Abstention Quotes

• Abstention means you stayed at home or went to the beach. By casting a blank vote, you're saying that you understand your responsibility, you have a political conscience and you came to vote, but you don't agree with any of the existing parties and this is the only way you have of saying so.

  Jose Saramago

  Beach, Party, Mean

  "Still a street-fighting man". Interview with Stephanie Merritt, www.theguardian.com. April 30, 2006.

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• Abstainer: a weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Motivational, Drinking, Beer

  The Devil's Dictionary

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• A total abstainer is one who abstains from everything but abstention, and especially from inactivity in the affairs of others.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Affair, Inactivity

  Ambrose Bierce (2016). “The Devil's Dictionary: The Devil World”, p.7, 谷月社

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• An artist needs knowledge and the power of observation only so that he can tell from what he is abstaining, and to be sure that his abstention will not appear artificial or false.

  Andrei Tarkovsky

  Artist, Needs, Abstaining

  "Time Within Time: The Diaries 1970-1986". Book by Andrei Tarkovsky, 1989.

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• Chastity does not mean abstention from sexual wrong; it means something flaming, like Joan of Arc.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Mean, Doe, Arcs

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• War will disappear only when men shall take no part whatever in violence and shall be ready to suffer every persecution that their abstention will bring them. It is the only way to abolish war.

  Anatole France

  War, Men, Suffering

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• Abstention from labor is the conventional evidence of wealth and is therefore the conventional mark of social standing.

  Thorstein Veblen

  Wealth, Social, Mark

  Thorstein Veblen (1993). “A Veblen Treasury: From Leisure Class to War, Peace, and Capitalism”, p.26, M.E. Sharpe

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• The real bosses, in the capitalist system of market economy, are the consumers.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Real, Boss, Economy

  Ludwig von Mises (2016). “Bureaucracy: The Economist”, p.20, VM eBooks

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• In my humble opinion, non-cooperation with evil is as much a duty as is cooperation with good. But in the past, non-cooperation has been deliberately expressed in violence to the evildoer. I am endeavoring to show my countrymen that violent non-cooperation only multiplies evil and that evil can only be sustained by violence. Withdrawal of support of evil requires complete abstention from violence. Non-violence implies voluntary submission to the penalty for non-cooperation with evil.

  Mahatma Gandhi

  Humble, Past, Evil

  Courtroom statement, Ahmadabad, India, 23 Mar. 1922

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• Twitter is a deliberate abstention. Somehow I hate the idea of there always being, in the back of my mind, this little voice saying: 'Oh, I should tweet about this.'

  George Saunders

  Hate, Ideas, Voice

  "George Saunders: My desktop". Interview With Ben Johncock, www.theguardian.com. April 22, 2013.

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• VIRTUES, n.pl. Certain abstentions.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Virtue, Certain, Certainty

  Ambrose Bierce (2016). “The Devil's Dictionary: The Devil World”, p.230, 谷月社

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• Helping other people is a drug so dangerous that there is no cure short of total abstention.

  Penelope Fitzgerald

  Helping Others, People, Drug

  Penelope Fitzgerald (2013). “Human Voices”, p.109, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The real bosses in the capitalist system of market economy are the consumers. They by their buying and by their abstention from buying decide who should own the capital and run the plants. They determine what should be produced and in what quantity and quality. Their attitudes result either in profit or in loss for the enterpriser. They make poor men rich and rich men poor. They are no easy bosses.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Running, Attitude, Real

  Ludwig Von Mises (1944). “Bureaucracy”

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• To use legal or financial constraint to compel either abstention or submission, is entirely horrible, unnatural and absurd.

  Aleister Crowley

  Use, Financial, Submission

  Aleister Crowley (1975). “The Commentaries of AL: Being the Equinox Volume V, No. 1”, Weiser Books

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• My work...is to shatter the faith of men here, there, and everywhere, faith in affirmation, faith in negation, and faith in abstention from faith, and this for the sake of faith in faith itself.

  Miguel de Unamuno

  Writing, Men, Sake

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• The common man is the sovereign consumer whose buying or abstention from buying ultimately determines what should be produced and in what quantity and quality.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Men, Liberty, Quality

  Ludwig Von Mises (1978). “Anti-Capitalistic Mentality, The”, p.1, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• An element of abstention, of restraint, must enter into all finer joys.

  Vida Dutton Scudder

  Motivational, Joy, Self Control

  Vida Dutton Scudder (1939). “The privilege of age: essays secular and spiritual”

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• A dinner! How horrible! I am to be made the pretext for killing all those wretched animals and birds, and fish! Thank you for nothing. Now if it were to be a fast instead of a feast; say a solemn three days' abstention from corpses in my honour, I could at least pretend to believe that it was disinterested. Blood sacrifices are not in my line

  George Bernard Shaw

  Believe, Sacrifice, Animal

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• When you are steadfast in your abstention of thoughts of harm directed toward yourself and others, all living creatures will cease to feel fear in your presence.

  Patanjali

  Harm, Steadfast, Feels

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• Each one of us, as long as life stirs is us, may play a part in extricating ourselves from the power system by asserting our primacy as people in quiet acts of mental or physical withdrawal-in gestures of non-conformity, in abstentions, restrictions, inhibitions, which will liberate us from the domination of the pentagon of power.

  Lewis Mumford

  Play, Long, People

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• A teenage taste of beer aside, Mitt Romney does not consume alcohol. Which begs the question, will total abstention put his candidacy, perhaps even this great nation in jeopardy?

  Martin Bashir

  Teenage, Beer, Alcohol

  "Bashir: Romney Not Presidential Material Because He Doesn't Drink". www.realclearpolitics.com. April 23, 2012.

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• Patanjali said that when you are steadfast in your abstention of thoughts of harm directed toward yourself and others, all living creatures will cease to feel fear in your presence. Steadfast means you never slip. I think my mission is to support people in being steadfast in not having thoughts of harm - thoughts of judgment, worry, or hatred - directed toward themselves or others.

  Wayne Dyer

  Mean, Thinking, Worry

  "Wayne Dyer Interview: On God and goodness, inspiration and presence". Interview with Ray Hemachandra, rayhemachandra.com. September 5, 2015.

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• If Algeria introduced a resolution declaring that the earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164 to 13 with 26 abstentions.

  Abba Eban

  Israel, Algeria, Earth

  "A fence built for peace" by Abba Eban, www.theguardian.com. February 3, 2004.

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• To assign to everybody his proper place in society is the task of the consumers. Their buying and abstention from buying is instrumental in determining each individual's social position.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Tasks, Buying, Individual

  Ludwig von Mises (2016). “Human Action”, p.340, Lulu Press, Inc

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• Capital is not a free gift of God or of nature. It is the outcome of a provident restriction of consumption on the part of man. It is created and increased by saving and maintained by the abstention from dissaving.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Men, Free Gifts, Saving

  Ludwig Von Mises (1978). “Anti-Capitalistic Mentality, The”, p.84, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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