Dross Quotes - Page 2

• the unconscious of an artist is her greatest treasure. It is what transmutes the dross of autobiography into the gold of myth.

  Erica Jong

  Artist, Greatest Treasure, Gold

  Erica Jong (2007). “What Do Women Want?: Essays by Erica Jong”, p.53, Penguin

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• The man who dies leaving behind him millions of available wealth, which was his to administer during his life, will pass away unwept, unhonoured and insung no matter to what uses he leaves the dross which he cannot take with him.

  Andrew Carnegie

  Men, Leaving, Passing Away

  "The Gospel of Wealth and Other Timely Essays". Book by Andrew Carnegie, 1900.

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• From the earliest times man has been engaged in a search for general rules whereby to turn the order of natural phenomena to his own advantage, and in the long search he has scraped together a great hoard of such maxims, some of them golden and some of them mere dross. The true or golden rules constitute the body of applied science which we call the arts; the false are magic.

  James G. Frazer

  Art, Men, Order

  "The Golden Bough: A Study in Comparative Religion". Book by James G. Frazer, 1890.

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• At last, Mythic feeling and conscious perception no longer confront each other as antagonists but as allies. Passionate nationalism is no longer directed toward tribal, dynastic or theological loyalties, but toward that primal substance, the racially based nationhood itself. Here is the message which will one day melt away all dross, eliminate all that is base, and bring into being all that is noble.

  Alfred Rosenberg

  Loyalty, Feelings, Perception

  "The Myth of the Twentieth Century". Book by Alfred Rosenberg, p. 45, 1930.

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• Writing is alchemy. Dross becomes gold. Experience is transformed. Pain is changed. Suffering may become song. The ordinary or horrible is pushed by the will of the writer into grace or redemption, a prophetic wail, a screed for justice, an elegy of sadness or sorrow. ... There is always a tension between experience and the thing that finally carries it forward, bears its weight, holds it in. Without that tension, one might as well write a shopping list.

  Andrea Dworkin

  Song, Pain, Writing

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• Television in the 1960s & 70s had just as much dross and the programmes were a lot more tediously patronising than they are now. Memory truncates occasional gems into a glittering skein of brilliance. More television, more channels means more good television and, of course, more bad. The same equation applies to publishing, film and, I expect, sumo wrestling.

  A. A. Gill

  Memories, Mean, Wrestling

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• On the whole, however, the critic is far less of a professional faultfinder than is sometimes imagined. He is first of all a virtue-finder, a singer of praise. He is not concerned with getting rid of dross except in so far as it hides the gold. In other words, the destructive side of criticism is purely a subsidiary affair. None of the best critics have been men of destructive minds. They are like gardeners whose business is more with the flowers than with the weeds.

  Robert Wilson Lynd

  Weed, Flower, Men

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• There is a tradition of television which isn't dross and stands up. Betjeman's programmes, which were made for 2/6d with one man and a cine camera, were amazing to watch because he was such a great talker.

  Jonathan Meades

  Men, Television, Cameras

  Source: thequietus.com

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• The day is not far distant when the man who dies leaving behind him millions of available wealth, which was free for him to administer during life, will pass away unwept, unhonored, and unsung, no matter to what uses he leave the dross which he cannot take with him. Of such as these the public verdict will then be: The man who dies thus rich dies disgraced. Such, in my opinion, is the true gospel concerning wealth, obedience to which is destined some day to solve the problem of the rich and the poor.

  Andrew Carnegie

  Men, Leaving, Passing Away

  "The Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie and His Essay The Gospel of Wealth". Book by Andrew Carnegie, 2014.

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• The scholar only knows how dear these silent, yet eloquent, companions of pure thoughts and innocent hours become in the season of adversity. When all that is worldly turns to dross around us, these only retain their steady value.

  Washington Irving

  Adversity, Silent, Innocent

  Washington Irving (1835). “The complete works of Washington Irving in one volume with a memoir of the author”, p.230

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• The disembodied soul does not part with Nature when it leaves the earth; life but, rather, it rises to a plane of Nature which is fuller, richer and sweeter in every way than the best of which the earth dwelling soul dreams. The dross of materiality burned away by the astral vibrations, the soul blossoms and bears spiritual fruit in the new life.

