Keep quiet and people will think you a philosopher.

How then did it work out, all this? How did one judge people, think of them? How did one add up this and that and conclude that it is liking one felt, or disliking?

Virginia Woolf

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness . . . it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair . . . in short, the period was so far like the present period . . . .

Charles Dickens

On that Sunday morning the first thing that impressed the people who approached the tomb was the unusual position of the one and a half to two ton stone that had been lodged in front of the doorway.

Josh McDowell

To live is to war with trolls.

Henrik Ibsen

The man of life upright has a guiltless heart, free from all dishonest deeds or thought of vanity.

Thomas Carlyle

It's really easy to get caught up in outward appearance or attributes that I have or talents that I have and focus my worth on those things. And none of those things really have anything to do with my identity. And my identity is a child of God. And I think it's important to remember that God has created each of us uniquely and it doesn't make sense to compare ourselves to other people because God has a different plan and a purpose for each person that he's made. And so we need to just remember that we are created perfectly to fulfill the plan that God has for our individual life.

J.J. Heller

I've just been growing right along. It's painful, but it's a great pain, and I like suffering for great results. It's like going to the gym. It hurts really bad at first, but after a couple of months and after that diet, you're looking so hot.

Mary J. Blige

There seem to be but three ways for a nation to acquire wealth. The first is by war, as the Romans did, in plundering their conquered neighbors. This is robbery. The second by commerce, which is generally cheating. The third by agriculture, the only honest way, wherein man receives a real increase of the seed thrown into the ground, in a kind of continual miracle, wrought by the hand of God in his favor, as a reward for his innocent life and his virtuous industry.

Benjamin Franklin

But what Kezia liked more than anything, what she liked frightfully, was the lamp. It stood in the middle of the dining-room table, an exquisite little amber lamp with a white globe. It was filled all ready for lighting, though, of course, you couldn't light it. But there was something inside that looked like oil and moved when you shook it. The father and mother dolls, who sprawled very stiff as though they had fainted in the drawing-room, and their two little children asleep upstairs, were really too big for the doll's house. They didn't look as though they belonged. But the lamp was perfect. It seemed to smile at Kezia, to say, 'I live here.' The lamp was real.

Katherine Mansfield, The Doll's

A man cannot be said to succeed in this life who does not satisfy one friend.

Henry David Thoreau

You and your purpose in life are the same thing. Your purpose is to be you.

George Alexiou

The individual who wants to reach the top in business must appreciate the might of the force of habit and must understand that practices are what create habits. He must be quick to break those habits that can break him and hasten to adopt those practices that will become the habits that help him achieve the success he desires.

J. Paul Getty