Ignoble Quotes - Page 2

• Self-pity is an ignoble emotion, but we all feel it, and the orthodox critical line that it represents some kind of artistic flaw is dubious, a form of emotional correctness.

  Nick Hornby

  Emotional, Self, Dubious

  Nick Hornby (2003). “Songbook”, p.49, Penguin

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• Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray; Along the cool sequester'd vale of life They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.

  Thomas Gray

  Life, Learning, Wish

  Thomas Gray, William Mason (1820). “The poems and letters of Thomas Gray, with memoirs of his life and writings by W. Mason”, p.494

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• Not the children of the rich or of the powerful only, but of all alike, boys and girls, both noble and ignoble, rich and poor, in all cities and towns, villages and hamlets, should be sent to school

  John Amos Comenius

  Girl, Children, Powerful

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• My philosophy of life is that the meek shall inherit nothing but debasement, frustration, and ignoble deaths.

  Harlan Ellison

  Philosophy, Frustration, Life Is

  Harlan Ellison (2014). “The Harlan Ellison Hornbook”, p.208, Open Road Media

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• Man, do not pride yourself on your superiority to the animals, for they are without sin, while you, with all your greatness, you defile the earth wherever you appear and leave an ignoble trail behind you -- and that is true, alas, for almost every one of us!

  Fyodor Dostoevsky

  Pride, Greatness, Men

  Fyodor Dostoevsky (2003). “Brothers Karamazov”, p.427, Bantam Classics

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• Many of us, whether in the jungles of Asia or on the streets of Chicago, had discovered that noble causes can lead to ignoble actions and that we were capable of sacrificing honor to a sense of efficacy.

  Linda Grant

  War, Sacrifice, Honor

  Linda Grant (1991). “Blind Trust”, Fawcett Books

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• The technique of winning is so shoddy, the terms of winning are so ignoble, the tenure of winning is so brief; and the specter of the has-been-a shameful rather than a pitiable sight today-brings a sudden chill even to our sunlit moments.

  Louis Kronenberger

  Success, Winning, Sight

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• A good man may fall, but he falls like a ball [and rebounds]; the ignoble man falls like a lump of clay.

  Bhartrhari

  Fall, Men, Good Man

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• To believe something in the face of evidence and against reason - to believe something by faith - is ignoble, irresponsible and ignorant, and merits the opposite of respect.

  A.C. Grayling

  Believe, Opposites, Ignorant

  A.C. Grayling (2012). “Against All Gods: Six Polemics on Religion and an Essay on Kindness”, p.8, Oberon Books

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• Ways of loving from a distance, mating without even touching-Amor platonicus! The ladder of love one is expected to climb higher and higher, elating the Self and the Other. Plato clearly regards any actual physical contact as corrupt and ignoble because he thinks the true goal of Eros is beauty. Is there no beauty in sex? Not according to Plato. He is after `more sublime pursuits.' But if you ask me, I think Plato's problem, like those of many others, was that he never got splendidly laid.

  Elif Safak

  Sex, Plato, Distance

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• Man indeed is the most noble, by creation, of all the creatures in the visible World; but by sin he has made himself the most ignoble.

  John Bunyan

  Men, Noble, World

  John Bunyan (2011). “Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners (Authentic Original Classic)”, p.33, Destiny Image Publishers

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• Since all motives at bottom are selfish and ignoble, we may judge acts and qualities only be their effects.

  H. P. Lovecraft

  Selfish, Judging, Quality

  "Collected Essays, Volume 5: Philosophy" edited by S. T. Joshi, (p. 71), 2006.

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• Men were created for something better than merely to make money. A close application to business, until a competence is gained, is one of the chief virtues; but to continue in trade long after this result is obtained, is one of the signs, not to be mistaken, of a sordid and ignoble nature.