  William Walker Atkinson

  Dream, Spiritual, Earth Life

  Yogi Ramacharaka, William Walker Atkinson “The Spiritual Writings”, Jazzybee Verlag

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• It is a kind and wise arrangement of Providence that weaves our sorrows into the elements of character and that all the disappointments, and conflicts, and afflictions of life may, if rightly used, become the means of improvement, and create in us the sinews of strength.... the dross is left in the crucible, the baser metals are transmuted, and the character is enriched with gold.

  William Morley Punshon

  Wise, Disappointment, Character

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• I barely watch TV apart from the news. Most of it is rubbish. There's all this reality nonsense and dross. I think there's a market for a well-produced, well-written melodrama like 'Dallas.' It's pure entertainment.

  Larry Hagman

  Reality, Thinking, Dallas

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• When a man makes utensils out of a metal which has been thoroughly cleansed of dross, the utensils will be excellent. You monks, who wish to follow the Way, make your own hearts clean from the dirt of evil passion, and your conduct will be unimpeachable.

  Gautama Buddha

  Passion, Heart, Men

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• Fiction, I believed, was the transmutation of experiential dross into linguistic gold. Fiction meant taking up whatever the world had abandoned by the road and making something beautiful out of it.

  Jonathan Franzen

  Beautiful, Gold, Fiction

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• It is not until we have passed through the furnace that we are made to know how much dross there is in our composition.

  Charles Caleb Colton

  Gratitude, Made, Composition

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• Science not only purifies the religious impulse of the dross of its anthropomorphism but also contributes to a religious spiritualization of our understanding of life.

  Albert Einstein

  Religious, Understanding, Anthropomorphism

  Albert Einstein (2011). “Out of My Later Years: The Scientist, Philosopher, and Man Portrayed Through His Own Words”, p.25, Open Road Media

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• Friendship's an abstract of this noble flame, 'Tis love refin'd, and purged from all its dross, 'Tis next to angel's love, if not the same, As strong in passion is, though not so gross.

  Katherine Philips

  Friendship, Strong, Passion

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• You cannot make steel until you have made the iron white-hot in fire. It is not meant for harm. Trouble and disease have a lesson for us. Our painful experiences are not meant to destroy us, but to burn out our dross, to hurry us back Home. No one is more anxious for our release than God.

  Paramahansa Yogananda

  Home, Fire, Painful Experiences

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• Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us; The beggar is taxed for a corner to die in, The priest hath his fee who comes and shrives us, We bargain for the graves we lie in; Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold... 'T is heaven alone that is given away, 'T is only God may be had for the asking; There is no price set on the lavish summer, And June may be had by the poorest comer.

  James Russell Lowell

  Summer, Money, Lying

  James Russell Lowell, Nathan Haskell Dole (1893). “The Early Poems of James Russell Lowell: With Biographical Sketch”

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• What if we have more of the rough file, if we have less rust! Afflictions carry away nothing but the dross of sin.

  Thomas Watson

  Christian, What If, Rust

  Thomas Watson (2015). “All Things for Good”, p.18, Ravenio Books

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• It is hard to know what other way men can come to truth, to lay hold of it, if they do not dig and search for it as for gold and hid treasure; but he that does so, must have much earth and rubbish, before he gets the pure metal; sand, and pebbles, and dross usually lie blended with it, but the gold is nevertheless gold, and will enrich the man that employs his pains to seek and separate it.

  John Locke

  Pain, Lying, Men

  John Locke (1727). “The Works of John Locke”, p.392

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• At the devil's booth are all things sold. Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold.

  James Russell Lowell

  Devil, Gold, Cost

  James Russell Lowell (2016). “Delphi Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell (Illustrated)”, p.282, Delphi Classics

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• Yet this perhaps is what love does, or the memory of it; it sucks the life from the living, glorying body and leaves it, when love has gone, a shred, a simulacrum - dross, to be swept up from the factory floor, pitiful and dusty, useless... Do all men and women feel love before they die? This force, this source of light, that lies before the sun; glances off mountains and lakes, blinding and dazzling, on a Sunday afternoon; so brilliant you have to guard your soul, fold your arms to shield your heart from the very memory of it.

  Fay Weldon

  Memories, Lying, Heart

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• More people have more access to more readers for less money than ever before in history. It means a lot of dross; but it means a lot of very talented people can find and nurture a readership in ways that were not possible twenty years ago. From a creative perspective, that is all that writing is about.

  John Hodgman

  Writing, Mean, Years

  "The Exchange: John Hodgman". Interview with Thessaly La Force, www.newyorker.com. November 11, 2008.

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