Foolish Quotes - Page 21

• You're in bad shape when your emotions force you into acts which you know are foolish.

  Robert A. Heinlein

  Shapes, Emotion, Force

  Robert A. Heinlein (2005). “Have Space Suit, Will Travel”, p.148, Simon and Schuster

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• The man who speaks and writes about art should refrain from censuring or pontificating. He will thus avoid doing anything foolish, for in the presence of primordial depth all art is but dream and nature.

  Hans Arp

  Dream, Art, Writing

  "Arp on Arp: poems, essays, memories". Book by Hans Arp, p. 327, 1958.

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• What if the leaves were to fall a-weeping, and say, "It will be so painful for us to be pulled from our stalks, when autumn comes?" Foolish fear! Summer goes, and autumn succeeds. The glory of death is upon the leaves; and the gentlest breeze that blows takes them softly and silently from the bough, and they float slowly down, like fiery sparks, upon the moss.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Summer, Fall, Autumn

  Henry Ward Beecher (1858). “Life Thoughts”, p.110

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• Our passions are the chief means of self-preservation; to try to destroy them is therefore as absurd as it is useless; this would be to overcome nature, to reshape God's handiwork. If God bade man annihilate the passions he has given him, God would bid him be and not be; He would contradict himself. He has never given such a foolish commandment, there is nothing like it written on the heart of man, and what God will have a man do, He does not leave to the words of another man. He speaks Himself; His words are written in the secret heart.

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Mean, Passion, Heart

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau (2009). “Emile: Or, On Education”, p.384, The Floating Press

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• And, as for what is called improving conversation, that is merely the foolish method by which the still more foolish philanthropist feebly tries to disarm the just rancour of the criminal classes.

  Oscar Wilde

  Class, Trying, Criminals

  Oscar Wilde, Isobel Murray (2008). “Oscar Wilde - The Major Works”, p.248, Oxford University Press

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• For example: (1) As if governed by Newton's First Law of Motion, an institution will resist any change in its current direction; (2) Just as work expands to fill available time, corporate projects or acquisitions will materialize to soak up available funds; (3) Any business craving of the leader, however foolish, will be quickly supported by detailed rate-of-return and strategic studies prepared by his troops; and (4) The behavior of peer companies, whether they are expanding, acquiring, setting executive compensation or whatever, will be mindlessly imitated.

  Warren Buffett

  Law, Leader, Peers

  Warren Buffett (2009). “Warren Buffett on Business: Principles from the Sage of Omaha”, p.151, John Wiley & Sons

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• It would be foolish to assert that there is no power above mine. Only the attitude that I take toward it will be quite another than that of the religious age: I shall be the enemy of every higher power, while religion teaches us to make it our friend and be humble toward it.

  Max Stirner

  Religious, Attitude, Humble

  Max Stirner, David Leopold (1995). “Stirner: The Ego and Its Own”, p.165, Cambridge University Press

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• Well, my father Kingsley Amis was a writer and it seemed natural to start writing in my late teens. I think it was good that I began when I was young and bold and foolish, otherwise I'd have become too self-conscious and aware of the weight of not having written anything yet.

  Martin Amis

  Father, Writing, Thinking

  "Martin Amis: I wasn’t trying to impress my father". Interview with Jane Graham, www.salon.com. July 24, 2013.

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• The need for general scientific understanding by the public has never been larger, and the penalty for scientific illiteracy never harsher. Lack of scientific fundamentals causes people to make foolish decisions about issues such as the toxicity of chemicals, the efficacy of medicines, the changes in the global climate.

  Peter Agre

  Medicine, Issues, People

  Nobel Banquet Speech, www.nobelprize.org. December 10, 2003.

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• Hyper-selectionism has been with us for a long time in various guises; for it represents the late nineteenth century's scientific version of the myth of natural harmony all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds (all structures well designed for a definite purpose in this case). It is, indeed, the vision of foolish Dr. Pangloss, so vividly satirized by Voltaire in Candide the world is not necessarily good, but it is the best we could possibly have.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Long, Vision, Drs

  Stephen Jay Gould (2010). “The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History”, p.57, W. W. Norton & Company

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• If we choose a weak and foolish speculation as a primary textbook illustration (falsely assuming that the tale possesses a weight of history and a sanction of evidence), then we are in for trouble - as critics properly nail the particular weakness, and then assume that the whole theory must be in danger if supporters choose such a fatuous case as a primary illustration.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Illustration, Weakness, Nails

  Stephen Jay Gould (1999). “Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms: Essays on Natural History”, Three Rivers Press (CA)

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• The reputation of a Don Juan gives to a man the most dangerous power. Wise virgins resist it, but foolish virgins frequently yield to the desire to take a celebrated lover from a rival - even from a friend. This emotion is a complex one, mad up of vanity, respect for another woman's taste, and the need to establish self-assurance by winning a difficult victory. Don Juan chose his first mistresses; later he was chosen.

