Insights & Observations

The road to hell is easy.

There is nothing of which we are so fond, and which we are so careless with, as life.

Personal interest is often the standard of our belief, as well as of our practice.

Nothing is so easy as to deceive one's self; for what we wish, we readily believe.

We are never more true to ourselves than when we are inconsistent.

To be in want is to possess. To have plenty is to be confused.

Necessity is the constant scourge of the lower orders, ennui that of the higher classes.

Not till we have lost the world (the world no longer dictates our actions), do we begin to find ourselves.

The two foes of human happiness are pain and boredom.

Boredom is a vital problem for the moralist, since at least half the sins of mankind are caused by it.

Much of our failure to understand human nature arises from neglect of this need to have our faculties excited and our lives thereby enhanced. The human animal cannot be itself without this exciting enhancement. Excitement is not merely good, it is indispensable to a proper human life.

If those stimulants to exertion which arise from the wants of the body were removed from the mass of mankind, we have much reason to think that they would be sunk to the level of brutes from a deficiency of excitements, than that they would be raised to the level of philosophers by the possession of leisure.

The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil.

When we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not hereditary.

Inhibition is not unnatural in civilizations built on restraints.

To become a great man it is necessary to become a great rascal.

No one ever became extremely wicked suddenly.

The world wants to be betrayed.

We are our own worst enemy.

We often give our enemies the means of our own destruction. - Aesop

We are accustomed to see men deride what they do not understand, and snarl at the good and the beautiful because it lies beyond their sympathies.

Burning is no answer.

It is easier to love humanity than to love your neighbor.

People hate those who make them feel their own inferiority.

It is easier to fight for principles than to live up to them.

I owe much, I have nothing, I give the rest to the poor.

Politics divides us but humanity unites us.

If mankind had wished for what is right, he might have had it long ago.

There is a written and an unwritten law. The one by which we regulate our constitution in our cities is the written law; that which arises from custom is the unwritten law.

Those who practice the same profession recognize each other instinctively. Likewise those who practice the same vice.

What rage for fame attends both great and small! Better be damned than not mentioned at all!

The theory that land is property subject to private ownership and control is the foundation of society.

Better is the enemy of good.

As a rule we disbelieve all facts and theories for which we have no use.

We are shaped and fashioned by what we love. - Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Comedy is tragedy plus time. - Carol Burnett

 

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