I see many contrary religions, and consequently all false but one. Each wishes to be believed on its own authority, and menaces the unbeliever, but I do not therefore believe them. Every one can say the same, and every one can call himself a prophet. But I see the Christian religion fulfilling prophecy, and that is what every one can not do.
L'orgueil ne veut pas devoir, et l'amour-propre ne veut pas payer=--Pride wishes not to owe, and self-love does not wish to pay.
Vanity is so anchored in the heart of man that a soldier, a soldier's servant, a cook, a porter brags and wishes to have his admirers. Even philosophers wish for them. Those who write against it want to have the glory of having written well; and those who read it desire the glory of having read it. I who write this have perhaps this desire, and perhaps those who will read it...
One ought to love society if he wishes to enjoy solitude. It is a social nature that solitude works upon with the most various power. If one is misanthropic, and betakes himself to loneliness that he may get away from hateful things, solitude is a silent emptiness to him.--_Zimmermann._
Let him who wishes to see how the soul inhabits its body observe what use the body makes of its daily habitation; that is to say, if the soul is full of confusion and disorder the body will be kept in disorder and confusion by the soul.
Though peace be in every man's wishes, yet the qualifications and predispositions necessary for procuring and preserving it are the care of very few.
Be sure that if you are unhappily celebrated for either beauty, wit, intellect, or all three together, half society wishes you dead already, and the other half tries to make you as wretched as possible while you are alive.
Laus magna natis obsequi parentibus=--Great praise is the meed of children who respect the wishes of their parents.
The woman who really wishes to refuse contents herself with saying No. She who explains wants to be convinced.--_Alfred de Musset._
Youth is not the age of pleasure; we then expect too much, and we are therefore exposed to daily disappointments and mortifications. When we are a little older, and have brought down our wishes to our experience, then we become calm and begin to enjoy ourselves.
Every one is poorer in proportion as he has more wants, and counts not what he has, but wishes only what he has not.
To be introduced into a decent company, there is need of a dress cut according to the taste of the public to which one wishes to present one's self.
Chi vuol presto e ben, faccia da se=--He who wishes a thing done quickly and well, must do it himself.
I shall never rise to the point of view which wishes to "raise" faith to knowledge. To me, the way of truth is to come through the knowledge of my ignorance to the submissiveness of faith, and then, making that my starting-place, to raise my knowledge into faith. Natural Law, Introduction, p. 28. Quotation from Beck: Bib. Psychol.
Virtue alone can procure that independence which is the end of human wishes.
Nam dives qui fieri vult, / Et cito vult fieri=--He who wishes to become rich wishes to become so quickly too.
Happy is he who soon discovers the chasm that lies between his wishes and his powers.
Beneath the makeup and behind the smile I am just a girl who wishes for the world.
If the painter wishes to see beautiful things which will enchant him he is able to beget them; if he wishes to see monstrous things which terrify, or grotesque and laughable things, or truly piteous things, he can dispose of all these; if he wishes to evoke places and deserts, shady or dark retreats in the hot season, he represents them, and likewise warm places in the cold season. If he wishes valleys, if he wishes to descry a great {91} plain from the high summits of the mountains, and if he wishes after this to see the horizon of the sea, he can do so; and from the low valleys he can gaze on the high mountains, or from the high mountains he can scan the low valleys and shores; and in truth all quantities of things that exist in the universe, either real or imaginary, he has first in his mind and then in his hands; and these things are of so great excellence that they beget a harmonious concord in one glance, as do the things of nature.
When one is in love, one wishes to be in fetters.
Desir de Dieu et desir de l'homme sont deux=--What God wishes and man wishes are two different things.
Quotes by people born this day, already used as QOTD: Truth can never be told so as to be understood and not be believed.
Every man wishes to amass money in order to give it to the physicians who are the destroyers of life; they ought therefore to be rich.
Mere wishes are bony fishes.
Hides from himself his state, and shuns to know That life protracted is protracted woe.
Laudat venales qui vult extrudere merces=--He praises his wares who wishes to palm them off upon others.
It is the ambiguous distracted training which they are subject to that makes men uncertain; it awakens wishes when it should quicken tendencies.
