisoner of myself?"
What then does Christian faith say to this? It opens its eyes,
looks upon all these insignificant, distasteful and despised duties
in the spirit, and is aware that they are all adorned with divine
approval as with the costliest gold and jewels. Its says, "O God, I
confess I am not worthy to rock that little babe or wash its diapers,
or to be entrusted with the care of a child and its mother. How is
it that I without any merit have come to this distinction of being
certain that I am serving thy creature and thy most precious will?
Oh, how gladly will I do so. Though the duty should be even more
insignificant and despised, neither frost nor heat, neither drudgery
nor labor will distress me for I am certain that it is thus pleasing
in thy sight."
|
| Elisabeth Elliot
The Shaping of a Christian Family,p87
|
|
"Our church is a collection of hurting people."
|
| Dick Dodge in Tuesday Night talk May 1985
|
"Be careful, you are a man who makes people afraid and thats dangerous."
"Well, its what people know about themselves inside that makes them
afraid."
|
| Clint Eastwood in "High Plains Drifter"
|
"I know its 110 degrees in Phoenix, but its a dry heat and it doesn't feel so hot."
"pssst... You know Polish jokes are really Aggie jokes except they change the character."
"I wish I'd kept playing the piano."
"I'm not real good with names, faces yes, but not names."
"I'm not good at estimating crowds."
"Its not even Thanksgiving and stores are already showing the Christmas stuff!"
"Well, its OK because, you know, you're eating for two now."
|
| My favorite pet peeves of trite sayings
|
Mitch's tips for women:
For dissuading a strange gentleman upon introduction,
"Why that's my boyfriend's name!"
To scare off a man, 14 simple words and you'll never hear from him again:
"I love you, I want to marry you, I want to bear your children."
To politely tell a man, you'd rather not dance with him:
"I'd love to dance with you, but the voices inside my head say not to."
|
|
|
While one person hesitates because he feels inferior, another is
busy making mistakes and becoming superior.
|
| Henry C. Link
|
|
I hate quotations.
|
| Ralph Waldo Emerson
|
|
Leadership is getting someone to do what they don't want to do, to achieve
what they want to achieve.
|
| Tom Landry
|
|
Simplicity is the natural result of profound thought.
|
|
|
"The past tempts us, the present confuses us, and the future frightens
us... and our lives slip away, moment by moment, lost in that vast,
terrible in-between."
|
| The late Centauri Emperor, Babylon 5
|
|
If an infinite number of rednecks riding in an infinite number of pickup
trucks fire an infinite number of shotgun rounds at an infinite number of
highway signs, they will eventually produce all the world's great literary
works in Braille.
|
|
|
It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because
we do not dare that they are difficult.
|
| Seneca
|
|
Is it not better to aim your spear at the moon and strike only an eagle,
than to aim your spear at the eagle, and strike only a rock?
|
|
|
The world is made for people who aren't cursed with self-awareness.
|
| the character Annie Savoy in the film Bull Durham
|
|
It is in vain to hope to please all alike. Let a man stand with his face
in what direction he will, he must necessarily turn his back on one half
of the world.
|
| George Dennison Prentice
|
|
Truth often suffers more by the heat of its defenders than the arguments of its opposers.
|
| William Penn
|
|
"Whatever we build in this life is composed of a million bricks."
|
| Jim Huddleston
|
|
* Q: What is an experienced Emacs user?
* A: A person who wishes that the terminal had pedals.
|
|
|
|
"He is no fool to give up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."
|
| Jim Elliot
|
|
"You miss 100% of the shots you never take."
|
| Wayne Gretzky
|
|
"Only the paranoid survive."
|
| Andy Groves, Intel CEO
|
|
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the
shoulder of Orion. I've watched c-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser
Gate. All those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain. Time to die.
|
| Roy Batty, from the movie Bladerunner
|
|
"Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced."
|
|
|
|
"Despair is the mentor of change."
|
| Tom Parker
|
|
"Maturity is the ability to be yourself around your family."
|
| Tom Parker
|
|
``Good. Fast. Cheap. Pick any two.''
|
| Erwin Frand, IR&D Editorial, Late '70s.
|
|
"I don't know what synchronicity means - but its the third time
I've heard it this week."
|
|
|
|
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt
of in your philosophy."
|
| Shakespeare, Hamlet
|
|
"Politics is not about finding the best solution, its finding one that
the least people complain about."
|
| NPR, Health Care Discussion.
|
"Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it
flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come."
