Appearance Quotes - Page 16

• We are each given a block of marble when we begin a lifetime, and the tools to shape it into sculpture. We can drag it behind us untouched, we can pound it to gravel, we can shape it into glory. Examples from every other life are left for us to see, lifeworks finished and unfinished, guiding and warning. Near the end our sculpture is nearly finished, and we can smooth and polish what we started years before. We can make our progress then, but to do it we must see past the appearances of age.

  Richard Bach

  Block, Past, Years

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• Fear not, nor be dismayed at the appearance that is darkness, at the disguise that is evil, at the empty cloak that is death, for you have picked these for your challenges. They are stones on which you choose to whet the keen edge of your spirit.

  Richard Bach

  Evil, Challenges, Darkness

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• Some people, in order to discover God, read books. But there is a great book: the very appearance of created things. Look above you! Look below you! Read it. God, whom you want to discover, never wrote that book with ink. Instead, He set before your eyes the things that He had made. Can you ask for a louder voice than that?

  Saint Augustine

  Book, Eye, Order

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• They [dogs] never talk about themselves but listen to you while you talk about yourself, and keep up an appearance of being interested in the conversation.

  Jerome K. Jerome

  Funny, Dog, Silly

  Jerome K. Jerome (2016). “The Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow”, p.68, Jerome K. Jerome

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• For we are like tree trunks in the snow. In appearance they lie smoothly and a little push should be enough to set them rolling. No, it can't be done, for they are firmly wedded to the ground. But see, even that is only appearance.

  Franz Kafka

  Lying, Snow, Tree

  Franz Kafka (2012). “The Complete Stories”, p.474, Schocken

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• Yes, I have tricks in my pocket, I have things up my sleeve. But I am the opposite of a stage magician. He gives you illusion that has the appearance of truth. I give you truth in the pleasant disguise of illusion.

  Tennessee Williams

  Truth, Opposites, Giving

  Tennessee Williams (1999). “The Glass Menagerie”, p.4, New Directions Publishing

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• The urge to transform one's appearance, to dance outdoors, to mock the powerful and embrace perfect strangers is not easy to suppress." --Barbara Ehrenreich, Dancing in the Streets, 260.

  Barbara Ehrenreich

  Powerful, Dancing, Perfect

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• My mind swirled with memories of the life I had led. The constant struggle to keep up appearances, the pretenses, the smiles that had been met with tears. The long sleepless nights, the loneliness that cloaked my spirit and turned me into a true ghost.

  Anchee Min

  Memories, Loneliness, Struggle

  Anchee Min (2004). “Empress Orchid”, Wheeler Publishing, Incorporated

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• As for Gussie Finknottle, many an experienced undertaker would have been deceived by his appearance and started embalming on sight.

  P. G. Wodehouse

  Depression, Sight, Embalming

  P. G. Wodehouse (2015). “Right Ho, Jeeves”, p.76, Booklassic

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• A melancholy-looking man, he had the appearance of one who has searched for the leak in life's gas-pipe with a lighted candle.

  P. G. Wodehouse

  Depression, Men, Melancholy

  P. G. Wodehouse (2012). “The Man Upstairs: And Other Stories”, p.126, The Floating Press

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• His contagious conviction that our love was unique and desperate infected me with an anxious sickness; soon we would learn to treat one another with the circumspect tenderness of comrades who are amputees, for we were surrounded by the most moving images of evanesecence, fireworks, morning glories, the old, children. But the most moving of these images were the intagible relfections of ourselves we saw in one another's eyes, reflections of nothing but appearances, in a city dedicated to seeming, and, try as we might to possess the essence of each other's otherness, we would inevitably fail.

  Angela Carter

  Morning, Children, Moving

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• There is so much more to this world then outward appearances. Our society basks in the illusion of normalcy every day, and hides from the truth every night.

  Amber Benson

  Night, Normalcy, World

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• Miss Jenkyns wore a cravat, and a little bonnet like a jockey-cap, and altogether had the appearance of a strong-minded woman; although she would have despised the modern idea of women being equal to men. Equal, indeed! she knew they were superior.

  Elizabeth Gaskell

  Strong, Men, Ideas

  Elizabeth Gaskell (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Elizabeth Gaskell (Illustrated)”, p.394, Delphi Classics

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• I do not scruple to employ mendacity and a fictitious appearance of female incompetence when the occasion demands it.