O blicke nicht nach dem was jedem fehlt; / Betrachte, was noch einem jeden bleibt=--O look not at what each comes short in; consider what each still retains. _Goethe._ [Greek: ho bouletai, touth' hekastos kai oietai]--What each one wishes that he also thinks.
How sleep the brave who sink to rest By all their country's wishes bless'd!
Do not interrupt the flight of your soul; do not distress what is best in you; do not enfeeble your spirit with half wishes and half thoughts. Ask yourself and keep on asking until you find the answer, for one may have known something many times, acknowledged it; one may have willed something many times, attempted it — and yet, only the deep inner motion, only the heart's indescribable emotion, only that will convince you that what you have acknowledged belongs to you, that no power can take it from you — for only the truth that builds up is truth for you.
Whom Fortune wishes to destroy she first makes mad.
Quem Jupiter vult perdere dementat prius=--Him whom Jupiter wishes to ruin, he first infatuates.
Behold our refutation of the error. It is not based on documents of faith, but on the reasons and statements of the philosophers themselves. If then anyone there be who, boastfully taking pride in his supposed wisdom, wishes to challenge what we have written, let him not do it in some corner nor before children who are powerless to decide on such difficult matters. Let him reply openly if he dare. He shall find me there confronting him, and not only my negligible self, but many another whose study is truth. We shall do battle with his errors or bring a cure to his ignorance. [St. Thomas Aquinas in response to Siger of Brabant’s attempt to base the law on faith rather than reason. Quoted in G. K. Chesterton, Saint Thomas Aquinas: The “Dumb Ox.” New York: Doubleday and Company, 1956, 94.]
A man of the world must seem to be what he wishes to be.
True love 's the gift which God has given To man alone beneath the heaven: It is not fantasy's hot fire, Whose wishes soon as granted fly; It liveth not in fierce desire, With dead desire it doth not die; It is the secret sympathy, The silver link, the silken tie, Which heart to heart and mind to mind In body and in soul can bind.
He whose son is obedient to him, whose wife's conduct is in accordance with his wishes, and who is content with his riches has his heaven here on earth.
No man at the head of affairs always wishes to be explicit.
Great minds have purposes, others have wishes. Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortunes; but great minds rise above them.
It is natural to a man to believe what he wishes to be true, and to believe it because be wishes it.
~Impossibility.~--One great difference between a wise man and a fool is, the former only wishes for what he may possibly obtain; the latter desires impossibilities.--_Democritus._
If people would only learn to see that there is really a religion beyond all religions, that each man must have his own religion which he has conquered for himself, and that we must learn to tolerate religion wherever we find it! Christianity would be a perfect religion, if it did not go beyond the simple words of Christ, and if, even in these words, we made full allowance for the time and place and circumstances in which they were spoken--that is, if we simply followed Christ where He wishes us to follow Him. We have gone far beyond those times and circumstances in many things, but in what is most essential we are still far behind the teaching of Christ. How many call themselves Christians who have no idea how difficult it is to be a Christian, a follower of Christ! It is easy enough to repeat creeds, and to work ourselves into a frame of mind when miracles seem most easy.
The popular man stands on our own level, or a hairsbreadth higher; and shows us a truth we can see without shifting our present intellectual position. The original man stands above us, and wishes to wrench us from our old fixtures, and elevate us to a higher and clearer level.
How comes it that this man, distressed at the death of his wife and his only son, or who has some great and embarrassing law suit, is not at this moment sad, and that he appears so free from all painful and distressing thoughts? We need not be astonished, for a ball has just been served to him, and he must return it to his opponent. His whole thoughts are fixed on taking it as it falls from the pent-house, to win a chase; and you cannot ask that he should think on his business, having this other affair in hand. Here is a care worthy of occupying this great soul, and taking away from him every other thought of the mind. This man, born to know the Universe, to judge of all things, to rule a State, is altogether occupied and filled with the business of catching a hare. And if he will not abase himself to this, and wishes always to be highly strung, he will only be more foolish still, because he wishes to raise himself above humanity; yet when all is said and done he is only a man, that is to say capable of little and of much, of all and of nothing. He is neither angel nor brute, but man.
