Quotable Quotes

What would life be if we couldn't find wisdom in the words of others? I often find that what I am trying to say has already been said by the astute and the insightful. No one should make a life out of cliches and one-liners, but wisdom doesn't need to be pages and pages of rhetoric, either. Here are some of my very favorites. There wasn't enough room for them all.

"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win."

Mahatma Gandhi

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." from the Bill of Rights of the USA Constitution

" No one can make you feel inferior without your permission." Eleanor Roosevelt

"Life is a long lesson in humility." James M. Barrie

"Life is just a mirror, and what you see out there, you must first see inside of you." Wally (Famous) Amos

"Reformers who are always compromising, have not yet grasped the idea that truth is the only safe ground to stand upon." Elizabeth Cady Stanton

"We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was "legal"and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal."
Martin Luther King, Jr., "Letter from Birmingham Jail," Why We Can't Wait, 1963

"The world has never yet seen a truly great and virtuous nation because in the degradation of woman the very fountains of life are poisoned at their source." Lucretia Mott (1793 - 1880) American Feminist

"The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie -- deliberate, contrived and dishonest -- but the myth -- persistent, persuasive and unrealistic." John F. Kennedy

"To follow, without halt, one aim: There's the secret of success." Anna Pavlova

"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody." Bill Cosby

"Living well is the best revenge." George Herbert

"Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing." Abraham Lincoln

"Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be." Also, Abraham Lincoln

"Happiness depends upon ourselves." Aristotle

"“ The law must be consonant with life. It cannot and should not ignore broad historical currents of history. Mankind is possessed of no greater urge than to try to understand the age-old questions: “Who am I” “Why am I?” Even now the sands and ashes of the continents are being sifted to find where we made our first step as man. Religions of mankind often include ancestor worship in one way or another. For many the future is blind without a sight of the past. Those emotions and anxieties that generate our thirst to know the past are not superficial and whimsical. They are real and they are “good cause” under the law of man and God.” The Hon. Wade S. Weatherford, SC Supreme Court Justice

"Blood's thicker than water, and when one's in trouble, it's best to seek out a relative's open arms." Author Unknown

"An ounce of blood is worth more than a pound of friendship." Spanish Proverb

"Of course I feel badly for the infertile. I also feel badly for the amputee. Does that mean I should give that person my legs?" A Mother (paraphrased)

"When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on. " Franklin D. Roosevelt.

"Blood is thicker than adoption papers." (my husband)