Attributed to Nietzsche
|
|
|
|
Outside of a dog, books are a man's best friend;
inside of a dog, it's too dark to read.
|
| Mark Twain ?
|
|
Your arguments are sound--all sound.
|
|
|
|
As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error.
|
| Weisert
|
|
Those who cannot fly most enjoy clipping wings.
|
|
|
|
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's
character, give him power.
|
| Abraham Lincoln
|
|
Time is Nature's method of keeping us from bumping into ourselves.
|
|
|
|
"It's not the bullet that kills you, it's the hole."
|
| Laurie Anderson
|
|
As you now are
I once was
As I now am
You will be
prepare for death
and follow me.
|
|
| tombstone in Abilene TX
|
|
Our potential grows with the realization of our potential.
|
| David Porterfield.
|
|
"Never seem more learned than the people you are with. Wear your learning
like a pocket watch and keep it hidden. Do not pull it out to count
the hours, but give the time when you are asked."
|
| - Lord Chesterfield
|
|
"The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the
problem."
|
| - Economist Milton Friedman
|
|
"To have a good political party, you need a strong opposition."
|
| -London Cab Driver, 2002
|
|
Well done is better than well said.
|
| -Benjamin Franklin
|
|
Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they came to success when they gave up.
|
| -Thomas Edison
|
|
Give what you have. It may be better than you dare to think.
|
| -Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
|
|
Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.
|
| -Cicero
|
|
One's dignity may be assaulted, vandalized and cruelly mocked, but it cannot be taken away unless it is surrendered.
|
| -Michael J. Fox
|
words invariant with antinomian prefix:
inflammable = flammable
irregardless = regardless
|
|
Some of my favorite words (mostly from
http://wordsmith.org/awad/):
| sed.u.lous | \'sej-*-l*s\ aj [L sedulus, fr. sedulo sincerely, diligently,
fr. se without]+ dolus guile - more at IDIOT, TALE : diligent in
application or pursuit : ASSIDUOUS - sed.u.lous.ly av
|
| Sis.y.phe.an | or Si.syph.i.an \.sis-i-'fe--*n\ \sis-'if-e--*n\ aj : of,
relating to, or suggestive of the labors of Sisyphus
1895 KIDD, Soc. Evol. ix. 245 "Do we only see therein humanity
condemned to an aimless Sisyphean labour?"
Sisyphus, the name of a king of Corinth, whose punishment in Hades was
to roll a heavy stone up a hill; as he reached the top, the stone rolled
down again.
|
| cwm | \'ku:m\ n [W, valley] : CIRQUE
(only word in English without vowels).
|
| sciolist (SAI-uh-list) noun |
One who engages in pretentious display of superficial knowledge.
|
| abio.gen.e.sis | n [NL, fr. a- + bio- + L genesis] (1870): the supposed
spontaneous origination of living organisms directly from lifeless
matter -- abi.og.e.nist n
|
| at.a.vism | \'at-*-.viz-*m\ n : appearance in an individual of a
remotely ancestral character; also : such an individual or
character
-- at.a.vis.tic \.at-*-'vis-tik\ adj
|
| syn.ec.do.che | \s*-'nek-d*-(.)ke-\ \.sin-.ek-'da:k-ik\ \-'da:k-i-k*l\
\-i-k(*-)le-\ n [L, fr. Gk synekdoche-, fr. syn- + ekdoche- sense,
inte]rpretation, fr. ekdechesthai to receive, understand, fr. ex from +
dechesthai to receive; akin to Gk dokein to seem good - more at EX-, DECENT
: a figure of speech by which a part is put for the whole (as fifty sail
for fifty ships), the whole for a part (as the smiling year for spring),
the species for the genus (as cutthroat for assassin), the genus for the
species (as a creature for a man), or the name of the material for the
thing made (as willow for bat) - syn.ec.doch.ic aj
|
| welt.schmerz | \'velt-.shme(*)rts\ n [G, fr. welt world + schmerz pain] often
cap 1: mental depression or apathy caused by comparison of the actual
state of the world with an ideal state 2: a mood of sentimental sadness
|
| log.or.rhea | \.lo.g-*-'re--*, .la:g-\ \-'re--ik\ n [NL] : excessive and
often incoherent talkativeness - log.or.rhe.ic aj
|
| eti.ol.o.gy | \.e_-t-e_--'a_:l-*-je_-\ n : CAUSE, ORIGIN; also : the
study of causes
-- eti.o.log.ic \.e_-t-e_--*-'la_:j-ik\ adj
|
| pro.te.an | \'pro-t-e--*n, pro--'te--\ aj 1: of or resembling Proteus :
VARIABLE 2: readily assuming different shapes or roles
|
| syzygy (SIZ-uh-jee) noun |
Astronomy. Either of two points in the orbit of a celestial body where
the body is in opposition to or in conjunction with the sun. Either of
two points in the orbit of the moon when the moon lies in a straight
line with the sun and Earth. The configuration of the sun, the moon,
and Earth lying in a straight line.
|
| misoneism (mis-uh-NEE-izm) noun |
Hatred or fear of change or innovation.
|
| tabula rasa (TAB-yuh-luh RAH-sa, -za) noun, plural tabulae rasae (TAB-yuh-lee
RA-see, -ze) |
1. The mind before it receives the impressions gained from experience.
The unformed, featureless mind in the philosophy of John Locke.
