Refusal Quotes - Page 4

• When I lay these questions before God I get no answer. But a rather special sort of 'No answer.' It is not the locked door. It is more like a silent, certainly not uncompassionate, gaze. As though He shook His head not in refusal but waiving the question. Like, 'Peace, child; you don't understand.

  C. S. Lewis

  Children, Doors, Special

  C.S. Lewis (2012). “A Grief Observed”, p.33, Faber & Faber

  30 Copy quote

  Show source

• There's a lot of pride involved in my refusal to believe in god.

  Orhan Pamuk

  Atheist, Believe, Pride

  Orhan Pamuk (2011). “Snow”, p.99, Faber & Faber

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• Pity does not get you aid. Admiration at your refusal to give in does.

  Suzanne Collins

  Katniss, Giving, Doe

  Suzanne Collins (2009). “The Hunger Games”, p.174, Scholastic Inc.

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• Your depression is connected to your insolence and refusal to praise. Whoever feels himself walking on the path, and refuses to praise--that man or woman steals from others every day--is a shoplifter! The sun became full of light when it got hold of itself. Angels only began shining when they achieved discipline. The sun goes out whenever the cloud of not-praising comes. The moment the foolish angel felt insolent, he heard the door close.

  Rumi

  Angel, Men, Clouds

  Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (Maulana), Jelaluddin Rumi, Kabir Helminski, Andrew Harvey (2005). “The Rumi Collection: An Anthology of Translations of Mevlâna Jalâluddin Rumi”, p.122, Shambhala Publications

  57 Copy quote

  Show source

• She used to pride herself on her refusal to see two sides of an argument, but increasingly she accepts that issues are more ambiguous and complicated than she once thought.

  David Nicholls

  Pride, Two Sides, Issues

  4 Copy quote

• Self-acceptance is my refusal to be in an adversarial relationship to myself.

  Nathaniel Branden

  Depression, Self Esteem, Acceptance

  Nathaniel Branden (1998). “A Woman's Self-Esteem: Struggles and Triumphs in the Search for Identity”, Jossey-Bass

  62 Copy quote

  Show source

• The strike, the boycott, the refusal to serve, the ability to paralyze the functioning of a complex social structure-these remain potent weapons against the most fearsome state or corporate power.

  Howard Zinn

  Fear, Weapons, Economy

  Howard Zinn (2013). “A Power Governments Cannot Suppress”, p.26, City Lights Books

  17 Copy quote

  Show source

• Love is creative, understanding goodwill for all men. It is the refusal to defeat any individual. When you rise to the level of love, of its great beauty and power, you seek only to defeat evil systems. Individuals who happen to be caught up in that system, you love, but you seek to defeat the system.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Life, Love Is, Men

  "Loving Your Enemies". Sermon by Martin Luther King, Jr. at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Montgomery, Alabama, November 17, 1957.

  64 Copy quote

  Show source

• The hatred of the youth culture for adult society is not a disinterested judgement but a terror-ridden refusal to be hooked into the, if you will, ecological chain of breathing, growing, and dying. It is the demand, in other words, to remain children.

  Midge Decter

  Children, Breathing, Hatred

  5 Copy quote

• The refusal of the British and Russian peoples to accept what appeared to be inevitable defeat was the great factor in the salvage of our civilization.

  George C. Marshall

  Acceptance, Civilization, Defeat

  Biennial Report of the Chief of Staff, US Army, September 1, 1945.

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• She was fabulously wrong when she said it the first time, and stunningly arrogant in her refusal to express any regret for lying to our fellow citizens.

  Trey Gowdy

  Regret, Lying, Bad Ass

  32 Copy quote

• On his refusal to deal with Keith Primeau: We refuse to pay a prima donna, a petulant, pouting player who had 30 goals last year the same money as Toronto is paying Mats Sundin or Pittsburgh is paying Jaromir Jagr.

  Peter Karmanos, Jr.