  Christian Nestell Bovee

  Money, Men, Long

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• Wherever snow falls, or water flows, or birds fly, wherever day and night meet in twilight, wherever the blue heaven is hung by clouds, or sown with stars, wherever are forms with transparent boundaries, wherever are outlets into celestial space, wherever is danger, and awe, and love, there is Beauty, plenteous as rain, shed for thee, and though thou shouldest walk the world over, thou shalt not be able to find a condition inopportune or ignoble.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Beauty, Stars, Rain

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2003). “Nature and Other Writings”, p.177, Shambhala Publications

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• Everybody's got a worldview, whether they know they have it or they don't. They might even get it when they are little tiny kids. Suppose they get it when they are in college, which is often the case, or in high school, whatever. Everything they learn after that or every thing they see after that, they fit it into that worldview. And they are making coherence of what's good, what's bad, what will work, what won't work, what's noble, what's ignoble, and so on... all through this filter.

  Jane Jacobs

  School, Kids, College

  Source: www.metropolismag.com

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• Life is indeed either a rich possession or a poor, according as it is made subservient to noble aims or ignoble pleasures.

  Christian Nestell Bovee

  Life, Noble, Rich

  Christian Nestell Bovee (1862). “Intuitions and Summaries of Thought”, p.14

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• Feeling lonely and ignoble indicates that you haven't been patient.

  Rumi

  Lonely, Loneliness, Being Alone

  Rumi (2014). “'Another city'. a selectionf of poems from the Persian”, p.55, Lulu.com

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• Up and away for life! be fleet!-
  The frost-king ties my fumbling feet,
  Sings in my ears, my hands are stones,
  Curdles the blood to the marble bones,
  Tugs at the heart-strings, numbs the sense,
  And hems in life with narrowing fence.
  Well, in this broad bed lie and sleep,-
  The punctual stars will vigil keep,-
  Embalmed by purifying cold;
  The winds shall sing their dead-march old,
  The snow is no ignoble shroud,
  The moon thy mourner, and the cloud.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Stars, Kings, Lying

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.234, Delphi Classics

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• It is not races but individuals that are noble and courageous or ignoble and craven or considerate or persistent or philosophical or reasonable. The race gets credit when the percentage of noble individuals is high.

  Edwin Way Teale

  Philosophical, Race, Class

  Edwin Way Teale (1987). “Circle of the seasons: the journal of a naturalist's year”, Olympic Marketing Corp

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• No matter what the cause, even though it be to conquer with tanks and planes and modern artillery some defenseless black population, there will be no lack of poets and preachers and essayists and philosophers to invent the necessary reasons and gild the infamy with righteousness. To this righteousness there is, of course, never an adequate reply. Thus a war to end poverty becomes an unanswerable enterprise. For who can decently be for poverty? To even debate whether the war will end poverty becomes an exhibition of ugly pragmatism and the sign of an ignoble mind.

  John T. Flynn

  War, Black, Mind

  John Thomas Flynn (1944). “As We Go Marching”, p.122, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• The malignity that never forgets or forgives is found only in base and ignoble natures, whose aims are selfish, and whose means are indirect, cowardly, and treacherous.

  George Stillman Hillard

  Selfish, Mean, Forgiving

  George Stillman Hillard “Life and Campaigns of George B. McClellan, Major-General, U. S. Army”, Charles River Editors

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• The more ignoble I find life, the more strongly I react by contradiction, in humour and in an outburst of liberty and expansion.

  Joan Miro

  Liberty, Expansion, Contradiction

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• Hell is wherever Love is not, and Heaven
  Is Love's location. No dogmatic creed,
  No austere faith based on ignoble fear
  Can lead thee into realms of joy and peace.
  Unless the humblest creatures on the earth
  Are bettered by thy loving sympathy
  Think not to find a Paradise beyond.

  Ella Wheeler Wilcox

  Life, Love Is, Thinking

  Ella Wheeler Wilcox (2012). “Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)”, p.1121, Jazzybee Verlag

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• In speaking to you men of the greatest city of the West, men of the state which gave to the country Lincoln and Grant, men who preeminently and distinctly embody all that is most American in the American character, I wish to preach not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the strenuous life.

  Theodore Roosevelt

  Life, Country, Character

  Speech to Hamilton Club, Chicago, Ill., 10 Apr. 1899

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• It's a great myth that the British public want our soldiers to be sent into harm's way on a bogus prospectus for ignoble reasons. There is nothing patriotic about that. It is the opposite of patriotism.

  George Galloway

  Patriotic, Opposites, Soldier

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