Famous Quotes & Sayings

George Santayana

Matters of religion should never be matters of controversy. We neither argue with a lover about his taste, nor condemn him, if we are just, for knowing so human a passion.

George Santayana

In the contemplation of beauty we are raised above ourselves, the passions are silenced and we are happy in the recognition of a good that we do not seek to possess.

George Santayana

Every nation thinks its own madness normal and requisite; more passion and more fancy it calls folly, less it calls imbecility.

George Meredith

In tragic life, God wot, No villain need be! Passions spin the plot: We are betrayed by what is false within.

George Mikes

In England the boy pats his adored one on the back and says softly, "I don't object, you know." If he is quite mad with passion, he may add: "I rather fancy you, in fact.

G. H. Hardy

I do not remember having felt, as a boy, any passion for mathematics, and such notions as I may have had of the career of a mathematician were far from noble. I thought of mathematics in terms of examinations and scholarships: I wanted to beat other boys, and this seemed to be the way in which I could do so most decisively.

Fyodor Dostoevsky

Reason is the slave of passion.

Friedrich Nietzsche

All human life is sunk deep in untruth; the individual cannot pull it out of this well without growing profoundly annoyed with his entire past, without finding his present motives (like honor) senseless, and without opposing scorn and disdain to the passions that urge one on to the future and to the happiness in it.

Friedrich Nietzsche

From passions grow opinions; intellectual laziness lets these harden into convictions.

John Ruskin

Superstition, in all times and among all nations, is the fear of a spirit whose passions are those of a man, whose acts are the acts of a man; who is present in some places, not in others; who makes no places holy and not others; who is kind to one person, unkind to another; who is pleased or angry according to the degree of attention you pay him, or praise you refuse to him; who is hostile generally to human pleasure, but may be bribed by sacrifice of a part of that pleasure into permitting the rest. This, whatever form of faith it colors, is the essence of superstition.

John Ruskin

Skill is the unified force of experience, intellect and passion in their operation.

John Milton

Wherefore did he [God] create passions within us, pleasures round about us, but that these rightly tempered are the very ingredients of virtue?

John Milton

Take heed lest passion sway Thy judgement to do aught, which else free will Would not admit.

John Milton

Calm of mind, all passion spent.

Norm MacDonald

Our passions may be compared to certain slaves--the more severity we show them, the better they obey us.

Norm MacDonald

The soul is never perfectly secure from the influence of passion; the occasional tranquility she seems to enjoy, is rather relaxation than imperturbable triumph.

Nolan Bushnell

Hire for passion and intensity; there is training for everything else.

Nita Ambani

What I have learnt is that it is important to pursue your passion more than your legacy; if you have a passion with a purpose, then everything else fits in.

Niles Eldredge

Paleontologist Niles Eldredge, a prominent evolutionist, said: 'The doubt that has infiltrated the previous, smugly confident certitude of evolutionary biology’s last twenty years has inflamed passions.' He spoke of the 'lack of total agreement even within the warring camps,' and added, 'things really are in an uproar these days . . . Sometimes it seems as though there are as many variations on each [evolutionary] theme as there are individual biologists.'

Mitch Albom

I seem to have very few casual readers, only passionate and appreciative ones.

Miguel de Cervantes

The beauty of some women has days and seasons, depending upon accidents which diminish or increase it; nay, the very passions of the mind naturally improve or impair it, and very often utterly destroy it.

Robert Herjavec

Long before I had money, my passion for cars was there.

Robert Henri

Do not worry about your originality. You could not get rid of it even if you wanted to.

Rick Santelli

At the end of the day, the markets are my passion.

Rick Pitino

When you describe passion at any age, passion is derived from everything, from the people you work with to enjoying the last years.

Rick Santorum

There are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire.

Rick Santorum

The idea is that the state doesn't have rights to limit individuals' wants and passions. I disagree with that.

Rick Santorum

Everybody knows full well my passion about defeating Barack Obama. Over my dead body would I vote for Barack Obama.

Gilbert K. Chesterton

Passion makes every detail important.

John F. Kennedy

But I think the American people expect more from us than cries of indignation and attack. The times are too grave, the challenge too urgent, and the stakes too high to permit the customary passions of political debate. We are not here to curse the darkness, but to light the candle that can guide us through that darkness to a safe and sane future. As Winston Churchill said on taking office some twenty years ago: if we open a quarrel between the present and the past, we shall be in danger of losing the future.

Jonathan Haidt

In accounts of men in battle, there is an incredible adrenaline rush from group-versus-group conflict. The fervor and passion of partisans is clearly rewarding; and if it's rewarding, it involves dopamine; and if it involves dopamine, then it is potentially addictive.

Jonathan Edwards

God’s purpose for my life was that I have a passion for God’s glory and that I have a passion for my joy in that glory, and that these two are one passion.

Joyce Carol Oates

Never be ashamed of your subject, and of your passion for your subject.