Quotes4study

Night! that great shadow and profile of the day.

_Jean Paul._

If you want Peace, work for Justice. [ Message of Pope Paul VI for the Celebration of the Day of Peace . Jan. 1,1972.]

Paul VI.

were in town. At dawn, NBC, along with the rest of the baseball world, awakened to the irresistible story of Joe Castle and his stunning debut in Philadelphia. Suddenly the biggest game of the day was

John Grisham

Not less in God's sight is the end of the day than the beginning.

_Gael. Pr._

The first hour of the morning is the rudder of the day.

_Ward Beecher._

So far as the religion of the day is concerned, it is a damned fake.. Religion is all bunk.

Thomas Alva Edison

I want to walk through life instead of being dragged through it.

Alanis Morissette (born 1 June 1974) This was the last quotation that was selected from the Quote of the Day proposals page, prior to setting up the current system of ranking quotes to be used for each day of the year. It was first proposed on that page on 8 August 2004 by IP 24.167.93.227 ~ Kalki

The morning is the gate of the day, and should be well guarded with prayer. It is one end of the thread on which the day's actions are strung, and should be well knotted with devotion. If we felt more the majesty of life we should be more careful of its mornings. He who rushes from his bed to his business and waiteth not to worship is as foolish as though he had not put on his clothes, or cleansed his face, and as unwise as though he dashed into battle without arms or armor. Be it ours to bathe in the softly flowing river of communion with God, before the heat of the wilderness and the burden of the way begin to oppress us.--_Spurgeon._

Various     Thoughts for the Quiet Hour

Love is a temporary madness, it erupts like volcanoes and then subsides. And when it subsides, you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion, it is not the desire to mate every second minute of the day, it is not lying awake at night imagining that he is kissing every cranny of your body. No, don't blush, I am telling you some truths. That is just being "in love", which any fool can do. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident.

Louis de Bernières

The paramount question of the day is not political, is not religious, but is economic. The crying-out demand of today is for a circle of principles that shall forever make it impossible for one man to control another by controlling the means of his existence.

Voltairine de Cleyre

A truth / Looks freshest in the fashion of the day.

_Tennyson._

Prayer should be the key of the day and the lock of the night.

Proverb.

Used with due abstinence, hope acts as a healthful tonic; intemperately indulged, as an enervating opiate. The visions of future triumph, which at first animate exertion, if dwelt upon too intently, will usurp the place of the stern reality; and noble objects will be contemplated, not for their own inherent worth, but on account of the day-dreams they engender. Thus hope, aided by imagination, makes one man a hero, another a somnambulist, and a third a lunatic; while it renders them all enthusiasts.

_Sir J. Stephen._

Colour is the type of love. Hence it is especially connected with the blossoming of the earth, and with its fruits; also with the spring and fall of the leaf, and with the morning and evening of the day, in order to show the waiting of love about the birth and death of man.

_Ruskin._

That well by reason men it call may The daisie, or els the eye of the day, The emprise, and floure of floures all.

GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 1328-1400.     _Prologue of the Legend of Good Women. Line 183._

So ends the bloody business of the day.

ALEXANDER POPE. 1688-1744.     _The Odyssey of Homer. Book xxii. Line 516._

Whoever has tasted the breath of morning knows that the most invigorating and most delightful hours of the day are commonly spent in bed; though it is the evident intention of nature that we should enjoy and profit by them.--_Southey._

Maturin M. Ballou     Pearls of Thought

All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.

T. E. Lawrence (born 16 August 1888

Spill not the morning (the quintessence of the day) in recreation, for sleep itself is a recreation. Add not, therefore, sauce to sauce.

_Fuller._

I love you, not just for now, but for always, and I dream of the day that you’ll take me in your arms again.

Nicholas Sparks

Morning on the mount! It will make me strong and glad all the rest of the day so well begun.--_Joseph Parker._

Various     Thoughts for the Quiet Hour

~Anticipation.~--It has been well said that no man ever sank under the burden of the day. It is when to-morrow's burden is added to the burden of to-day that the weight is more than a man can bear.--_George MacDonald._

Maturin M. Ballou     Pearls of Thought

At the close of the day when the hamlet is still, And mortals the sweets of forgetfulness prove, When naught but the torrent is heard on the hill, And naught but the nightingale's song in the grove.

