Readiness Quotes - Page 9

• The salvation of the common people of every race and of every land from war or servitude must be established on solid foundations and must be guarded by the readiness of all men and women to die rather than submit to tyranny.

  Winston Churchill

  War, Men, Race

  Address on Unified Cooperation in Europe, delivered 19 September 1946, Zurich, Switzerland

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• Abstract truth has no value unless it incarnates in human beings who represent it, by proving their readiness to die for it.

  Mahatma Gandhi

  Truth, Abstract, Prove

  Mahatma Gandhi (1965). “Glorious Thoughts of Gandhi: Being a Treasury of about Ten Thousand Valuable and Inspiring Thougths of Mahatma Gandhi, Classified Under Four Hundred Subjects”

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• It is perhaps the most characteristic feature of the intellectual that he judges new ideas not by their specific merits but by the readiness with which they fit into his general conceptions, into the picture of the world which he regards as modern or advanced.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Philosophy, Ideas, Judging

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• Wit in conversation is only a readiness of thought and a facility of expression, or a quick conception and an easy delivery.

  Alexander Pope

  Expression, Easy, Conversation

  Alexander Pope (1812). “The works of Alexander Pope. With a selection of explanatory notes, and the account of his life by dr. Johnson”, p.233

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• How could a readiness for war in time of peace be safely prohibited, unless we could prohibit, in like manner, the preparations and establishments of every hostile nation? The means of security can only be regulated by the means and the danger of attack. They will, in fact, be ever determined by these rules, and by no others . . . . If one nation maintains constantly a disciplined army, ready for service of ambition or revenge, it obliges the most pacific nations who may be within the reach of its enterprises to take corresponding precautions.

  James Madison

  Revenge, War, Ambition

  "Federalist No. 41. General View of the Powers Conferred by the Constitution" by James Madison, www.congress.gov.

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• A man should always have these two rules in readiness. First, to do only what the reason of your ruling and legislating faculties suggest for the service of man. Second, to change your opinion whenever anyone at hand sets you right and unsettles you in an opinion, but this change of opinion should come only because you are persuaded that something is just or to the public advantage, not because it appears pleasant or increases your reputation.

  Marcus Aurelius

  Men, Hands, Two

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• The only condition of fighting for the right to create is faith in your own vocation, readiness to serve, and refusal to compromise.

  Andrei Tarkovsky

  Fighting, Compromise, Refusal

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• Prayer if it is real is an acknowledgment of our finitude, our need, our openness to be changed, our readiness to be surprised, yes, astonished by the "beams of love."

  Douglas V. Steere

  Spiritual, Prayer, Real

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• Water is also one of the four elements, the most beautiful of God's creations. It is both wet and cold, heavy, and with a tendency to descend, and flows with great readiness. It is this the Holy Scripture has in view when it says, "And the darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." Water, then, is the most beautiful element and rich in usefulness, and purifies from all filth, and not only from the filth of the body but from that of the soul, if it should have received the grace of the Spirit.

  John of Damascus

  Beautiful, Should Have, Four Elements

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• As for your doctrines I am prepared to go to the Stake if requisite ... I trust you will not allow yourself to be in any way disgusted or annoyed by the considerable abuse & misrepresentation which unless I greatly mistake is in store for you... And as to the curs which will bark and yelp - you must recollect that some of your friends at any rate are endowed with an amount of combativeness which (though you have often & justly rebuked it) may stand you in good stead - I am sharpening up my claws and beak in readiness.

  Thomas Huxley

  Mistake, Science, Annoyed

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• By integrating women into particularly military institutes, it cripples the readiness of our defense. Schools like The Citadel train young men to confidently lead other young men into a battlefield where one of them will die. And when you have women in that situation, it creates a whole new set of dynamics which are distracting to training these men to kill or be killed.

  Christine O'Donnell

  Military, School, Men

  "The Rachel Maddow Show", www.msnbc.com. September 15, 2010.

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• Nothing you can lose by dying is half as precious as the readiness to die, which is man's charter of nobility.

  George Santayana

  Men, Funeral, Dying

  George Santayana (1937). “The Works of George Santayana: Soliloquies in England and Later soliloquies”

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• Faith is the leading grace in all our spiritual warfare and conflict; but all along while we live, it hath faithful company that adheres to it, and helps it. Love works, and hope works, and all other graces, — self-denial, readiness to the cross, — they all work and help faith. But when we come to die, faith is left alone. Now, try what faith will do.

