Unnecessary Quotes - Page 14

• I write every paragraph four times - once to get my meaning down, once to put in anything I have left out, once to take out anything that seems unnecessary, and once to make the whole thing sound as if I had only just thought of it.

  Margery Allingham

  Writing, Sound, Four

  18 Copy quote

• It is my art. I am better at it than I ever was. And I will do it as long as I can. When you reach a certain age you can slough off what is unnecessary and concentrate on what is. And why not?

  Arthur Miller

  Art, Writing, Long

  5 Copy quote

• A plongeur is a slave, and a wasted slave, doing stupid and largely unnecessary work. He is kept at work, ultimately, because of a vague feeling that he would be dangerous if he had leisure. And educated people, who should be on his side, acquiesce in the process, because they know nothing about him and consequently are afraid of him.

  George Orwell

  Fear, Stupid, People

  George Orwell (2012). “Down and Out in Paris and London”, p.86, Lulu.com

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The government is best which makes itself unnecessary.

  Wilhelm von Humboldt

  Government

  "Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern English and Foreign Sources". Book by James Wood, 1899.

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• We . . . must try to live without causing unnecessary harm, not just to fellow humans but to all beings. We must try not to be stingy, or to exploit others. There will be enough pain in the world as it is.

  Gary Snyder

  Pain, Trying, World

  Gary Snyder (2010). “The Practice of the Wild”, p.4, Counterpoint Press

  77 Copy quote

  Show source

• I am strongly drawn to the simple life and am often oppressed by the feeling that I am engrossing an unnecessary amount of the labour of my fellow men. I regard class differences as contrary to justice and, in the last resort, based on force. I also consider that plain living is good for everybody, physically and mentally.

  Albert Einstein

  Simple, Men, Class

  Albert Einstein (2016). “The Albert Einstein Collection: Essays in Humanism, The Theory of Relativity, and The World As I See It”, p.168, Open Road Media

  14 Copy quote

  Show source

• Michael Ondaatje’s work taught me how to be at home in fragments, and how to think about a big story in carefully curated vignettes. All his books were odd, all of them ‘unfinished’ the way Chopin’s Études are unfinished: no wasted gestures, no unnecessary notes.

  Amitava Kumar

  Book, Home, Thinking

  6 Copy quote

• From now on you must strive to cut out unnecessary
  movement. Waste in movement is wrong and will get you
  killed.

  Masaaki Hatsumi

  Cutting, Movement, Waste

  24 Copy quote

• The effort to untangle the human words from the divine seems not only futile to me but also unnecessary, since God works with what is. God uses whatever is usable in a life, both to speak and to act, and those who insist on fireworks in the sky may miss the electricity that sparks the human heart.

  Barbara Brown Taylor

  Heart, Sky, Effort

  FaceBook post by Barbara Brown Taylor from Dec 31, 2013

  17 Copy quote

  Show source

• A perfectionist is someone who finishes the backside of a drawer, which I consider completely unnecessary.

  Helmut Krone

  Perfectionist, Drawers, Backsides

  10 Copy quote

• Execution as punishment is barbaric and unnecessary.

  Kate Mulgrew

  Punishment, Execution, Barbaric

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• I... was not too happy to suddenly take on this public role thrust upon me. They just assumed I was the Joan of Arc of the women's movement. And I wasn't at all. It put a lot of unnecessary pressure on me.

  Bea Arthur

  Roles, Movement, Pressure

  TV Legends, August 6, 2005.

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• Mania's premonitory signs are unusual acts of extravagance, manifested by the purchase of houses, and certain expensive and unnecessary articles of furniture.

  Benjamin Rush

  House, Bipolar, Extravagance

  7 Copy quote

• Conversation like television set on honeymoon... unnecessary.

  Peter Sellers

  Talking, Television, Honeymoon

  "Fictional character: Mr. Wang". "Murder by Death", 1976.

  24 Copy quote

  Show source

• I had been conscious a feeling of depression and so I voiced to [Secretary Of War Stimson] my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at this very moment, seeking a way to surrender with a minimum loss of 'face.'

  Dwight D. Eisenhower

  Country, War, Loss

  "Mandate for Change: The White House Years, 1953-1956". Book by Dwight D. Eisenhower, pp. 312-313, 1963.

  19 Copy quote

  Show source

• A fancy watch, it's completely unnecessary. I just need a watch to tell the right time.

  Judd Nelson

  Watches, Needs, Fancy

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

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• I'm afraid that reason will triumph and that the world will become a place where anyone who doesn't fit that will become unnecessary

  David Byrne

  Triumph, World, Fit

  5 Copy quote

• Most troubles are unnecessary. We have Nature beaten; we can make her grow wheat; we can keep warm when she sends blizzards. So we raise the devil just for pleasure--wars, politics, race-hatreds, labor-disputes.

  Sinclair Lewis

  War, Race, Hatred

  Sinclair Lewis (1995). “Main Street: The Story of Carol Kennicott”, p.143, Penguin

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• If we are understood, more words are unnecessary; if we are not likely to be understood, they are useless.

  Charles II of England

  Useless, Understood, Ifs

  "Hudibras" by Samuel Butler, edited by Henry George Bohn, (Part 1, Canto 1), 1859.

  34 Copy quote

  Show source

• I think a person has to believe in something,
  or search out some kind of faith;
  otherwise life is empty, nothing.
  How can you live not knowing why the cranes fly,
  why children are born, why there are stars in the sky...
  Either you know why you live,
  or it's all small, unnecessary bits.

  Sarah Ruhl

  Stars, Children, Believe

  11 Copy quote

• When spiritual seeking becomes too complicated, its exercies too elaborated, its doctrines too esoteric, it becomes also too artificial and the resulting achievements too fabricated. It is the beginners and intermediates who carry this heavy and unnecessary burden, who involve themselves to the point of becoming neurotics.

  Paul Brunton

  Spiritual, Achievement, Beginners

  10 Copy quote

• The State is said by some to be a necessary evil; it must be made unnecessary.

  Benjamin Tucker

  Evil, Anarchy, States

  Benjamin Ricketson Tucker (1972). “Instead of a Book”

  25 Copy quote

  Show source

• I hate war, and I hate having to struggle. I honestly do because I wish I had been born into a world where it was unnecessary. This context of struggle and being a warrior and being a struggler has been forced on me by oppression. Otherwise I would be a sculptor, or a gardener, carpenter - You know, I would be free to be so much more… I guess part of me or a part of who I am, a part of what I do is being a warrior - a reluctant warrior, a reluctant struggler. But I do it, because I’m committed to life.

  Assata Shakur

  Hate, War, Struggle

  161 Copy quote

• Unfortunately, what is thrown away is not only food and dispensable objects, but often human beings themselves, who are discarded as 'unnecessary.' For example, it is frightful even to think there are children, victims of abortion, who will never see the light of day; children being used as soldiers, abused and killed in armed conflicts; and children being bought and sold in that terrible form of modern slavery which is human trafficking, which is a crime against humanity.

  Pope Francis

  Inspiring, Wise, Children

  Pope Francis' 'State Of The World' Address To Diplomatic Corps, www.huffingtonpost.com. January 13, 2014.

  10 Copy quote

  Show source

• In the realm of Nature there is nothing purposeless, trivial, or unnecessary

  Maimonides

  Realms

  19 Copy quote