It often happens that the real tragedies in life occur in such an inarticulate manner that they hurt one by their crude violence, their absolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack of style. oscar wilde,...

An envious heart makes a treacherous ear. Zora Neale Hurston, “Their Eyes Were Watching God”

In the career of glory one gains many things; the gout and medals, a pension and rheumatism….And also frozen feet, an arm or leg the less, a bullet lodged between two bones which the surgeon cannot extract….all of...

Arbeit macht frei. (Work sets you free). Major Rudolph Hoss, Auschwitz Gate

We are what we love, not what loves us. Charlie Kaufman, Adaptation

I know you have come to kill me. Shoot, coward! You are only going to kill a man. Che Guevara, His last words, spoken to his assassin.

The most profound statements are often said in silence. Lynn Johnston, For Better or For Worse, 01-15-04

Change, when it comes, cracks everything open. Dorothy Allison, O Magazine, January 2004

We shall not fail or falter; we shall not weaken or tire…Give us the tools and we will finish the job. Sir Winston Churchill, BBC radio broadcast, Feb 9, 1941

I think people want their illusions and writers are mostly illusion. When you read their words, you read a flattened, incomplete version of the writer. Real Live Preacher, RealLivePreacher.com Weblog, January 05, 2004

I have been truthful all along the way. The truth is more interesting, and if you tell the truth you never have to cover your tracks. Real Live Preacher, RealLivePreacher.com Weblog, January 04, 2004

Sometimes its good to contrast what you like with something else. It makes you appreciate it even more. Darby Conley, Get Fuzzy, 2001

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. Franklin D. Roosevelt, message for Jefferson Day, April 13, 1945

Living is having ups and downs and sharing them with friends. Trey Parker and Matt Stone, South Park, Prehistoric Ice Man, 1999

The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget. Mitchell Burgess, Northern Exposure, Thanksgiving, 1992

I never did give anybody hell. I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell. Harry S Truman, quoted by Time, June 9, 1975

The law is not so much carved in stone as it is written in water, flowing in and out with the tide. Jeff Melvoin, Northern Exposure, Crime and Punishment, 1992

Sometimes love will pick you up by the short hairs…and jerk the heck out of you. Denise Dobbs, Northern Exposure, Survival of the Species, 1993

Good food ends with good talk. Geoffrey Neighor, Northern Exposure, Duets, 1993

A person has three choices in life. You can swim against the tide and get exhausted, or you can tread water and let the tide sweep you away, or you can swim with the tide, and let it...

Words calculated to catch everyone may catch no one. Adlai E. Stevenson Jr., speech to Democratic National Convention, Chicago, Illinois, July 21, 1952

Trees like to have kids climb on them, but trees are much bigger than we are, and much more forgiving. Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider, Northern Exposure, Old Tree, 1993

Working with children with autism has provided me with an opportunity to see the world in a different way. I see them strive to overcome obstacles and persevere, and learn to persevere myself. They are my inspiration. Clay...

A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives. Jackie Robinson, baseball player

People feel comfortable around someone who is comfortable with himself. Clay Aiken, Teen People

Those who dance were thought to be quite insane by those who could not hear the music. Angela Monet

Peace and blessings manifest with every lesson learned – and if your knowledge were your wealth then it would be well earned. Erykah Badu, A line from the song “On & On”

Charm is deceptive and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Solomon, King of Israel, The Bible Proverbs 31:30

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things, there is no law. The Apostle Paul (Saul of Tarsus), The Bible- Galations 5:22-23 NIV

When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on. Franklin D. Roosevelt, quoted Kansas City Star, June 5, 1977

When he stood up, it was a very complicated motion. If the deck chairs on the Ship to the Sea of Night had opened up, they would have done so like that. It was like he was unfolding...

Any transition serious enough to alter your definition of self will require not just small adjustments in your way of living and thinking but a full-on metamorphosis. Martha Beck, O Magazine, Growing Wings, January 2004

You can take from every experience what it has to offer you. And you cannot be defeated if you just keep taking one breath followed by another. Oprah Winfrey, O Magazine, What I Know For Sure, January 2004

That consciousness is everything and that all things begin with a thought. That we are responsible for our own fate, we reap what we sow, we get what we give, we pull in what we put out. I...

