Doug Johnson

A few of my favorite quotes

I am a compulsive quote collector. Find below a few of my favorites. If you find a misattribution, let me know, but send me documentation as well. Thanks! This page last updated August 2010.

If you have told a child a thousand times and he still does not understand, then it is not the child who is the slow learner. Lianne M. Hanson

 A fierce unrest seethes at the core, of all existing things:
it was the eager wish to soar, that gave the gods their wings.  Don Marquis

 My education was dismal. I went to a series of schools for mentally disturbed teachers. Woody Allen.

Everyone has a purpose in life. Perhaps yours is watching television.  David Letterman

 Love many, trust a few, and always paddle your own canoe. Bumper Sticker

Children need to hang around a teacher who is asking bigger questions of herself than she is asking of them. Donald Graves

We’re fools whether we dance or not, so we might as well dance.  ~Japanese proverb

And did you get what
you wanted from this life, even so?
I did.
And what did you want?
To call myself beloved, to feel myself
beloved on the earth.                                   —Raymond Carver

If you want an interesting party sometime, combine cocktails and a fresh box of crayons for everyone.  ~Robert Fulghum

I’d rather be partly great than entirely useless.  ~ Neil Shusterman

There’ll be two dates on your tombstone
And all your friends will read ‘em
But all that’s gonna matter
is that little dash between ‘em. ~Kevin Welch

“For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror
which we are barely able to endure, and it amazes us so,
because it serenely disdains to destroy us.
Every angel is terrible.” Rainer Maria Rilke 

Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened. -Dr. Seuss

Same old slippers, Same old rice, Same old glimpse of paradise.  ~ William James Lampton 

Politicians should read science fiction, not westerns and detective stories. - Arthur C Clark

Little drops of water,
      Little grains of sand,
Make the mighty ocean
      And the pleasant land.

Little deeds of kindness,
      Little words of love,
Make our earth an Eden,
      Like the heaven above. “Little Things” Julia A.F. Carney

Don’t worry if your job is small and your rewards are few. Just remember that the mighty oak was once a nut like you. Bullwinkle J. Moose

Facts have a well known liberal bias. Stephen Colbert

The primary purpose of a liberal education is to make one’s mind a pleasant place in which to spend one’s leisure. Sydney J. Harris

You teach kids how to succeed when they successfully foil the educational system. Arlo Guthrie

Know what’s weird? Day by day, nothing seems to change, but pretty soon…everything’s different. – Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes

Ring the bells that still can ring.
Forget your perfect offering.
There’s a crack in everything—
That’s how the light gets in. Leonard Cohen

The ultimate goal of the educational system is to shift to the individual the burden of pursuing his education. ~ John Gardner

The secret to happiness is having low expectations.—Warren Buffett

There are no rules here. We’re trying to accomplish something. Thomas Edison

A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle. - Proverb

Foolish writers and readers are created for each other. Horace Walpole

The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world’s problems. Gandhi

Each time a person stands for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he or she sends forth a tiny ripple of hope. And crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance. Few are willing to embrace the disapproval of their fellows, the censure of their colleagues, the wrath of their society. Moral courage is a rarer commodity than bravery in battle or great intelligence. Yet it is the one essential vital quality for those who seek to change a world that yields most painfully to change. - Robert F. Kennedy

If we teach as we taught yesterday, we rob our children of tomorrow. - John Dewey

Who dares to teach must never cease to learn. –John Cotton Dana

“out beyond ideas of right doing and wrong doing there is a field.  I’ll meet you there.” Rumi

If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.  -Antoine de Saint-Exupery 

When everyone’s out to get you, paranoia’s just good thinking. - Dr. Johnny Fever

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. - Plato

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.” - General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff, U.S. Army

“Thou shalt not” might reach the head, but it takes “Once upon a time” to reach the heart. Philip Pullman

The only consistent feature in all of your dissatisfying relationships is you. - Despair, Inc.

If the unheard-of actions of today’s youth are allowed to continue, then we are doomed. Sumerian tablet

“Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.” Mahatma Gandhi

“If you disaggregate, things fall apart.” - Tony Snow

Dance like it hurts,/ Love like you need money,/ Work when people are watching. - Scott (Dilbert) Adams

If you lose your job, your marriage and your mind in all the same week, try to lose your mind first, because then the other stuff won’t matter that much.” Jack Handy

Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs, but sometimes he feels there really is another way, if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it. - AA Milne

Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837–1909)

When you go for a job interview, I think a good thing to ask is if they ever press charges.” Jack Handy

If we don’t succeed, we run the risk of failure. Dan Quayle

I feel so bad since you’ve gone. It’s almost like having you here. Anon

I was going to buy a copy of The Power of Positive Thinking, and then I thought: What the hell good would that do? Ronnie Shakes

In a fight between you and the world, bet on the world. Kafka

It’s not an optical illusion. It just looks like one. Steven Wright

If it’s true we’re here to help others, what exactly are the others here for? George Carlin

Originality usually only amounts to plagiarizing something unfamiliar. Katherine Gerould

The world bats last. Anon.

…technology is an accelerator of greatness already in place, never the principal cause of greatness or decline. Newsweek, April 29, 2002.

