Significance Quotes - Page 14

• It is a good lesson - though it may often be a hard one - for a man... to step aside out of the narrow circle in which his claims are recognized, and to find how utterly devoid of significance, beyond that circle, is all that he achieves, and all he aims at.

  Nathaniel Hawthorne

  Men, Often Is, Circles

  Nathaniel Hawthorne, Karin Jacobson (2004). “CliffsComplete The Scarlet Letter”, p.27, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Women, in general, will find it difficult to turn from a man and stop demanding that he meets their needs, provides security, and protects their identity, and return to me. Men, in general, find it very hard to turn from the works of their hands, their own quests for power and security and significance, and turn to me.

  William P. Young

  Men, Hands, Identity

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• I have often had a retrospective vision where everything in my past life seems to fall with significance into logical sequence.

  Ansel Adams

  Fall, Past, Vision

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• [American] liberalism today sees no realm of human life that is beyond political significance, from what you eat to what you smoke to what you say.

  Jonah Goldberg

  Political, Today, Human Life

  Jonah Goldberg (2008). “Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning”, p.14, Crown Forum

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• But maybe the Charm Bracelets understood more about life than I did. From an early age they knew what little value the world placed in books, and so didn't waste their time with them. Whereas I, even now, persist in believing that these black marks on white paper bear the greatest significance, that if I keep writing, I might be able to catch the rainbow of consciousness in a jar.

  Jeffrey Eugenides

  Believe, Book, Writing

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• In the post-Warhol era a single gesture such as uncrossing one's legs will have more significance than all the pages in War and Peace.

  J. G. Ballard

  War, Legs, Gestures

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• She entered a state where prayer and poetry became one and the everyday world seemed full of holiness and significance.

  Lian Hearn

  Prayer, Everyday, World

  Lian Hearn (2008). “Brilliance of the Moon: Tales of the Otori”, p.296, Pan Macmillan

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• The value of myth is that it takes all the things you know and restores to them the rich significance which has been hidden by the veil of familiarity.

  C. S. Lewis

  Veils, Rich, Myth

  "On Stories and Other Essays on Literature". Book by C. S. Lewis, edited by Walter Hooper, "Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings", p. 90, 1982.

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• We all have such fateful objects -- it may be a recurrent landscape in one case, a number in another -- carefully chosen by the gods to attract events of specific significance for us: here shall John always stumble; there shall Jane's heart always break.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Heart, Numbers, Events

  Vladimir Nabokov (2012). “Lolita”, p.163, Penguin UK

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• ...boredom speaks the language of time, and it is to teach you the most valuable lesson in your life--...the lesson of your utter insignificance. It is valuable to you, as well as to those you are to rub shoulders with. 'You are finite,' time tells you in a voice of boredom, 'and whatever you do is, from my point of view, futile.' As music to your ears, this, of course, may not count; yet the sense of futility, of limited significance even of your best, most ardent actions is better than the illusion of their consequence and the attendant self-satisfaction.

  Joseph Brodsky

  Voice, Self, Views

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• If you can imagine the one family continuously occupying the same land for 40,000 years or more, using it not just to sustain life but as a place of reverence and worship, where every tree, rock and waterhole had significance, you will get some understanding of the importance of land to indigenous people.

  Tania Major

  Wisdom, Rocks, Years

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• Of all the differences between man and the lower animals, the moral sense or conscience is by far the most important. This sense, as Mackintosh remarks, "has a rightful supremacy over every other principle of human action"; it is summed up in that short but imperious word "ought," so full of high significance. It is the most noble of all the attributes of man, leading him without a moment's hesitation to risk his life for that of a fellow-creature; or after due deliberation, impelled simply by the deep feeling of right or duty, to sacrifice it in some great cause.

  Charles Darwin

  Sacrifice, Animal, Men

  "The Descent of Man: Human Sexuality".

