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Quote by John Dos Passos

“That's the great danger of sectarian opinions, they always accept the formulas of past events as useful for the measurement of future events and they never are, if you have high standards of accuracy.”

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John Dos Passos

John Dos Passos was an American novelist born on January 14, 1896, and died on September 28, 1970. His works are known for their unique narrative style and profound insights into the realities of American society. more

“We're headed for collapse, if you want my opinion, Missy. I can see it in the fallin' off of the quality of vagrants. There was atime you could find real good company in almost any jungle you'd pick, men who could talk, men who'd read a book now and then; and now, what do you find, a lot of dirty little guttersnipes no decent tramp would want to associate with. Well, it's been that way all through history.”

Source: Three Plays: The Garbage Man, Airways, Inc., Fortune Heights

“Talk is a pure art. Its only limits are the patience of listeners who, when they get tired, can always pay for their coffee or change it with a friendly waiter and walk out.”

Art Walks Pay Talking Pure Conversation Limits Tired Coffee Friendly Listeners Waiter

Author:John Dos Passos

“When the typewriter stops in a New York office everybody's embarrassed; men start to quarrel or to make love to the stenographer or drop lighted cigarettes in the wastebasket.”

Men New York Office Cigarette Making Love Embarrassed Quarrels Typewriters

Book:Travel books and other writings, 1916-1941

Source: Travel books and other writings, 1916-1941

“I think we are all of us a pretty milky lot, without tea-table convictions and our radicalism that keeps so consistently within the bounds of decorum . . . .I'd like to annihilate these stupid colleges of ours . . . instillers of stodginess.”

Thinking Stupid College Tables Bounds Conviction Tea Consistently Radicalism Decorum

Author:John Dos Passos

“It was the ponderous battering ram of his novels that opened the way through the genteel reticences of American nineteenth-century fiction. . . Without [Theodore] Dreiser's treading out a path for naturalism none of us would have had a chance to publish.”

Way Chance Fiction Novel Path Century Publish Nineteenth Century Naturalism Rams Treading Theodore Reticence Battering

Book:The Best Times: An Informal Memoir

Source: The Best Times: An Informal Memoir

“Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today -- for tomorrow's gonna be bad enough as it is.”

Enough Today Can Do Tomorrow

Author:George Gobel

“Out of all those centuries the Greeks can count seven sages at the most, and if anyone looks at them more closely I swear he'll not find so much as a half-wise man or even a third of a wise man among them.”

Ifs Men Looks Half Wise Century Thirds Seven Greek Swear Sage

Book:Literary and Educational Writings: Panegyricus and Philippum Austriaeducem. Moriae encomium. Dialogus Julius exclusus e coelis. Institutio principis christiani. Querela pacis

Source: Literary and Educational Writings: Panegyricus and Philippum Austriaeducem. Moriae encomium. Dialogus Julius exclusus e coelis. Institutio principis christiani. Querela pacis

“Human affairs are so obscure and various that nothing can be clearly known. This was the sound conclusion of the Academic sceptics, who were the least surly of philosophers.”

Humans Sound Known Affair Philosopher Various Conclusion Uncertainty Academic Skepticism Obscure Sceptic Surly

Author:Desiderius Erasmus

“Read first the best books. The important thing for you is not how much you know, but the quality of what you know.”

Knows Firsts Important Book Quality Important Things

Author:Desiderius Erasmus

“The wedlocks of minds will be greater than that of bodies.”

Mind Body Greater Wedlock

Author:Desiderius Erasmus

Quote by John Dos Passos

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