Somebody has to do something, and it’s just incredibly pathetic that is has to be us. Jerry Garcia

Don’t worry about the world coming to an end today. It is already tomorrow in Australia. Charles M. Schulz

If I’m not having fun in class, no one is having fun. - Albert Cullum

What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from. And every phrase
And sentence that is right (where every word is at home,
Taking its place to support the others…)
Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning,
Every poem an epitaph. And any action
Is a step to the block, to the fire, down the sea’s throat
Or to an illegible stone: and that is where we start.

With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this Calling

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

- T.S. Eliot, “The Four Quartets”

If one person tells you that you have ass’s ears, take no notice; should two tell you so, procure a saddle for yourself. Spanish proverb

Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore, we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore, we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, could be accomplished alone; therefore, we must be saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our own standpoint; therefore, we must be saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness. Reinhold Niebuhr

If you want your children to be brilliant, read them fairly tales. If you want them to be geniuses, read them more fairy tales. Albert Einstein

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away. — George Carlin

Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake. Napoleon Bonaparte

Whenever he thought about it, he felt terrible. And so, he made a fateful decision. He decided not to think about it. Life 101

It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer . Albert Einstein

We must be the change we wish to see in the world. Gandhi

The fates guide those who go willingly; those who do not, they drag. Seneca

The final result is that technology aids our thoughts and civilized lives, but it also provides a mind-set that artificially elevates some aspects of life and ignores others, not based upon their real importance but rather by the arbitrary condition of whether they can be measured scientifically and objectively by today’s tools. Consequently, science and technology tend to deal solely with the products of their measurements, they divorce themselves from the real world. The danger is that things that cannot be measured play no role in scientific work and are judged to be of little importance. Science and technology do what they can do and ignore the rest. They are superb at what they do, but what is left out can be of equal or greater importance. Donald A. Norman

Dew knot trussed yore spell chequer two fined awl yore mistakes. Brendan Hill

You are educated when you have the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or self-confidence. Robert Frost

Some luck lies in not getting what you thought you wanted but getting what you have, which once you have got it you may be smart enough to see is what you would have wanted had you known. Keillor.

There’s no such thing as knowledge management; there are only knowledgeable people. Information only becomes knowledge in the hands of someone who knows what to do with it. - Peter Drucker

I’d like to get to a state where people think that if you’ve Googled something, you’ve researched it, and otherwise haven’t, and that’s it. Sergy Brin

Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time tells the story of a cosmologist whose speech is interrupted by a little old lady who informs him that the universe rests on the back of a turtle. Ah, yes, madame, the scientist replies, but what does the turtle rest on? The old lady shoots back: You can’t trick me, young man. It’s nothing but turtles, turtles, turtles, all the way down. George Will

With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine.

Men have become the tools of their tools. -Henry David Thoreau

This is my rule of married life: it’s better to be happy than to be right. -Click & Clack

Lazlo’s Chinese Relativity Axiom: No matter how great your triumphs or how tragic your defeats, approximately one billion Chinese couldn’t care less.

I think, therefore I am paid.

HELP WANTED: Telepath - You know where to apply.

The best defense against logic is ignorance.

The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. -Alvin Toffler

I had been my whole life a bell, and never knew until at that moment I was lifted and stuck… Anne Dillard

The generation of random numbers is too important to be left to chance. -Robert R. Coveyou

Just where are we going and why are we in this handbasket? -Penny Pennington

Nothing important can be taught, only learned. Dale Dauten

Pick battles big enough to matter, small enough to win. Jonathan Kozol

aibohphobia n. The fear of palindromes.

Give me ambiguity or give me something else.

Computers are useless. They can only give you answers. Picasso

How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book. Thoreau

My dog is worried about the economy because Alpo is up to 99 cents a can. That’s almost $7.00 in dog money. Joe Weinstein

Leadership is not magnetic personality— that can just as well be a glib tongue. It is not ‘making friends and influencing people’— that is flattery. Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to higher sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations. öPeter Drucker

There is no such thing as a minor lapse of integrity. -Tom Peters

I’ve learned that the person with big dreams is more powerful than the one with all the facts. -Anonymous, age 51 (quoted in Live & Learn & Pass It On

Teaching a child not to step on a caterpillar is as valuable to the child as it is to the caterpillar. -Bradley Miller

May those that love us, love us; and those that don’t love us, May God turn their hearts; and if He doesn’t turn their hearts, may He turn their ankles so we’ll know them by their limping. - Old Irish Toast

Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws. -Plato

Technology is dominated by those who manage what they do not understand.

The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; and the realist adjusts the sails. -William Arthur Ward

If we’re not supposed to eat animals, how come they’re made out of meat? Bob Pease

The next time you feel the urge to procrastinate… just put it off. Lions Club International

Resentment is just a way of letting someone else use your mind rent-free. Roger Ebert

Everything must degenerate into work if anything is to happen. Peter Drucker

Ex abusu non arguitur in usum. (The abuse of a thing is no argument against its use.)

..people (in Minnesota) avoid stupidity when possible, not wanting to be a $10 haircut on a 50 cent head. - Garrison Keillor

For a list of all the ways technology has failed to improve the quality of life, please press 3. Alice Kahn

A human mind, once stretched to a new idea, never returns to its former dimension. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

The other day, I dropped a piece of bread and it fell butter side up. I was convinced that I’d buttered the wrong side of the bread.

