Books are the reality you get to choose; life is the reality you hide from inside a book.

And such is your definition of matrimony and dancing. Taken in that light, certainly their resemblance is not striking; but I think I could place them in such a view. You will allow that in both man has the advantage of choice, woman only the power of refusal; that in both it is an engagement between man and woman, formed for the advantage of each; and that when once entered into, they belong exclusively to each other till the moment of its dissolution; that it is their duty each to endeavor to give the other no cause for wishing that he or she had bestowed themselves elsewhere, and their best interest to keep their own imaginations from wandering towards the perfections of their neighbors, or fancying that they should have been better off with any one else.

Jane Austen

The past is a great place and I don't want to erase it or to regret it, but I don't want to be its prisoner either.

Mick Jagger

Spectacular achievement is always preceded by spectacular preparation.

Robert H. Schuller

Short cycle business are being impacted by credit, and are being impacted by gasoline prices, food, distribution businesses, chemical business.

Jack Welch

My wife disagrees with 100 percent of what I say. That's the same marriage I have.

Curtis Sliwa

You know me better than you think, you know, and you shall know me better yet.

C.S. Lewis

A No uttered from deepest conviction is better and greater than a Yes merely uttered to please, or what is worse, to avoid trouble.

Mahatma Gandhi

People respond when you tell them there is a great future in front of you, you can leave your past behind.

Joel Osteen

He discovered wonderful stories, also, about jewels. In Alphonso's Clericalis Disciplina a serpent was mentioned with eyes of real jacinth, and in the romantic history of Alexander, the Conqueror of Emathia was said to have found in the vale of Jordan snakes 'with collars of real emeralds growing on their backs.' There was a gem in the brain of the dragon, Philostratus told us, and 'by the exhibition of golden letters and a scarlet robe' the monster could be thrown into a magical sleep and slain. According to the great alchemist, Pierre de Boniface, the diamond rendered a man invisible, and the agate of India made him eloquent. The cornelian appeased anger, and the hyacinth provoked sleep, and the amethyst drove away the fumes of wine. The garnet cast out demons, and the hydropicus deprived the moon of her color. The selenite waxed and waned with the moon, and the meloceus, that discovers thieves, could be affected only by the blood of kids. Leonardus Camillus had seen a white stone taken from the brain of a newly killed toad, that was a certain antidote against poison. The bezoar, that was found in the heart of the Arabian deer, was a charm that could cure the plague. In the nests of Arabian birds was the aspirates, that, according to Democritus, kept the wearer from any danger by fire.

Oscar Wilde

If you leave the smallest corner of your head vacant for a moment, other people's opinions will rush in from all quarters.

George Bernard Shaw

Through tattered clothes, small vices do appear. Robes and furred gowns hide all.

William Shakespeare

All travel has its advantages. If the passenger visits better countries, he may learn to improve his own. And if fortune carries him to worse, he may learn to enjoy it.

Samuel Johnson