  John Owen

  Leadership, Spiritual, Self

  "The Works of John Owen".

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• We cannot hope to be secure when our government has declared, by its readiness to act alone, its willingness to be everybody's enemy.

  Wendell Berry

  Government, Enemy, Secure

  Wendell Berry, David James Duncan (2003). “Citizens Dissent: Security, Morality, and Leadership in an Age of Terror”

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• There are similarities between absolute power and absolute faith: a demand for absolute obedience, a readiness to attempt the impossible, a bias for simple solutionsto cut the knot rather than unravel it, the viewing of compromise as surrender. Both absolute power and absolute faith are instruments of dehumanization. Hence, absolute faith corrupts as absolutely as absolute power.

  Eric Hoffer

  Faith, Cutting, Power

  Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

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• There is nothing so unready as readiness of wit.

  Antoine Rivarol

  Wit

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• People who carry a musical soul about them are, I think, more receptive than others. They smile more readily. One feels in them a pleasant propensity toward the lesser sins, a pleasing readiness also to admit the possibility that on occasion they may be in the wrong--they may be mistaken.

  Catherine Drinker Bowen

  Thinking, People, Soul

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• The revulsion from an unwanted self, and the impulse to forget it, mask it, slough it off and lose it, produce both a readiness to sacrifice the self and a willingness to dissolve it by losing one's individual distinctness in a compact collective whole.

  Eric Hoffer

  Sacrifice, Self, Society

  Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

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• The vigor of a mass movement stems from the propensity of its followers for united action and self-sacrifice. When we ascribe the success of a movement to its faith, doctrine, propaganda, leadership, ruthlessness and so on, we are but referring to instruments of unification and to means used to inculcate a readiness for self-sacrifice. It is perhaps impossible to understand the nature of a mass movement unless it is recognized that their chief preoccupation is to foster, perfect and perpetuate a facility for united action and self-sacrifice.

  Eric Hoffer

  Mean, Sacrifice, Self

  Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

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• I actually didn't listen to the Beatles song 'Nowhere Man' when I was writing my book of the same name. What I listened to a lot was 'Abbey Road.' Its disjointedness and its readiness to confuse only to delight were inspiring to me.

  Aleksandar Hemon

  Song, Book, Writing

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• The readiness with which women are apt to forgive the men who have deceived other women; and that inconsiderate notion of too many of them that a reformed rake makes the best husband, are great encouragements to vile men to continue their profligacy.

  Samuel Richardson

  Encouragement, Husband, Forgiving

  Samuel Richardson (1755). “A collection of the moral and instructive sentiments, maxims, cautions, and reflexions, contained in the histories of Pamela, Clarissa, and Sir Charles Grandison: Digested under proper heads, with references to the volume, ...”, p.2

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• "Do you love me?"; "Are you my friend?". The One who scrutinizes hearts (cf. Rom 8:27), makes himself a beggar of love and questions us on the one truly essential issue, a premiss and condition for feeding his sheep, his lambs, his Church. May every ministry be based on this intimacy with the Lord; living from him is the measure of our ecclesial service which is expressed in the readiness to obey, to humble ourselves, as we heard in the Letter to the Philippians, and for the total gift of self.

  Pope Francis

  Heart, Humble, Sheep

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• Our national fondness for celebrating the physical heroism of soldiers - the apparent readiness with which they sacrifice their lives to larger causes - eclipses the far less romantic displays of moral and intellectual fortitude that also distinguish so many of them. In turning them all into heroes, we have lost a sense of the individuality they also fight to preserve.

  Elizabeth Samet

  War, Hero, Fighting

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• Most acts of assent require far more courage than most acts of protest, since courage is clearly a readiness to risk self-humiliation.

  Nigel Dennis

  Courage, Self, Risk

  Nigel Forbes Dennis (1949). “A Sea Change”

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• Gratitude is a virtue disposing the mind to an inward sense and an outward acknowledgment of a benefit received, together with a readiness to return the same, or the like, as occasions of the doer of it shall require, and the abilities of the receiver extend to. He who receives a good turn, should never forget it: he who does one, should never remember it.

  Pierre Charron

  Gratitude, Mind, Together

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