Comparison Quotes - Page 13

• There is speaking well, speaking easily, speaking justly and speaking seasonably: It is offending against the last, to speak of entertainments before the indigent; of sound limbs and health before the infirm; of houses and lands before one who has not so much as a dwelling; in a word, to speak of your prosperity before the miserable; this conversation is cruel, and the comparison which naturally arises in them betwixt their condition and yours is excruciating.

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Speaking Well, Offending, Land

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• There are three degrees of comparison: stupido, stupidissimo, and tenore.

  Pietro Mascagni

  Ignorance, Degrees, Three

  "Musicdotes". Book by Scott Beach, p. 94, 1977.

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• The life of a plural wife, she'd found, was a life lived under constant comparison, a life spent wondering. Sitting across from her sister-wives at Sunday dinner, the platters and serving dishes floating past like hovercraft, the questions were almost inescapable; Who of us is the most happy? Which of us is his one true love? Who does he desire the most?

  Brady Udall

  Sunday, Past, Wife

  Brady Udall (2010). “The Lonely Polygamist: A Novel”, p.150, W. W. Norton & Company

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• The problem of Eternity, of which the face of the Sphinx speaks, takes us into the realm of the impossible. Even the problem of Time is simple in comparison with the problem of Eternity.

  P.D. Ouspensky

  Simple, Sphinx, Faces

  "A New Model of the Universe: Principles of the Psychological Method in Its Application to Problems of Science, Religion and Art". Book by P.D. Ouspensky, 1931.

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• There is then no analogy whatever between the operations of the Chess-Player, and those of the calculating machine of Mr. Babbage , and if we choose to call the former a pure machine we must be prepared to admit that it is, beyond all comparison, the most wonderful of the inventions of mankind.

  Edgar Allan Poe

  Player, Analogies, Chess

  Edgar Allan Poe (2016). “The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe”, p.838, Xist Publishing

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• A woman well bred and well taught, furnished with the additional accomplishments of knowledge and behaviour, is a creature without comparison. Her society is the emblem of sublimer enjoyments, her person is angelic, and her conversation heavenly. She is all softness and sweetness, peace, love, wit, and delight. She is every way suitable to the sublimest wish, and the man that has such a one to his portion, has nothing to do but to rejoice in her, and be thankful.

  Daniel Defoe

  Women, Accomplishment, Being Thankful

  Daniel Defoe (2017). “An Essay Upon Projects”, p.130, Litres

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• When I was a freshman, I fooled around with shooting free throws this way: For some reason, I thought you had to stay within the top half of that free-throw circle, so I would step back to just inside the top of the circle, take off from behind the line and dunk. They outlawed that, but I wouldn't have done it in a game, anyway. I was a good free throw shooter in college." Actually he was a 62% free throw shooter, which is poor except in comparison to his 51% as a pro.

  Wilt Chamberlain

  College, Games, Circles

  "The Leaping Legends of Basketball" by Scott Ostler, The Los Angeles Times, February 12, 1989.

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• Nature and society are so replete with startling contrasts that wit often consists in the mere statement and comparison of facts, as when Hume says that the ancient Muscovites wedded their wives with a whip instead of a ring.

  Edwin Percy Whipple

  Wife, Facts, Ancient

  Edwin Percy Whipple (1851). “Literature and life, lects”, p.43

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• It is the saints who know what being in love is all about. Earthly love pales by comparison.

  Thomas Dubay

  Being In Love, Love Is, Saint

  Thomas Dubay (1989). “Fire Within: St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, and the Gospel, on Prayer”, p.25, Ignatius Press

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• To put it in a nutshell, the Central and South American high cultures of antiquity were entirely worthy of comparison with what the Old World had achieved by the time of the Han, the Gupta, and the Hellenistic age. The fact is that the Amerindian high cultures were a human modality of their own, and those Spaniards who came among them first would have had the sensation, if they had ever heard of such literature, of treading in a world of imaginative science fiction. But it was real, and the Amerindian achievements deserve all our sympathy and praise.

