Mere Quotes - Page 23

Order is not sufficient. What is required, is something much more complex. It is order entering upon novelty; so that the massiveness of order does not degenerate into mere repetition; and so that the novelty is always reflected upon a background of system.

Alfred North Whitehead

Science, Order, Doe

Alfred North Whitehead, David Ray Griffin (1978). “Process and reality: an essay in cosmology”, Free Pr

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Without execution, thinking is mere idleness.

Winston Churchill

Knowledge, Thinking, Execution

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To remain pure, a novel has to cast a moral puzzle. Anything else is mere negotiation.

Anita Brookner

Writing, Moral, Negotiation

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In the clearness of this Himalayan air, mountains draw near, and in such splendor, tears come quietly to my eyes and cool on my sunburned cheeks. this is not mere soft-mindedness, nor am I all that silly with the altitude. My head has cleared in these weeks free of intrusions- mail, telephones, people and their needs- and I respond to things spontaneously, without defensive or self-conscious screens. Still, all this feeling is astonishing: not so long ago I could say truthfully that I had not shed a tear in twenty years.

Peter Matthiessen

Silly, Eye, Long Ago

Peter Matthiessen (2008). “The Snow Leopard”, p.138, Penguin

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Progress is not a straight line; the future is not a mere projection of trends in the present. Rather, it is revolutionary. It overturns the conventional wisdom of the present, which often conceals or ignores the clues to the future.

Dr. An Wang

Progress, Lines, Trends

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An understanding of Jesus is not a mere matter of intelligence. He has to be accepted by faith.

Lloyd C. Douglas

Jesus, Understanding, Matter

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Human relationships are rich and they're messy and they're demanding. And we clean them up with technology. We sacrifice conversation for mere connection.

Sherry Turkle

Sacrifice, Caring, Technology

"TED2012 live - day three from Long Beach". www.theguardian.com.

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The ironic is a mere ancient whisper in this torqued narrative: its odd violence feels true. Today & Tomorrow crashes through the windows of strip malls and paints the hypertrophic aisles with bristly-creepy hilarity.

Stacey Levine

Ironic, Creepy, Hilarity

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Many readers simply can't stomach fantasy. They immediately picture elves with broadswords or mighty-thewed barbarians with battle axes, seeking the bejeweled Coronet of Obeisance ... (But) the best fantasies pull aside the velvet curtain of mere appearance. ... In most instances, fantasy ultimately returns us to our own now re-enchanted world, reminding us that it is neither prosaic nor meaningless, and that how we live and what we do truly matters.

Michael Dirda

Axes, Battle, Velvet

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Those who try to make room for sex as mere casual enjoyment pay the penalty: they become shallow. At any rate the talk that reflects and commends this attitude is always shallow. They dishonour their own bodies; holding cheap what is naturally connected with the origination of human life.

G. E. M. Anscombe

Sex, Attitude, Trying

G.E.M. Anscombe (2012). “Faith in a Hard Ground: Essays on Religion, Philosophy and Ethics by G.E.M. Anscombe”, p.208, Andrews UK Limited

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I have to warn you that my bedroom isn't the best place to stage an assault on me. It's where I'm at my weakest, with my bed a mere twenty feet away.

Amy Plum

Feet, Bed, Twenties

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Just as drowning cannot be equated with swimming, mere existence is not the same as abundant life. We have been offered a new way to live – a new way to be human.

Jon Foreman

Swimming, Way To Live, Drowning

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For a while in my teens, I was sure I had it. It was about getting to heaven. If heaven existed and lasted forever, then a mere lifetime spent scrupulously following orders was a small investment for an infinite payoff. One day, though, I realized I was no longer a believer, and realizing that, I couldn't go back.

Alan Alda

Order, Forever, Heaven

Alan Alda (2009). “Things I Overheard While Talking To Myself”, p.9, Random House

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Today Jesus Christ is being dispatched as the Figurehead of a Religion, a mere example. He is that, but he is infinitely more; He is salvation itself, He is the Gospel of God.

Oswald Chambers

Jesus, Example, Today

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Constant labor of one uniform kind destroys the intensity and flow of a man's animal spirits, which find recreation and delight in mere change of activity.

Karl Marx

Animal, Men, Delight

Karl Marx (1932). “Capital: The Communist Manifesto and Other Writings”

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A soul-winner can do nothing without God. He must cast himself
on the Invisible, or be a laughing-stock to the devil, who regards
with utter disdain all who think to subdue human nature with mere words and arguments.

Charles Spurgeon

Thinking, Laughing, Soul

Charles Spurgeon (1989). “The Soul Winner”, p.39, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

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I can't tell if a straw ever saved a drowning man, but I know that a mere glance is enough to make dspair pause. For in truth, we who are creatures of impulse, are creatures of despair.

Joseph Conrad

Love, Men, Despair

"Chance". Book by Joseph Conrad, part I, ch. 6, 1913.

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When we understand the outside of things, we think we have them. Yet the Lord puts his things in subdefined, suggestive shapes, yielding no satisfactory meaning to the mere intellect, but unfolding themselves to the conscience and heart.

George MacDonald

Heart, Thinking, Shapes

George Macdonald (2012). “Unspoken Sermons Series I, II, and III”, p.113, Simon and Schuster

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You know, I think that allowing somebody, one mere person to believe that he or she is like, the vessel you know, like the font and the essence and the source of all divine, creative, unknowable, eternal mystery is just a smidge too much responsibility to put on one fragile, human psyche. It's like asking somebody to swallow the sun.

Elizabeth Gilbert

Believe, Responsibility, Thinking

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Has God decreed all things that come to pass? Then there is nothing that falls out by chance, nor are we to ascribe what we meet with either to good or ill luck and fortune. There are many events in the world which men look upon as mere accidents, yet all these come by the counsel and appointment of Heaven.

Thomas Boston

Fall, Men, Heaven

Thomas Boston (1812). “An Illustration of the Doctrines of the Christian Religion, with Respect to Faith and Practice, Upon the Plan of the Assembly's Shorter Catechism, Comprehending a Complete Body of Divinity”, p.179

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There is a witchery in the sea, its songs and stories, and in the mere sight of a ship, and the sailor's dress, especially to a young mind, which has done more to man navies, and fill merchantmen, than all the pressgangs of Europe.

Richard Henry Dana, Jr.

Song, Men, Sight

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No longer mere earthbeings and planetbeings are we, but bright children of the stars! And together we shall dance in and out of ten billion years, celebrating the gift of consciousness until the stars themselves grow cold and weary, and our thoughts turn again to the beginning.

Sid Meier

Stars, Children, Years

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Until Jesus Christ is the obsession of your heart, you'll always be looking to mere men to meet your needs that only Him can fill. Only when you make Jesus Christ your first love,will you be ready for a love story that reflects His glory.

Leslie Ludy

Jesus, Heart, First Love

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It should be emphasized that the balagtasan also served a higher social and political function. More than mere entertainment, it enhanced the tradition role of the poet as purveyor of truth for the people.

Virgilio S. Almario

People, Political, Roles

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Bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. Take what I cannot give: my heart, body, thoughts, time, abilities, money, health, strength, nights, days, youth, age, and spend them in Thy service, 0 my crucified Master, Redeemer, God. Oh, let not these be mere words! Whom have I in heaven but Thee and there is none upon earth that I desire in comparison of Thee. My heart is athirst for God.

Elizabeth Prentiss

Heart, Night, Giving

"Stepping Heavenward".

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