  Barbara Mertz

  Female, Demand, Incompetence

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• The passive American consumer, sitting down to a meal of pre-prepared food, confronts inert, anonymous substances that have been processed, dyed, breaded, sauced, gravied, ground, pulped, strained, blended, prettified, and sanitized beyond resemblance to any part of any creature that ever lived. The products of nature and agriculture have been made, to all appearances, the products of industry. Both eater and eaten are thus in exile from biological reality.

  Wendell Berry

  Inspiring, Reality, Agriculture

  Wendell Berry (2010). “Bringing It to the Table: On Farming and Food (Large Print 16pt)”, p.286, ReadHowYouWant.com

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• The fear of appearances is the first symptom of impotence.

  Fyodor Dostoevsky

  Firsts, Symptoms, Norm

  Fyodor Dostoevsky, Jane Austen, Lewis Carroll, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (2014). “The 10 Greatest Books of All Time”, p.510, Google Publishing

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• To understand the stars would spoil their appearance.

  Patrick White

  Stars, Spoil

  Patrick White (2011). “Voss”, p.137, Random House

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• "Is," "is," "is" — the idiocy of the word haunts me. If it were abolished, human thought might begin to make sense. I don't know what anything "is"; I only know how it seems to me at this moment.

  Robert Anton Wilson

  Objectivity, Might, Subjectivity

  "Fictional character: Sigismundo Celine". The Historical Illuminatus book series, 1982-1991.

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• …Those who’ve marred their appearance in any way by their actions in life aren’t forced to witness that marring. If they were, they’d become self-conscious and be unable to concentrate on improving themselves.

  Richard Matheson

  Self, Way, Action

  Richard Matheson (2007). “What Dreams May Come: A Novel”, p.94, Macmillan

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• Whenever the intensity of looking reaches a certain degree, one becomes aware of an equally intense energy coming towards one through the appearance of whatever it is one is scrutinizing.

  John Berger

  Energy, Degrees, Intense

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• ...no cat out of its first fur can ever be deceived by appearances. Unlike human beings, who enjoy them.

  Peter S. Beagle

  Cat, Fur, Firsts

  Peter S. Beagle (1968). “The Last Unicorn”, Roc

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• In the construction of houses, choice of woods is made. Straight un-knotted timber of good appearance is used for the revealed pillars, straight timber with small defects is used for the inner pillars. Timbers of the finest appearance, even if a little weak, is used for the thresholds, lintels, doors, and sliding doors, and so on. Good strong timber, though it be gnarled and knotted, can always be used discreetly in construction.

  Miyamoto Musashi

  Strong, Doors, Choices

  Miyamoto Musashi (2013). “The Book of Five Rings: A Text on Kenjutsu and the Martial Arts in General, Written by the Swordsman Miyamoto Musashi”, p.25, Lulu Press, Inc

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• He loved the extensive vaults where you could hear the night birds and the sea breeze; he loved the craggy ruins bound together by ivy, those dark halls, and any appearance of death and destruction. Having fallen so far from so high a position, he loved anything that had also fallen from a great height

  Gustave Flaubert

  Dark, Night, Sea Breeze

  Gustave Flaubert (1991). “Early Writings”, p.56, U of Nebraska Press

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• People were so naive about plants, Ellie thought. They just chose plants for appearance, as they would choose a picture for the wall. It never occurred to them that plants were actually living things, busily performing all the living functions of respiration, ingestion, excretion, reproduction---and defense.

  Michael Crichton

  Wall, People, Defense

  Michael Crichton (1997). “Michael Crichton's Jurassic World”, Alfred a Knopf Incorporated

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• It's funny how strangers can pass in front of you every day and all you see is a flat shadow, a vague outline, not noticing any of the details. They move in a gray crowd, always looking the same and acting the same, simple caricatures of who they really are, but once you get to know them, you notice the specific, tiniest things, you pay attention to the intricacies of their personalities, their habits and particular ways of walking and talking, the subtle changes in their appearance and dress.

  Gregory Galloway

  Moving, Simple, Talking

  Gregory Galloway (2015). “As Simple as Snow”, p.33, Penguin

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