B Quotes
Browse famous quotes beginning with B. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.
“But what the long walk had not done was reveal the cause of the inherent distaste that had sprung out of nowhere overtaking her there under the tree. On the cold, damp grass, or up against the rough tree trunk. He had done it many times without a second thought, and in more challenging situations. It would have been nothing at all to wrap her long legs around his waist, brace one hand against the tree trunk, hold her tight with his other arm, and give the lady exactly what she wanted.
But for some reason he had not been able to do it. For the first time in his life, his body had been willing but his mind had not. Labeling the experience unpleasant would be a severe understatement.”
Source: Her Ladyship's Companion
“But what the working-class can do, when once they grow into a solidified organization, is to show the possessing class, through a sudden cessation of all work, that the whole social structure rests on them; that the possessions of the others are absolutely worthless to them without the workers' activity; that such protests, such strikes, are inherent in the system of property and will continually recur until the whole thing is abolished - and having shown that effectively, proceed to expropriate.”
“But what then? What had he really gained by all this trouble? What had he brought back from this long and weary journey? Nothing, you say? Perhaps so; nothing but a charming woman, who, strange as it may appear, made him the happiest of men! Truly, would you not for less than that make the tour around the world?”
Source: Delphi Complete Works of Jules Verne (Illustrated)
“But what truly horsey girls discover in the end is that boyfriends, husbands, children, and careers are the substitute-for horses”
Source: A Year at the Races: Reflections on Horses, Humans, Love, Money and Luck
“But what use is the unicorn to you if your intellect doesn't believe in it?”
“But what virtue I do have is in me and of me. Men deny the good that comes from themselves, calling it God. So do they with their won evil, calling it the Devil.”
“But what was a body? Dust, dung, urine, itches. It was the light within which was important, and it was not significant if that light endured after death, or if the soul was blinded eternally in the endless night of the suspired flesh.”
Source: Great Lion of God: A Novel About Saint Paul
“But what was a scar, really? Neither evidence of defeat, nor a medal of triumph. A scar was nothing more than a mark to show that a warrior faced his enemies at all times, never once showing his back.”
Source: Butcher's Nails
“But what was a starry sky for a child who wasn’t even capable of imagining that a ceiling might not be above his head?”
Source: Metro 2033
“But what was fortune? She had come to believe it was being exactly the same on the inside as on the outside. What was misfortune but the quality of existing as something, or someone else, inside?”
Source: Do Not Say We Have Nothing
“But what was I but a scared child lost in a strange world? How could I replace all that been lost? Where was my place in the world?”
Source: Stargazer
“But what was interesting about what the Who did is that we took things which were happening in the pop genre and represent them to people so that they see them in a new way. I think the best example is Andy Warhol's work, the image of Marilyn Monroe or the Campbell's soup can.”
“But what was it Haymitch said when I asked if he had told Peeta the situation? That he had to pretend to be desperately in love? “Don’t have to. He’s already there.”
Source: The Hunger Games
“But what was lacking, what was different, I asked myself, listening to the talk? And to answer that question I had to think myself out of the room, back into the past, before the war indeed, and to set before my eyes the model of another luncheon party held in rooms not very far distant from these; but different. Everything was different. Meanwhile the talk went on among the guests, who were many and young, some of this sex, some of that; it went on swimmingly, it went on agreeably, freely, amusingly. And as it went on I set it against the background of that other talk, and as I matched the two together I had no doubt that one was the descendant, the legitimate heir of the other. Nothing was changed; nothing was different save only - here I listened with all my ears not entirely to what was being said, but to the murmur or current behind it. Yes - that was it - the change was there. Before the war at a luncheon party like this people would have said precisely the same things but they would have sounded different, because in those days they were accompanied by a sort of humming noise, not articulate, but musical, exciting, which changed the value of the words themselves. Could one set that humming noise to words? Perhaps with the help of the poets one could. ...
The very reason why the poetry excites one to such abandonment, such rapture, is that it celebrates some feeling that one used to have (at luncheon parties before the war perhaps), so that one responds easily, familiarly, without having to check the feeling, or to compare it with any that one has now.”
Source: A Room of One’s Own
“But what was most remarkable, Broadway being three miles long, and the booths lining each side of it, in every booth there was a roast pig, large or small, as the centre attraction. Six miles of roast pig! And that in New York City alone; and roast pig in every other city, town, hamlet, and village in the Union. What association can there be between roast pig and independence?”
Source: A Diary in America
“But what was my motivation was music, and the fact that I love to move around. I'm always moving around.”
“But what was possible or practical had been replaced by a far baser impulse. Hope.”
“But what was the point of living so quietly you made no noise at all?”
“But what was there to say? Only that there were tears. Only that Quietness and Emptiness fitted together like stacked spoons. Only that there was a snuffling in the hollows at the base of a lovely throat. Only that a hard honey-colored shoulder had a semicircle of teethmarks on it. Only that they held each other close, long after it was over. Only that what they shared that night was not happiness, but hideous grief. Only that once again they broke the Love Laws. That lay down who should be loved. And how. And how much.”
“But what we all have to learn is that we can't do everything ourselves.”
“But what we are given is taken as well, so that we know God's glory comes to us from His will alone.”
Source: The Dovekeepers: A Novel
“But what we call our despair is often only the painful eagerness of unfed hope.”
Source: Delphi Complete Works of George Eliot (Illustrated)
“But what we found in the study is that churches are ten times less diverse than the neighborhoods they sit in. So there's something more going on than just reflecting the neighborhood, yeah.”
