Splendid Quotes - Page 13

• He (Thomas Paine) saw oppression on every hand; injustice everywhere; hypocrisy at the altar; venality on the bench, tyranny on the throne; and with a splendid courage he espoused the cause of the weak against the strong

  Robert Green Ingersoll

  Strong, Hands, Hypocrisy

  Robert Green Ingersoll (1874). “An Oration on the Life and Services of Thomas Paine”, p.122

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• Writing is a splendid sorter of... feelings, better even than paint.

  Emily Carr

  Writing, Feel Better, Feelings

  13 Copy quote

• The splendid empire of Charles the Fifth was erected upon the grave of liberty.

  John Lothrop Motley

  Liberty, Empires, Graves

  John Lothrop Motley (1863). “The Rise of the Dutch Republic: Complete in One Volume”, p.5

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• It is a splendid thing to have the use of any gift of God. It isn't for us to choose again, or wonder and dispute, but just work in our own places, and leave the rest to God.

  Sarah Orne Jewett

  Use, Wonder, Disputes

  4 Copy quote

• A nation's character is the sum of its splendid deeds; they constitute one common patrimony, the nation's inheritance. They awe foreign powers, they arouse and animate our own people.

  Henry Clay

  Character, People, Deeds

  Henry Clay (2015). “The Papers of Henry Clay: The Rising Statesman 1815--1820”, p.149, University Press of Kentucky

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• Thy return Posterity shall witness. Years must roll away, but then at length the splendid sight again shall greet our distant children's eyes.

  Jeremiah

  Children, Eye, Sight

  5 Copy quote

• Splendid architecture, the love of your life, an old friend... they can all go drifting by unseen if youre not careful.

  Ian Mckellen

  Old Friends, Unseen, Architecture

  "Ian McKellen: 'I couldn't be a dad, I'm too selfish'". Mirror.co.uk Interview, www.mirror.co.uk. April 11, 2010.

  23 Copy quote

  Show source

• We can roam the bloated stacks of the Library of Alexandria, where all imagination and knowledge are assembled; we can recognize in its destruction the warning that all we gather will be lost, but also that much of it can be collected again; we can learn from its splendid ambition that what was one man's experience can become, through the alchemy of words, the experience of all, and how that experience, distilled once again into words, can serve each singular reader for some secret, singular purpose.

  Alberto Manguel

  Ambition, Men, Imagination

  Alberto Manguel (2011). “The Library at Night”, p.36, Vintage Canada

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• Holly Black is the Real Thing: a gifted writer with a solid grounding in what matters. Her stories are dark and splendid blooms rising from roots sunk deep in myth and tradition.

  Ellen Kushner

  Real, Dark, Roots

  4 Copy quote

• In the American hemisphere the cause of freedom and independence has continued to prevail, and if signalized by none of those splendid triumphs which had crowned with glory some of the preceding years it has only been from the banishment of all external force against which the struggle had been maintained. The shout of victory has been superseded by the expulsion of the enemy over whom it could have been achieved.

  John Quincy Adams

  Struggle, Years, Independence

  John Quincy Adams, Kenneth V. Jones, United States. President (1825-1829 : Adams) (1970). “John Quincy Adams, 1767-1848; chronology, documents, bibliographical aids”, Oceana Pubns

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• There is a certain sort of man whose doom in the world is disappointment, who excels in it, and whose luckless triumphs in his meek career of life, I have often thought, must be regarded by the kind eyes above with as much favor as the splendid successes and achievements of coarser and more prosperous men.

  William Makepeace Thackeray

  Disappointment, Eye, Careers

  William Makepeace Thackeray (1869). “The Paris sketch book. Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush. The Irish sketch book. Notes of a journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo”, p.505

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Beauty is Nature in perfection; circularity is its chief attribute. Behold the full moon, the enchanting golf ball, the domes of splendid temples, the huckleberry pie, the wedding ring, the circus ring, the ring for the waiter, and the "round" of drinks.

  O. Henry

  Golf, Moon, Pie

  O. Henry (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of O. Henry (Illustrated)”, p.681, Delphi Classics

  54 Copy quote

  Show source

• One man is a splendid fighter -- a god has made him so -- one's a dancer, another skilled at lyre and song, and deep in the next man's chest farseeing Zeus plants the gift of judgment, good clear sense. And many reap the benefits of that treasure.

  Homer

  Song, Men, Dancer

  4 Copy quote

• I believe that Communism is necessary to the world, and I believe that the heroism of Russia has fired men's hopes in a way which was essential to the realization of Communism in the future. Regarded as a splendid attempt, without which ultimate success would have been very improbable, Bolshevism deserves the gratitude and admiration of all the progressive part of mankind.

