Wagers Quotes

• Courtiers don't take wagers against the king's skill. There is the deadly danger of winning.

  Isaac Asimov

  Kings, Winning, Skills

  Isaac Asimov (1951). “Foundation”

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• If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation, that He exists.

  Blaise Pascal

  Funny, God, Humorous

  "Pensées". Book by Blaise Pascal, 1669.

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• Lord Snow wants to take my place now.' He sneered. 'I'd have an easier time teaching a wolf to juggle than you will training this aurochs.' 'I'll take that wager, Ser Alliser', Jon said. 'I'd love to see Ghost juggle.

  George R. R. Martin

  Teaching, Snow, Training

  George R. R. Martin (2012). “George R. R. Martin's A Game of Thrones 5-Book Boxed Set (Song of Ice and Fire Series): A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, A Feast for Crows, and and A Dance with Dragons”, p.168, Bantam

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• Surfing also teaches quality . I will wager that it is not the number of waves that makes a session memorable for any given surfer, but that one beautiful wave that he or she waited for … and rode all the way the way to shore.

  Shaun Tomson

  Beautiful, Memorable, Numbers

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• Combat isn't where you might die -- though that does happen -- it's where you find out whether you get to keep on living. Don't underestimate the power of that revelation. Don't underestimate the things young men will wager in order to play that game one more time.

  Sebastian Junger

  Men, Order, Games

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• God is, or He is not." But to which side shall we incline? Reason can decide nothing here. There is an infinite chaos which separated us. A game is being played at the extremity of this infinite distance where heads or tails will turn up. What will you wager?

  Blaise Pascal

  God, Distance, Games

  Pensees no. 680 (1658). Popularly known as "Pascal's wager."

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• Belief is a wise wager. Granted that faith cannot be proved, what harm will come to you if you gamble on its truth and it proves false? If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation, that He exists.

  Blaise Pascal

  Faith, Wise, Gains

  "Pensées" by Blaise Pascal, 1669.

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• Faith is a free surrenderand a joyous wager on the unseen, unknown, untested goodness of God.

  Martin Luther

  Unseen, Goodness, Joyous

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• A first novel of astonishing force, craft and beauty, The Headmaster's Wager conjures up a dizzyingly evocative wartime Saigon in the story of Percival Chen, a Chinese schoolmaster in Vietnam. This extraordinary book made me weep. Read it.

  Janice Y. K. Lee

  Book, Chinese, Stories

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• All of life is a wager

  Christopher Hitchens

  Life Is

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• He is no true reader who has not experienced the reproachful fascination of the great shelves of unread books, of the libraries at night of which Borges is the fabulist. He is no reader who has not heard, in his inward ear, the call of the hundreds of thousands, of the millions of volumes which stand in the stacks of the British Library asking to be read. For there is in each book a gamble against oblivion, a wager against silence, which can be won only when the book is opened again (but in contrast to man, the book can wait centuries for the hazard of resurrection.)

  George Steiner

  Book, Night, Men

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• When widows exclaim loudly against second marriages, I would always lay a wager than the man, If not the wedding day, is absolutely fixed on.

  Henry Fielding

  Wedding, Men, Widows And Orphans

  Henry Fielding (1821). “The novels of Henry Fielding ... complete in one volume. To which is prefixed, a memoir of the life of the author [by sir W. Scott].”, p.601

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• If those arrangements [the fundamental arrangements of knowledge] were to disappear as they appeared... then one can certainly wager that man would be erased, like a face drawn in sand at the edge of the sea.

  Michel Foucault

  Men, Sea, Would Be

  The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences ch. 10 (1966)

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• I would wager that my job has helped save our economy from the economic ravages of out-of-control environmental extremism. I view my job a little like a legislator, supported by the taxpayer, to protect the interests of the taxpayer and to minimize the role of government.

  Roy Spencer

  Jobs, Government, Views

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• Wagers and pacts are made with angels - or with devils.

  Paulo Coelho

  Life, Inspiration, Angel

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• Let us weigh the gain and the loss, in wagering that God is. Consider these alternatives: if you win, you win all, if you lose you lose nothing. Do not hesitate, then, to wager that he is.

  Blaise Pascal

  Loss, Winning, Lost Friendship

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• I have always considered "Pascal's Wager" a questionable bet to place. Any God worth "believing in" would surely prefer an honest agnostic to a calculating hypocrite.

  Alan Dershowitz

  Atheist, Believe, Hypocrite

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• If there is a God, He is infinitely incomprehensible, since, having, neither parts nor limits, He has no affinity to us. We are then incapable of knowing either what He is or if He is. [So] you must wager. Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is. Let us estimate these two chances. If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager then without hesitation that he is.

  Blaise Pascal

  Atheist, Loss, Knowing

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• All the time, I've felt that life is a wager and that I probably was getting more out of leading a bohemian existence as a writer than I would have if I didn't.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Life Is, Bohemian, Existence

  "Christopher Hitchens to Charlie Rose: I'd do it again" by Patrick Gavin, www.politico.com. August 16, 2010.

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• Ralston stiffened at the reference to the stupid wager that caused so much pain and unhappiness. He ignored Oxford's proffered hand, and instead met the baron's concerned gaze, and said, "Keep the money. I have her. She's all I want.

  Sarah MacLean

  Pain, Stupid, Hands

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• Tree planting is always a utopian enterprise, it seems to me, a wager on a future the planter doesn't necessarily expect to witness.

  Michael Pollan

  Garden, Tree, Enterprise

  Michael Pollan (2007). “Second Nature: A Gardener's Education”, p.152, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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• When men have realized that time has upset many fighting faiths, they may come to believe... that the ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas-- that the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market, and that truth is the only ground upon which their wishes safely can be carried out. That at any rate is the theory of our Constitution. It is an experiment. As all life is an experiment. Every year if not every day we wager our salvation upon some prophecy based upon imperfect knowledge.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.

  Freedom, Believe, Fighting

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• I'll wager at the end a body realizes the Lord has already shown Himself. That things as they are -- her hand circles in a gesture that gathers clouds and kites and grass and Queenie pawing earth over her bone - just what they've always seen, was seeing Him. As for me, I could leave the world with today in my eyes.

  Truman Capote

  Eye, Hands, Circles

  Truman Capote (2012). “A Christmas Memory”, p.25, Modern Library

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• I'm not resigned, but I'm realistic too. The statistics in my case are very poor. Not many people come through esophageal cancer and live to talk about it, or not for long.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Cancer, Long, People

  "Anderson Cooper 360°", transcripts.cnn.com. August 5, 2010.

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• You know what they say the modern version of Pascal's Wager is? Sucking up to as many Transhumanists as possible, just in case one of them turns into God.

  Greg Egan

  Pascal, Modern, Cases

  Greg Egan (2009). “Crystal Nights and Other Stories”, Subterranean

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