JAMES BEATTIE. 1735-1803.     _The Hermit._

O woman! thou knowest the hour when the goodman of the house will return, when the heat and burden of the day are past; do not let him at such time, when he is weary with toil and jaded with discouragement, find upon his coming to his habitation that the foot which should hasten to meet him is wandering at a distance, that the soft hand which should wipe the sweat from his brow is knocking at the door of other houses.--_Washington Irving._

Maturin M. Ballou     Pearls of Thought

Religion is not the simple fire-escape that you build in anticipation of a possible danger, upon the outside of your dwelling, and leave there until danger comes. You go to it some morning when a fire breaks out in your house, and the poor old thing that you built up there, and thought that you could use some day, is so rusty and broken, and the weather has so beaten upon it and the sun so turned its hinges, that it will not work. That is the condition of a man who has built himself what seems a creed of faith, a trust in God in anticipation of the day when danger is to overtake him, and has said to himself, I am safe, for I will take refuge in it then. But religion is the house in which we live, it is the table at which we sit, it is the fireside at which we draw near, the room that arches its graceful and familiar presence over us; it is the bed on which we lie and think of the past, and anticipate the future, and gather our refreshment.--_Phillips Brooks._

Various     Thoughts for the Quiet Hour

There is certainly no happier life than a life of simple faith; of literal acceptance, of rosy dreams. We must all grant that, if it were possible, nothing would be more perfect. I gladly acknowledge that some of the happiest, and also some of the best men and women I have known, were those who would have shrunk with horror from questioning a single letter of the Bible, or doubting that a serpent actually spoke to Eve, and an ass to Balaam. But can we prevent the light of the sun and the noises of the street from waking the happy child from his heavenly dreams? Nay, is it not our duty to wake the child, when the time has come that he must be up and doing, and take his share in the toils of the day? And is it not well for those who for the first time open their eyes and look around, that they should see by their side some who have woke before them, who understand their inquiring looks, and can answer their timid questions and tell them in the simple-hearted language of the old poet:

Friedrich Max Müller     Thoughts on Life and Religion

Qu? fuerant vitia mores sunt=--What were once vices are now the fashion of the day.

Seneca.

I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to.

Elvis Presley chosen by Nanobug, honoring Presley's first commercial hit, "That's All Right (Mama)", recorded on 5 July 1954. (This was not designated as a "Quote of the Day" but it did appear for a time in the earliest logos prior to the first official QOTD on 11 July 2003

What is death? To go out like a light, and in a sweet trance to forget ourselves and all the passing phenomena of the day, as we forget the phantoms of a fleeting dream; to form, as in a dream, new connections with God's world; to enter into a more exalted sphere, and to make a new step up man's graduated ascent of creation.--_Zschokke._

Maturin M. Ballou     Pearls of Thought

To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts. Every man is tasked to make his life, even in its details, worthy of the contemplation of his most elevated and critical hour.

Henry David Thoreau

You may not be her first, her last, or her only. She loved before she may love again. But if she loves you now, what else matters? She's not perfect—you aren't either, and the two of you may never be perfect together but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice, and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can. She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break—her heart. So don't hurt her, don't change her, don't analyze and don't expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she's not there.

Bob Marley

Nichts ist hoher zu schatzen, als der Wert des Tages=--Nothing is to be rated higher than the value of the day.

_Goethe._

Of seeming arms to make a short essay, Then hasten to be drunk,--the business of the day.

JOHN DRYDEN. 1631-1701.     _Cymon and Iphigenia. Line 407._

No sooner is there a good thing in the world than a _division is necessary_. Light and darkness have no communion; God has divided them, let us not confound them. Sons of light must not have fellowship with deeds, doctrines, or deceits of darkness. The children of the day must be sober, honest, and bold in their Lord's work, leaving the works of darkness to those who shall dwell in it forever.

Various     Thoughts for the Quiet Hour

Borne the burden and heat of the day.

NEW TESTAMENT.     _Matthew xx. 12._

These papers of the day have uses more adequate to the purposes of common life than more pompous and durable volumes.--_Johnson._

Maturin M. Ballou     Pearls of Thought

What once were vices are now the manners of the day.

Seneca.