“But what we know, we who are either observers of a business we once were in and loved, or are people within it now, our business as a whole, when it is not obsessed with the business of business, is eaten up with a form of cultural conservatism which is truly amazing. Indeed, more often than not it is eaten up with pure reactionary-ism.”
“But what we need are readers. Right? Where would writers be without readers? Who are they going to write for? And actors, what are they without an audience? Actors, painters, dancers, comedians, even just ordinary people doing ordinary things, what are they without an audience of some sort? See, that's what I do. I am the audience. I am the witness. I am the great appreciator, that's what I do and that's all I want to do. I worked for a lot of years. I did a lot of things for a lot of years. Now, well, here I am. I don't feel useless. I feel lucky.”
Source: The Story of Arthur Truluv
“But what we strive to gratify, though we may call it a distant hope, is an immediate desire; the future estate for which men drudge up city alleys exists already in their imagination and love.”
Source: Four Novels of George Eliot
“But what we're really trapped by is perceptions. You think you need to lose weight for someone to love you. I think if I gain weight, no one will love me. What we really need is to just stop thinking of ourselves as bodies and start thinking of ourselves as people.”
Source: Good in Bed
“But what Web services suggest is that the connection is always there between an application that is resident somewhere in the cloud, and a user who is somewhere on the other end of a connection.”
“But what when there [is] not enough? Then force entered in; might making right; power, and it’s tool, violence, and its most devoted ally, the averted eye.”
Source: The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia
“But what will happen even if we do burn down the Jews synagogues and forbid them publicly to praise God, to pray, to teach, to utter God's name? They will still keep doing it in secret. If we know that they are doing this in secret, it is the same as if they were doing it publicly. for our knowledge of their secret doings and our toleration of them implies that they are not secret after all and thus our conscience is encumbered with it before God.”
Source: On the Jews & Their Lies
“But what will he do when he sees only too clearly why his patient is ill; when he sees that it arises from his having no love, but only sexuality; no faith, because he is afraid to grope in the dark; no hope, because he is disillusioned by the world and by life; and no understanding, because he has failed to read the meaning of his own existence?”
Source: Modern Man in Search of a Soul
“But what words exactly did he use? People who aren't writers never describe things exactly.”
Source: The Black Prince
“But what world says that [I'm wicked]? It can only be the next world. This world and I are on excellent terms.”
“But what would have been the good?" Aslan said nothing. "You mean," said Lucy rather faintly, "that it would have turned out all right – somehow? But how? Please, Aslan! Am I not to know?" "To know what would have happened, child?" said Aslan. "No. Nobody is ever told that." "Oh dear," said Lucy. "But anyone can find out what will happen," said Aslan. "If you go back to the others now, and wake them up; and tell them you have seen me again; and that you must all get up at once and follow me – what will happen? There is only one way of finding out.”
Source: The Chronicles of Narnia Vol II: Prince Caspian
“But what would interest you about the brook,
It's always cold in summer, warm in winter.”
Source: Delphi Works of Robert Frost (Illustrated)
“But what would that be like
feeling the tide rise
out of the numbness inside”
“But what would they have said to their Liaison? It’s like this, Meg. We didn’t like that Asia Crane, so we ate her.
When dealing with humans, honesty isn’t always the best policy, Vlad thought”
Source: Written in Red
“But what you could perhaps do with in these days is a word of most sincere sympathy. Your movement is carried internally by so strong a truth and necessity that victory in one form or another cannot elude you for long.”
“But what you need to understand, my darling," she whispers, "is that this little taste your daughter has had is a taste of what could be. She’s swallowed it. It’s inside her now.”
Source: The Rehearsal
“But what you’re calling poetry is what everything is. It’s not even poetry — it’s seeing. These materialists are blind. You told me they say space is infinite. Where do they see that in space?”
And I, disconcerted: “But don’t you think of space as infinite? Can’t you conceive of space as infinite?”
“I don’t conceive of anything as being infinite. How could I conceive of anything as being infinite?”
“But, man,” I said, “Imagine space. Beyond that space is more space, and beyond that more, and then more, and more... It never ends...“
“Why?” asked my master Caeiro.”
“But what you realise after you've been in the business for a while is that people develop opinions about you that don't have anything to do with your music, they like or dislike you for a million reasons, they like or dislike you for your last record.”
“But what you seek is how wars are won. Through cunning and precise actions before a single piece of armor is pierced on the battlefield. It is no less harsh, but it is not brutal. What is, is the morality of fools. The choice to make war instead of going after only those who have made the decisions that created the conflict. That is brutality.”
Source: Born of Blood and Ash
“But what's a writer for? The whole point is to put yourself into other lives, other heads-writers have always done that. If you screw up, so someone will tell you, that's all.”
“But what's interesting is now - and not only in horror, but across the board - the studios basically only make B pictures with A budgets. That's the biggest difference.”
“But what's real? You can't find the truth. You just pick the lie you like best. As long as you know that everything's a lie, you can't hurt yourself.”
“But what's regret anyway? Regret, I am learning these days, is a lot of things. But mostly, it's a slippery seed of longing, of looking back and asking yourself why you didn't know better when the answers were so obvious all along.”
“But what's so blessed-fair that fears no blot? Thou mayst be false, and yet I know it not.”
Source: Arden Shakespeare Complete Works
“But what's so great about being a perfectionist?... You do all this work, and then the stuff you've made just pisses you off.”
“But what's the good of freedom? What can you do with it? What one wants is to live well and have a beautiful house and be respected by people.”
Source: Three Soldiers
“But what's true about comedians is that we've all got a huge hole in our personality. In a room of 3,000 people, we're the one person facing in the opposite direction - yet we have this overwhelming desire to be liked.”