Serious Quotes - Page 28

• I'm ready to be insulted as being insufficiently democratic, but I want to be serious ... I am for secret, dark debates.

  Jean-Claude Juncker

  Dark, Secret, Want

  "Eurogroup chief: 'I'm for secret, dark debates'" by Valentina Pop, euobserver.com. April 21, 2011.

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• I am now satisfied that the future music of this country must be founded upon what are called negro melodies. This must be the real foundation of any serious and original school of composition to be developed in the United States.

  Antonin Dvorak

  Country, Real, School

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• What can be considered human emotions? Surely not only lyricism, sadness, tragedy? Doesn't laughter also have a claim to that lofty title? I want to fight for the legitimate right of laughter in "serious" music.

  Dmitri Shostakovich

  Laughter, Sadness, Fighting

  "Sovetskoye Iskusstvo", quoted in "Shostakovich: A Life", transl. by Laurel Fay (2000) p. 77, November 5, 1934.

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• I am not an angel and do not pretend to be. That is not one of my roles. But I am not a devil, either. I am a woman and a serious artist, and I would like so to be judged.

  Maria Callas

  Angel, Artist, Devil

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• The great political tragedy of our time is that conservative leaders in America have chosen to use their superior messaging and political skills to thwart serious action on global warming.

  Joseph J. Romm

  Skills, America, Leader

  Joseph J. Romm (2007). “Hell and high water: global warming - the solution and the politics - and what we should do”, William Morrow & Co

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• In England it is enough for a man to try and produce any serious, beautiful work to lose all his rights as a citizen.

  Oscar Wilde

  Beautiful, Men, Rights

  Oscar Wilde (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Oscar Wilde (Illustrated)”, p.1583, Delphi Classics

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• Controversial daily radio host. Considered to be engaging in unacceptable behaviour by seeking to provoke others to serious criminal acts and fostering hatred which might lead to inter-community violence.

  Michael Savage

  Community, Hatred, Violence

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• Jesus and Paul were serious dudes. They had teeth missing. Jesus was a carpenter, Paul was in prison. These guys didn’t eat tofu dogs and bean sprouts. They didn’t play tennis. If there were trucks back in their times, they would have been doing driveway lube jobs on a Saturday afternoon. Same thing with King David. Yeah, he might have played a lyre, but he slaughtered thousands of guys.

  Mark Driscoll

  Dog, Jesus, Kings

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• I realize that homosexuality is a serious problem for anyone who is - but then, of course, heterosexuality is a serious problem for anyone who is, too. And being a man is a serious problem and being a woman is, too. Lots of things are problems.

  Edward Gorey

  Men, Heterosexuality Is, Problem

  Edward Gorey (2001). “Ascending Peculiarity: Edward Gorey on Edward Gorey : Interviews”, Houghton Mifflin

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• No degree of prosperity could justify
  the accumulation of large amounts of highly toxic substances which nobody knows how to
  make safe and which remain an incalculable danger to the whole of creation for historical or
  even geological ages. To do such a thing is a transgression against life itself,
  a transgression infinitely more serious than any crime perpetrated by man.
  The idea that a civilization could sustain itself on such a transgression is an ethical, spiritual, and metaphysical monstrosity. It means conducting the economical affairs of man
  as if people did not matter at all.

  E. F. Schumacher

  Spiritual, Mean, Men

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• The transmission of human life is a most serious role in which married people collaborate freely and responsibly with God the Creator.

  Pope Paul VI

  People, Roles, Married

  "Humanae Vitae". Encyclical Letter of the Supreme Pontiff Paul VI, w2.vatican.va. July 25, 1968.

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• Even in the era of AIDS, sex raises no unique moral issues at all. Decisions about sex may involve considerations about honesty, concern for others, prudence, and so on, but there is nothing special about sex in this respect, for the same could be said of decisions about driving a car. (In fact, the moral issues raised by driving a car, both from an environmental and from a safety point of view, are much more serious than those raised by sex.)

