Quotes



Taking a few sentences from a book and putting them by themselves is like removing a few sheep from a meadow.
The sheep might get lonely, but you might find them delicious...

— Lemony Snicket


Quotes about Death

Inside every living person is a dead person waiting to get out

— Reaper Man, Terry Pratchett 📖

He had decided to live forever or die in the attempt

— Catch-22, Joseph Heller 📖

If you drown, at least die knowing you were heading for shore

— Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury 📖

How would you like to die?
Old.

— Tenet 🎬

Death smiles upon all of us. The best we can do is smile back

— Gladiator 🎬

How you live is how you die


The moments that change your life happen suddenly, like the one where you die

— Moving Pictures, Terry Pratchett 📖

What did he die of?
Insubordination! How dare you ask such a question!

— All The Wrong Questions, Lemony Snicket 📖


Thoughtful Quotes

Don't put your trust in revolutions. They always come around again. That's why they're called revolutions. People die and nothing changes.

— Night Watch, Terry Pratchett 📖

Will he come between us?
Yes. Like a bridge he'll come between us.

— Enders Game: Speaker for the Dead, Orson Scott Card 📖

This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper

— The Hollow Men, T.S. Elliot 📖

Perhaps a lunatic was simply a minority of one

— 1984, George Orwell 📖

He won't let the pain blot out the humor, no more'n he'll let the humor block out the pain

— One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Kensy 📖

Odd thing is — the word "experiment" is unpopular, but not the word "experimental". You mustn't experiment on children; but offer the dear little kiddies free education in an experimental school... and it's all correct

— That Hideous Strength, C.S. Lewis 📖

Try to peel an onion; if you succeed there will be nothing left

— The Inner Ring, C.S. Lewis 📃

If everyone fought fire with fire, the entire world would go up in smoke

— Lemony Snicket 🗣

The honest poor can sometimes forget poverty. The honest rich can never forget the poor

— Cockneys and Their Jokes, G.K. Chesterton 📃


Quotes about Wealth

The best measure of wealth is what you have minus what you want

— Some Things I Think, Morgan Housel 💻

The man who can buy anything he covets, values nothing he buys

— Mark Twain 🗣

Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get

— Warren Buffet 🗣

The most valuable personal finance asset is not needing to impress anyone

— Some Things I Think, Morgan Housel 💻


Insightful Quotes

The dignity of truth is lost with much protesting

— Fahenheit 451, Ray Bradbury 📖

The first man through the wall always gets bloody. Always

— Moneyball 🎬

Technology... It was your slave but, in a sense, it might be the other way round

— Raising Steam, Terry Pratchett 📖

A human truth, which is always very much a lie, hides as much of life as it displays

— Books Which Have Influenced me, R.L. Stevenson 📃

Loyalty implies loyalty in misfortune; and when a soldier has accepted any nation's uniform he has already accepted its defeat.

— Thoughts Around Koepenick, G.K. Chesterton 📃

Reserving judgement is a matter of infinite hopes

— The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald 📖

Explaining an allegory is like dissecting a frog. The more you dissect it the more it dies.

— The West Wing 🎬

'I suppose there are two views about everything,' said Mark.
'Eh? Two views? There are more than a dozen views about everything until you know the answer. Then there's never more than one...'

— That Hideous Strength, C.S. Lewis 📖

It is assumed that the sceptic has no bias; whereas he has a very obvious bias in favour of skepticism

— The Error of Impartiality, G.K. Chesterton 📃

I'm a politician... When I'm not kissing babies, I'm stealing their lollipops.

— The Hunt for Red October 🎬

Conversation is, indeed, both the scene and instrument of friendship

— Talk and Talkers, R.L. Stevenson 📃

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral. Returning violence with violence only multiplies violence adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars.

— Dr King 🗣

The old idea that the joke was not good enough for the company has been superseded by the new aristocratic idea that the company was not worthy of the joke

— Demagogues and Mystagogues, G.K. Chesterton 📃

Pain is knowledge rushing in to fill a void, with great speed

— Jerry Seinfield 🗣

Any time you can make someone else feel something, you have power over them

— Words of Radiance, Brandon Sanderson 📖

Where friendship fails, hatred will often force a way

— Oliver Twist, Charles Dickens 📖

An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind

— Mahatma Gandhi 🗣

If coders don’t run the world, they run the things that run the world.

— What is Code, Paul Ford 💻

With some movies, you begin to notice implausibilities. With others, you begin to admire them

— Roger Egbert 💻

Privilege just means "private law".

— The Truth, Terry Pratchett 📖

More strictly, and mathematically, nameability ends where countability ends

— Vastness, Venkatesh Rao 💻

Any explanation of a work of art must be found in it, not taken to it.

— Roger Egbert 💻

Curiosity is itself a kind of originality; it's roughly to questions what originality is to answers

— How to Do Great Work, Paul Graham 📃


One Liners

A truth told with bad intent, beats all the lies you can invent

— Paradise Lost, John Milton 📖

He who sows hurry reaps indigestion

— An Apology for Idlers, R.L. Stevenson 📃

Ignorance is the parent of fear

— Moby Dick, Herman Melville 📖

Rumour is information distilled so finely that it can filter through anything

— Feet of Clay, Terry Pratchett 📖

A man who makes trouble for others, also makes trouble for himself

— Things Fall Apart, Chinna Achebe 📖

Drama is the poetry of conduct

— A Gossip on Romance, R.L. Stevenson 📃

Extraordinary claims required extraordinary evidence

— 68 Bits of Unsolicited Advice, Kevin Kelly 🗣

Happiness is that feeling you get right before you need more happiness.

