So, cutting the lashing of the waterproof match keg, after many failures Starbuck contrived to ignite the lamp in the lantern; then stretching it on a waif pole, handed it to Queequeg as the standard-bearer of this forlorn hope. There, then, he sat, holding up that imbecile candle in the heart of that almighty forlornness. There, then, he sat, the sign and symbol of a man without faith, hopelessly holding up hope in the midst of despair.

This is why I belong, and why I believe. I commend to all this same search for happiness and for the truth.

Clayton Christensen

Call a thing immoral or ugly, soul-destroying or a degradation of man, a peril to the peace of the world or to the well-being of future generations; as long as you have not shown it to be uneconomic you have not really questioned its right to exist, grow, and prosper.

E. F. [Ernst Friedrich] Schumach

And suddenly, like light in darkness, the real truth broke in upon me; the simple fact of Man, which I had forgotten, which had lain deep buried and out of sight; the idea of community, of unity.

Ernst Toller

With a host of proposals on the table and a President examining new ideas for health reform, we have an obligation to give real reform our best shot.

Ron Wyden

Outward failure may be a manifested variant of inward success.

Kenneth L. Pike

I thought I had a clear picture of death, but now I know it's a mystery and it will always be a mystery, although it is something we all have in common: everybody knows that life ends with death.

Beth Gibbons

From the smallest necessity to the highest religious abstraction, from the wheel to the skyscraper, everything we are and everything we have comes from one attribute of man

Ayn Rand

Science is feasible when the variables are few and can be enumerated; when their combinations are distinct and clear. We are tending toward the condition of science and aspiring to do it. The artist works out his own formulas; the interest of science lies in the art of making science.

Paul Ambroise Valery

True courage is not the brutal force of vulgar heroes, but the firm resolve of virtue and reason.

Alfred North Whitehead

Love makes everything that is heavy light.

Thomas Kempis

Love lives on hope, and dies when hope is dead; It is a flame which sinks for lack of fuel.

Corneille, Pierre

I like movies about failing.

Albert Brooks