Wer ist der Weiseste? Der nichts anders weiss und will, als das was begegnet=--Who is the wisest man? He who neither knows nor wishes for anything else than what happens.
Our ambiguous dissipating education awakens wishes when it should be animating tendencies; instead of forwarding our real capacities, it turns our efforts towards objects which are frequently discordant with the mind that aims at them.
1745.) Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison.
The civilised nation consists broadly of mob, money-collecting machine, and capitalist; and when the mob wishes to spend money for any purpose, it sets its money-collecting machine to borrow the money it needs from the capitalist, who lends it on condition of taxing the mob generation after generation.
Let him leave the imperial court, who wishes to be virtuous. Virtue and absolute power cannot coexist. ( Exeat aula, qui vult esse pius. Virtus et summa potestas non c?unt .) [ Pharsalia , VIII, 493.]
Not because I couldn’t find God, but because suddenly I absolutely did: God was there, I realized, and God had no intention of making things happen or not, of saving my mother’s life. God was not a granter of wishes. God was a ruthless bitch.
~Influence.~--He who wishes to exert a useful influence must be careful to insult nothing. Let him not be troubled by what seems absurd, but let him consecrate his energies to the creation of what is good. He must not demolish, but build. He must raise temples where mankind may come and partake of the purest pleasures.--_Goethe._
Whoever wishes to keep a secret must hide from us that he possesses one.
For glances beget ogles, ogles sighs, / Sighs wishes, wishes words, and words a letter; / And then God knows what mischief may arise / When love links two young people in one fetter.
The statesman wishes to steer, while the politician is satisfied to drift.
Superfluous lags the veteran on the stage.
Nature has ordained for man the ministering {29} muscles which exercise the sinews, and by means of which the limbs can be moved according to the will and desire of the brain, like to officers distributed by a ruler over many provinces and towns, who represent their ruler in these places, and obey his will. And this officer, who will in a single instance have most faithfully obeyed the orders he received from his master by word of mouth, will afterwards, in a similar way, of his own accord fulfil the wishes of his master.
The imagination does not perceive such excellent things as the eye, because the eye receives the images or semblances from objects, and transmits them to the perception, and from thence to the brain; and there they are comprehended. But the imagination does not issue forth from the brain, with the exception of that part of it which is transmitted to the memory, and in the brain it remains and dies, if the thing imagined is not of high quality. And in this case poetry is formed in the mind or in the imagination of the poet, who depicts the same objects as the painter, and by reason of the work of his fancy he wishes to rival the painter, but in reality he is greatly inferior to him, as we have shown above. Therefore with regard to the work of fancy we will say that there is the same proportion between the art of painting and that of poetry as exists between the body and the shadow proceeding from it, and the proportion is still greater, inasmuch as the shadow of such a body at least penetrates to {122} the brain through the eye, but the imaginative embodiment of such a body does not enter into the eye, but is born in the dark brain. Ah! What difference there is between imagining such a light in the darkness of the brain and seeing it in concrete shape set free from all darkness.
No man is good but as he wishes the good of others.
Quicquid agunt homines, votum, timor, ira, voluptas, / Gaudia, discursus, nostri est farrago libelli=--Whatever men are engaged in, their wishes and fear, anger, pleasures, joys, runnings to and fro, form the medley of my book.
There is one who having promised me much less than his due, and being disappointed of his presumptuous desire, has tried to deprive me of all my friends; and finding them wise and not pliable to his will, he has threatened me that he would bring accusations against me and alienate my benefactors from me: hence I have informed Your Lordship of this, so that this man, who wishes to sow the usual scandals, may not find a soil fit for sowing the thoughts and deeds of his evil nature; and that when he tries to make Your Lordship the tool of his infamous and malicious nature he may be disappointed of his desire.
We often wish most for our friends when they are absent. Even in married life love is not diminished by distance. A man, like a burning-glass, should be placed at a certain distance from the object he wishes to dissolve, in order that the proper focus may be obtained.--_Richter._
Humility is the altar upon which God wishes that we should offer Him His sacrifices.