  Peter Singer

  Sex, Honesty, Unique

  Peter Singer (1993). “Practical Ethics”, p.2, Cambridge University Press

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• Suppose I grant that pigs and dogs are self-aware to some degree, and do have thoughts about things in the future. That would provide some reason for thinking it intrinsically wrong to kill them - not absolutely wrong, but perhaps quite a serious wrong. Still, there are other animals - chickens maybe, or fish - who can feel pain but don't have any self-awareness or capacity for thinking about the future. For those animals, you haven't given me any reason why painless killing would be wrong, if other animals take their place and lead an equally good life.

  Peter Singer

  Dog, Pain, Good Life

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• He liked to play chess and do intelligent things, and I was a serious drinker and nonthinker.

  Warren G. Harding

  Intelligent, Climbing, Play

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• The notion that the careless sinner is the smart fellow and the serious-minded Christian, though well-intentioned, is a stupid dolt altogether out of touch with life will not stand up under scrutiny. Sin is basically an act of moral folly, and the greater the folly the greater the fool.

  Aiden Wilson Tozer

  Christian, Smart, Stupid

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• Our thoughts and prayers continue to go out to every individual who was affected by these powerful storms, ... Despite facing serious obstacles, the wireless industrys response to these natural disasters was nothing short of Herculean. We remain fully committed to aiding and assisting our subscribers in the affected regions in whatever way we can.

  Steve Largent

  Prayer, Powerful, Storm

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• Earnest people are often people who habitually look on the serious side of things that have no serious side.

  Van Wyck Brooks

  People, Looks, Sides

  Van Wyck Brooks (1941). “Opinions of Oliver Allston”, New York, Dutton

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• Newsmen believe that news is a tacitly acknowledged fourth branch of the federal system. This is why most news about government sounds as if it were federally mandated -- serious, bulky and blandly worthwhile, like a high-fiber diet set in type.

  P. J. O'Rourke

  Believe, Government, Sound

  P. J. O'Rourke (2007). “Parliament of Whores: A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government”, p.34, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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• I have decided to keep a record of my inmost real-self thoughts. Perhaps it will help me to find out what I really am like: horrid, I know: selfish, conceited, and material-minded. For instance, lately whenever I've tried to concentrate on anything serious or beautiful, I've started thinking about the Spencers' dance next week. I am ashamed of my pettiness. I'm going to try to do better this year--develop my character more and not always be thinking about enjoying myself. I've always been so happy, I dread disappointment and unhappiness, but they would be good for me. But I don't want them.

  Rosamond Lehmann

  Beautiful, Disappointment, Selfish

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• A pregnant woman facing the most dire circumstances must be able to count on her doctor to do what is medically necessary to protect her from serious physical harm.

  Barbara Mikulski

  Doctors, Redemption, Able

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• In all my years one thing has never changed; You win with serious, tough-minded players. That never changes

  Tom Thibodeau

  Basketball, Winning, Player

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• Naive optimism and pervasive pessimism are both to be avoided, therefore. It's not an easy balance to maintain, to be asked to work away in the Ninevehs of our lives without being so conscious of the coming cataclysm that we are not serious citizens of our communities and nations. By living and sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ, we are doing the most relevant thing we can do by way of helping. (There are civic and other chores to be done, of course.) Day in and day out, the gospel is the one thing that is most relevant, and we are to be of good cheer.

  Neal A. Maxwell

  Life, Jesus, Cheer

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• If the truth is boring, civilization is irksome. The constraints inherent in civilized living are frustrating in innumerable ways. Yet those with the vision of the anointed often see these constraints as only arbitrary impositions, things from which they-and we all-can be 'liberated.' The social disintegration which has followed in the wake of such liberation has seldom provoked any serious reconsideration of the whole set of assumptions-the vision-which led to such disasters. That vision is too well insulated from feedback.

  Thomas Sowell

  Civilization, Vision, Arbitrary

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• I feel no shame at being found still owning a share when the bottom of the market comes…I would go much further than that. I should say that it is from time to time the duty of a serious investor to accept the depreciation of his holdings with equanimity and without reproaching himself.  … An investor…should be aiming primarily at long-period results, and should be solely judged by these.

  John Maynard Keynes

  Long, Shame, Share

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• American literature had always considered writing a very serious matter

  Guillermo Cabrera Infante

  Writing, Literature, Matter

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