A quiet hour spent alone with God at the beginning of the day is the best beginning for the toils and cares of active business. A brief season of prayer, looking above for wisdom and grace and strength, and seeking for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, helps us to carry our religion into the business of the day. It brings joy and peace within the heart. And as we place all our concerns in the care and keeping of the Lord, faithfully striving to do His will, we have a joyful trust that however dark or discouraging events may appear, our Father's hand is guiding everything, and will give the wisest direction to all our toils.--_Selected._

Various     Thoughts for the Quiet Hour

The study of the ancient religions of mankind, I feel convinced, if carried on in a bold, but scholarlike, careful, and reverent spirit, will remove many doubts and difficulties which are due entirely to the narrowness of our religious horizon; it will enlarge our sympathies, it will raise our thoughts above the small controversies of the day, and at no distant future evoke in the very heart of Christianity a fresh spirit and a new life.

Friedrich Max Müller     Thoughts on Life and Religion

To have any chance of lasting, a book must satisfy, not merely some fleeting fancy of the day, but a constant longing and hunger of human nature.

_Lowell._

A fresh mind keeps the body fresh. Take in the ideas of the day, drain off those of yesterday. As to the morrow, time enough to consider it when it becomes to-day.--_Bulwer-Lytton._

Maturin M. Ballou     Pearls of Thought

Sometimes I wish I could step outside of myself for a while. I want to leave this worn body behind, but my chains are too many, my weights too heavy. This life is all that’s left of me. And I know I won’t be able to meet myself in the mirror for the rest of the day.

Tahereh Mafi

The counsels of impatience and hatred can always be supported by the crudest and cheapest symbols; for the counsels of moderation, the reasons are often intricate, rather than emotional, and difficult to explain. And so the chauvinists of all times and places go their appointed way: plucking the easy fruits, reaping the little triumphs of the day at the expense of someone else tomorrow, deluging in noise and filth anyone who gets in their way, dancing their reckless dance on the prospects for human progress, drawing the shadow of a great doubt over the validity of democratic institutions. And until people learn to spot the fanning of mass emotions and the sowing of bitterness, suspicion, and intolerance as crimes in themselves — as perhaps the greatest disservice that can be done to the cause of popular government — this sort of thing will continue to occur.

George F. Kennan

It was the sense of an overpowering truth which led to the admission of a revelation. But while in the beginning truth made revelation, it soon came to pass that revelation was supposed to make truth. When we see this happening in every part of the world, when we can watch the psychological progress which leads in the most natural way to a belief in supernatural inspiration, it will hardly be said that an historical study of religion may be useful to the antiquarian, but cannot help us to solve the burning questions of the day.

Friedrich Max Müller     Thoughts on Life and Religion

One must not swerve in one's self, not even a hair's breadth from the highest maxims of art and life; but in empiricism, in the movement of the day, I would rather allow what is mediocre to pass than mistake the good, or even find fault with it.

_Goethe._

Choose a word that will guide you for the rest of the day.

Rachel Rofe

T-shirt of the Day:

    Head for the Mountains

        -- courtesy Anheuser-Busch beer

Followup T-shirt of the Day (on the same scenic background):

    If you liked the mountains, head for the Busch!

        -- courtesy someone else

Fortune Cookie

Afternoon, n.:

    That part of the day we spend worrying about how we wasted the morning.

Fortune Cookie

Norbert Weiner was the subject of many dotty professor stories.  Weiner was, in

fact, very absent minded.  The following story is told about him: when they

moved from Cambridge to Newton his wife, knowing that he would be absolutely

useless on the move, packed him off to MIT while she directed the move.  Since

she was certain that he would forget that they had moved and where they had

moved to, she wrote down the new address on a piece of paper, and gave it to

him.  Naturally, in the course of the day, an insight occurred to him.  He

reached in his pocket, found a piece of paper on which he furiously scribbled

some notes, thought it over, decided there was a fallacy in his idea, and

threw the piece of paper away.  At the end of the day he went home (to the

old address in Cambridge, of course).  When he got there he realized that they

had moved, that he had no idea where they had moved to, and that the piece of

paper with the address was long gone.  Fortunately inspiration struck.  There

was a young girl on the street and he conceived the idea of asking her where

he had moved to, saying, "Excuse me, perhaps you know me.  I'm Norbert Weiner

and we've just moved.  Would you know where we've moved to?"  To which the

young girl replied, "Yes, Daddy, Mommy thought you would forget."

