W Quotes
Browse famous quotes beginning with W. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.
“We think of agents, traffickers and facilitators as the worst abusers of refugees, but when they set out to extort from their clients, when they cheat them or dispatch them to their deaths, they are only enacting an entrepreneurial version of the disdain which refugees suffer at the hands of far more powerful enemies – those who terrorise them and those who are determined to keep them at arm’s length. Human traffickers are simply vectors of the contempt which exists at the two poles of the asylum seeker’s journey; they take their cue from the attitudes of warlords and dictators, on the one hand, and, on the other, of wealthy states whose citizens have learned to think of generosity as a vice.
[from the London Review of Books Vol. 22 No. 3 · 3 February 2000]”
“We think of bulimia and anorexia as either a bizarre psychosis, or as a quirky little habit, a phase, or as a thing that women just do. We forget that it is a violent act, that it bespeaks a profound level of anger toward and fear of the self.”
“We think of cannabis as a drug, in accordance with international opinions. This means that even consuming small amounts can lead to very severe dependence. With alcohol or cigarettes however, sensibly limited consumption does not bear the risk of immediate addictiveness as this is the case with cannabis according to our opinion. With alcohol there surely is an element of a tradition. However, enjoyed in moderation, as supplement to a meal for example, alcohol is not something that causes immediate dependence. Still, there is a great need for prevention and information in this matter.”
“We think of color as a thing that we’re receiving. And if you go into one of the Skyspaces, you can see that it’s possible to change the color of the sky. Now, I obviously don’t change the color of the sky, but I changed the context of vision.”
“We think of communication as words. But a screaming child is trying to say something. A tantrum carries a message. Hitting is communication. Sleep patterns carry a message. Even the sulky belligerence of a teen is an attempt to convey a message. Everything the child does says something to the person who is willing to take the time to listen carefully.”
“We think of Craigslist as a form of Social Media.We provide a simple service that is mostly free and we leave money in the community, instead of taking it away. Shared values, nothing fancy, treating people like we want to be treated. What works on the net works for people in general. The net has very little to do with technology, what matters is how people use the technology.”
“We think of English as a fortress to be defended, but a better analogy is to think of English as a child. We love and nurture it into being, and once it gains gross motor skills, it starts going exactly where we don't want it to go: it heads right for the goddamned electrical sockets. We dress it in fancy clothes and tell it to behave, and it comes home with its underwear on its head and wearing someone else's socks. As English grows, it lives its own life, and this is right and healthy. Sometimes English does exactly what we think it should; sometimes it goes places we don't like and thrives there in spite of all our worrying. We can tell it to clean itself up and act more like Latin; we can throw tantrums and start learning French instead. But we will never really be the boss of it. And that's why it flourishes.”
Source: Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries
“We think of Euclid as of fine ice; we admire Newton as we admire the peak of Teneriffe. Even the intensest labors, the most remote triumphs of the abstract intellect, seem to carry us into a region different from our own-to be in a terra incognita of pure reasoning, to cast a chill on human glory.”
Source: Literary studies ; Religious and metaphysical essays ; Letters on the French coup d'état
“We think of faith as a source of comfort and understanding but find our expressions of faith sowing division; we believe ourselves to be a tolerant people even as racial, religious, and cultural tensions roil the landscape. And instead of resolving these tensions or mediating these conflicts, our politics fans them, exploits them,and drives us further apart.”
Source: The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream
“We think of first love as sweet and valuable, a blessed if hazardous condition.”
“We think of God as too much like what we are. Learn to acknowledge the full majesty of your incomparable God and Savior.”
Source: Knowing God Devotional Journal: A One-Year Guide
“We think of happiness as something we can take. But usually it comes from being content with what we have, and accepting ourselves.”
“We think of history as another specialization, like philosophy of language, rather than as something that informs everything we do and think.”
“We think of immigration as a Western issue but, of course, it isn't.”
“We think of it as a sort of traffic accident of the heart. It is an emotion that scares us more than cruelty, more than violence, more than hatred. We allow ourselves to be foiled by the vagueness of the word. After all, love requires the utmost vulnerability. We equip someone with freshly sharpened knives; strip naked; then invite him to stand close. What could be scarier?”
Source: A Natural History of Love: Author of the National Bestseller A Natural History of the Senses
“We think of it as art meets life, Bunny. We’re putting art into the world.”
Source: Bunny
“We think of justice sometimes as getting what you deserve, you know - what crime was committed and what is the punishment for that crime. That's how a lot of the criminal justice works. But God's justice is restorative, so it's not as interested in those same questions of "What did they do wrong?" and "What is the punishment for that?" It's more about what harm was done and how do we heal that harm, and that's a much more redemptive version. So, it definitely doesn't turn a blind eye to harm, but it does say we want to heal the wounds of that.”
