“I went to a bookstore and asked the saleswoman, 'Where's the self-help section?' She said if she told me, it would defeat the purpose.”
― George Carlin
"The only useful thing I ever learned in school was that if you spit on your eraser it will erase ink."
--Dorothy Parker
“There exists indeed an opposition to it [building of UVA, Jefferson's secular college] by the friends of William and Mary, which is not strong. The most restive is that of the priests of the different religious sects, who dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of day-light; and scowl on it the fatal harbinger announcing the subversion of the duperies on which they live. In this the Presbyterian clergy take the lead. The tocsin is sounded in all their pulpits, and the first alarm denounced is against the particular creed of Doctr. Cooper; and as impudently denounced as if they really knew what it is.
[Letter to José Francesco Corrê a Da Serra - Monticello, April 11, 1820]”
― Thomas Jefferson, Letters of Thomas Jefferson
"We have got to see what it is that has lured these individuals and young people into criminal activity like this. We have to understand why this 'jihadi cool' culture seems to lure them, and make sure this does not persuade them, and ensure they are engaged with society and understand this is wrong."
-Dr. Shuja Shafi, The Muslim Council of Britain, August 22, 2014
“Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are people who want crops without ploughing the ground; they want rain without thunder and lightning; they want the ocean without the roar of its many waters. The struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, or it may be both. But it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”
― Frederick Douglass
“As a general rule...people ask for advice only in order not to follow it; or if they do follow it, in order to have someone to blame for giving it.”
― Alexandre Dumas
“He was polite to his elders, who disliked him. Whatever his elders told him to do, he did. They told him to look before he leaped, and he always looked before he leaped. They told him to never put off until the next day what he could do the day before, and he never did. He was told to honor his father and his mother, and he honored his father and his mother. He was told that he should not kill, and he did not kill, until he got into the Army. Then he was told to kill, and he killed. He turned the other cheek on every occasion and always did unto others exactly as he would have had others do unto him. When he gave to charity, his left hand never knew what his right hand was doing. He never once took the name of the Lord his God in vain, committed adultery or coveted his neighbor's ass. In fact, he loved his neighbor and never even bore false witness against him. Major Major's elders disliked him because he was such a flagrant nonconformist.”
― Joseph Heller, Catch-22
"The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slightly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much."
--Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness
“All my black friends have a bunch of white friends. And all my white friends have one black friend.” Chris Rock
"Men are not punished for their sins, but by them."
--Elbert Hubbard
@Lustig Andrei,
"I got double rest last night. I dreamed I was sleeping."
Milton Berle
“Some people have a way with words, and other people...oh, uh, not have way.”
― Steve Martin
Who has seen the wind?
Neither you nor I:
But when the trees bow down their heads,
The wind is passing by.
Christina Rossetti
"In school, you're taught a lesson and then given a test. In life, you're given a test that teaches you a lesson."
-- Tom Bodett
@Lustig Andrei,
"On their first night together, Adam warns Eve, 'stand back. I don't know ow big this thing gets."
Milton Berle
“Boy, those French! They have a different word for everything.”
― Steve Martin
“First the doctor told me the good news: I was going to have a disease named after me.”
― Steve Martin
Reminder: Facebook Going Down Is Not A Good Reason To Call the Police - Mother Jones