In the Name of Allah the Merciful, the Compassionate, Who manifests Himself through everything, the revelation of a clear knowing to whomsoever He wishes, peace be upon you, my son. This praise belongs to Allah Who manifests Himself on the head of a pin to whom He wishes, so that one testifies that He is not, and another testifies that there is none other than He. But the witnessing in the denying of Him is not rejected, and the witnessing in the affirming of Him is not praised.
Notwithstanding these miseries, man wishes to be happy, and wishes for happiness only; unable to wish otherwise, he knows not how to gain happiness. For this he must needs make himself immortal; but unable to effect this, he sets himself to avoid the thought of death.
We take a great deal for granted in this world, and expect that everything, as a matter of course, ought to fit into our humours, wishes, and wants; it is often only when danger threatens that we awake to the discovery that the guiding reins are held by one whom we had well-nigh forgotten in our careless ease.
Ever take it for granted that man collectively wishes that which is right; but take care never to think so of one!
Les honneurs coutent a qui veut les posseder=--Honours are dearly bought by whoever wishes to possess them.
Society wishes to be amused. I do not wish to be amused. I wish that life should not be cheap, but sacred; the days to be as centuries, loaded, fragrant.
You may say, "I wish to send this ball so as to kill the lion crouching yonder ready to spring upon me. My wishes are all right, and I hope Providence will direct the ball." Providence won't. You must do it; and if you do not, you are a dead man.
It seemed that hell could appear day or night, at any time, at any place, simply in response to one's thoughts or wishes. It seemed that we could summon it at our pleasure and that instantly it would appear.
Vieles wunscht sich der Mensch, und doch bedarf er nur wenig; / Denn die Tage sind kurz, und beschrankt der Sterblichen Schicksal=--Much wishes man for himself, and yet needs he but little; for the days are short, and limited is the fate of mortals.
If a man wishes to become rich, he must appear rich.
To which we reply that none of these things of which he speaks is his true profession; but if he wishes to speak and make orations, it can be shown that he is surpassed by the orator in this province; and if he speaks of astrology, that he has stolen the subject of the astrologer; and in the case of philosophy, of the philosopher; and that in reality poetry has no true position and merits no more consideration than a shopkeeper {77} who collects goods made by various workmen. As soon as the poet ceases to represent by means of words the phenomena of nature, he then ceases to act as a painter, because if the poet leaves such representation and describes the flowery and persuasive speech of him to whom he wishes to give speech, he then becomes an orator, and neither a poet nor a painter; and if he speaks of the heavens he becomes an astrologer, and a philosopher and a theologian if he discourses of nature or God; but if he returns to the description of any object he would rival the painter, if with words he could satisfy the eye as the painter does.
Were a man of pleasure to arrive at the full extent of his several wishes, he must immediately feel himself miserable.
Mille hominum species et rerum discolor usus; / Velle suum cuique est, nec voto vivitur uno=--There are a thousand kinds of men, and different hues they give to things; each one follows his own inclination, nor do they all agree in their wishes.
They told us not to wish in the first place, not to aspire, not to try; to be quiet, to play nice, to shoot low and aspire not at all. They are always wrong. Follow your dreams. Make your wishes. Create the future. And above all, believe in yourself.
God, to procure His glory, sometimes permits that we should be dishonored and persecuted without reason. He wishes thereby to render us conformable to His Son, who was calumniated and treated as a seducer, as an ambitious man, and as one possessed.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
Mundus vult decipi; ergo decipiatur=--The world wishes to be deceived; therefore let it be deceived.
The poorest human soul is infinite in wishes, and the infinite universe was not made for one, but for all.
There mark what ills the scholar's life assail,-- Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail.
An age that melts in unperceiv'd decay, And glides in modest innocence away.
We should abandon ourselves entirely into the hands of God, and believe that His providence disposes everything that He wishes or permits to happen to us for our greater good.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
The just man acts by faith in the smallest things; when he blames his servants, he wishes for their conversion by the spirit of God, and prays God to correct them; for he expects as much from God as from his own blame, and he prays God to bless his corrections. And so with all his other actions.