  Hockey, Player, Years

  7 Copy quote

• I feel that the recent ruling of the United States Army and Navy regarding the refusal of colored blood donors is an indefensible one from any point of view. As you know, there is no scientific basis for the separation of the bloods of different races except on the basis of the individual blood types or groups.

  Charles R. Drew

  Army, Race, Views

  "One Blood: The Death and Resurrection of Charles R. Drew" by Spencie Love, (pp. 155-156), 1996.

  92 Copy quote

  Show source

• So far from science being irreligious, as many think, it is the neglect of science that is irreligious-it is the refusal to study the surrounding creation that is irreligious.

  Herbert Spencer

  Science, Thinking, Study

  Herbert Spencer (1861). “Education: intellectual, moral, and physical”, p.51

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• There is only one blasphemy, and that is the refusal to experience joy.

  Paul Rudnick

  Happiness, Joy, Atheism

  10 Copy quote

• South Africa does not have a poverty problem. Poverty is a result of denialism of the way corruption taxes poor people, the inefficiencies that undermine poor people's opportunities and our refusal to admit that we are part of the problem.

  Mamphela Ramphele

  Opportunity, People, Way

  32 Copy quote

• The mastery of the true self, and the refusal to permit others to dominate us, is the ultimate in living and self-expression in athletics.

  Percy Cerutty

  Sports, Hockey, Self

  19 Copy quote

• Ignorance is not a simple lack of knowledge but an active aversion to knowledge, the refusal to know, issuing from cowardice, pride, or laziness of mind.

  Karl Popper

  Ignorance, Pride, Simple

  127 Copy quote

• Faith is the refusal to panic.

  Martyn Lloyd-Jones

  Faith, Panic

  134 Copy quote

• For the essence of science, I would suggest, is simply the refusal to believe on the basis of hope.

  Barrington Moore, Jr.

  Hope, Believe, Science

  11 Copy quote

• It is the mind that tells you that the mind is there. Don't be deceived. All the endless arguments about the mind are produced by the mind itself, for its own protection, continuation and expansion. It is the blank refusal to consider the convolutions and convulsions of the mind that can take you beyond it.

  Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

  Spiritual, Wisdom, Mind

  9 Copy quote

• In most modern instances, interpretation amounts to the philistine refusal to leave the work of art alone. Real art has the capacity to make us nervous. By reducing the work of art to its content and then interpreting that, one tames the work of art. Interpretation makes art manageable, conformable.

  Susan Sontag

  Art, Real, Criticism

  Evergreen Review Dec. 1964

  55 Copy quote

  Show source

• Christian love is the only kind of love in which there is no rivalry, no jealousy. There is jealousy among the lovers of art; there is jealousy among the lovers of song; there is jealousy among the lovers of beauty. The glory of natural love is its monopoly, its power to say, 'It is mine. ' But the glory of Christian love is its refusal of monopoly.

  George Matheson

  Love, Christian, Song

  25 Copy quote

• [W]hen the empirical investigator glories in his refusal to go beyond the specialized observation dictated by the traditions of his discipline, be they ever so inclusive, he is making a virtue out of a defense mechanism which insures him against questioning his presuppositions.

  Karl Mannheim

  Discipline, Hens, Defense

  Karl Mannheim (1936). “Ideology and utopia: an introduction to the sociology of knowledge”

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• The statement "I am in pain" may be one piece of evidence for the conclusion that the speaker is in pain, but it is not the only possible evidence, and since people sometimes tell lies, not even the best possible evidence. Even if there were stronger grounds for refusing to attribute pain to those who do not have language, the consequences of this refusal might lead us to reject the conclusion. Human infants and young children are unable to use language. Are we to deny that a year-old child can suffer?

  Peter Singer

  Children, Pain, Lying

  Peter Singer (1975). “Animal liberation: a new ethics for our treatment of animals”

  7 Copy quote

  Show source