Quality Quotes - Page 29

• Courage, of all national qualities, is the most precarious; because it is exerted only at intervals, and by a few in every nation; whereas industry, knowledge, civility, may be of constant and universal use, and for several ages, may become habitual to the whole people.

  David Hume

  Courage, People, Use

  David Hume (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of David Hume (Illustrated)”, p.706, Delphi Classics

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• Courage is a quality so necessary for maintaining virtue, that it is always respected, even when it is associated with vice.

  Samuel Johnson

  Courage, Vices, Maintaining

  Samuel Johnson, James Boswell (1825). “The Table Talk of Dr. Johnson: Comprising Opinions and Anecdotes of Life and Literature, Men, Manners, and Morals”, p.276

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• Before, I was always trying to make my relationships work by means of willpower and forced affability. This time I didn't have to strive for anything. A quality of ease spread over us.

  Charles Baxter

  Mean, Always Trying, Ease

  "The Feast of Love: A Novel". Book by Charles Baxter, May 1, 2001.

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• But we are living in a sceptical and, if I may use the phrase, a thought-tormented age: and sometimes I fear that this new generation, educated or hyper-educated as it is, will lack those qualities of humanity, of hospitality, of kindly humour which belonged to an older day.

  James Joyce

  Humanity, Age, Generations

  "Dubliners".

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• From the first time he'd met her, he'd sensed an air of contradiction about her. She was very much a woman, but still retained a waiflike quality. She could be brash, and at times deliberately suggestive, yet she was painfully shy. She was incredibly easy to get along with, yet she had few friends. She was a talented artist in her own right, but so self-conscious about her work that she rarely completed a piece and preferred to work with other people's art and ideas.

  Charles de Lint

  Art, Ideas, Air

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• To say that she had a book is to say that her solitude did not press upon her; for her love of knowledge had a fertilizing quality and her imagination was strong. There was at this time, however, a want of lightness in her situation, which the arrival of an unexpected visitor did much to dispel.

  Henry James

  Strong, Book, Imagination

  Henry James (1994). “Henry James: selected works”, Random House Value Publishing

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• I did not consider him to be any kind of a genius. I considered him deeply lacking in the area that mattered most in life. Star quality.

  Augusten Burroughs

  Stars, Genius, Kind

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• If one were to be a person of value that value could not be a condition subject to hazards of fortune. It had to be a quality that could not change. No matter what.

  Cormac McCarthy

  Hazards, Matter, Fortune

  Cormac McCarthy (2013). “The Border Trilogy”, p.223, Pan Macmillan

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• Around us the night creatures have their say. We are surrounded by a symphony of crickets and frogs. Neither of us feels the need to speak, and I suppose that is one of the qualities I find comforting in Kartik. We can be alone together.

  Libba Bray

  Night, Symphony, Comforting

  Libba Bray (2010). “The Sweet Far Thing”, p.152, Simon and Schuster

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• The truest art I would strive for in any work would be to give the page the same qualities as earth: weather would land on it harshly; light would elucidate the most difficult truths; wind would sweep away obtuse padding.

  Gretel Ehrlich

  Art, Nature, Light

  Gretel Ehrlich (1986). “The Solace of Open Spaces”, Penguin Group USA

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• To live means to experience-through doing, feeling, thinking. Experience takes place in time, so time is the ultimate scarce resource we have. Over the years, the content of experience will determine the quality of life. Therefore one of the most essential decisions any of us can make is about how one's time is allocated or invested.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Life, Mean, Thinking

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1997). “Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement with Everyday Life”, p.8, Basic Books

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• My working method has more often than not involved the subtraction of weight. I have tried to remove weight, sometimes from people, sometimes from heavenly bodies, sometimes from cities; above all I have tried to remove weight from the structure of stories and from language. . . . Maybe I was only then becoming aware of the weight, the inertia, the opacity of the world--qualities that stick to the writing from the start, unless one finds some way of evading them.

  Italo Calvino

  Writing, Cities, People

  "Six Memos For This Millennium" by Sam Cooney, therumpus.net. November 22, 2010.

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• ...once I falsely hoped to meet the beings who, pardoning my outward form, would love me for the excellent qualities which I was capable of unfolding.

  Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

  Excellent, Form, Unfolding

  Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (2005). “Frankenstein”, p.184, Prestwick House Inc

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• We grant God the possession of all the qualities of mind except the one that keeps the others healthy; that watches over their dignity; that focuses their vision true--humor.

  Mark Twain

  God, Healthy, Mind

  Mark Twain, William M. Gibson (1969). “Mark Twain's Mysterious Stranger Manuscripts”, p.26, Univ of California Press

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• The need of black conservatives to gain the respect of their white peers deeply shapes certain elements of their conservatism. In this regard, they simply want what most people want, to be judged by the quality of their skills, not by the color of their skin. But the black conservatives overlook the fact that affirmative action policies were political responses to the pervasive refusal of most white Americans to judge black Americans on that basis.

  Cornel West

  Color, Skills, White

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• Money has lost its narrative quality the way painting did once upon a time. Money is talking to itself.

  Don DeLillo

  Talking, Once Upon A Time, Narrative

  Don DeLillo (2011). “Cosmopolis”, p.64, Pan Macmillan

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• The truest mark of being born with great qualities is to be born without envy.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Happiness, Jealousy, Envy

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• In our concern for others, we worry less about ourselves. When we worry less about ourselves an experience of our own suffering is less intense. What does this tell us? Firstly, because our every action has a universal dimension, a potential impact on others' happiness, ethics are necessary as a means to ensure that we do not harm others. Secondly, it tells us that genuine happiness consists in those spiritual qualities of love, compassion, patience, tolerance and forgiveness and so on. For it is these which provide both for our happiness and others' happiness.

  Dalai Lama

  Happiness, Spiritual, Mean

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• Pioneering spirit should continue, not to conquer the planet or space ... but rather to improve the quality of life.

  Bertrand Piccard

  Health, Space, Spirit

  Twitter post from Mar 26, 2016

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• The quality of mercy is not strain'd, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes: 'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown; His sceptre shows the force of temporal power, The attribute to awe and majesty, Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings; But mercy is above this sceptred sway; It is enthroned in the hearts of kings, It is an attribute to God himself; And earthly power doth then show likest God's When mercy seasons justice.

  William Shakespeare

  Kings, Rain, Heart

  'The Merchant of Venice' (1596-8) act 4, sc. 1, l. [182]

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• But I am constant as the Northern Star, Of whose true fixed and resting quality There is no fellow in the firmament.

  William Shakespeare

  Stars, Firmament, Fixed

  'Julius Caesar' (1599) act 3, sc. 1, l. 59

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• How many times have I wondered if it is really possible to forge links with a mass of people when one has never had strong feelings for anyone, not even one's own parents: if it is possible to have a collectivity when one has not been deeply loved oneself by individual human creatures. Hasn't this had some effect on my life as a militant--has it not tended to make me sterile and reduce my quality as a revolutionary by making everything a matter of pure intellect, of pure mathematical calculation?

  Antonio Gramsci

  Strong, People, Parent

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• It is not the brains that matter most, but that which guides them — the character, the heart, generous qualities, progressive ideas.

  Fyodor Dostoevsky

  Love, Heart, Character

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Entertainment is a sacred pursuit when done well. When done well, it raises the quality of human life.

  Michael Chabon

  Done, Sacred, Entertainment

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• The mother...swinging the children by pulling on a length of string, while at the same time she kept and eye on them with that protective watchfulness, half animal, half angelic, which is the quality of motherhood.

  Victor Hugo

  Mother, Children, Eye

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