There is some help for all the defects of fortune; for if a man cannot attain to the length of his wishes, he may have his remedy by cutting of them shorter.--_Cowley._
He who wishes to find Jesus will do so only by having recourse to Mary.--ST. ALPHONSUS.
We will say, therefore, that poetry is an art which is supremely potent for the blind, and the painting has the same result on the deaf. Painting, therefore, excels poetry in proportion as the sense to which it ministers is the nobler. The only true function of the poet is to represent the words of people who talk among each other, and these alone he represents to the hearing as if they were natural, because they are natural in themselves and created by the human voice; and in all other respects he is surpassed by the painter. Still more, incomparably greater is the width of range of painting than that of speech, because the painter can accomplish an infinity of things which speech will not be able to name for want of the appropriate terms. And seest thou not that if the painter wishes to depict animals and devils in Hell with what richness of invention he proceeds?
It has been my conviction ever since reading Rauschenbusch that any religion which professes to be concerned about the souls of men and is not concerned about the social and economic conditions that scar the soul, is a spiritually moribund religion only waiting for the day to be buried. [“Pilgrimage to Nonviolence,” excerpted from Stride Toward Freedom , 1958.] I had also learned that the inseparable twin of racial injustice was economic injustice. Although I came from a home of economic security and relative comfort, I could never get out of my mind the economic insecurity of many of my playmates and the tragic poverty of those living around me. During my late teens I worked two summers, against my father’s wishes–he never wanted my brother and me to work around white people because of the oppressive conditions–in a plant that hired both Negroes and whites. Here I saw economic injustice firsthand, and realized that the poor white was exploited just as much as the Negro. Through these early experiences I grew up deeply conscious of the varieties of injustice in our society. [ Ibid. ] Man is not made for the state; the state is made for man. To deprive man of freedom is to relegate him to the status of a thing, rather than elevate him to the status of a person. Man must never be treated as a means to the end of the state, but always as an end within himself. [ Ibid. ] T]ruth is found neither in Marxism nor in traditional capitalism. Each represents a partial truth. Historically capitalism failed to see the truth in collective enterprise, and Marxism failed to see the truth in individual enterprise. Nineteenth century capitalism failed to see that life is social and Marxism failed and still fails to see that life is individual and personal. The Kingdom of God is neither the thesis of individual enterprise nor the antithesis of collective enterprise, but a synthesis which reconciles the truths of both. [ Ibid. ] With all of its false assumptions and evil methods, communism grew as a protest against the hardships of the underprivileged. Communism in theory emphasized a classless society, and a concern for social justice, though the world knows from sad experience that in practice it created new classes and a new lexicon of injustice. [ Ibid. ] [C]apitalism is always in danger of inspiring men to be more concerned about making a living than making a life. We are prone to judge success by the index of our salaries or the size of our automobiles, rather than by the quality of our service and relationship to humanity-thus capitalism can lead to a practical materialism that is as pernicious as the materialism taught by communism. [ Ibid. ] Personalism’s insistence that only personality-finite and infinite-is ultimately real strengthened me in two convictions: it gave me metaphysical and philosophical grounding for the idea of a personal God, and it gave me a metaphysical basis for the dignity and worth of all human personality. [ Ibid. ] A sixth basic fact about nonviolent resistance is that it is based on the conviction that the universe is on the side of justice. Consequently, the believer in nonviolence has deep faith in the future. This faith is another reason why the nonviolent resister can accept suffering without retaliation. For he knows that in his struggle for justice he has cosmic companionship. It is true that there are devout believers in nonviolence who find it difficult to believe in a personal God. But even these persons believe in the existence of some creative force that works for universal wholeness. Whether we call it an unconscious process, an impersonal Brahman, or a Personal Being of matchless power and infinite love, there is a creative force in this universe that works to bring the disconnected aspects of reality into a harmonious whole. [ Ibid. ] [A]gape means recognition of the fact that all life is interrelated. All humanity is involved in a single process, and all men are brothers. To the degree that I harm my brother, no matter what he is doing to me, to that extent I am harming myself. [ Ibid. ]