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• Always bear this in mind: Everything is in God's hands, and you are His tool to be used by Him as He pleases. Try to grasp the significance of 'all is His'. and you will immediately feel free from all burdens. What will be the result of your surrender to Him? None will seem alien, all will be your very own Self.

  Anandamayi Ma

  Success, Self, Hands

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• But novels are never about what they are about; that is, there is always deeper, or more general, significance. The author may not be aware of this till she is pretty far along with it. A novel's whole pattern is rarely apparent at the outset of writing, or even at the end; that is when the writer finds out what a novel is about, and the job becomes one of understanding and deepening or sharpening what is already written. That is finding the theme.

  Diane Johnson

  Jobs, Writing, Understanding

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• Cheerfulness is full of significance: it suggests good health, a clear conscience, and a soul at peace with all human nature.

  Charles Kingsley

  Soul, Self Improvement, Human Nature

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• When we begin to understand the magnitude of [the Messiah's] sacrifice and service to us individually and collectively, we then cannot consider anything else to be of more importance or to approach His significance in our lives. "For most of us, this understanding does not come all at once and likely will not be fully complete during our mortal sojourn. We do know, however, that as we learn line upon line, our appreciation for the Savior's contributions will increase and our knowledge and assurance of their truthfulness will grow.

  Cecil O. Samuelson

  Appreciation, Sacrifice, Understanding

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• The simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as the precise organization of forms which gives that event its proper expression... In photography, the smallest thing can be a great subject. The little human detail can become a leitmotif.

  Henri Cartier-Bresson

  Photography, Organization, Expression

  "Cartier-Bresson's classic is back - but his Decisive Moment has passed" by Sean O'Hagan, www.theguardian.com. December 23, 2014.

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• More and more are turning to photography as a medium of expression as well as communication. The leavening of aesthetic approaches continues. While it is too soon to define the characteristic of the photographic style today, one common denominator, rooted in tradition, seems in the ascendancy. The direct use of the camera for what it can do best, and that is the revelation, interpretation, and discovery of the world of man and of nature. The greatest challenge to the photographer is to express the inner significance through the outward form.

  Beaumont Newhall

  Photography, Communication, Men

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• Significance is inherent in the human body.

  Julia Kristeva

  Photography, Body, Inherent

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• It seems so utterly naive that landscape - not that of the pictorial school - is not considered of "social significance" when it has a far more important bearing on the human race of a given locale than excrescences called cities.

  Edward Weston

  Photography, School, Race

  Edward Weston, Leslie Squyres Calmes, Willard Van Dyke (1992). “The letters between Edward Weston and Willard Van Dyke”, Center for Creative Photography

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• The provisions of the Constitution are not mathematical formulas having their essence in their form; they are organic, living institutions transplanted from English soil. Their significance is vital, not formal; it is to be gathered not simply by taking the words and a dictionary, but by considering their origin and the line of their growth.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Government, Essence, Growth

  "Gompers v. United States, 233 U.S. 604, 610". Judicial opinion, 1914.

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• To make images is a way of ordering one's world, of exploring and understanding one's relationship to existence. ... The images we make are often ahead of our understanding, but to say "yes" to a subject is also to have recognized, however dimly, a part of oneself; to live with that image, to accept its significance is perhaps to grow in understanding.

  John Blakemore

  Photography, Understanding, World

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• The events in our lives happen in a sequence in time, but in their significance to ourselves they find their own order the continuous thread of revelation.

  Eudora Welty

  Life, Time, Order

  1984 One Writer's Beginnings, II. 'Learning to See'.

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• This dullness of vision regarding the importance of the general welfare to the individual is the measure of the failure of our schools and churches to teach the spiritual significance of genuine democracy.

  Henry A. Wallace

  Spiritual, School, Vision

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• The black fist is a meaningless symbol. When you open it, you have nothing but fingers - weak, empty fingers. The only time the black fist has significance is when there's money inside. There's where the power lies.

  Jesse Owens

  Sports, Lying, Athlete

  "Jesse Owens, Champion Athlete". Book by Tony Gentry, 1990.

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