Education is when you read the fine print. Experience is what you get if you don’t. Pete Seeger

You can’t steer a parked car.

I wanted a perfect ending … Now I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. Delicious ambiguity. Gilda Radner

A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep. Saul Bellow

I’m tired of love, I’m still more tired of rhyme, but money gives me pleasure all the time. Hilaire Belloc

Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in their readiness to doubt. H.L. Mencken


The great pleasure of life is doing what people say you cannot do. Walter Bagehot

The right to be left alone is the most comprehensive of rights and the most valued in civilized man. Louis D. Brandeis


The Saturday night special is nature’s way of holding down the population of trash in this country - your adulterous wives, drunken husbands, card cheats and obnoxious citizens in bars. It is a form of natural selection that tends toward the perfection of the breed. Molly Ivins

Teachers open the door. You enter by yourself. Chinese Proverb

I dwell in Possibility,
A fairer house than Prose. Emily Dickinson


The Buddha, the Godhead, resides quite as comfortably in the circuits of a digital computer or the gears of a cycle transmission as he does at the top of a mountain or in the petals of a flower. To think otherwise is to demean the Buddha - which is to demean oneself. Robert Pirsig


The Noah Principal: No more prizes for predicting rain. Prizes only for building arks. Louis Gerstner


The Gods have two ways of dealing harshly with us ö the first is to deny us our dreams, and the second is to grant them. Oscar Wilde


We may destroy all the men in America and we shall still have all we can do to defeat the women. British officer during the American Revolutionary War


Cheer Up! The Worst Is Yet To Come! Phillip C. Johnson


The race will go to the curious, the slightly mad, those with an unsated passion for learning and daredeviltry. Tom Peters


186,000 miles per second. It’s not just a good idea - it’s the law.


Anything that does not kill me, makes me stronger. Nietzche


For when the One Great Scorer comes
To write against your name,
He marks - not what you won or lost -
But how you played the game. Grantland Rice


LOST: Black and white cat. Blind in left eye. Lame. Recently castrated. Answers to the name of Lucky. Roland Dille


As things so very often are
intelligence won’t get you far.
So be glad you’ve got more sense
than you’ve got intelligence. Piet Hein

Experts have
their expert fun
ex cathedra
telling one
just how nothing
can be done. Piet Hein


As yourself whether you are happy, and you will cease to be so. John Stuart Mill


Shake and shake
The catsup bottle,
None will come,
And then a lot’ll. Richard Armour


Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined. Samuel Goldwyn


Every good thought you think is contributing its share to the ultimate result of your life. Grenville Kleiser


In Paris they simply stared when I spoke to them in French; I never did succeed in making those idiots understand their own language. Mark Twain


Do you realize if it weren’t for Edison we’d be watching TV by candlelight? Al Boliska


Hide not your talents,
they for use were made.
What’s a Sun-dial
in the Shade? Benjamin Franklin

Consolation
Losing one glove
is certainly painful,
but nothing
compared to the pain
of losing one,
throwing the other away,
and finding the first one again.

It is possible to own too much. A man with one watch knows what time it is; a man with two watches is never quite sure. Lee Segall

Those who do not study the past are doomed to repeat its errors. Those who do —- will find other ways to err.

The important thing is not to stop questioning. Albert Einstein

The other day I got out my can-opener and was opening a can of worms when I thought, “What am I doing?! Jack Handey

Captain Penny’s Law: You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time, but you can’t fool MOM!,

Be humble for the worst thing in the world is of the same stuff as you; be confident for the stars are of the same stuff as you. Nicholai Velimrovie

Refuse to join the cautious crowd that plays not to lose; play to win. David J. Mahoney

Imagination is more important than knowledge. A. Einstein

You can always tell a real friend: when you’ve made a fool of yourself he doesn’t feel you’ve done a permanent job. Laurence J. Peter

I respect faith but doubt is what gets you an education. Wilson Mizner

If the path be beautiful, let us not ask where it leads. Anatole France

An ass is beautiful to an ass, and a pig is beautiful to a pig. John Ray

Someday I would like to stand on the moon, look down through a quarter million miles of space and say, There certainly is a beautiful earth out tonight. William H. Rankin


All the fun’s in how you say a thing. Robert Frost


The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder. Ralph W. Sockman

The Chinese use two brush strokes to write the word crisis. One brush stroke stands for danger, the other for opportunity. In a crisis, be aware of the danger - but recognize the opportunity. Richard M. Nixon


Is it progress if a cannibal uses a knife and fork? Stanislaw J. Lec


Every snowflake in an avalanche pleads not guilty. Stanislaw J. Lec


There is no accounting for taste, as the woman said when told her son was wanted by the police. Franklin P. Adams


After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music. Aldous Huxley


The best way I know of winning an argument is to start by being in the right. Quentin Hogg, M.P.


Tact: the ability to tell a man he’s open minded when he has a hole in his head. F.G. Kernan


What is not good for the hive is not good for the bee. Marcus Aurelius


There is never time to do it right, but always time to do it over.


Patton’s Law: A good plan to today is better than a perfect plan tomorrow.