— Don Draper 🗣

The spice of life is battle

— Talk and Talkers, R.L. Stevenson 📃

If the news is fake, imagine history

— Balaji Srinivasan 🗣

Action produces information

— Brian Armstrong 🗣

Loss and gain are brothers twain

— How much land does a man need?, Leo Tolstoy 📖

The best measure of wealth is what you have minus what you want.

— Morgan Housel 🗣

The foundation of war is economics

— Elon Musk 🗣

Creativity is the essence of that which is not mechanical

— Godel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, Douglas Hofstadter 📖

Write drunk, edit sober

— Ernest Hemmingway 🗣


Wisdom and Advice

The man who has least fear for his own carcass, has most time to consider others

— Aes Triplex, R.L. Stevenson 📃

If a lad does not learn in the streets, it is because he has no faculty of learning

— An Apology for Idlers, R.L. Stevenson 📃

He was never one for protocol – it got in the way and often concealed nasty and dangerous things

— Raising Steam, Terry Pratchett 📖

Before he can tell what cadences he truly prefers, the student should have tried all that are possible

— Books Which Have Influenced me, R.L. Stevenson 📃

The greatest risk is not taking one

— The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho 📖

Pigeonholes are best for pigeons

— Which team?, Seth Godin 💻

Don’t fear failure. Fear average.

— 68 Bits of Unsolicited Advice, Kevin Kelly 🗣

Writing converts your ideas from vague to bad. But that's a step forward, because once you can see the brokenness, you can fix it.

— The Best Essay, Paul Graham 💻

Question authority, because authority that cannot be questioned is just tyranny, and I will not accept tyranny, even that of heaven

— Terry Pratchett 🗣

To be interesting, be interested

— 68 Bits of Unsolicited Advice, Kevin Kelly 🗣


Turns of Phrase

Time is fun when you're having flies

— Pizza Boy, Everything Everything 🎵

...stared at the offending journal with the air of a vegetarian who has found a caterpillar in his salad.

— The Prince and Betty, P.G. Wodehouse 📖

"You have made quite the splash" said the fish to the man with the lead weight tied to his feet

— Night Watch, Terry Pratchett 📖

Quarrel with a man for cracking nuts, having no other reason but because thou hast hazel eyes

— Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare 📖

There is a trick, or rather a knack to flying. The knack is falling without hitting the ground

— Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams 📖

All men that count have come to my conclusion; for if they come to your conclusion they do not count.

— The Error of Impartiality, G.K. Chesterton 📃

Victory has defeated you

— The Dark Knight Rises 🎬

The day was burning to death

— Perelandra, C.S. Lewis 📖

Whoever holds the torch casts the darkest shadow

— Scythe, Neal Shusterman 📖

If I may lend a machete to this intellectual thicket...

— Pirates of the Caribean: At World's End 📖

Back in Philly... we had to save up to be poor

— The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air 🎬

It's a mess when strange events smack into the windscreen of a resolutely rational mind

— Sourdough, Robin Sloun 📖

I'm always truthful as well. So full of truth, in fact, that sometimes it squeezes the lies right out of my lips. There isn't a place for them inside, you see.

— The Way of Kings, Brandon Sanderson 📖

"Don't play dumb with me."
"No, I am dumb. Most of the time I'm playing smart."

— The West Wing 🎬

Men spoke of the sinner breaking the law; but it was rather the law that broke him

— Tom Jones and Morality, G.K. Chesterton 📃


Quotes about Life

Life ain't a moment it's a skillful opponent
That you learn to have to fight or just roll with

— Chapter 7, Ezra Collective 🎵

If every fool wore a crown
I would be a king and not a clown

— Let Me Down Easy, Paulo Nutini 🎵

Life has a way of talking to the future. It’s called memory.

— The Overstory, Richard Powers 📖

Time's arrow is the loss of fidelity in compression. A sketch, not a photograph. A memory is a re-creation, precious because it is both more and less than the original.

— An Advanced Readers' Picture Book of Comparative Cognition, Ken Liu 📖

I only went out for a walk and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.

— The Overstory, Richard Powers 📖

A happy ending is just a story that hasn't ended yet.

— Mr and Mrs Smith 🎬


Funny Quotes

A face only a mother could love, and then perhaps only if her sight was failing

— Artemis Fowl, Eion Colfer 📖

We are the penultimate... Plus one!

— The Penguins of Madagascar 🎬

Lofty goals... aim for the sun. That way if you miss, at least your arrow will fall far away, and the person it kills will likely be someone you don't know.

— Oathbringer, Brandon Sanderson 📖

Come on Steve. We've got a diem to carpe!

— Charlie with a chance of meatballs 🎬

Every great thing in life starts with a bribe.

— Kicking and Screaming 🎬

That remark's political, or what is much the same, it ain't true

— Demagogues and Mystagogues, G.K. Chesterton 📃

Give a man a fire and he’s warm for a day, but set fire to him and he’s warm for the rest of his life

— Jingo, Terry Pratchett 📖

...so, you're a psychologist. Are you going to read me? I'm an open book, and I think you'll find me quite the page turner

— Johnny English: Reborn 🎬

You are pardoned... From life!

— Thor: Ragnarok 🎬

Pretty please...
The physical appearance of the please will make no difference to my response

— Despicable Me 🎬

Blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed: a passage which some have considered as a prophecy of modern journalism

— Spiritualism, G.K. Chesterton 📃

If it is not true that a divine being fell, then we can only say that one of the animals went entirely off its head

— Wine When it is Red, G.K. Chesterton 📃

What is he doing?
He's taking minutes.
Well precious minutes we don't have!

— Thor: Love and Thunder 🎬

You can either win big or go home... and live with your mom for the rest of your life

— Molly's Game 🎬

For a special agent, you're not having a very special day, are you?

— The Man from UNCLE 🎬




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