2. A need or an opportunity to start from the beginning.
|
| retronym (RE-truh-nim) noun |
A term, such as acoustic guitar, coined in modification of the original
referent that was used alone, such as guitar, to distinguish it from a
later contrastive development, such as electric guitar.
|
| hobson's choice | A choice without an alternative; the thing offered or nothing.
Note: It is said to have had its origin in the name of one Hobson, at Cambridge, England, who rented horses, and required every customer to take the horse which stood next the stable door or none. |
| Morpheus (MOR-fee-uhs, -fyoos), noun |
1. A son of Hypnos and the god of dreams.
2. In the arms of Morpheus: asleep.
[Middle English from Latin from Greek morphe + Latin -eus; coined by Ovid,
with allusion to the forms seen in dreams.]
|
| pangram (PAN-gram, -gruhm, PANG-) noun |
A sentence that makes use of all the letters of the alphabet.
[From Greek pan- (all) + -gram (something written).]
Many typists know "The quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog" as a
thirty-three-letter sentence that employs every letter in the alphabet at
least once. Another one:
Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs. (thirty-two letters)
|
| trichotillomania |
MEANING:
noun: A compulsion to pull out one's hair.
ETYMOLOGY:
From Greek tricho- (hair) + tillein (to pluck, pull out) + -mania (excessive enthusiasm or craze). A related word is trichology (the word for the study and treatment of hair and its disorders).
|
| capitol (KAP-i-tol) noun |
A building or complex of buildings in which a state legislature meets.
[Middle English Capitol, Jupiter's temple in Rome, from Old French capitole,
from Latin Capitolium after Capitolinus, Capitoline, the hill on which
Jupiter's temple stood, perhaps akin to, caput, head.]
|
| cancrine (KANG-krin) adjective |
1. Reading the same backwards as forwards, palindromic. For example,
"A man, a plan, a canal: Panama." (letter cancrine)
"So patient a doctor to doctor a patient so!" (word cancrine)
2. Crab-like.
[From Latin cancr- (stem of cancer) cancer + -ine.]
|
|
"Our country is still right of center."
|
| Dee Dee Myers on CBS Nov 4, 2008. (Perhaps showing more where Dee Dee stands than the country.)
|
Quotes from my students at Texas A & M, 1986-1989
*
"You won't have Dick Nixon to kick around any more"
Nov 6, 1962
*
"Why would anyone need a computer of their own?"
Ken Olsen, President and Founder of DEC, 1974
*
"I am not a potted plant!"
*
"It was more important for our children to have parents who have done what
they felt they had top do, even if it cost us our lives..."
Response of a person who aided Jews escape Nazi Europe when asked why they
risked their lives and the possibility of making their children orphans.
*
Be reasonable, do it MY way!
*
"Go ahead. But I'll take my chances in the shuttle."
*
"I understand, Eve."
-Chance Gardner
*
Be not weary of doing little things for the love of God, who regards not
the greatness of the work, but the love with which it is performed.
Brother Lawrence
*
"This should be good for our business. Getting sued by DEC is a sign of
arrival in the DEC market."
John Stadler, President Clearpoint Inc., a maker of DEC-compatible memories,
on hearing that DEC was starting legal action for copyright infringement.
*
Many workmen
Built a huge ball of masonry
Upon a mountain-top.
Then they went to the valley below,
And turned to behold their work.
"It is grand," they said;
They loved the thing.
Of a sudden it moved:
It came upon them swiftly;
It crushed them all to blood.
But some had opportunity to squeal.
-Stephen Crane
*
"Things should be make as simple as possible - but not simpler."
-Albert Einstein
*
"The greatest part of what we say and do is really unnecessary, If a
man takes this to heart, He will have more leisure and less
uneasiness."
-Marcus Aurelius (c. 121-180)
*
"There is a great man who makes every man feel small. But the real
great man is the man who makes every man feel great."
-G.K. Chesterton ( 1874-1936)
*
"For fast-acting relief, try slowing down."
Lily Tomlin
*
"These are the days of miracles and wonders."
