Famous Quotes & Sayings

Charles Caleb Colton

A semi-civilized state of society, equally removed from the extremes of barbarity and of refinement, seems to be that particular meridian under which all the reciprocities and gratuities of hospitality do most readily flourish and abound. For it so happens that the ease, the luxury, and the abundance of the highest state of civilization, are as productive of selfishness, as the difficulties, the privations, and the sterilities of he lowest.

Alan Bennett

I saw someone peeing in Jermym Street the other day. I thought, is this the end of civilization as we know it? Or is it simply someone peeing in Jermyn Street?

Aiden Wilson Tozer

Modern civilization is so complex as to make the devotional life all but impossible. It wears us out by multiplying distractions and beats us down by destroying our solitude, where otherwise we might drink and renew our strength before going out to face the world again.

Aiden Wilson Tozer

I have no doubt that historians will conclude that we of the twentieth century had intelligence enough to create a great civilization but not the moral wisdom to preserve it.

David Mitchell

Freedom!- is the fatuous jingle of our civilization, but only those deprived of it have the barest inkling re: what the stuff actually is.

David Graeber

It's a difficult business, creating a new, alternative civilization.

David Suzuki

More than any other time in history, the 1990s will be a turning point for human civilization.

Cesare Pavese

Generations do not age. Every youth of any period, any civilization, has the same possibilities as always.

Camille Paglia

They do not understand the fragility of civilization and the constant nearness of savage nature.

David Cross

There's the disingenuous duplicitousness, but you can apply that to every politician, really.

Catherine Zeta-Jones

A great politician has great charisma.

Alexei Navalny

I'm only sort of a politician.

Billy Campbell

I would make a horrible politician, because I wouldn't enjoy my work.

Arlen Specter

You know, a statesman is a dead politician.

Elizabeth Edwards

You know, everybody knows some of what politicians say is malarkey, and having somebody there to call them on it is good. I'd be happy to do that any time and any place.

Eliot Spitzer

I don't like politicians who vacillate.

Farooq Abdullah

I should learn the language of a politician - give away as little and keep the rest to yourself. Not lie, I just want to be more guarded.

Douglas Alexander

Any politician in a democracy has to be mindful of public opinion.

Charles Dickens

Why then we should drop into poetry.

David McCullough

Read somewhat in the English poets every day. You will find them elegant, entertaining and constructive companions through your whole life.

Camille Paglia

Poetry is the connecting link between body and mind.

C. K. Williams

Poetry confronts in the most clear-eyed way just those emotions which consciousness wishes to slide by.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The poet should size the Particular, and he should, if there be anything sound in it, thus represent the Universal

Eugenio Montale

The poet does not know and often will never know his true receiver.

Edward Hirsch

Readers bring their own experiences, their own range of - their own wisdom, their own knowledge, their own insights to poem and the meaning of a poem takes place in the negotiation between the poet, the poem and the reader.

Edward Hirsch

Poetry never loses its appeal. Sometimes its audience wanes and sometimes it swells like a wave. But the essential mystery of being human is always going to engage and compel us. We're involved in a mystery. Poetry uses words to put us in touch with that mystery. We're always going to need it.

Edward Hirsch

There has never been a great poet who wasn't also a great reader of poetry.