Surprising Quotes

• It's surprising how many persons go through life without ever recognizing that their feelings toward other people are largely determined by their feelings toward themselves, and if you're not comfortable within yourself, you can't be comfortable with others.

  Sydney J. Harris

  Relationship, Confidence, Self Esteem

  75 Copy quote

• Nothing is more surprising than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few.

  David Hume

  Philosophy, Philosophical, Government

  160 Copy quote

• It's surprising how hard we'll work when the work is done just for ourselves.

  Bill Watterson

  Done, Hard

  "Some thoughts on the real world by one who glimpsed it and fled". Bill Watterson's commencement speech at the Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, www.graduationwisdom.com. May 20, 1990.

  16 Copy quote

  Show source

• Surprise is the greatest gift which life can grant us.

  Boris Pasternak

  Life, Leadership, Morning

  Boris Leonidovich Pasternak (1959). “Poetry, 1917-1959”

  46 Copy quote

  Show source

• One of the surprising things in this world is the respect a worthless man has for himself.

  E. W. Howe

  Respect, Men, Literature

  13 Copy quote

• The dream is to keep surprising yourself, never mind the audience.

  Tom Hiddleston

  Dream, Mind, Audience

  "Tom Hiddleston: 'The dream is to keep surprising yourself'". Interview with Euan Ferguson, www.theguardian.com. February 26, 2011.

  24 Copy quote

  Show source

• When we first broke into that forbidden box in the other dimension, we knew we had discovered something as surprising and powerful as the New World when Columbus came stumbling onto it.

  Ken Kesey

  Powerful, Ghouls, Firsts

  15 Copy quote

• The surprising thing about young fools is how many survive to become old fools.

  Doug Larson

  Funny, Wisdom, Survival

  17 Copy quote

• Let's quit fiddling with religion and do something to bring the world to Christ.

  Billy Sunday

  Inspiration, Religion, World

  Billy Sunday, William Thomas Ellis (1914). “Salesman's Prospectus for "Billy" Sunday: The Man and His Message, with His Own Words which Have Won Thousands for Christ”

  151 Copy quote

  Show source

• There is something thrilling in the mimesis of life's surprising unfolding.

  Joyce Carol Oates

  Mimesis, Unfolding, Thrilling

  "Writing Lessons From the Madly Prolific Joyce Carol Oates". Interview with Alexander Sammon, www.motherjones.com. September 10, 2016.

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• Surprising people is the key to career longevity for someone like me.

  John C. Reilly

  Keys, Careers, People

  "John C. Reilly: Confessions of a scene-stealer" by Ryan Gilbey, www.theguardian.com. September 14, 2010.

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• True realism consists in revealing the surprising things which habit keeps covered and prevents us from seeing.

  Jean Cocteau

  Reality, Habit, Revealing

  "Le Mystère Laïc". Book by Jean Cocteau, 1928.

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• Many people mistake our work for our vocation. Our vocation is the love of Jesus.

  Mother Teresa

  Love, Jesus, Work

  24 Copy quote

• That was clearly surprising, interesting - a very interesting milestone was when you can pick up a magazine and read an article about some sort of computer related thing and they mention the word internet without explaining it.

  Jon Postel

  Interesting, Magazines, Computer

  19 Copy quote

• Property is unstable, and youth perishes in a moment. Life itself is held in the grinning fangs of Death, Yet men delay to obtain release from the world. Alas, the conduct of mankind is surprising.

  Plautus

  Men, Delay, World

  17 Copy quote

• It's indeed surprising that replacing the elementary particle with a string leads to such a big change in things. I'm tempted to say that it has to do with the fuzziness it introduces.

  Edward Witten

  Change, Introducing, Bigs

  6 Copy quote

• I want to work with intelligent people and look for scripts that I think are intelligent and surprising.

  Adam Brody

  Intelligent, Thinking, People

  6 Copy quote

• I just like surprising people. I never want to get to a place where people see that I am in a movie and they go see the movie and they expect a certain performance one way or the other. That is just inherently boring to me.

  John C. Reilly

  People, Want, Way

  6 Copy quote

• What's surprising is that the people who fought against torture here are the communists.

  Jean-Marie Le Pen

  People, Communist, Torture

  6 Copy quote

• It would be wonderful to think that the future is unknown and sort of surprising.

  Alan Rickman

  Thinking, Would Be, Wonderful

  32 Copy quote

• The concentration in my book on Marie Antoinette's childhood and on her family influences. It is surprising how some books actually start with her arrival in France!

  Antonia Fraser

  Book, Childhood, France

  7 Copy quote

• Richard Schiff is a really good baseball player. It's surprising because he looks exhausted.

  Bradley Whitford

  Baseball, Player, Looks

  6 Copy quote

• Every one of our greatest national treasures, our liberty, enterprise, vitality, wealth, military power, global authority, flow from a surprising source: our ability to give thanks.

  Tony Snow

  Military, Giving, Liberty

  11 Copy quote

• When I finish a painting, it usually looks as surprising to me as to anyone else.

  Howard Hodgkin

  Looks, Painting

  10 Copy quote

• But any big change is more likely to result if there is a disruptive event such as new technologies or platforms that have a surprising effect on market share.

  Trip Hawkins

  Technology, Events, Economy

  6 Copy quote