It takes a lot more energy to fail than to succeed, since it takes a lot of concentrated energy to hold on to beliefs that don't work.

Writing laws is easy, but governing is difficult.

Leo Tolstoy

At the last moment, Antoinette came out of her faint and shouted one word to her child.That word, reader, was adieu...Adieu is the French word for farewell. Farewell is not the word you would like to hear from your mother as you are being led to the dungeon by two oversize mice in black hoods... Farewell is a word that, in any language, is full of sorrow. It is a word that promises absolutely nothing.

Kate DiCamillo

The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective.

Gilbert K. Chesterton

This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.

William Shakespeare

It's no shame in reaching second or third base if you aimed for first base.

Stephen Richards

The hatred of relatives is the most violent.

Tacitus

Maybe the first time you saw her you were ten. She was standing in the sun scratching her legs. Or tracing letters in the dirt with a stick. Her hair was being pulled. Or she was pulling someone's hair. And a part of you was drawn to her, and a part of you resisted--wanting to ride off on your bicycle, kick a stone, remain uncomplicated. In the same breath you felt the strength of a man, and a self-pity that made you feel small and hurt. Part of you thought: Please don't look at me. If you don't, I can still turn away. And part of you thought: Look at me.

Nicole Krauss

I love extreme sports, I like snowboarding and motorcross and rollerblading and hockey.

Jeremy London

My work is the only ground I've ever had to stand on. I seem to have a whole superstructure with no foundation but I'm working on the foundation.

Marilyn Monroe

Many complain of their memory, few of their judgment.

Benjamin Franklin

All commend patience, but none can endure to suffer.

Thomas Fuller

Then, wearied by the uncertainty and difficulties with which each scheme appeared to be attended, he bent up his mind to the strong effort of shaking off his love, like dew-drops from the lion's mane, and resuming those studies and that career of life which his unrequited affection had so long and so fruitlessly interrupted. In this last resolution he endeavoured to fortify himself by every argument which pride, as well as reason, could suggest.

Sir Walter Scott, The Antiquary