Understood Quotes - Page 40

• A few months ago, I had the pleasure of actually visiting the Playboy Mansion. I saw the peacocks, fed grapes to the monkeys, and even braved the fabled Grotto. After seeing the estate, I understood why anyone would be reluctant to leave.

  Diablo Cody

  Would Be, Monkeys, Months

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• Earth Day 1970 was irrefutable evidence that the American people understood the environmental threat and wanted action to resolve it.

  Barry Commoner

  People, Firefighter, Earth Day

  "Interview with Barry Commoner" by Alan Hall, www.scientificamerican.com. June 23, 1997.

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• Man is not imprisoned by habit. Great changes in him can be wrought by crisis - once that crisis can be recognized and understood.

  Norman Cousins

  Inspirational, Change, Men

  Norman Cousins (1953). “Who Speaks for Man?”, New York : Macmillan

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• Shadow is the obstruction of light. Shadows appear to me to be of supreme importance in perspective, because, without them opaque and solid bodies will be ill defined; that which is contained within their outlines and their boundaries themselves will be ill-understood unless they are shown against a background of a different tone from themselves.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Light, Perspective, Shadow

  Leonardo Da Vinci “The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci”, Lulu.com

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• The beginnings and ends of shadow lie between the light and darkness and may be infinitely diminished and infinitely increased. Shadow is the means by which bodies display their form. The forms of bodies could not be understood in detail but for shadow.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Lying, Mean, Light

  Leonardo da Vinci (2014). “Delphi Complete Works of Leonardo da Vinci (Illustrated)”, p.384, Delphi Classics

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• The problem with merely writing so that you can be understood is that the wrong people, in advancing their agendas, are only too ready to misunderstand you. Writing so that you cannot be misunderstood anticipates and preempts those who would willfully distort what you are trying to say.

  William A. Dembski

  Writing, People, Misunderstood

  "Peerless: A Radically Decentralized Digital Monetary Framework" by Bill Dembski, billdembski.com. November 23, 2016.

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• Ed Koch will never "rest in peace." That was not his way. He was always nervously squirming, while making others squirm as well. Comfort was not his goal. He understood that to be a proud and assertive Jew meant never being able to leave a sigh of relief and say "it's over, we are at peace, we can now put down our guard and relax."

  Alan Dershowitz

  Rest In Peace, Sigh Of Relief, Goal

  "Ed Koch: The Death of a Liberal Israel Lover" by Alan Dershowitz, www.huffingtonpost.com. February 4, 2013.

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• Love is understood, in a historical way, as one of the great human vocations - but its counterspell has always been infidelity. This terrible, terrible betrayal that can tear apart not only another person, not only oneself, but whole families.

  Junot Diaz

  Betrayal, Love Is, Historical

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• It wasn't until I went to college and I got my first motorcycle that I understood the thrill of speed.

  Vin Diesel

  College, Racing, Motorcycle

  "Vin Diesel: I Want To Be A Good Dad". Interview, parade.com. August 25, 2008.

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• Crystals grew inside rock like arithmetic flowers. They lengthened and spread, added plane to plane in an awed and perfect obedience to an absolute geometry that even stones - maybe only the stones - understood.

  Annie Dillard

  Fear, Flower, Rocks

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• The shortage of buyers, which the world is suffering from, is readily understood, not as due to people not wishing to obtain possession of goods, but as people being unwilling to part with something which might earn a regular income in exchange for those goods.

  Paul Dirac

  People, Suffering, Wish

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• A battle lost or won is easily described, understood, and appreciated, but the moral growth of a great nation requires reflection, as well as observation, to appreciate it.

  Frederick Douglass

  Patriotic, Reflection, Moral Growth

  Frederick Douglass, Philip Sheldon Foner, Yuval Taylor (1999). “Frederick Douglass: Selected Speeches and Writings”, p.565, Chicago Review Press

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• As Cuvier could correctly describe a whole animal by the contemplation of a single bone, so the observer who has thoroughly understood one link in a series of incidents should be able to accurately state all the other ones, both before and after.

  Arthur Conan Doyle

  Animal, Links, Able

  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, David Stuart Davies (1998). “The Best of Sherlock Holmes”, p.53, Wordsworth Editions

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• I never understood why the metal heads in my school hated the punks.

  Trevor Dunn

  School, Punk, Hated

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• I've been around golf my whole life. My father did it all the time, and I resented him for it. But a couple years ago I picked up a golf club and I understood the physics of it. If anyone knows anything about golf, it's that once you hit a few shots, you'll become addicted.

  Fred Durst

  Couple, Father, Golf

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• And while I stood there I saw more than I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes as they must live together like one being.

  Black Elk

  Inspirational, Native American, Circles

  Black Elk (2000). “Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux”, Bison Books

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• I think I have told you, but if I have not, you must have understood, that a man who has a vision is not able to use the power of it until after he has performed the vision on earth for the people to see.

  Black Elk

  Men, Thinking, People

  Black Elk (2000). “Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux”, Bison Books

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• During the Middle Ages they understood that words accompanied by imagery are much more memorable. By making the margins of a book colorful and beautiful, illuminations help make the text unforgettable. It's unfortunate that we've lost the art of illumination.

  Joshua Foer

  Beautiful, Art, Book

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• Being understood is not the most essential thing in life.

  Jodie Foster

  Things In Life, Essentials

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• The moment I understood this - that my Parkinson's was the one thing I wasn't going to change - I started looking at the things I could change, like the way research is funded.

  Michael J. Fox

  Research, Way, Moments

  "The Givers : What Inspires Michael J. Fox? A Very Personal Interview". Interview with Marlo Thomas, www.huffingtonpost.com. March 5, 2012.

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• I’ve never understood why we would want to deny all the joys - and the challenges - of marriage to anyone. Which is why I think any loving, committed couple — gay or straight — should be able to get married.

  Al Franken

  Couple, Gay, Thinking

  "Keeping Discrimination Out of Minnesota’s Constitution" by Al Franken, www.huffingtonpost.com. October 16, 2012.

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• Obviously one must hold oneself responsible for the evil impulses of one's dreams. In what other way can one deal with them? Unless the content of the dream rightly understood is inspired by alien spirits, it is part of my own being.

  Sigmund Freud

  Dream, Evil, Understanding

  Sigmund Freud (1950). “Collected papers”

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• Prayer is not an old woman's idle amusement. Properly understood and applied, it is the most potent instrument of action.

  Mahatma Gandhi

  Inspirational, Prayer, Cancer

  Mahatma Gandhi (2007). “Gandhi on Non-Violence”, p.87, New Directions Publishing

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• Equality, rightly understood as our founding fathers understood it, leads to liberty and to the emancipation of creative differences; wrongly understood, as it has been so tragically in our time, it leads first to conformity and then to despotism.

  Barry Goldwater

  Father, Equality, Differences

  Speech Accepting the Republican Presidential Nomination, delivered 16 July 1964, San Francisco

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• Truth is, I'll never know all there is to know about you just as you will never know all there is to know about me. Humans are by nature too complicated to be understood fully. So, we can choose either to approach our fellow human beings with suspicion or to approach them with an open mind, a dash of optimism and a great deal of candour.

  Tom Hanks

  Optimistic, Optimism, Tolerance

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