I learned to make my mind large, as the universe is large, so that there is room for paradoxes.
—Maxine Hong Kingston, 1976
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Quotes
Men who are unhappy, like men who sleep badly, are always proud of the fact.
—Bertrand Russell, 1930Time’s violence rends the soul; by the rent eternity enters.
—Simone Weil, 1947Every memory everyone has ever had will eventually be underwater.
—Anthony Doerr, 2006If you are truly serious about preparing your child for the future, don’t teach him to subtract—teach him to deduct.
—Fran Lebowitz, 1981The best of all rulers is but a shadowy presence to his subjects.
—LaoziMy stern chase after time is, to borrow a simile from Tom Paine, like the race of a man with a wooden leg after a horse.
—John Quincy Adams, 1844A private sin is not so prejudicial in this world as a public indecency.
—Miguel de Cervantes, 1615The almost insoluble task is to let neither the power of others, nor our own powerlessness, stupefy us.
—Theodor Adorno, 1951Calamities are of two kinds: misfortune to ourselves, and good fortune to others.
—Ambrose Bierce, 1906Man, when perfected, is the best of animals, but when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all.
—Aristotle, c. 350 BCThe more religious a country is, the more crimes are committed in it.
—Napoleon Bonaparte, 1817Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in the nineteenth century that one cannot explain away.
—Oscar Wilde, 1891