  Andre Maurois

  Wise, Winning, Men

  "The Art of Living". Book by Andre Maurois, 1939.

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• A presentation copy...is a copy of a book whoch does not sell, sent you by the author, with his foolish autograph at the beginning of it; for which, if a stranger, he only demands your friendship; if a brother author, he expects from you a book of yours, which does not sell, in return.

  Charles Lamb

  Brother, Book, Doe

  "Last Essays of Elia". Book by Charles Lamb, 1833.

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• Leave your theories. All theories, you see, even those of virtue, are bad, foolish, mischievous.

  Romain Rolland

  Virtue, Theory, Mischievous

  Romain Rolland (1914). “John Christopher: Storm and Stress”

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• Thus night with all her snares passed through the upper world and baited all heads sweetly, fed all foolish hopes, for night can bring to men all shrewish day denies, wrapped as a gift in the green leaves of opiate dream.

  Nikos Kazantzakis

  Dream, Night, Men

  Nikos Kazantzakis (1958). “the Odyssey a Modern Sequel”

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• Remember in the forms of speech comes change Within a thousand years, and words that then Were well esteemed, seem foolish now and strange; And yet they spake them so, time and again, And thrived in love as well as any men; And so to win their loves in sundry days, In sundry lands there are as many ways.

  Geoffrey Chaucer

  Winning, Men, Years

  Geoffrey Chaucer (2012). “Troilus and Cressida”, p.49, Courier Corporation

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• Intellectuals never sound more foolish than when posing as the last civilised man.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Men, Sound, Lasts

  Christopher Hitchens (2002). “Unacknowledged Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere”, p.268, Verso

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• Warned by such evidences of their spiritual illness, believers profit by their humiliations. Robbed of their foolish confidence in the flesh, they take refuge in the grace of God. And when they have done so, they experience the nearness of the divine protection which is to them a strong fortress (Ps 30:6-7).

  John Calvin

  Spiritual, Strong, Grace

  John Calvin (2004). “Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life”, p.51, Baker Books

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• But have you wine and music still,And statues and a bright-eyed love,And foolish thoughts of good and ill,And prayers to them who sit above?

  James Elroy Flecker

  Prayer, Wine, Ill

  James Elroy Flecker (1947). “Selected Poems”

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• If you're doing your job properly, you take the risk of feeling slightly foolish and delve in and bring out the emotions.

  Christian Bale

  Feelings, Risk, Emotion

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• We do not believe in government through the voting booth. The Spanish national will was never freely expressed through the ballot box. Spain has no foolish dreams.

  Francisco Franco

  Dream, Believe, Government

  "Spain: Voters Say 'S". content.time.com. June 27, 1977.

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• Any lack of confidence in the economic future or the basic strength of business in the United States is foolish.

  Herbert Hoover

  United States, Economic, Lack Of Confidence

  Herbert Hoover (1934). “March 4, 1929, to October 1, 1931”

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• When it was reported to General Washington that the army was frequently indulging in swearing, he immediately sent out the following order: The general is sorry to be informed that the foolish and wicked practice of profane cursing and swearing - a vice little known heretofore in the American army - is growing into fashion. Let the men and officers reflect "that we can not hope for the blessing of heaven on our army if we insult it by our impiety and folly."

  George Washington

  Fashion, Sorry, Army

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• Now I find that in a state of pure obedience the mind learns contentment in appearing weak and foolish to that wisdom which is of the world; and in these lowly labors, they who stand in a low place and are rightly exercised under the cross will find nourishment.

  John Woolman

  Mind, Contentment, World

  "The Journal of John Woolman".

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• Weak, feeble and foolish as it may seem to people, the simple story of the Cross is enough for all mankind in every part of the globe.

  J. C. Ryle

  Simple, People, Stories

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