Plan, transitive verb: to bother about the best method of accomplishing an accidental result. Ambrose Bierce


In times of change, learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists. Eric Hoffer


We have excellent gifted programs in every school. The problem is that they are for athletes. Marvin Myers


All technology should be assumed guilty until proven innocent. David Brower

… look the spangles
that sleep all the year in a dark box
dreaming of being taken out and allowed to shine,
the balls the chains red and gold the fluffy threads
put up your little arms
and i’ll give them all to you to hold
every finger shall have its ring
and there won’t be a single place dark or unhappy …
e.e. cummings


Never teach a pig to sing. It will frustrate you and annoy the pig. Old Iowa saying,


As you get older, the pickings get slimmer, but the people don’t. Carrie Fisher


The only sure defense in the post-modern world is a bad attitude. Zippy the Pinhead


Whoso would be a man, must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Ralph Waldo Emerson

You can be sincere and still be stupid. Charles F. Kettering

The goal is to teach in such a way as to produce the most learning from the least teaching. – Seymour Papert

Anybody can win, unless there happens to be a second entry. George Ade

Those of you who think you know everything are annoying to those of us who do.

Backward, turn backward, O time, in your flight, And tell me just one thing I studied last night. Hobart Brown

Solitude: a good place to visit, but a poor place to stay. Josh Billings

Easy to use is easy to say. Jeff Garbers

Statistics are no substitute for judgment. – Henry Clay

The person who knows how will always have a job. But the person who knows why will be his boss. – Carl C. Wood

You don’t stop laughing because you grow old; you grow old because you stop laughing. — Anonymous

There is always an easy solution to every problem - neat, plausible, and wrong. H.L. Mencken

Truth is with the victor - who, as you know, controls the historians. Rolf Hochhuth


I’ve met a few people in my time who were enthusiastic about hard work. And it was just my luck that all of them happened to be men I was working for at the time. Bill Gold


Most men, when they think they are thinking, are merely rearranging their predjudices. Knute Rockne


A problem well stated is a problem half solved. Charles F. Kettering


I believe that leadership starts at the bottom, not from the top. Every movement in our history starts from the bottom up. Abolitionism, the Civil War, the civil rights movement, women’s rights, environment, consumerism, antiwar, you name it. They aren’t lead by the one great voice. If we look for the miracle person to solve this, we’re never gonna do it. Hayes Johnson

Tim was so learned, that he could name a horse in nine languages. So ignorant, that he bought a cow to ride on.” — Benjamin Franklin

You do what you do out of your private love of the thing itself. Anne Dillard


Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.

O wud some power the giftie gie us, To see oursel’s as others see us. Robert Burns



Don’t discuss yourself, for you are bound to lose; if you belittle yourself, you are believed; if you praise yourself you are disbelieved. Michel de Montaigne


He that has no fools, knaves, nor beggars in his family was begot by a flash of lightning. Thomas Fuller


Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. Carl Sagan


Hating people is like burning down your own house to get rid of a rat. Harry Emerson Fosdick


The word good has many meanings. For example, if a man were to shoot his grandmother at the range of five hundred yards, I should call him a good shot, but not necessarily a good man. G.K. Chesterton

WETHERN’S LAW OF SUSPENDED JUDGMENT: Assumption is the mother of all screw-ups.

The Rebel
When I
die
I’m sure
I will have a
Big Funeral
Curiosity
seekers
coming to see
if I
am really
Dead
Or just
trying to make
Trouble - Mari Evans


I never resist temptation because I have found that the things that are bad for me do not tempt me. G.B. Shaw


Those who do not know their opponent’s arguments do not completely understand their own.


To use too much Time in Studies is Sloth. Francis Bacon


Discussion is an exchange of knowledge; argument is an exchange of ignorance. Robert Quillan


Potter’s Law: The amount of flack received on any subject is inversely proportional to the subject’s true value.

Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that something inside them was superior to circumstances. Bruce Barton


Shrimpton’s Law of Teenage Opportunity: When opportunity knocks, you’ve got headphones on.


We would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism. Norman Vincent Peale


I was so long writing my review that I never got around to reading the book. Groucho Marx


But who is to guard the guards themselves? Juvenal


Mrs. Weiler’s Law: Anything is edible if it is chopped finely enough.

A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. Oscar Wilde


He is either dead or teaching school. Zenobius

Life is not a spectacle or a feast: it is a predicament. George Santayana

For every evil under the sun,
There is a remedy or there is none.
If there be one, try and find it.
If there be none, never mind it. - Old English rhyme

I often have long conversations all by myself, and am so clever that sometimes I don’t understand a single word I am saying. Oscar Wilde


There are three great questions which in life we have to ask over and over again to answer:
Is it right or wrong?
Is it true or false?
Is it beautiful or ugly?
Our education ought to help us to answer these questions. John Lubbock


Subdue your appetites, my dear, and you’ve conquered human nature. Charles Dickens


The Carpenter is Not the Best Who Makes More Chips than all the Rest. Arthur Guiterman


What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Matthew


Never eat anything in one sitting that you can’t lift. Miss Piggy


In the future no one wins a war. It is true, there are degrees of loss, but no one wins. Brock Chishom


The day when nobody comes back from a war, it will be because the war has at last been properly organized. Boris Vian


A cynic is the man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin. H.L. Menken



Hatred is like fire; it makes even light rubbish deadly. George Eliot


Be yourself is the worst advice you can give to some people. Tom Masson

Shake was a dramatist of note; He lived by writing things to quote. H.C. Brunner

To make headway, improve your head. B.C. Forbes


The desire for safety stands against every great and noble enterprise. Tacitus


A conclusion is the place where you got tired thinking. Martin H. Fischer

The IQ is often less important than the I Will. E Escar

Jones’ Law: The man who can smile when things go wrong has thought of someone to blame it on.