We shall show mercy, but we shall not ask for it. Sir Winston Churchill, speech in the House of Commons, July 14, 1940

Each decision we make, each action we take, is born out of an intention. Sharon Salzberg, O Magazine, The Power of Intention, January 2004

How we treasure (and admire) the people who acknowledge us! Julie Morgenstern, O Magazine, Belatedly Yours, January 2004

Let your light shine. Shine within you so that it can shine on someone else. Let your light shine. Oprah Winfrey, O Magazine, January 2004

Disconnecting from change does not recapture the past. It loses the future. Kathleen Norris, O Magazine, January 2004

Repetition is the death of art. Robin Green, Northern Exposure, Burning Down the House, 1992

We hold in our hands, the most precious gift of all: Freedom. The freedom to express our art. Our love. The freedom to be who we want to be. We are not going to give that freedom away...

Rain usually makes me feel mellow. Curl up in the corner time, slow down, smell the furniture. Today it just makes me feel wet. Jeff Melvoin, Northern Exposure, Dateline: Cicely, 1992

The idea of an election is much more interesting to me than the election itself…The act of voting is in itself the defining moment. Jeff Melvoin, Northern Exposure, Democracy in America, 1992

Be open to your dreams, people. Embrace that distant shore. Because our mortal journey is over all too soon. David Assael, Northern Exposure, It Happened in Juneau, 1992

Repetition does not transform a lie into a truth. Franklin D. Roosevelt, radio address, October 26, 1939

Not all treasure is silver and gold, mate. Johnny Depp, Pirates of the Caribbean

Religion is pickled God. H. G. Wells, H. G. Wells Society

Live as though Christ died yesterday, rose from the grave today, and is coming back tomorrow. Theodore Epp

There was a star danced, and under that was I born. William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing

Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds. Franklin D. Roosevelt, Pan American Day address, April 15, 1939

If we do not ever take time, how can we ever have time? Wachowski Brothers, The Matrix Reloaded

Joel: Ed, are you hallucinating? Ed: Oh, yeah, but not right now. Sy Rosen and Christian Williams, Northern Exposure, On Your Own, 1992

People are simply incapable of prolonged, sustained goodness. Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider, Northern Exposure, Do The Right Thing, 1992

There can be no spirituality, no sanctity, no truth without the female sex. Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider, Northern Exposure, Revelations, 1993

If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from within or without, we must try to extinguish it. Thomas Jefferson, letter to James Lewis, Jr., May 9, 1798

As a scientist, I am not sure anymore that life can be reduced to a class struggle, to dialectical materialism, or any set of formulas. Life is spontaneous and it is unpredictable, it is magical. I think that...

Death is the enemy. I spent 10 years of my life singlemindedly studying, practicing, fighting hand to hand in close quarters to defeat the enemy, to send him back bloodied and humble and I am not going to...

Women have more to offer this world than just a fallopian tube. Nothing is going to change until you quit looking at us as just sperm receptacles. Barbara Hall, Northern Exposure, Baby Blues, 1994

George Washington had a vision for this country. Was it three days of uninterrupted shopping? Jeff Melvoin, Northern Exposure, Bolt from the Blue, 1994

How much easier it is to be critical than to be correct. Benjamin Disraeli, speech, January 24, 1860

Truth is generally the best vindication against slander. Abraham Lincoln, letter to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, July 18, 1864

They say dreams are the windows of the soul–take a peek and you can see the inner workings, the nuts and bolts. Henry Bromel, Northern Exposure, The Big Kiss, 1991

A man should not leave this earth with unfinished business. He should live each day as if it was a pre-flight check. He should ask each morning, am I prepared to lift-off? Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider, Northern...

Obsessions and fixations are not really my field. All I know, when the mind really grabs hold of something, look out. Martin Sage and Sybil Adelman, Northern Exposure, The Bumpy Road to Love, 1991

I always admired atheists. I think it takes a lot of faith. Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider, Northern Exposure, Seoul Mates, 1991

I think that parents only get so offended by television because they rely on it as a babysitter and the sole educator of their kids. Trey Parker and Matt Stone, South Park, Death, 1997

And for the season it was winter, and they that know the winters of that country know them to be sharp and violent, and subject to cruel and fierce storms. William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation

The tendinous part of the mind, so to speak, is more developed in winter; the fleshy, in summer. I should say winter had given the bone and sinew to literature, summer the tissues and the blood. John Burroughs,...

