Circumstances Quotes - Page 35

• Far better, and more cheerfully, I could dispense with some part of the downright necessaries of life, than with certain circumstances of elegance and propriety in the daily habits of using them.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Elegance, Habit, Refinement

  Thomas De Quincey, James Thomas Fields (1851). “De Quincey's Writings: Life and manners; from The autobiography of an English opium-eater. 1851”, p.14

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• A man is not little when he finds it difficult to cope with circumstances, but when circumstances overmaster him.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Men, Littles, Difficult

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, John Stuart Blackie (1883). “The Wisdom of Goethe”, Edinburgh, W. Blackwood

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• What men usually say of misfortunes, that they never come alone, may with equal truth be said of good fortune; nay, of other circumstances which gather round us in a harmonious way, whether it arise from a kind of fatality, or that man has the power of attracting to himself things that are mutually related.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Men, May, Way

  7 Copy quote

• Cassius and Brutus were the more distinguished for that very circumstance that their portraits were absent.
  [Lat., Praefulgebant Cassius atque Brutus eo ipso, quod effigies eorum non videbantur.]

  Tacitus

  Portraits, Cassius, Brutus

  9 Copy quote

• The changeful change of circumstances.
  [Lat., Varia sors rerum.]

  Tacitus

  5 Copy quote

• He is a friend who, in dubious circumstances, aids in deeds when deeds are necessary.

  Plautus

  Friends, Dubious, Deeds

  Titus Maccius Plautus (1852). “The comedies of Plautus literally tr., with notes, by H.T. Riley”, p.427

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• The science of government is only a science of combinations, of applications, and of exceptions, according to times, places and circumstances.

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Government, Combination, Exception

  4 Copy quote

• Sleep takes off the costume of circumstance, arms us with terrible freedom, so that every will rushes to deed. A skillful man reads his dreams for his self-knowledge; yet not the details, but the quality. What part does he play in them - a cheerful, manly part, or a poor, drivelling part? However monstrous and grotesque their apparitions, they have a substantial truth.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Dream, Sleep, Men

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1904). “The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: With a Biographical Introduction and Notes”

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• Very great personages are not likely to form very just estimates either of others or of themselves; their knowledge of themselves is obscured by the flattery of others; their knowledge of others is equally clouded by circumstances peculiar to themselves. For in the presence of the great, the modest are sure to suffer from too much diffidence, and the confident from too much display.

  Charles Caleb Colton

  Character, Suffering, Peculiar

  Charles Caleb Colton (1823). “Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan”, p.75

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• When you see reference to a new paradigm you should always, under all circumstances, take cover.

  John Kenneth Galbraith

  Should, Paradigm

  "Galbraith on Crashes, Japan and Walking Sticks" by Ben Laurance and William Keegan, The Observer, June 21, 1998.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• This is the part of a great man, after he has maturely weighed all circumstances, to punish the guilty, to spare the many, and in every state of fortune not to depart from an upright, virtuous conduct.

  Marcus Tullius Cicero

  Greatness, Men, Guilty

  Marcus Tullius Cicero (1855). “Cicero's Three books of offices, or moral duties: also his Cato Major, an essay on old age; Lælius, an essay on friendship; Paradoxes; Scipio's dream; and Letter to Quintus on the duties of a magistrate”, p.42

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• The thing about genius is it will never yield to circumstances. Genius regards what's given as the beginning of its need to find or devise something else.

  June Jordan

  Yield, Needs, Genius

  4 Copy quote

• As flowers always wear their own colors and give forth their own fragrance every day alike, so should Christians maintain their character at all times and under all circumstances.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Christian, Flower, Character

  4 Copy quote

• The events we most desire do not happen; or, if they do, it is neither in the time nor in the circumstances when they would have given us extreme pleasure.

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Desire, Events, Anticipation

  7 Copy quote

• There are circumstances of peculiar difficulty and danger, where a mediocrity of talent is the most fatal quantum that a man can possibly possess. Had Charles the First and Louis the Sixteenth been more wise or more weak, more firm or more yielding, in either case they had both of them saved their heads.