It is not enough to be busy the question is: what are we busy about? Henry David Thoreau

On statistics: Then there was the man who drowned crossing a stream with an average depth of only six inches. W.I.E. Gates


Colors are the deeds and suffering of light. Goethe


If you would thoroughly know anything, teach it to others. Tryon Edwards


Whoever gossips to you will gossip about you. Spanish proverb

My purpose in writing is to entertain myself first and other people secondly. John D. McDonald


Sometimes I sit and think.
And sometimes I just sit.


If people really like to work, we’d still be plowing the land with sticks and transporting goods on out backs. William Feather

There is no place so benighted and godforsaken that some moron won’t go there on vacation. People could be living in an open sewer and swallowing dirt to stop the hunger, and there’d be a couple from Larchmont wearing comfortable shoes there to take pictures of them. Thomas Perry

Every saint has a past and every sinner a future. Oscar Wilde

If at first you don’t succeed you’re running about average. MH Alderson

If your parents didn’t have any children, there’s a good chance that you won’t have any. Clarence Day


It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

How can you come to know yourself? Never by thinking; always by doing. Try to do your duty, and you’ll know right away what you amount to. And what is your duty? Whatever the day calls for. Goethe


Have more than thou showest, Speak less than thou knowest. Shakespeare


Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest. Mark Twain


Let me have my own way exactly in everything, and a sunnier and pleasanter creature does not exist. Thomas Carlyle

We’re all born brave, trusting and greedy, and most of us remain greedy. Mignon McLaughlin

People are divided into two groups - the righteous and the unrighteous - and the righteous do the dividing.


It is better to have loafed and lost than to have never loafed at all. James Thurber

If you scoff at language study … how, save in terms of language, will you scoff? Mario Pei

Diplomacy is the art of saying Nice doggie till you can find a rock. Will Catlin

Our plans miscarry because they have no aim. When a man does not know what harbor he is making for, no wind is the right wind. Seneca

Gross ignorance: 144 times worse than ordinary ignorance. Bennett Cerf

Better a pebble given out of love than a diamond out of duty.

A reformer is a guy who rides through a sewer on a glass bottom boat. Jimmy Walker

There is only one way to have happiness on this terrestrial ball,
And that is to have a clear conscience, or none at all. - Ogden Nash

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity. - Hanlon

If I have been able to see farther than others, it was because I have stood on the shoulders of giants. Sir Isaac Newton

If ambition doesn’t hurt you, you haven’t got it. Kathleen Norris

‘Taint what a man don’t know that hurts him; it’s what he knows that just ain’t so. Kin Hubbard


Newton’s Little Known 7th Law: A bird in the hand is safer than one overhead.

My father worked for the same firm for 12 years. They fired him. They replaced him with a tiny gadget this big. It does everything my father does only better. The depressing thing is my mother ran out and bought one. Woody Allen

I never, ever say I can’t about anything. I might say I don’t have the authority to make that decision or Building A is too heavy for me to lift or I will need training before I pilot that space shuttle. Mike Huber

The MOST PLEASANT and useful persons are those who leave some of the problems of the universe for God to worry about. Don Marquis

Honesty is the best policy, but insanity is a better defense.

We should all be obliged to appear before a board every five years and justify our existence…on pain of liquidation. G.B. Shaw

People do not quit playing because they grow old. They grow old because they quit playing. Oliver Wendell Holmes

I don’t have any solution but I certainly admire the problem. Ashleigh Brilliant

Imagine a school with children that can read or write, but with teachers who cannot, and you have a metaphor of the Information Age in which we live. Peter Cochrane

Mason to Dixon: ‘You gotta draw the line someplace.

The best way to predict the future is to invent it. Alan Kay

And what I discovered in my life is that, if you have a dream, it almost always comes true, but you have to stick to it. You have to believe very deeply in it, and the forces of the universe are helping you. Robert Muller

Go as far as you can see; when you get there you’ll be able to see farther. Thomas Carlyle

A smooth sea never made a skillful sailor.

Kids can do it! Parent’s can do it! Heck, even a typing monkey could do it! With those odds, we’re sure you’ll have absolutely no problems! Sean Carton

I think animal testing is a terrible idea; they get all nervous and give the wrong answers. Fry and Laurie

Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts. Aristotle

It it’s a penny for your thoughts and you put in your two cents worth, then someone, somewhere is making a penny. Stephen Wright

The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat. Lily Tomlin

I was a peripheral visionary. I could see the future, but only way off to the side. Steven Wright

Knock-Please don’t ring doorbell. - Ivan Pavlov,

Try to relax and enjoy the crisis. Ashleigh Brilliant

Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear. Ambrose Redmoon

First Law of Political Campaigns: If there are twelve clowns in a ring, you can jump in the middle and start reciting Shakespeare, but to the audience, you’ll just be the thirteenth clown. Adam Walinsky

Wouldn’t it be nice if the wattage of a car stereo could not exceed the IQ of the driver

I plan to be more assertive - that is, if it’s OK with the group. Bill Chase

Finagle’s Laws of Information:
1. The information you have is not what you want.
2. The information you want is not what you need.
3. The information you need is not what you can obtain.
4. The information you can obtain costs more than you want to pay!