Winter lies too long in country towns; hangs on until it is stale and shabby, old and sullen. Willa Cather, My Antonia

Whose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the village though; He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow. Robert Frost, Stopping by Woods on a Snowy...

Every mile is two in winter. George Herbert, Jacula Prudentum

In the bleak midwinter Frosty wind made moan, Earth stood hard as iron, Water like a stone; Snow had fallen, snow on snow, Snow on snow, In the bleak midwinter, Long ago. Christina Rossetti, A Christmas Carol

If there comes a little thaw, Still the air is chill and raw, Here and there a patch of snow, Dirtier than the ground below, Dribbles down a marshy flood; Ankle-deep you stick in mud In the meadows...

A little Madness in the Spring Is wholesome even for the King. Emily Dickinson, No. 1333

To deny our own impulses is to deny the very thing that makes us human. Andy and Larry Wachowski, The Matrix, 1999

There are two things in particular that it [the computer industry] failed to foresee: one was the coming of the Internet(…); the other was the fact that the century would end. Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt

When life hands us a beutiful bouquet of flowers we stare at it in cautious expectation of a bee. Dean Koontz, Shadow Fires ( early book)

If a nation is ruled by two kings, both the kings and their subjects will perish. Yeghishe

It never ceases to amaze me: we all love ourselves more than other people, but care more about their opinions than our own. Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

You can win a million battles but you can only lose one. R. A. Salvatore, Homeland

I am one of those who believe that spiritual progress is a rule of human life, but the approach to perfection is slow and painful. If a woman elevates herself in one respect and is retarded in another,...

No, it is remrable that everest did not yield to the first few attempts; it would have been suprising and not a little sad if it had, for that is not the way of great mountains. Jon Krakauer,...

We never learn to pray, really pray- until we are in a situatioin where there is nothing left to do but pray. Victoria Damon

Do you want to know the secret of pain? If you just stop feeling it, you can start to use it. Robert Englund

The very idea of a bird is a symbol and a suggestion to the poet. A bird seems to be at the top of the scale, so vehement and intense his life. . . . The beautiful vagabonds,...

You cannot fly like an eagle with the wings of a wren. William Henry Hudson, Afoot in England, 1909

I realized that If I had to choose, I would rather have birds than airplanes. Charles Lindbergh, Interview shortly before his death, 1974

He saw that it was an ironical thing for him to be running thus toward that which he had been at such pains to avoid. But he said, in substance, to himself that if the earth and the...

Loving is misery for women always. I shall never forgive God for making me a woman and dearly am I beginning to pay for the honour of owning a pretty face. Thomas Hardy, Far From the Madding Crowd

The teaching of politics is that the Government, which was set for protection and comfort of all good citizens, becomes the principal obstruction and nuisance with which we have to contend? The cheat and bully and malefactor we...

When a traveller returneth home, let him not leave the countries where he hath travelled altogether behind him. Francis Bacon, 1597-1625

Once you have traveled, the voyage never ends, but is played out over and over again in the quietest chambers, that the mind can never break off from the journey. Pat Conroy, The Prince of Tides

Miracles: You do not have to look for them. They are there, 247, beaming like radio waves all around you. Put up the antenna, turn up the volume – snap… crackle… this just in, every person you talk...

When the destroyer comes, his first act will be to destroy all the books. Thomas More

Any man with a moderate income can afford to buy more books than he can read in a lifetime. Henry Holt

I do begin to have bloody thoughts. William Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act 4 Scene 1

I would fain die a dry death. William Shakespeare, The Tempest,, Act 1 Scene 1

What seest thou else In the dark backward and abysm of time? William Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act 1 Scene 2

Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground. William Shakespeare, The Tempest,, Act 1 Scene 2

Come what come may, Time and the hour runs through the roughest day. William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act 1 Scene 3