  Bertrand Russell

  Gratitude, Believe, Men

  Bertrand Russell (1972). “Bolshevism: practice and theory”, Ayer Co Pub

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• As the Deity has given us Greeks all other blessings in moderation, so our moderation gives us a kind of wisdom which is timid, in all likelihood, and fit for common people, not one which is kingly and splendid. This wisdom, such as it is, observing that human life is ever subject to all sorts of vicissitudes, forbids us to be puffed up by the good things we have, or to admire a man's felicity while there is still time for it to change.

  Solon

  Men, Blessing, Giving

  "Solon". Book by Plutarch, ch. 27; translation by Bernadotte Perrin, 1497.

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• You are taken, shaken, by moments when the improbability of our lives comes over you like a fever. Everything is remarkable, people, living, events present themselves to you with the immediacy of players in some barbarous and splendid drama that it seems we are part of. You have been given new eyes.

  Doris Lessing

  Drama, Taken, Eye

  7 Copy quote

• The recovery of freedom is so splendid a thing that we must not shun even death when seeking to recover it.

  Marcus Tullius Cicero

  Freedom, Recovery, Seeking

  Marcus Tullius Cicero (1856). “Select Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero”, p.439

  20 Copy quote

  Show source

• Whither, O splendid ship, thy white sails crowding,Leaning across the bosom of the urgent West,That fearest nor sea rising, nor sky clouding,Whither away, fair rover, and what thy quest?

  Robert Bridges

  Sea, Sky, White

  Robert Bridges (1912). “Poetical Works Of Robert Brides Excluding The Eight Dramas”

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• The country is headed toward a single and splendid government of an aristocracy founded on banking institutions and moneyed incorporations and if this tendency continues it will be the end of freedom and democracy, the few will be ruling...I hope we shall...crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations which dare already to challenge our government to trial and bid defiance to the laws of our country. I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Crush, Country, Believe

  82 Copy quote

• Every artist knows that there is no such thing as "freedom" in art. The first thing an artist does when he begins a new work is to lay down the barriers and limitations; he decides upon a certain composition, a certain key, a certain relation of creatures or objects to each other. He is never free, and the more splendid his imagination, the more intense his feeling, the farther he goes from general truth and general emotion.

  Willa Cather

  Art, Keys, Decide Upon

  Willa Cather (1988). “Willa Cather on Writing: Critical Studies on Writing as an Art”, p.123, U of Nebraska Press

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• I could not but smile to think in what out-of-the-way corners genius produces her bantlings! And the Muses, those capricious dames, who, forsooth, so often refuse to visit palaces, and deny a single smile to votaries in splendid studies, and gilded drawing-rooms--what holes and burrows will they frequent to lavish their favors on some ragged disciple!

  Washington Irving

  Thinking, Drawing, Dames

  Washington Irving, Charles Neider (1998). “The Complete Tales of Washington Irving”, p.275, Da Capo Press

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Far, far away, there is a beautiful Country which no human eye has ever seen in waking hours. Under the Sunset it lies, where the distant horizon bounds the day, and where the clouds, splendid with light and colour, give a promise of the glory and beauty which encompass it. Sometimes it is given to us to see it in dreams.

  Bram Stoker

  Beautiful, Dream, Country

  Bram Stoker (2016). “Under the Sunset: And Other Stories”, p.4, The Floating Press

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• The triumph of the industrial arts will advance the cause of civilization more rapidly than its warmest advocates could have hoped, and contribute to the permanent prosperity and strength of the country far more than the most splendid victories of successful war.

  Charles Babbage

  Country, Art, War

  "The Exposition of 1851: Views Of The Industry, The Science, and the Government Of England". Book by Charles Babbage, 1851.

  17 Copy quote

  Show source

• Professor von Mises has a splendid analytical mind and an admirable passion for liberty; but as a student of human nature he is worse than null and as a debater he is of Hyde Park standard.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Passion, Mind, Liberty

  "Liberalism in Caricature". Review of "The Anti-Capitalist Mentality", The Economist Magazine, April 13, 1957.

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• A ship, an isle, a sickle moon With few but with how splendid stars The mirrors of the sea are strewn Between their silver bars!

  James Elroy Flecker

  Stars, Moon, Mirrors

  'The Golden Journey to Samarkand' (1913) 'A Ship, an Isle, and a Sickle Moon'

  7 Copy quote

  Show source