Example is not the main thing in influencing others. It is the only thing. Albert Schweitzer

Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing. Clive James

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. Margaret Mead

Only dead fish go with the flow.

It’s not just the ups and downs that make life difficult; it’s the jerks.

Most of us miss out on life’s big prizes. The Pulitzer. The Nobel. Oscars. Tonys. Emmys. But we’re all eligible for life’s small pleasures. A pat on the back. A kiss behind the ear. A four-pound bass. A full moon. An empty parking space. A crackling fire. A great meal. A glorious sunset. Hot soup. Cold beer. Don’t fret about copping life’s grand awards. Enjoy its tiny delights. There are plenty for all of us. Ken Dye

Arithmetic is being able to count up to twenty without taking off your shoes. Mickey Mouse

Never cut what you can untie. Joseph Joubert

Leadership is getting someone to do what they don’t want to do, to achieve what they want to achieve. Tom Landry

E = MC**2 -Albert Einstein
Very good Albert, but next time show your work! C+,

It has come to our attention that there is a remote tribe that worships the number zero. Is nothing sacred?,

Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself. Mark Twain


The brook would lose its song if you removed the rocks.

Personally I’m always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught. Winston Churchill

Have patience with all things, but first of all with yourself. St. Francis de Sales

The cost of living is high, but it’s worth it. Doug Larson

Itâs not where the puck is that counts. Itâs where the puck will be. Wayne Gretzky

What did the snail say when he rode on the turtle’s back? WHEEEEEEEEEE

Month-End Report: All targets met; All systems working; All customers satisfied; All staff eager and enthusiastic; All pigs fed and ready to fly. V. Arwginski

There are two thoughts that will insure success in all you do:
1. Don’t tell everything you know.

When your mind goes blank, don’t forget to turn off the sound.

How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. Annie Dillard

Youth and skill are no match for experience and treachery.

We live by encouragement and die without it - slowly, sadly, angrily. Celeste Holm

Outside of a dog, a book is a man’s best friend: and inside a dog, it’s too dark to read. Groucho Marx

Life is about making hard judgments and inferences. It’s not about repeating what a teacher told you. Richard Elmore

Every morning I get up and look through the Forbes list of the richest people in America. If I’m not there, I go to work. Robert Orben

Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber. Plato

In a fight between you and the world, bet on the world. Franz Kafka

Progress might have been all right once, but it has gone on too long. Ogden Nash

Faced with the choice between changing one’s mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everybody gets busy on the proof. John Kenneth Galbraith

Things will get better - despite our efforts to improve them. Will Rogers

The pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple. Oscar Wilde

I don’t want any yes-men around me. I want everybody to tell me the truth even if it costs them their job. Samuel Goldwyn

I was going to buy a copy of The Power of Positive Thinking, and then I thought: What the hell good would that do? Ronnie Shakes

Q: What do you call a boomerang that won’t come back?
A: A stick.

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: The Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) has determined that
the maximum safe load on my butt is 2 persons at a time - unless I install handrails or safety straps. As you have arrived 6th in line to ride my ass today, please take a number and wait your turn.

The sweat of hard work is not to be displayed. It is much more graceful to appear favored by the gods. Maxine Hong Kingston

Which is worse - ignorance or apathy? Who knows? Who cares?

Reputation continues to be made by many acts and lost by one.

The issue of the use of technology is 5 percent bits and bytes (a spiffy e-mail system that spans continents), 95 percent psychology and sociology (an organization that dotes on sharing information rather than hoarding it). Tom Peters

A person’s creative ability decreases in direct proportion to the degree to which he takes himself seriously. Eric Hoffer

You will have inservice training on the use of technology every Tuesday and Thursday after school for the rest of your life. Royal Van Horn

No student has the right to interfere with the learning of another student or the purpose of an activity. (The one rule that governs the Glen Urquhart School in Mass.)

We wish to be self-sustained. We do not quite forgive a giver. The hand that feeds us is in some danger of being bitten. R.W. Emerson

If you really do place small value on yourself, rest assured that the world will not raise your price. Anon

The trouble with being punctual is that nobody’s there to appreciate it. Franklin P. Jones

An Edible: Good to eat and wholesome to digest, as a worm to a toad, a toad to a snake, a snake to a pig, a pig to a man, and a man to a worm. A. Bierce

There are two things on earth that are universal: hydrogen and stupidity. Frank Zappa

Love your enemy - it will drive him nuts. Eleanor Doan

How can they say my life isn’t a success? Have I not for more than sixty years got enough to eat and escaped being eaten? Logan Pearsall Smith

When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years. Mark Twain

Hate the sin and love the sinner. Mohandas Gandhi

If you can’t win, make the fellow ahead of you break the record. Anonymous

Anyone who has not begun to think places some portion of the world in jeopardy. John Dewey

He who hates vices hates mankind. Thrasea

Many people’s tombstones should read, Died at 30. Buried at 60. Nicholas Murray Butler

An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes it will also make a better soup. H.L. Menken

Everyone is somebody else’s weirdo. Dykstra

Do not remove a fly from your friend’s forehead with a hatchet. Chinese proverb.