    The capper to the story is that I asked his daughter (the girl in the

story) about the truth of the story, many years later.  She said that it wasn't

quite true -- that he never forgot who his children were!  The rest of it,

however, was pretty close to what actually happened...

        -- Richard Harter

Fortune Cookie

You know the great thing about TV?  If something important happens

anywhere at all in the world, no matter what time of the day or night,

you can always change the channel.

        -- Jim Ignatowski

Fortune Cookie

Mountain Dew and doughnuts...  because breakfast is the most important meal

>of the day.

Fortune Cookie

Tip of the Day:

    Never fry bacon in the nude.

    [Correction: always fry bacon in the nude; you'll learn not to burn it]

Fortune Cookie

It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a

statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious

to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look,

which morally we can do.  To affect the quality of the day, that is the

highest of arts. Every man is tasked to make his life, even in its details,

worthy of the contemplation of his most elevated and critical hour.

        -- Henry David Thoreau, "Where I Live"

Fortune Cookie

T-shirt Of The Day:

    I'm the person your mother warned you about.

Fortune Cookie

Unless hours were cups of sack, and minutes capons, and clocks the tongues

of bawds, and dials the signs of leaping houses, and the blessed sun himself

a fair, hot wench in flame-colored taffeta, I see no reason why thou shouldst

be so superfluous to demand the time of the day.  I wasted time and now doth

time waste me.

        -- William Shakespeare

Fortune Cookie

The Worst American Poet

    Julia Moore, "the Sweet Singer of Michigan" (1847-1920) was so bad that

Mark Twain said her first book gave him joy for 20 years.

    Her verse was mainly concerned with violent death -- the great fire

of Chicago and the yellow fever epidemic proved natural subjects for her pen.

    Whether death was by drowning, by fits or by runaway sleigh, the

formula was the same:

        Have you heard of the dreadful fate

        Of Mr. P. P. Bliss and wife?

        Of their death I will relate,

        And also others lost their life

        (in the) Ashbula Bridge disaster,

        Where so many people died.

    Even if you started out reasonably healthy in one of Julia's poems,

the chances are that after a few stanzas you would be at the bottom of a

river or struck by lightning.  A critic of the day said she was "worse than

a Gatling gun" and in one slim volume counted 21 killed and 9 wounded.

    Incredibly, some newspapers were critical of her work, even

suggesting that the sweet singer was "semi-literate".  Her reply was

forthright: "The Editors that has spoken in this scandalous manner have went

beyond reason."  She added that "literary work is very difficult to do".

        -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"

Fortune Cookie

At each hour of the day three supplementary strokes sound from the church bell of the convent. At this signal prioress, vocal mothers, professed nuns, lay-sisters, novices, postulants, interrupt what they are saying, what they are doing, or what they are thinking, and all say in unison if it is five o'clock, for instance, "At five o'clock and at all hours praised and adored be the most Holy Sacrament of the altar!" If it is eight o'clock, "At eight o'clock and at all hours!" and so on, according to the hour.

Victor Hugo     Les Miserables

18:1. And the Lord appeared to him in the vale of Mambre as he was sitting at the door of his tent, in the very heat of the day.

THE BOOK OF GENESIS     OLD TESTAMENT

We must come to the biblical conviction that the forgiveness of our sins is not just some “heavenly bookkeeping” that will enable us to slip into heaven some day; God’s forgiveness is a present reality that enables us to concentrate on walking daily with a loving and accepting God who desires to live through us.

Bob George

"Leave me--go!" The young girl kissed her grandmother, and left with her handkerchief to her eyes; at the door she found the valet de chambre, who told her that the doctor was waiting in the dining-room. Valentine instantly ran down. The doctor was a friend of the family, and at the same time one of the cleverest men of the day, and very fond of Valentine, whose birth he had witnessed. He had himself a daughter about her age, but whose life was one continued source of anxiety and fear to him from her mother having been consumptive.

