Sheer Quotes - Page 14

It is sheer madness to live in want in order to be wealthy when you die.

Juvenal

Order, Want, Madness

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The decisive step in evolution, the first step toward macroevolution, the step from one species to another, requires another evolutionary method than that of sheer accumulation of micromutations.

Richard Goldschmidt

Science, Firsts, Steps

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I'd been an expert at taking beatings. Then I had a lucky break where I did a bully in, by total sheer luck. ... One minute I was the mark, and with just one swift move, I put the big man in school down. ... Once he was down, the whole atmosphere in the schoolyard changed. A huge cloud seemed to be lifted from me. ... I'd never been aware the cloud was so large.

Keith Richards

Bullying, Moving, School

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Today we are crushed by the sheer weight of the mechanized forces hurled against us, but we can still look to the future in which even greater mechanized forces will bring us victory. Therein lies the destiny of the world.

Charles de Gaulle

War, Lying, Destiny

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There is no room in your mind for negative thoughts. The busier you keep yourself with the particulars of shot assessment and execution, the less chance your mind has to dwell on the emotional. This is sheer intensity.

Jack Nicklaus

Sports, Golf, Emotional

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Beauty is excrescence, superabundance, random ebulience, and sheer delightful waste to be enjoyed in its own right.

Donald C. Peattie

Beauty, Waste, Delightful

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Intelligence is a valuable thing, but it is not usually the key to survival. Sheer fecundity ... usually counts. The intelligent gorilla doesn't do as well as the less intelligent but more-fecund rat, which doesn't do as well as the still-less-intelligent but still-more-fecund cockroach, which doesn't do as well as the minimally-intelligent but maximally-fecund bacterium.

Isaac Asimov

Intelligent, Keys, Survival

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In war, numbers alone confer no advantage. Do not advance relying on sheer military power.

Sun Tzu

Art, Military, War

Sun Tzu, Shang Yang (1997). “The Art of War”, p.41, Wordsworth Editions

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The basis of optimism is sheer terror.

Oscar Wilde

Positive, Funny Inspirational, Attitude

Oscar Wilde, Russell Jackson, Joseph Bristow, Ian Small (2000). “The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde: The picture of Dorian Gray : the 1890 and 1891 texts”, p.52, Oxford University Press on Demand

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English usage is sometimes more than mere taste, judgment and education - sometimes it's sheer luck, like getting across the street.

E. B. White

Communication, Luck, Taste And Judgment

E. B. WHITE (1954). “The SECOND TREE from the CORNER”

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He decided in favor of life out of sheer spite and malice.

Patrick Süskind

Favors, Spite, Malice

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The problem with living so long is that we get used to it. We watch the mortals age and wither and die around us, watch the world change and decay...but no matter the hardship or the pain or the sorrow we suffer, we choose to continue living. Out of sheer habit, I think.

Derek Landy

Pain, Regret, Thinking

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What he did to my heart was sheer, inexplicable, magic.

Wendelin Van Draanen

Heart, Magic, Inexplicable

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Lie is more worth living, more full of interest when you are likely to lose it. It shouldn't be, perhaps, but it is. When you're young and strong and healthy, and life stretches ahead of you, living isn't really important at all. It's young people who commit suicide easily, out of despair from love, sometimes from sheer anxiety and worry. But old people know how valuable life is and how interesting. - Jane Marple

Agatha Christie

Suicide, Strong, Lying

Agatha Christie (1993). “A Caribbean Mystery ; A Pocket Full of Rye ; The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side ; They Do it with Mirrors”

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Perhaps it is only human nature to inflict suffering on anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuine humility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness.

Honore de Balzac

Humility, Anti Bullying, Suffering

Honore de Balzac, Pierre F. Limouzy (1999). “CliffsNotes on Balzac's Pere Goriot”, p.7, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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I believe in a personal god who cares about me and worries and oversees everything I do. I believe in an impersonal god who set the universe in motion and went off to hang with her girlfriends and doesn't even know that I'm alive. I believe in an empty and godless universe of causal chaos, background noise, and sheer blind luck... I believe that life is a game, that life is a cruel joke, and that life is what happens when you're alive and that you might as well lie back and enjoy it.

Neil Gaiman

Girlfriend, Lying, Believe

"American Gods". Book by Neil Gaiman. Chapter 13, 2001.

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Whoa there, Tobias," says the man to my left. "Weren't you raised a Stiff? I thought the most you people did was... graze hands or something." "Then how do you explain all the Abnegation children?" Tobias raises his eyebrows. "They are brought into being by sheer force of will," the woman on the arm of the chair interjects. "Didn't you know that, Tobias?" "No, I wasn't aware." He grins. "My apologies.

Veronica Roth

Children, Apology, Men

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Good. If you checked your e-mail every five minutes, or keep texting and Tweeting in the middle of our conversation, I might snap your neck out of sheer principle.

Jeaniene Frost

Necks, Principles, Texting

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My head reeled at the sheer and startling beauty, the wide, bare openness of it. The sense of space, the vastness of the sky above and on either side made my heart race, I would have travelled a thousand miles to see this. I had never imagined such a place.

Susan Hill

Heart, Race, Sky

Susan Hill (1986). “The Woman in Black”

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He turned and reached behind him for the chocolate bar, then he turned back again and handed it to Charlie. Charlie grabbed it and quickly tore off the wrapper and took an enormous bite. Then he took another…and another…and oh, the joy of being able to cram large pieces of something sweet and solid into one's mouth! The sheer blissful joy of being able to fill one's mouth with rich solid food! 'You look like you wanted that one, sonny,' the shopkeeper said pleasantly. Charlie nodded, his mouth bulging with chocolate.

Roald Dahl

Sweet, Joy, Chocolate

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There aren’t many honest men or women in Washington anymore. Politicians get where they are by the sheer force of their egos, not their convictions. And you know what? It’s our fault as voters. We don’t demand better candidates, so we end up getting what we deserve—on both sides of the aisle.

Brad Thor

Men, Ego, Demand

Brad Thor (2012). “Brad Thor Collectors' Edition #3: The Last Patriot, The Apostle, and Foreign Influence”, p.359, Simon and Schuster

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...there is the sheer emotional, intellectual, physical, chemical pleasure of your children. The honest truth is that the world holds no greater gratification than lying in bed with your children, putting your leg on top of them in a semi-crushing manner, while saying sternly, "You are a poo.

Caitlin Moran

Crush, Children, Lying

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But I know too that if we ever make a world without shadow, if the chemists and scientists and psychologists succeed in abolishing fear, pain, loneliness, death, some of us will find life so intolerable we will probably blow out our brains out of sheer boredom.

MacDonald Harris

Pain, Loneliness, Blow

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No words for the passion. No words for the need.No words for the sheer epiphany of the moment.And so, on an otherwise unremarkable Friday afternoon, in the heart of Mayfair, in a quiet drawing room on Mount Street, Colin Bridgerton kissed Penelope Featherington.And it was glorious.

Julia Quinn

Friday, Passion, Heart

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Identify you as messenger...to other Riders." The words were gasped as if he were forcing air in and out of his lungs by sheer will to extend his life. "Fly...Rider, with great speed. Don't read m-message. Then they can't tor-torture...it from you. If captured, shred it and toss it to the winds." Then, because his voice had grown so faint, she had to lean very close to hear his final words. "Beware the shadow man." A cold tremor ran through Karigan's body. "I'll do my best," she told him.

Kristen Britain

Men, Air, Wind

Kristen Britain (2008). “Green Rider: Book One of Green Rider”, p.20, Penguin

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