Happiness? That’s nothing more than good health and a poor memory. Albert Schweitzer

My father taught me to work, but not to love it. I never did like work, and I don’t deny it. I’d rather read, tell stories, crack jokes, talk, laugh - anything but work. Abraham Lincoln

The First Law of Money Dynamics: A surprise monetary windfall will be accompanied by an unexpected expense of the same amount.

The truth can be made up if you know how. Jane Wagner

A neurotic is a man who builds a castle in the air.
A psychotic is the man who lives in it.
A psychiatrist is the man who collects the rent. Jerome Lawrence

Talk not of wasted affection! Affection never was wasted. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

If all the year were playing holidays To sport would be as tedious as work. Shakespeare

Work is the refuge of people who have nothing better to do. Oscar Wilde

Never do anything standing that you can do sitting, or anything sitting that you can do lying down. Chinese proverb

This is the first age that’s paid much attention to the future, which is a little ironic since we may not have one. Arthur C. Clarke

Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of science. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Think like a man of action, and act like a man of thought. K. Bergson

They talk most who have the least to say. Matthew Prior

People who take time to be alone usually have depth, originality, and quiet reserve. John Miller

If you want to get rich by writing, write the sort of thing that’s read by people who move their lips when they’re reading to themselves. Don Marquis

My riches consist not in the extent of my possessions but in the fewness of my wants. J. Brotherton

I don’t know what to think until I see what I’ve said. E.M. Forster

To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men — that is genius. R.W. Emerson

It’s fine to believe in ourselves, but we mustn’t be too easily convinced. B. Hillis

Selfishness is that detestable vice no one will forgive in others and no one is without in himself. H. Beecher

Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers. Voltaire

There is a difference between beauty and charm. A beautiful woman is one I notice. A charming woman is one who notices me. John Erskin

It doesn’t matter if you are rich or poor, as long as you’ve got money. Joe E. Lewis

If happiness truly consisted in physical ease and freedom from care, then the happiest individual would not be either a man or a woman; it would be, I think, an American cow. William Lyon Phelps

Problems worthy of attack, prove their worth by hitting back. Piet Hein

On intellect: If your head is wax, don’t walk in the sun. Benjamin Franklin

For every 10 there are 10 1s. Munder

From the errors of others a wise man corrects his own. Publilius Syrus

Virtue has needs of limits. Baron de Montesquieu

A fanatic is one who sticks to his guns whether they’re loaded or not. Franklin P. Jones

I worry no matter how cynical you become, it’s never enough to keep up. Jane Wagner

I’d rather have roses on my table than diamonds on my neck. Emma Goldman

I love being a writer. What I can’t stand is the paperwork. Peter De Vries

No call alligator long mouth until you pass him. Jamaican proverb

A bore is a person who talks when you want him to listen. Ambrose Bierce

A man said to the universe, Sir, I exist. However, replied the universe, that fact has not created in me a sense of obligation. Stephen Crane

All snakes who wish to remain in Ireland will please raise their right hands. Saint Patrick

We must respect the other fellow’s religion, but only in the same sense and to the same extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart. H.L. Menken

You grow up the day you have the first real laugh - at yourself. Ethel Barrymore

All things I really like to do are either immoral, illegal or fattening. Alexander Woollcottt

True success is overcoming the fear of being unsuccessul. Paul Sweney

The man who has ceased to learn ought not be allowed to wander loose in these dangerous days. M.M. Cody

If it ain’t broke, you probably still can fix it. Tim Allen

The whole point of getting things done is knowing what to leave undone. Stella, Lady Reading

You don’t want to be in bed with somebody who says, I’ll race you to sleep. Richard Lewis

We can’t all be heroes because someone has to sit on the curb and clap as they go by. Will Rogers

I HATE PEOPLE WHO ARE INTOLERANT. Laurence J. Peter

A man never so clearly describes his own character as when he describes another’s. J.P. Richter

As soon as you make something idot-proof, along comes another idiot. Graves Law,

Anyone who popular is bound to be disliked. Yogi Berra

It is not best that we should all think alike; it is difference of opinion which makes horse races. Mark Twain

Happiness, n. An agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another. Ambrose Bierce

Edelstein’s Advice: Don’t worry over what other people are thinking about you. They’re too busy worrying over what you are thinking about them.

Procrastination - the art of keeping up with yesterday. Don Marquis

Katz’s Law: People and nations will act rationally when all other possibilities have been exhausted.

Some of the greatest love affairs I’ve known have involved one actor - unassisted. Wilson Mazer

Foreign Aid - taxing the poor people in rich countries for the benefit of rich people in poor countries. Bernard Rosenburg

An incompetent teacher is even worse than an incompetent surgeon because a surgeon can only cut up one person at a time. Ernet Boyer

A converted cannibal is one who on Fridays eats only fishermen. Emily Lotney

I was once thrown out of a mental hospital for depressing the other patients. Oscar Levant

Natalie’s Law of Algebra You never catch on until after the test.

My loathings are simple: stupidity, oppression, crime, cruelty, soft music. Vladimir Nabokov

Finagles 2nd Law: Always keep a record of data - it indicates you’ve been working.

