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Post by Tamrin on Mar 6, 2014 8:39:52 GMT 10
A faithful friend is a strong defense; and he that hath found him hath found a treasure
A little kingdom I possess, where thoughts and feelings dwell; And very hard the task I find of governing it well
Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead
Do the things you know, and you shall learn the truth you need to know
Women have been called queens for a long time, but the kingdom given them isn't worth ruling
I like to help women help themselves, as that is, in my opinion, the best way to settle the woman question. Whatever we can do and do well we have a right to, and I don't think anyone will deny us
Let my name stand among those who are willing to bear ridicule and reproach for the truth's sake, and so earn some right to rejoice when the victory is wonLouisa May AlcottUS novelist ( Little Women) (Died this day 1888) Housekeeping ain't no joke
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 6, 2014 8:40:43 GMT 10
We have a moral obligation to use our prosperity at this moment, especially to uplift communities in poverty
Emperors and armies come and go ... but unless they leave new ideas in their wake, they are of passing historic consequence. The short list of intellectuals who have mat- erially advanced the betterment of civilization unquestionably includes Adam Smith
I do not deny that many appear to have succeeded in a material way by cutting corners and by manipulating associates, both in their professional and in their personal lives. But material success is possible in this world and far more satisfying when it comes without exploiting others
The true measure of a career is to be able to be content, even proud, that you succeeded through your own endeavors without leaving a trail of casualties in your wake
The Fact that our economical models at The Fed, the best in the world, have been wrong for fourteen straight quarters, does not mean they will not be right in the fifteenth quarter
Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself included, are in a state of shocked disbelief
Look at it! Look at it, damn you! This is the result of your consistent, persistent, grinding, impoverishing inflation, you despicable loathsome morons!Alan GreenspanAmerican Objectivist economist (“ I was wrong”) former President of the US Federal Reserve Board (Born this day 1926) I guess I should warn you, if I turn out to be particularly clear, you've probably misunderstood what I've said
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 6, 2014 8:47:01 GMT 10
All human beings have three lives: public, private, and secret
What matters in life is not what happens to you but what you remember and how you remember it
The heart's memory eliminates the bad and magnifies the good; and thanks to this artifice we manage to endure the burdens of the past
Humanity, like armies in the field, advances at the speed of the slowest
Fiction was invented the day Jonas arrived home and told his wife that he was three days late because he had been swallowed by a whale
In the end, it is impossible not to become what others believe you are
He repeated until his dying day that there was no one with more common sense, no stone cutter more obstinate, no manager more lucid or dangerous, than a poetGabriel García Márquez (Magical Realism movement) Colombian journalist, novelist and short story writer (Born this day 1928) Be calm. God awaits you at the door
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 6, 2014 8:48:06 GMT 10
A man is educated and turned out to work. But a woman is educated and turned out to grass
Men and women should own the world as a mutual possession
Race prejudice is not only a shadow over the colored, it is a shadow over all of us, and the shadow is darkest over those who feel it least and allow its evil effects to go on
I feel no need for any other faith than my faith in the kindness of human beings. I am so absorbed in the wonder of earth and the life upon it that I cannot think of heaven and angels
It may be that religion is dead, and if it is, we had better know it and set our- selves to try to discover other sources of moral strength before it is too late
When men destroy their old gods they will find new ones to take their place
The truth is always exciting. Speak it, then. Life is dull without itPearl S. Buck (Sai Zhenzhu)US Pulitzer Prize winning author ( The Good Earth) (Died this day 1973) Inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that is where I renew my springs that never dry up
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 6, 2014 8:50:16 GMT 10
A building has integrity just like a man. And just as seldom
A desire presupposes the possibility of action to achieve it; action presupposes a goal which is worth achieving
Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values
God ... a being whose only definition is that he is beyond man's power to conceive
The hardest thing to explain is the glaringly evident which everybody had decided not to see
A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others
Force and mind are opposites; morality ends where a gun beginsAyn RandRussian / US author (The Fountainhead, Atlas Shrugged) Advocate of psychopathy as a way of life (Died this day 1982, good riddance) Rand's funeral was attended by some of her prominent followers, including Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan. A six-foot floral arrangement in the shape of a dollar sign was placed near her coffin. [The Native Americans] didn't have any rights to the land and there was no reason for anyone to grant them rights which they had not conceived and were not using ... What was it they were fighting for, if they opposed white men on this continent? For their wish to continue a primitive existence, their "right" to keep part of the earth untouched, unused and not even as property, just keep everybody out so that you will live practically like an animal, or maybe a few caves above it. Any white person who brought the element of civilization had the right to take over this continent
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 7, 2014 11:17:14 GMT 10
Friday’s Quotes:I have gained this from philosophy: that I do without being commanded what others do only from fear of the law
It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it
Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts
It is absurd to hold that a man ought to be ashamed of being unable to defend himself with his limbs but not of being unable to defend himself with speech and reason, when the use of reason is more distinctive of a human being than the use of his limbs
Anybody can become angry — that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way — that is not within everybody's power and is not easy
A tyrant must put on the appearance of uncommon devotion to religion. Subjects are less apprehensive of illegal treatment from a ruler whom they consider god-fearing and pious
The whole is more than the sum of its partsAristotleGreek philosopher, student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great (Died this day 322 BCE) The gods too are fond of a joke
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 7, 2014 11:17:54 GMT 10
Most men seem to live according to sense rather than reason
It is requisite for the relaxation of the mind that we make use, from time to time, of playful deeds and jokes
In order for a war to be just, three things are necessary. First, the authority of the sovereign. Secondly, a just cause. Thirdly, a rightful intention