-Paul Simon, Boy in the Bubble
*
"Don't you understand? when you give up your dream - you die. "
Nick Hurley, Flash Dance
*
" If a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for,
He isn't fit to live."
Martin Luther King, June 23 1963
*
" I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go to the
mountain, And I've looked over, and I've seen the promised land... So
I'm happy tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing
any man."
Martin Luther King, April 3, 1968, the evening before his assassination
*
" I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of
former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit
down together at the table of brotherhood ... I have a dream that my four
little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be
judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their
character. "
Martin Luther King, Aug 28, 1963
*
"Very clever dish."
Long Duck Long, after tasting Quiche for the first time
from the movie, 16 Candles
*
"Even a blind hog finds an acorn now and then."
humbly accepting a compliment on an endeavor
*
"One learns more from defeat than from victory."
Samuel Eliot Morison, WWII historian.
*
"It's easier to get forgiveness than permission."
Grace Hopper
one of the authors of COBOL and the concept of a compiler
*
Woody Allen's got this great new idea. He is going to take the recent movies
and by a complex, computer-aided process convert movies like Star Wars to
a more artistic Black and White version.
*
"We will fight them on the beaches of Miami Vice.
We will fight them on the sidewalks of Dallas.
We will fight them on the knots landing stage.
We will nev nev nev never surrender.
And if the rating system lasts for a thousand years, men will say this
was Max Headroom's finest hour."
Max Headroom's last words on the incredible series, Max Headroom.
*
"A man with no forgiveness in his heart is in a punishment worse than death"
Pat, 'Karate Kid II'
*
"It's easier to fall into the gutter than to get back out"
-Philip Marlowe
*
"A great man shows his greatness by the way he treats little men."
-Carlyle
*
"Many who have spent a lifetime in it can tell us less of love than a
child that lost a dog yesterday."
-Thornton Wilder, The Bridge of San Luis Rey
*
"An organized minority, obeying a single impulse, is irresistible against an
unorganized majority. A hundred men acting uniformly in concert, with a common
understanding, will triumph over a thousand men who are not in accord and can
be dealt with one by one."
-Mosca
*
"I had grown up among engineers, and I could remember the engineers of the
twenties very well indeed: their open, shining intellects, their free and
gentle humor, their agility and breadth of thought, the ease with which they
shifted from one engineering field to another, and, for that matter, from
technology to social concerns and art. Then, too, they personified good
manners and delicacy of taste; well-bred speech that flowed evenly and was free
of uncultured words; one of them might play a musical instrument, another
dabble in painting; and their faces always bore a spiritual imprint."
-Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago
*
"Teaching is too vital an occupation to be left to the lazy or greedy or
negative"
-Eliot Wigginton, Sometimes a Shining Moment
*
"Do everything without complaining or arguing"
-Phillipians 2.14
*
"One who always agrees with me is a fool"
Dr. Glendon Johnson
*
"All the science, I don't understand -
It's just my job five days a week"
Elton John, 'Rocket Man'
*
"Be careful. you are a man who makes people afraid and that's dangerous"
"Well, its what people know about themselves inside that makes them afraid"
Clint Eastwood, High Plains Drifter
*
"Somebody who reads only newspapers and at best books of contemporary authors
looks to me like an extremely near-sighted person who scorns eyeglasses.
He is completely, dependent on the prejudices and fashions of his times,
since he never gets to see or hear anything else."
Albert Einstein, Ideas and Opinions, Workmans Calendar
*
"A man may die, nations may rise and fall, but an idea lives on.
Ideas have endurance without death."
John F. Kennedy, Workman 86 Calendar
*
"A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams."
- John Barrymore
*
Other Random Stuff:
soc.history:
> I wonder what human plan in history has lasted the longest.
I heard a tale about King's College, Cambridge, (founded AD 1441) c 1950.
It became general knowledge that the College was to cut down some of
their magnificent elm trees, and there was much opposition to this
among the general public. Letters were written to the local paper
accusing the College authorities of vandalism. The Bursar replied, a
week later, along the following lines:
"The life expectancy of an elm is about 600 years. It is therefore
our policy to cut down and replant one third of the elms every 200
years."
--
Ken Moore
...........................................................................
soc.history:
When Benjamin Franklin died in 1790, his will left some money at
interest to be given to the city of Philadelphia after 200 years.
When the 200 years expired in 1990, the city got $6 million.
--
...........................................................................
"If I am a son of God, nothing but God will satisfy my soul; no amount
of comfort, no amount of ease, no amount of pleasure, will give me
peace or rest. If I had the full cup of all the world's joys held up
to me, and could drain it to the dregs, I should still remain thirsty
if I had not God." - G. A. Studdert Kennedy, The Wicket Gate (1923)