Never get angry. Never make a threat. Reason with people. Don Corleone, The Godfather

If no thought your mind does visit,
make your speech not too explicit. - Piet Hein

When a man points a finger at someone else, he should remember that four of his fingers are pointing at himself. Louis Nizer

Most educators would continue to lecture on navigation while the ship is going down. James H. Boren

Welcome to the New Automated Teacher Mental Health Line
If you are obsessive-compulsive, please press 1 repeatedly.
If you are codependent, please ask someone to press 2.
If you have multiple personalities, please press 3, 4, 5, and 6.
If your are paranoid, we know who you are and what you want. Just stay on the line so we can trace the call.
If your schizophrenic, listen carefully and a little voice will tell you what number to press.
If you are depressed it doesnât matter which number you press. No one will answer.

First Rule of Staff Development: Work with the living.

Millihelen. n. amount of beauty required to launch one ship.

A hypocrite is someone who complain about the sex and violence on his VCR.

SIX PHASES OF A PROJECT
1. Enthusiasm
2. Disillusionment
3. Panic
4. Search for the Guilty
5. Punishment of the Innocent
6. Praise & Honors for the Nonparticipants

Nothing in our culture, not even home computers, is more overrated than the epidermal felicity of two featherless bipeds in desperate congress. Quentin Crisp

It is easier to move a cemetery than to change a curriculum. Woodrow Wilson

The only completely consistent people are the dead. Aldous Huxley

If you want to change the world, you change the world of a child. Pat Schroeder

We shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us. Winston Churchill

Remember:
The value of time.
The success of perseverance.
The pleasure of working.
The dignity of simplicity.
The worth of character.
The power of kindness.
The influence of example.
The obligation of duty.
The wisdom of economy.
The virtue of patience.
The improvement of talent.
The joy of originating. - Marshall Field

Always take a job that is too big for you. Harry Emerson Fosdick

I find television very educating. Everytime someone turns on the set I go into the other room and read a book. Groucho Marx

one nacho underwear, with licorice and jug wine for owls

When I was a kid I said to my father one afternoon, Daddy, will you take me to the zoo? He answered, If the zoo wants you let them come and get you. Jerry Lewis

Always behave like a duck - keep calm and unruffled on the surface but paddle like the devil underneath. Jacob Braude

Life will hand Mary
No harder task
Than to know the right answer
And have no one ask.

A good problem statement often includes: (a) what is known, (b) what is unknown, and (c) what is sought. Edward Hodnett

Bear in mind that children of all ages close their ears to advice and open their eyes to example.

First Law of Debate Never argue with a fool. People may not be able to tell the difference.

Hitch your wagon to a star. R.W. Emerson

The hen is an egg’s way of producing another egg. Samuel Butler

Nothing is really work unless you’d rather be doing something else. James M. Barrie

Be virtuous and you will be eccentric. Mark Twain

The palest ink is better than the best memory. Chinese proverb

Don’t be agnostic - be something. Robert Frost

What is moral is what you feel good after. Ernest Hemingway

Gordon’s 1st Law: If a research project is not worth doing, it is not worth doing well.

The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose. Shakespeare

You can’t write a term paper before breakfast. Charles Schultz

We know what we are, but not what we may be. Shakespeare

Schick’s Law: There is no problem a good miracle can’t solve.

Express a mean opinion of yourself occasionally; it will show your friends that you know how to tell the truth. Ed Howe

I’m a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it. Thomas Jefferson

There’s no trick in being a humorist when you have the whole government working for you. Will Rogers

Zoo: an excellent place to study the habits of human beings. Evan Esar

I know why God made babies cute…so we won’t kill ‘em. Gallagher

It’s a small world, but I wouldn’t want to paint it. Steven Wright

We’re all special cases. Albert Camus

Anything that can go wrong will go wrong faster with computers.

A manager is a person who thinks that nine women can produce a child in one month.

If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always gotten.

What we have here is an insurmountable opportunity. Yogi Berra

Learning is as natural a human passion as sex. Lewis J. Perelman

True charity is not a measure of how much one gives, but of how much one has left.

Happy people evaluate themselves; unhappy people evaluate others. Wm Glasser

IBM Pollyana Principle:
Machines should work;
people should think.

One of the greatest labor-saving devices of today is tomorrow. Vincent T. Foss

If at first you don’t succeed, think how many people you’ve made happy. H. Duane Black

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Back stabbing colleagues, demanding superiors, impossible deadlines. It’s a wonder anyone makes it through first grade. Ashland Oil Ad,

We make the easy impossible.

It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare. Mark Twain

More than anytime in history mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction. Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly. Woody Allen

People find life entirely too time-consuming. Stanislaw J. Lec 

I find that a great part of the information I have was acquired by looking up something and finding something else on the way. Franklin P. Adams 

We are generally the better persuaded by the reasons we discover ourselves than by those given to us by others. Blaise Pascal 

Human salvation lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted. Martin Luther King Jr.

To punish me for my contempt for authority, fate made me an authority myself. Albert Einstein

You do what you think is right and let the law catch up. Thurgood Marshall

If you are seeking creative ideas, go out walking. Angels whisper to a man when he goes for a walk. ~Raymond Inmon

My grandmother started walking five miles a day when she was sixty. She’s ninety-seven now, and we don’t know where the heck she is. ~ Ellen DeGeneres

A vigorous five-mile walk will do more good for an unhappy but otherwise healthy adult than all the medicine and psychology in the world. ~Paul Dudley White