Dispensable Quotes

• Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Life, Positive, Simple

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.11, Simon and Schuster

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• All too often we say of a man doing a good job that he is indispensable. A flattering canard, as so many disillusioned and retired and fired have discovered when the world seems to keep on turning without them. In business, a man can come nearest to indispensability by being dispensable in his current job. How can a man move up to new responsibilities if he is the only one able to handle his present tasks? It matters not how small or large the job you now have, if you have trained no one to do it as well, you're not available; you've made your promotion difficult if not impossible.

  Malcolm Forbes

  Jobs, Moving, Responsibility

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• Impressions are like pearls; ideas are like the string that turns the pearls into a necklace. The string is invisible, but it is not dispensable and cannot be broken.

  Mu Xin

  Ideas, Broken, Necklaces

  Interview with Toming Jun Liu, www.wordswithoutborders.org. August 2003.

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• Unfortunately, what is thrown away is not only food and dispensable objects, but often human beings themselves, who are discarded as 'unnecessary.' For example, it is frightful even to think there are children, victims of abortion, who will never see the light of day; children being used as soldiers, abused and killed in armed conflicts; and children being bought and sold in that terrible form of modern slavery which is human trafficking, which is a crime against humanity.

  Pope Francis

  Inspiring, Wise, Children

  Pope Francis' 'State Of The World' Address To Diplomatic Corps, www.huffingtonpost.com. January 13, 2014.

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• I honor my importance and the importance of others. None of us is dispensable, none of us is replacable. In the chorus of life each of us brings a True Note, a perfect pitch that adds to the harmony of the whole. I act creatively and consciously to actively endorse and encourage the expansion of those whose lives I touch. Believing in the goodness of each, I add to the goodness of all. We bless each other even in passing.

  Julia Cameron

  Believe, Perfect, Honor

  "Blessings : Prayers and Declarations for a Heartful Life". Book by Julia Cameron, 1998.

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• But quality of work can be expected only through personal satisfaction, dedication and enjoyment. In our profession, precision and perfection are not a dispensable luxury, but a simple necessity.

  Niklaus Wirth

  Work, Simple, Dedication

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• The divinity of Jesus is not a dispensable extra that has no significance for our salvation. On the contrary, our salvation depends on it. We can be saved only by God Himself.

  Klaas Runia

  Christian, Jesus, Divinity

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• Elegance is not a dispensable luxury but a factor that decides between success and failure.

  Edsger Dijkstra

  Congratulations, Luxury, Elegance

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• War is a biological necessity of the first importance, a regulative element in the life of mankind which cannot be dispensed with. ... But it is not only a biological law but a moral obligation and, as such, an indispensable factor in civilization.

  Friedrich von Bernhardi

  War, Civilization, Law

  "Germany and the next War" by Friedrich von Bernhardi, (Ch. I), 1911.

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• The disasteris not the money, although the money will be missed. The disaster is the disrespect--this belief that the arts are dispensable, that they're not critical to a culture's existence.

  Twyla Tharp

  Art, Disrespect, Culture

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• Also see how many quarters of corn you will spend in a week in dispensable bread, how much in alms.

  Robert Grosseteste

  Corn, Bread, Week

  Francis Henry Cripps-Day, Walter de Henley, Jacques Bellot, Robert Grosseteste (1931). “The manor farm”

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• How do we convince people that in programming simplicity and clarity - in short: what mathematicians call elegance - are not a dispensable luxury, but a crucial matter that decides between success and failure?

  Edsger Dijkstra

  Luxury, People, Simplicity

  Edsger W. Dijkstra (2012). “Selected Writings on Computing: A personal Perspective”, p.347, Springer Science & Business Media

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• The welfare culture tells the man he is not a necessary part of the family; he feels dispensable, his wife knows he is dispensable, his children sense it.

  George Gilder

  Children, Men, Wife

  George Gilder (2012). “Wealth and Poverty: A New Edition for the Twenty-First Century”, p.171, Regnery Publishing

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• We thus begin to see that the institutionalized practice of citations and references in the sphere of learning is not a trivial matter. While many a general reader-that is, the lay reader located outside the domain of science and scholarship-may regard the lowly footnote or the remote endnote or the bibliographic parenthesis as a dispensable nuisance, it can be argued that these are in truth central to the incentive system and an underlying sense of distributive justice that do much to energize the advancement of knowledge.

  Robert K. Merton

  Learning, Knowledge, Science

  Robert K. Merton, Piotr Sztompka (1996). “On Social Structure and Science”, p.333, University of Chicago Press

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• Hamas is regularly described as 'Iranian-backed Hamas, which is dedicated to the destruction of Israel.' One will be hard put to find something like 'democratically elected Hamas, which has long been calling for a two-state settlement in accord with the international consensus'—blocked for over 30 years by the US and Israel. All true, but not a useful contribution to the Party Line, hence dispensable.

  Noam Chomsky

  Party, Israel, Years

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• ... the man in the violent situation reveals those qualities least dispensable in his personality, those qualities which are all he will have to take into eternity with him.

  Flannery O'Connor

  Men, Afterlife, Personality

  Flannery O'Connor (1993). “"A Good Man is Hard to Find"”, p.59, Rutgers University Press

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