Alexandre Dumas, Pere     The Count of Monte Cristo

It seemed that somewhat late on the afternoon of the day previous, while three of the stranger's boats were engaged with a shoal of whales, which had led them some four or five miles from the ship; and while they were yet in swift chase to windward, the white hump and head of Moby Dick had suddenly loomed up out of the water, not very far to leeward; whereupon, the fourth rigged boat--a reserved one--had been instantly lowered in chase. After a keen sail before the wind, this fourth boat--the swiftest keeled of all--seemed to have succeeded in fastening--at least, as well as the man at the mast-head could tell anything about it. In the distance he saw the diminished dotted boat; and then a swift gleam of bubbling white water; and after that nothing more; whence it was concluded that the stricken whale must have indefinitely run away with his pursuers, as often happens. There was some apprehension, but no positive alarm, as yet. The recall signals were placed in the rigging; darkness came on; and forced to pick up her three far to windward boats--ere going in quest of the fourth one in the precisely opposite direction--the ship had not only been necessitated to leave that boat to its fate till near midnight, but, for the time, to increase her distance from it. But the rest of her crew being at last safe aboard, she crowded all sail--stunsail on stunsail--after the missing boat; kindling a fire in her try-pots for a beacon; and every other man aloft on the look-out. But though when she had thus sailed a sufficient distance to gain the presumed place of the absent ones when last seen; though she then paused to lower her spare boats to pull all around her; and not finding anything, had again dashed on; again paused, and lowered her boats; and though she had thus continued doing till daylight; yet not the least glimpse of the missing keel had been seen.

Herman Melville     Moby Dick; or The Whale

His tale had occupied the whole day, and the sun was upon the verge of the horizon when he departed. I knew that I ought to hasten my descent towards the valley, as I should soon be encompassed in darkness; but my heart was heavy, and my steps slow. The labour of winding among the little paths of the mountain and fixing my feet firmly as I advanced perplexed me, occupied as I was by the emotions which the occurrences of the day had produced. Night was far advanced when I came to the halfway resting-place and seated myself beside the fountain. The stars shone at intervals as the clouds passed from over them; the dark pines rose before me, and every here and there a broken tree lay on the ground; it was a scene of wonderful solemnity and stirred strange thoughts within me. I wept bitterly, and clasping my hands in agony, I exclaimed, "Oh! Stars and clouds and winds, ye are all about to mock me; if ye really pity me, crush sensation and memory; let me become as nought; but if not, depart, depart, and leave me in darkness."

Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley     Frankenstein

When the reading of Denisov's virulent reply, which took more than an hour, was over, Rostov said nothing, and he spent the rest of the day in a most dejected state of mind amid Denisov's hospital comrades, who had gathered round him, telling them what he knew and listening to their stories. Denisov was moodily silent all the evening.

Leo Tolstoy     War and Peace

"And you are quite right," said the notary, who feared to lose his fee. "It is a charming place, well supplied with spring-water and fine trees; a comfortable habitation, although abandoned for a long time, without reckoning the furniture, which, although old, is yet valuable, now that old things are so much sought after. I suppose the count has the tastes of the day?"

Alexandre Dumas, Pere     The Count of Monte Cristo

Suddenly and simultaneously a crowd of memories awoke in his fancy--of the look Platon had given him as he sat under the tree, of the shot heard from that spot, of the dog's howl, of the guilty faces of the two Frenchmen as they ran past him, of the lowered and smoking gun, and of Karataev's absence at this halt--and he was on the point of realizing that Karataev had been killed, but just at that instant, he knew not why, the recollection came to his mind of a summer evening he had spent with a beautiful Polish lady on the veranda of his house in Kiev. And without linking up the events of the day or drawing a conclusion from them, Pierre closed his eyes, seeing a vision of the country in summertime mingled with memories of bathing and of the liquid, vibrating globe, and he sank into water so that it closed over his head.

Leo Tolstoy     War and Peace

He gave his arm to his daughter, and took her down-stairs to the chariot which Mr. Lorry had hired in honour of the day. The rest followed in another carriage, and soon, in a neighbouring church, where no strange eyes looked on, Charles Darnay and Lucie Manette were happily married.

Charles Dickens     A Tale of Two Cities

The Parish Priest, of austerity, Climbed up in the high church steeple To be nearer God, that he might hand His word down to the people. And in sermon script he daily wrote What he thought was sent from heaven; And he dropped it down on the people's heads Two times one day in seven. In his age God said, "Come down and die." And he cried out from the steeple: "Where art thou, Lord?" And the Lord replied: "Down here among My people."--_Selected._

Various     Thoughts for the Quiet Hour

Index: