Disposition Quotes - Page 21

• The most necessary disposition to relish pleasures is to know how to be without them.

  Anne-Therese de Marguenat de Courcelles

  Moderation, Pleasure, Know How

  "A Mother's Advice to Her Son". Book by Anne Thérèse de Marguenat de Courcelles, 1726.

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• ... continual hard labor deadens the energies of the soul, and benumbs the faculties of the mind; the ideas become confined, the mind barren, and, like the scorching sands of Arabia, produces nothing; or, like the uncultivated soil, brings forth thorns and thistles. Again, continual hard labor irritates our tempers and sours our dispositions; the whole system become worn out with toil and fatigue; nature herself becomes almost exhausted, and we care but little whether we live or die.

  Maria W. Stewart

  Ideas, Soul, Mind

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• Babies are born with neither good nor bad character. Normal people - as they grow, learn and are trained - develop better or worse dispositions and habits of conduct.

  Edwin J Delattre

  Baby, Character, People

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• We are born with a potential for good character - and for the dispositions and habits that make up bad or weak character. Because we are born in ignorance of moral ideals, however, we must be instructed or trained if we are to achieve a good second nature.

  Edwin J Delattre

  Character, Ignorance, Moral

  Edwin J. Delattre (2011). “Character and Cops: Ethics in Policing”, p.7, Rowman & Littlefield

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• The thing that makes our friendships so short and changeable is that the qualities and dispositions of the soul are very hard to know, and those of the understanding and wit very easy.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Friendship, Understanding, Soul

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• Excellence or virtue is a settled disposition of the mind that determines our choice of actions and emotions and consists essentially in observing the mean relative to us ... a mean between two vices, that which depends on excess and that which depends on defect.

  Aristotle

  Mean, Two, Choices

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• It is a proverbial expression that every man is the maker of his own fortune, and we usually regard it as implying that every man by his folly or wisdom prepares good or evil for himself. But we may view it in another light, namely, that we may so accommodate ourselves to the dispositions of Providence as to be happy in our lot, whatever may be its privations.

  Alexander von Humboldt

  Men, Light, Views

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• What the activity of this disposition of ours means in the evolution of the world, we do not know. Nor can we regulate this activity from outside; we must leave entirely to each individual
  its shaping and its extension. From every point of view, then, world- and life-affirmation and ethics are non-rational, and we must have the courage to admit it.

  Albert Schweitzer

  Mean, Views, World

  Albert Schweitzer (1929). “Civilization and Ethics”

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• It is the natural disposition of all men to listen with pleasure to abuse and slander of their neighbour, and to hear with impatience those who utter praises of themselves.

  Demosthenes

  Men, Abuse, Praise

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• I crave fit disposition for my wife;
  Due reference of place, and exhibition;
  With such accommodation, and besort,
  As levels with her breeding.

  William Shakespeare

  Wife, Exhibitions, Levels

  William Shakespeare (1809). “The Plays of William Shakespeare”, p.241

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• The disposition to admire, and almost to worship, the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or, at least, to neglect persons of poor and mean condition is the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments.

  Adam Smith

  Powerful, Mean, Causes

  Adam Smith (2012). “The Theory of Moral Sentiments”, p.58, Courier Corporation

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• The spirit of true religion breathes gentleness and affability; it gives a native, unaffected ease to the behavior; it is social, kind, cheerful; far removed from the cloudy and illiberal disposition which clouds the brow, sharpens the temper, and dejects the spirit.

  Hugh Blair

  Clouds, Giving, Cheerful

  "Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers". Book by Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, 1895.

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• The library is not, as some would have it, a place for the retiring of disposition or faint of heart. It is not an ivory tower or a quiet room in a sanitarium facing away from the afternoon sun. It is, rather, a command center, a power base. A board room, a war room. An Oval Office for all who preside over their own destinies. One does not retreat from the world here; one prepares to join it at an advantage.

  Eric Burns

  War, Heart, Destiny

  Eric Burns (1995). “The Joy of Books: Confessions of a Lifelong Reader”

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• The natures and dispositions of men are, not without truth, distinguished from the predominance of the planets.

  Francis Bacon

  Men, Astrology, Planets

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• The Meaning of Mature Femininity: At the heart of mature felinity is a freeing disposition to affirm, receive, and nurture strength and leadership from worthy men in ways appropriate to a woman's differing relationships.

  John Piper

  Heart, Men, Way

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• In the eye of that Supreme Being to whom our whole internal frame is uncovered, dispositions hold the place of actions.

  Hugh Blair

  Motivation, Eye, Action

  Hugh Blair (1827). “Sermons ... To which is prefixed, a short account of the life and character of the author, by James Finlayson ... A new edition, etc. With a portrait”, p.150

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• If I am able to determine the enemy's dispositions while at the same time I conceal my own, then I can concentrate and he must divide.

  Sun Tzu

  Enemy, Able, Determine

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• He [Aristotle] pointed out that people who had become initiates in the various mystery religions were not required to learn any facts 'but to experience certain emotions and to be put in a certain disposition.' Hence his famous literary theory that tragedy effected a purification (katharsis) of the emotions of terror and pity that amounted to an experience of rebirth.

  Karen Armstrong

  Literary Theory, People, Tragedy

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• Our actions determine our dispositions.

  Aristotle

  Our Actions, Action, Determine

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• Our German language has a word which in a magnificent way denotes conduct based on this spirit: doing one's duty [Pflichterfüllung]-which means serving the community instead of contenting oneself. We have a word for the basic disposition which underlies conduct of this kind in contrast to egoism and selfishness-idealism. By 'idealism' we mean only the ability of the individual to sacrifice himself for the whole, for his fellow men.

  Adolf Hitler

  Mean, Sacrifice, Men

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• O my Savior...teach me to pray; implant in me all the dispositions needful for the prayer of the Holy Spirit....Of what use is my prayer if the Holy Spirit does not pray with me? Come, Holy Spirit, come to dwell and work with me! Take possession of my understanding and of my will; govern my actions not only at the moment of prayer but at every moment.

  Jean Grou

  Prayer, Understanding, Doe

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• For memetics to be a reasonable research programme, it should be the case that copying, and differential success in causing the multiplication of copies, overwhelmingly plays the major role in shaping all or at least most of the contents of culture. Evolved domain-specific psychological dispositions, if there are any, should be at most a relatively minor factor that could be considered part of background conditions.

  Dan Sperber

  Play, Copying, Culture

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• And I saw for the first time how, despite the isolation of our own lives, we are always connected to our ancestors; our bodies hold the memories of those who came before us, whether it is the features we inherit or a disposition that is etched into our soul.

  Alyson Richman

  Memories, Soul, Body

  Alyson Richman (2011). “The Lost Wife”, p.237, Penguin

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• I rejoice that horses and steers have to be broken before they can be made the slaves of men, and that men themselves have some wild oats still left to sow before they become submissive members of society. Undoubtedly, all men are not equally fit subjects for civilization; and because the majority, like dogs and sheep, are tame by inherited disposition, this is no reason why the others should have their natures broken that they may be reduced to the same level.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Dog, Horse, Men

  Henry David Thoreau (2002). “The Essays of Henry D. Thoreau: Selected and Edited by Lewis Hyde”, p.252, North Point Press

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• The disposition to give a cup of cold water to a disciple is a far nobler property than the finest intellect. Satan has a fine intellect, but not the image of God.

  William Dean Howells

  Giving, Water, Cups

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