  Joseph Needham

  Real, Aztec, Achievement

  Joseph Needham, Gwei-Djen Lu (1985). “Trans-Pacific Echoes and Resonances: Listening Once Again”, p.64, World Scientific

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• [When criticized for appearing bare-shouldered Madonna-like at a banquet:] A comparison between Madonna and me is a comparison between a strapless evening gown and a gownless evening strap.

  Kim Campbell

  Gowns, Evening, Banquets

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• Comparisons are really no good in sport, especially if it is a comparison between different eras and generations, for there are so many variables that come into play, starting from the quality of the opposition to playing conditions.

  Sunil Gavaskar

  Sports, Play, Quality

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• The very special place that a language occupies among institutions is undeniable, but there is much more to be said-, a comparison would tend rather to bring out the differences.

  Ferdinand de Saussure

  Differences, Special, Language

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• It is a tribute to the peculiar horror of contemporary life that it makes the worst features of earlier times -- the stupefaction of the masses, the obsessed and driven lives of the bourgeoisie -- seem attractive by comparison.

  Christopher Lasch

  Bourgeoisie, Peculiar, Horror

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• A manure containing several ingredients acts in this wise: The effect of all of them in the soil accommodates itself to that one among them which, in comparison to the wants of the plant, is present in the smallest quantity.

  Justus von Liebig

  Wise, Science, Want

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• Is it possible your pragmatical worship should not know that the comparisons made between wit and wit, courage and courage, beauty and beauty, birth and birth, are always odious and ill taken?.

  Miguel de Cervantes

  Courage, Taken, Birth

  Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1855). “The history of Don Quixote de la Mancha”, p.176

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• How hard would it be to ask children what they see in their heads? How big should the house be in comparison to the family standing in front of it? What is it about the anatomy of the people that doesn't look right? Then let them try it again. Teach them to learn how to see and ask questions.

  Charles de Lint

  Children, People, House

  Charles De Lint (2000). “Triskell Tales: Twenty-two Years of Chapbooks”, Subterranean

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• People are going to make comparisons and they can do that but I'm definitely not going to compare myself to Derek Jeter.

  Nomar Garciaparra

  People, Jeter, Compare

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• I don't like comparisons with football. Baseball is an entirely different game. You can watch a tight, well-played football game,but it isn't exciting if half the stadium is empty. The violence on the field must bounce off a lot of people. But you can go to a ball park on a quiet Tuesday afternoon with only a few thousand people in the place and thoroughly enjoy a one-sided game. Baseball has an aesthetic, intellectual appeal found in no other team sport.

  Bowie Kuhn

  Sports, Baseball, Football

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• Envy and jealousy are the private parts of the human soul. Perhaps the comparison can be extended.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Jealousy, Envy, Soul

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• Art can never match the luxury and superfluity of Nature. In the former all is seen; it cannot afford concealed wealth, and is niggardly in comparison; but Nature, even when she is scant and thin outwardly, satisfies us still by the assurance of a certain generosity at the roots.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Art, Nature, Roots

  Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.124, Penguin

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• Brothers naturally invite comparison.

  Larry Watson

  Brother, Invites

  Larry Watson (2010). “Montana 1948: A Novel”, p.24, Milkweed Editions

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• I cannot but regard it as a kindness in those who have the steering of me that, by the want of pecuniary wealth, I have been nailed dawn to this my native region so long and steadily, and made to study and love this spot of earth more and more. What would signify in comparison a thin and diffused love and knowledge of the whole earth instead, got by wandering? The traveler's is but a barren and comfortless condition. Wealth will not buy a man a home in nature-house nor farm there. The man of business does not by his business earn a residence in nature, but is denaturalized rather.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Travel, Kindness, Home

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• Bill Maher does something amazing in Religulous. He makes Michael Moore look incredibly likable in comparison.

  Mick LaSalle

  Doe, Looks, Bills

  "Film review: 'Religulous' - comic on a crusade" by Mick LaSalle, www.sfgate.com. October 3, 2008.

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• Knowing the importance of luck, you should be particularly suspicious when highly consistent patterns emerge from the comparison of successful and less successful firms. In the presence of randomness, regular patterns can only be mirages.

  Daniel Kahneman

  Successful, Knowing, Luck

  Daniel Kahneman (2011). “Thinking, Fast and Slow”, p.236, Macmillan

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