Pessimism Quotes - Page 15

• Naive optimism and pervasive pessimism are both to be avoided, therefore. It's not an easy balance to maintain, to be asked to work away in the Ninevehs of our lives without being so conscious of the coming cataclysm that we are not serious citizens of our communities and nations. By living and sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ, we are doing the most relevant thing we can do by way of helping. (There are civic and other chores to be done, of course.) Day in and day out, the gospel is the one thing that is most relevant, and we are to be of good cheer.

  Neal A. Maxwell

  Life, Jesus, Cheer

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• I think I'm a realist. Which people who don't like me consider to be pessimism. It isn't pessimism at all. If I was a pessimist I wouldn't get up, I wouldn't shave, I wouldn't watch Batman at 7:30 a.m. Pessimists just don't do that sort of thing.

  Steven Morrissey

  Thinking, People, Watches

  "Stop me if you've heard this one before". "NME" Magazine, February 20, 1988.

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• Truth that is naked is the most beautiful, and the simpler its expression the deeper is the impression it makes.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Beautiful, Writing, Expression

  Arthur Schopenhauer (2015). “Essays of Schopenhauer: Top Essays”, p.29, 谷月社

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• I've always said, the key organ here isn't the brain, it's the stomach. When things start to decline - there are bad headlines in the papers and on television - will you have the stomach for the market volatility and the broad-based pessimism that tends to come with it?

  Peter Lynch

  Learning, Keys, History

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• I can UNDERSTAND pessimism, but I don't BELIEVE in it. It's not simply a matter of faith, but of historical EVIDENCE. Not overwhelming evidence, just enough to give HOPE, because for hope we don't need certainty, only POSSIBILITY.

  Howard Zinn

  Believe, Giving, Historical

  Howard Zinn (2011). “The Zinn Reader: Writings on Disobedience and Democracy”, p.709, Seven Stories Press

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• The truth can wait, for it lives a long life.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Long, Waiting, Long Life

  "Willen in der Natur". Book by Arthur Schopenhauer, chapter 'Einleitung', 1836.

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• Every child is in a way a genius; and every genius is in a way a child.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Children, Genius, Way

  "The World as Will and Representation". Book by Arthur Schopenhauer (Bd. 2, § 3.31, p. 451), 1819.

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• All religions promise a reward beyond life, in eternity, for excellences of the will or heart, but none for excellences of the head or understanding.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Heart, Understanding, Promise

  "The World as Will and Idea".

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• There's my pessimism. Because I didn't know yet that type of film is always going to become more extinct, that there won't be anymore. Because there will always be more films that win five Oscars like Terms of Endearment.

  Sergio Leone

  Winning, Oscars, Film

  Interview With Marlaine Glicksman, www.americansuburbx.com. December 28, 2012.

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• To refuse everything, to say, even when there is something which really should be done, "Ah, that's no longer feminist," is a pessimistic, even masochistic tendency in women, the result of having been habituated to inertia, to pessimism.

  Simone de Beauvoir

  Feminist, Done, Pessimistic

  Source: www.iaphitalia.org

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• If a person is stupid, we excuse him by saying that he cannot help it; but if we attempted to excuse in precisely the same way the person who is bad, we should be laughed at.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Stupid, Way, Helping

  Arthur Schopenhauer, E. F. J. Payne (1966). “The World as Will and Representation”, p.230, Courier Corporation

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• The pessimism of the intellect is the starting point for struggle. It's not the end point, it's the starting point. You have to make something critical to make it meaningful, to make it transformative.

  Henry Giroux

  Meaningful, Struggle, Intellect

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• remember to recognize the small successes that you will have. Don't let the brightness of that big goal blind you to what happens on the way toward the goal. Meet one wave at a time and enjoy what progress you make. I want you please not to be taken up in the undertow of pessimism.

  Lucille Ball

  Success, Taken, Goal

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• Pessimism is a product of our civilization. It is not natural to the savage; he feels pain, or discomfort, and suffers from these palpable conditions, but when he recovers from wounds he forgets the torments, and when he is well fed he is joyous in the light of day.

  Arthur Lynch

  Pain, Light, Civilization

  Arthur Lynch (1921). “Moods of Life: Popular Psychological Studies of Affairs of Every Day”

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• The first-rate mind is always curious, compassionate, original, and pessimistic.

  Mignon McLaughlin

  Mind, Firsts, Pessimistic

  Mignon McLaughlin (2014). “Aperçus: The Aphorisms of Mignon McLaughlin”, p.85, BookBaby

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• Finally, develop tenacity and an optimistic outlook. It doesn't mean that everything will always work out or that you won't suffer. But pessimism seems to be designed to force you to suffer before the fact!

  William Foege

  Optimistic, Mean, Work Out

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• People misunderstand happiness. They think it's the absence of trouble. That's not happiness, that's luck. Happiness is the ability to live well alongside trouble. No two people have the same trouble, or the same way of metabolizing it. Q.E.D. - No two happy people are happy in the same way. . . . Every day brilliant people, people smarter than I, wallow in safe tragedy and pessimism, shying from what really takes guts - recognizing how much courage and labor happiness demands.

  Rachel Kadish

  Thinking, Two, People

  Rachel Kadish (2007). “Tolstoy Lied: A Love Story”, p.325, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• It is important to possess a short-term pessimism and a long-term optimism.

  Adrienne Rich

  Long, Optimism, Important

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• The prophet who fails to present a bearable alternative and yet preaches doom is part of the trap that he postulates.

  Margaret Mead

  Alternatives, Failing, Prophet

  Margaret Mead (1970). “Culture and Commitment”

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• Humans will always endure suffering - even accepting the fact that we're going to die will cause us suffering, and from that stems a little pessimism and negativity that all of us are susceptible to.

  Jason Mraz

  Negativity, Suffering, Facts

  Source: www.timeout.com

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• Now the pessimist proper is the most modest of men. ... under no circumstances does he presume to imagine that he, a mere unit of pain, can in any degree change or soften the remorseless words of fate.

  Agnes Repplier

  Pain, Fate, Men

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• Pessimism like calumny is easy to do, and attracts immediate attention. The gossiper and the writer may find this out soon enough, and a little encouragement from the current mood will procure them successes that bring endless imitators in their trail. On the other hand saying good things about life in general and individuals in particular and making it interesting is a serious task which few can achieve with credit.

  Bernard Berenson

  Encouragement, Hands, Calumny Is

  Bernard Berenson (1963). “Sunset and Twilight: From the Diaries of 1947-1958”, New York : Harcourt, Brace & World

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• Pessimism is carefully cultivated in some intellectual circles, as if it were a precious plant that the human race could not afford to lose.

  Arthur Lynch

  Race, Circles, Intellectual

  Arthur Lynch (1921). “Moods of Life: Popular Psychological Studies of Affairs of Every Day”

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• I'm kind of perverse in that I think pessimism is helpful. My pessimism is my own kind of patriotism. My dissent.

  Tracy Letts

  Thinking, Helpful, Kind

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• Pessimism negates the existing world. Yet its negating is ambiguous. It can simply will decay and nothingness, but it can also renounce what exists and thus open a path for a new formation of the world.

  Martin Heidegger

  Decay, World, Path

  Martin Heidegger (1987). “Nietzsche”

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