Misfortunes Quotes - Page 28

• The pupil dilates in darkness and in the end finds light, just as the soul dilates in misfortune and in the end finds God.

  Victor Hugo

  Depression, Light, Soul

  Victor Hugo (1980). “Les misérables”, Viking Pr

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• Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the overcompensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand.

  Aldous Huxley

  Happiness, Struggle, Passion

  Aldous Huxley (1950). “The Collected Works of Aldous Huxley: Brave new world”

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• Misfortune, and recited misfortune especially, can be prolonged to the point where it ceases to excite pity and arouses only irritation.

  Dorothy Parker

  Women, Irritation, Pity

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• But Gregor understood easily that it was not only consideration for him which prevented their moving, for he could easily have been transported in a suitable crate with a few air holes; what mainly prevented the family from moving was their complete hopelessness and the thought that they had been struck by a misfortune as none of their relatives and acquaintances had ever been hit.

  Franz Kafka

  Moving, Air, Hopelessness

  Franz Kafka (1972). “The Metamorphosis”

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• Courage, it would seem, is nothing less than the power to overcome danger, misfortune, fear, injustice, while continuing to affirm inwardly that life with all its sorrows is good; that everything is meaningful even if in a sense beyond our understanding; and that there is always tomorrow.

  Dorothy Thompson

  Inspirational, Motivational, Meaningful

  Dorothy Thompson (1957). “The Courage to be Happy”

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• 'When you have a lemon, make a lemonade.' That is what a great educator does. But the fool does the exact opposite. If he finds that life has handed him a lemon, he gives up and says, 'I 'm beaten. It is fate. I haven't got a chance.' Then he proceeds to rail against the world and indulge in an orgy of self-pity .

  Dale Carnegie

  Wise, Giving Up, Fate

  "The Essential Dale Carnegie".

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• Blanche: No, I have the misfortune of being an English instructor. I attempt to instill a bunch of bobby-soxers and drugstore Romeos with a reverence for Hawthorne and Whitman and Poe!

  Tennessee Williams

  Hawthorne, Bunch, Reverence

  Tennessee Williams (1953). “A Streetcar Named Desire: Play in Three Acts”, p.39, Dramatists Play Service Inc

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• Even in the darkest moments, light exists if you have the faith to see it. Fear is a poison produced by the mind, and courage is the antidote stored always in the soul. In misfortune lies the seed of future triumph.

  Dean Koontz

  Lying, Light, Soul

  Dean Koontz (2007). “One Door Away from Heaven: A Novel”, p.134, Bantam

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• The lack of power to take joy in outdoor nature is as real a misfortune as the lack of power to take joy in books

  Theodore Roosevelt

  Real, Book, Presidential

  Theodore Roosevelt (1941). “Theodore Roosevelt Cyclopedia”

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• I will love you as misfortune loves orphans, as fire loves innocence, and as justice loves to sit and watch while everything goes wrong.

  Daniel Handler

  Love You, Fire, Justice

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• The friendliness and charity of our countrymen can always be relied upon to relieve their fellow citizens in misfortune. This has been repeatedly and quite lately demonstrated. Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character, while it prevents the indulgence among our people of that kindly sentiment and conduct which strengthens the bonds of a common brotherhood.

  Grover Cleveland

  Character, Government, Expectations

  Grover Cleveland (1968). “Grover Cleveland, 1837-1908: Chronology, Documents, Bibliographical Aids”

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• Much talking is the cause of danger. Silence is the means of avoiding misfortune. The talkative parrot is shut up in a cage. Other birds, without speech, fly freely about.

  Sakya Pandita

  Change, Happiness, Mean

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• The friendliness and charity of our countrymen can always be relied upon to relieve their fellow citizens in misfortune.

  Grover Cleveland

  Citizens, Charity, Countrymen

  Grover Cleveland (1968). “Grover Cleveland, 1837-1908: Chronology, Documents, Bibliographical Aids”

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• I will live this day as if it is my last. …I will waste not a moment mourning yesterday’s misfortunes, Yesterday’s defeats, yesterday’s aches of the heart, for why should I throw good after bad?

  Og Mandino

  Heart, Yesterday, Mourning

  Og Mandino (2009). “The Greatest Secret in the World”, p.66, Bantam

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• Not the least misfortune in a prominent falsehood is the fact that tradition is apt to repeat it for truth.

  Hosea Ballou

  Facts, Tradition, Repeats

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• To those who live by the land there must always come times of hardship, of fear and of hunger, even as there are years of plenty. This is one of the truths of our existence as those who live by the land know: that sometimes we eat and sometimes we starve. We live by our labours fromone harvest to the next, there is no certain telling whether we shall be able to feed ourselves and our children, and if bad times are prolonged we know we must see the weak surrender their lives and this fact, too, is within our experience. In our lives there is no margin for misfortune.

  Kamala Markandaya

  Children, Years, Land

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• To this day, I fondly recall the challenges of building a fire, pitching a tent, climbing a New England mountain, canoeing on a lake. Camp songs still resonate inside me. Competition exists at Keewaydin, of course, but nobody fails summer camp, a nice respite from winters of fortune and misfortune at school.

  Michael Eisner

  Summer, Song, Nice

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• You have no idea how much of the inefficiency of mankind comes from thinking about the wrong-doings of others, and of ourselves. There is nothing more miserable than to feel that by some mistake in life you have not amounted to what you might have, and that your misfortunes all hinge on that mistake.

  Emma Curtis Hopkins

  Mistake, Thinking, Ideas

  Emma Curtis Hopkins (2012). “Scientific Christian Mental Practice”, p.172, Jazzybee Verlag

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• There is no worse mistake in public leadership than to hold out false hopes soon to be swept away. The British people can face peril or misfortune with fortitude and buoyancy, but they bitterly resent being deceived or finding that those responsible for their affairs are themselves dwelling in a fool's paradise.

  Winston Churchill

  Mistake, Dwelling, People

  Winston Churchill (1986). “The Hinge of Fate”, p.54, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Whoever grows angry amid troubles applies a drug worse than the disease and is a physician unskilled about misfortunes.

  Sophocles

  Anger, Drug, Physicians

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• Cast between the extremes of happiness and misfortune, uncertainty is a cruel torment.

  Pierre Choderlos de Laclos

  Casts, Torment, Extremes

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• Bad luck and (extreme) misfortune will infest your pathetic soul for all eternity.

  Rocko

  Soul, Luck, Modern Life

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• It is how people respond to stress that determines whether they will profit from misfortune or be miserable.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Stress, People, Miserable

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2001). “Flow: the psychology of optimal experience”

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• Pride thinks it's own happiness shines the brighter by comparing it with the misfortunes of others.

  Thomas More

  Pride, Thinking, Shining

  Thomas More (2009). “Utopia”, p.84, Cosimo, Inc.

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• Even when the winds of misfortune blow, amazing things can still happen.

  Gabriel Garcia Marquez

  Blow, Wind, Stills

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