Three things are necessary for the salvation of man: to know what he ought to believe; to know what he ought to desire; and to know what he ought to do
The truth of our faith becomes a matter of ridicule among the infidels if any Catholic, not gifted with the necessary scientific learning, presents as dogma what scientific scrutiny shows to be false
If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever
Beware the man of one bookThomas AquinasItalian scholastic philosopher (Died this day 1274) The things that we love tell us what we are
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 7, 2014 11:18:38 GMT 10
Every student who enters upon a scientific pursuit, especially if at a somewhat advanced period of life, will find not only that he has much to learn, but much also to unlearn
A mind which has once imbibed a taste for scientific enquiry, and has learnt the habit of applying its principles readily to the cases which occur, has within itself an inexhaustible source of pure and exciting contemplations
Speculations apparently the most unprofitable have almost invariably been those from which the greatest practical applications have emanated
It can hardly be pressed forcibly enough on the attention of the student of nature, that there is scarcely any natural phenomenon which can be fully and completely explained, in all its circumstances, without a union of several, perhaps of all, the sciences
Words are to the Anthropologist what rolled pebbles are to the Geologist — Battered relics of past ages often containing within them indelible records capable of intelligible interpretation
Geology, in the magnitude and sublimity of the objects of which it treats, undoubtedly ranks, in the scale of the sciences, next to astronomy
The sun's rays are the ultimate source of almost every motion which takes place on the surface of the earthSir John HerschelEnglish mathematician and astronomer (Born this day 1792) Self-respect is the cornerstone of all virtue
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 7, 2014 11:19:22 GMT 10
The clear light of science teaches us that we must be our own saviors, if we are to be found worth saving
Science, unlike theology, never leads to insanity
The chief trouble with religion has been too much dependence upon names or words. People fail to discriminate. They do not think. Generally, people who think for themselves, instead of thinking according to the rules laid down by others, are considered unfaithful to the established order. In that respect I, too, differ with the established order and established designations
Those who would legislate against the teaching of evolution should also legislate against gravity, electricity and the unreasonable velocity of light, and also should introduce a clause to prevent the use of the telescope, the microscope and the spectroscope or any other instrument … used for the discovery of truth
And to think of this great country in danger of being dominated by people ignorant enough to take a few ancient Babylonian legends as the canons of modern culture. Our scientific men are paying for their failure to speak out earlier. There is no use now talking evolution to these people. Their ears are stuffed with Genesis
A theory of personal resurrection or reincarnation of the individual is untenable when we but pause to consider the magnitude of the idea. On the contrary, I must believe that rather than the survival of all, we must look for survival only in the spirit of the good we have done in passing through
I do not believe what has been served to me to believe. I am a doubter, a questioner, a skeptic. When it can be proved to me that there is immortality, that there is resurrection beyond the gates of death, then will I believe. Until then, noBro. Luther BurbankAmerican horticulturist, freethinker and Freemason (Born this day 1849) Justice, love, truth, peace and harmony, a serene unity with science and the laws of the universe
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Post by Tamrin on Mar 7, 2014 11:20:11 GMT 10
A religious phenomenon will only be recognized as such if it is grasped at its own level, that is to say, if it is studied as something religious. To try to grasp the essence of such phenomenon by means of physiology, psychology, sociology, economics, linguistics, art or any other study is false; it misses the one unique and irreducible element in it — the element of the sacred
Man becomes aware of the sacred because it manifests itself, shows itself, as something wholly different from the profane ... something sacred shows itself to us ... something of a wholly different order, a reality that does not belong to our world, in objects that are an integral part of our natural "profane" world … In each case we are confronted by the same mysterious act — the manifestation of something of a wholly different order, a reality that does not belong to our world, in objects that are an integral part of our natural "profane" world
For the past fifty years at least, Western scholars have approached the study of myth from a viewpoint markedly different from, let us say, that of the nineteenth century. Unlike their predecessors, who treated myth in the usual meaning of the word, that is, s "fable," "invention," "fiction," they have accepted it as it was understood in archaic societies, where, on the contrary, "myth" means a "true story" and, beyond that, a story that is a most precious possession because it is sacred, exemplary, significant
The hearer of myth, regardless of his level of culture, when he is listening to a myth, forgets, as it were, his particular situation and is projected into another world, into another universe which is no longer his poor little universe of every day … The myths are true because they are sacred, because they tell him about sacred beings and events. Consequently, in reciting or listening to a myth, one resumes contact with the sacred and with reality, and in so doing one transcends the profane condition, the "historical situation
For those to whom a stone reveals itself as sacred, its immediate reality is transmuted into supernatural reality. In other words, for those who have a religious experience all nature is capable of revealing itself as cosmic sacrality
In imitating the exemplary acts of a god or of a mythic hero, or simply by recounting their adventures, the man of an archaic society detaches himself from profane time and magically re-enters the Great Time, the sacred time
One is devoured by Time, not because one lives in Time, but because one believes in its reality, and therefore forgets or despises eternityMircea EliadeRomanian historian of religion, fiction writer and philosopher (Born this day 1907) These thirty years, and more, that I've spent among exotic, barbaric, indomitable gods and goddesses, nourished on myths, obsessed by symbols, nursed and bewitched by so many images which have come down to me from those submerged worlds, today seem to me to be the stages of a long initiation. Each one of these divine figures, each of these myths or symbols, is connected to a danger that was confronted and overcome. How many times I was almost lost, gone astray in this labyrinth where I risked being killed... These were not only bits of knowledge acquired slowly and leisurely in books, but so many encounters, confrontations, and temptations. I realize perfectly well now all the dangers I skirted during this long quest, and, in the first place, the risk of forgetting that I had a goal... that I wanted to reach a "center"
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