  Charles Caleb Colton

  Wise, Men, Peculiar

  Charles Caleb Colton (1823). “Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan”, p.96

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• If in addition to being physically unattractive you find that you do not get along well with others, do not under any circumstances attempt to alleviate this situation by developing an interesting personality. An interesting personality, is, in an adult, insufferable. In a teenager it is frequently punishable by law.

  Fran Lebowitz

  Teenager, Law, Interesting

  Fran Lebowitz (2011). “The Fran Lebowitz Reader”, p.222, Vintage

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• If, while watching the sun set on a used-car lot in Los Angeles, you are struck by the parallels between this image and the inevitable fate of humanity, do not, under any circumstances, write it down.

  Fran Lebowitz

  Writing, Fate, Car

  Fran Lebowitz (1994). “The Fran Lebowitz Reader”, Vintage

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• An idea is, in the end, always stronger than circumstances.

  Albert Schweitzer

  Ideas, Stronger, Ends

  Albert Schweitzer, Ernest Newman (1911). “J. S. Bach”, p.36, Courier Corporation

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• I am colored but I offer nothing in the way of extenuating circumstances except the fact that I am the only Negro in the United States whose grandfather on the mother's side was not an Indian chief.

  Zora Neale Hurston

  Mother, Native American, African American

  Zora Neale Hurston, Alice Walker (1979). “I Love Myself when I Am Laughing ... and Then Again when I Am Looking Mean and Impressive: A Zora Neale Hurston Reader”, p.152, Feminist Press at CUNY

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• That man is guilty of impertinence who considers not the circumstances of time, or engrosses the conversation, or makes himself the subject of his discourse, or pays no regard to the company he is in.

  Marcus Tullius Cicero

  Men, Pay, Guilty

  4 Copy quote

• The parallel circumstances and kindred images to which we readily conform our minds are, above all other writings, to be found in the lives of particular persons, and therefore no species of writing seems more worthy of cultivation than biography.

  Samuel Johnson

  Writing, Mind, Biographies

  Samuel Johnson (1810). “The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.: With An Essay on His Life and Genius”, p.382

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• I too acknowledge the all-out omnipotence of early culture and nature; hereby we have either a doddered dwarf-bush, or a high-towering, wide-shadowing tree! either a sick yellow cabbage, or an edible luxuriant green one. Of a truth, it is the duty of all men, especially of all philosophers, to note down with accuracy the characteristic circumstances of their education,--what furthered, what hindered, what in any way modified it.

  Thomas Carlyle

  Education, Men, Dwarves

  9 Copy quote

• Consider in fact, a body of six hundred and fifty-eight miscellaneous persons, set to consult about "business," with twenty-seven millions, mostly fools, assiduously listening to them, and checking and criticising them. Was there ever, since the world began, will there ever be till the world end, any "business" accomplished in these circumstances?

  Thomas Carlyle

  Eight, Government, Listening

  Thomas Carlyle (2014). “The Selected Works of Thomas Carlyle”, p.637, Lulu.com

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• When the Gauls laid waste Rome, they found the senators clothed in their robes, and seated in stern tranquillity in their curule chairs; in this manner they suffered death without resistance or supplication. Such conduct was in them applauded as noble and magnanimous; in the hapless Indians it was reviled as both obstinate and sullen. How truly are we the dupes of show and circumstances! How different is virtue, clothed in purple and enthroned in state, from virtue, naked and destitute, and perishing obscurely in a wilderness.

  Washington Irving

  Rome, Purple, Waste

  Washington Irving (1983). “History, Tales, and Sketches”, p.1011, Library of America

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• simply to ask a blessing upon one's circumstances, whatever they are, is somehow to improve them, and to tap some mysterious source of energy and joy.

  Marjorie Holmes

  Prayer, Blessing, Joy

  Marjorie Holmes (1982). “I've/Talk/Somebd/God”, Bantam Books

  10 Copy quote

  Show source