“We think of Marilyn who was every man's love affair with America. Marilyn Monroe who was blonde and beautiful and had a sweet little rinky-dink of a voice and all the cleanliness of all the clean American backyards.”
“We think of mortality so little these days... I thought of the stern Victorian determination to keep death in mind, the uncompromising tombstones. Remember, pilgrim, as you pass by, As you are now so once was I: As I am so will you be.”
“We think of music as this substance that flows - you turn on the tap, and there it is, streaming off your computer - but that's not how we evolved as a species. We evolved to listen to each other, and the reason we're able to listen to music in the terms is talking about is because we're really good at listening to each other. But this kind of technology has allowed us to forget that music is the sound of each other.”
“We think of our emotions as being the result of something happening to us, but happiness is a choice.”
Source: Folly Cove
“We think of our eyes as video cameras and our brains as blank tapes to be filled with sensory inputs.”
“We think of our land and water and human resources not as static and sterile possessions but as life giving assets to be directed by wise provisions for future days.”
“We think of photography as pictures. And it is. But I think of photography as ideas. And do the pictures sustain your ideas or are they just good pictures? I want to have an experience in the world that is a deepening experience, that makes me feel alive and awake and conscious.”
“We think of politics in terms of power and who has the power. Politics is the end to which that power is put.”
“We think of poverty as a condition simply meaning a lack of funds, no money, but when one sees fifth, sixth, and seventh generation poor, it is clear that poverty is as complicated as high finance.”
Source: A Hero Ain't Nothin But a Sandwich
“We think of prayer as a preparation for work, or a calm after having done work, whereas prayer is the essential work.”
Source: The Quotable Oswald Chambers
“We think of prices as simply the notation of how much we must pay for things. But the price system accomplishes far more than that. Hundreds of millions of people buying and selling, and abstaining from buying and selling, generate a system of signals - prices to producers and consumers about relative scarcities and demand. Through this system, consumers can convey to producers their subjective priorities and entrepreneurs can invest accordingly.”
“We think of religion as the symbolic expression of our highest moral ideals; we think of magic as a crude aggregate of superstitions. Religious belief seems to become mere superstitious credulity if we admit any relationship with magic. On the other hand our anthropological and ethnographical material makes it extremely difficult to separate the two fields.”
Source: An essay on man: an introduction to a philosophy of human culture
“We think of remembering as retrieval, but in fact it is an act of creation. Our memories grow and change as we do.”
Source: Red Memory: The Afterlives of China's Cultural Revolution
“We think of Shots Fired as almost an autopsy of Ferguson that shows the events from every street in the house. And, in dealing with these two murders of a black victim and a white victim, we show the ways that communities and the media deal with victims differently based on race.”
“We think of Starbucks not as a coffee company but a media company.”
“We think of strangers as stronger and better than we are.”
Source: East of Eden
“We think of technological change as the fancy, new, expensive stuff. But the real change comes from last-decade stuff getting cheaper and faster.”
“We think of the Christian life as a ‘changed life’ but it is not that. What God offers us is an ‘exchanged life,’ a ‘substituted life,’ and Christ is our Substitute within.”
Source: The Normal Christian Life
“We think of the noble object for which the professor appears tonight, we may be assured that the Lord will forgive any one who will laugh at the professor.”
Source: My Discovery of England
“We think of the number "five" as applying to appropriate groups of any entities whatsoever - to five fishes, five children, five apples, five days... We are merely thinking of those relationships between those two groups which are entirely independent of the individual essences of any of the members of either group. This is a very remarkable feat of abstraction; and it must have taken ages for the human race to rise to it”
“We think of the romance novel as a lesser form of literature, but I don't think that's true. Love is a very important aspect of human life and worth exploring.”
“We think of violence as being conflict and fighting and wars and so forth, but the most ongoing horrific measure of violence is in the horrible poverty of the Third World... and the poverty in the United States as well. We have our own Third World here. And we have to first become aware of that and how to help and solve that.”
“We think of women at every age: while still children, we fondle with a naïve sensuality the breasts of those grown-up girls kissing us and cuddling us in their arms; at the age of ten, we dream of love; at fifteen, love comes along; at sixty, it is still with us, and if dead men in their tombs have any thought in their heads, it is how to make their way underground to the nearby grave, lift the shroud of the dear departed women, and mingle with her in her sleep”
Source: November: Fragments in a Nondescript Style
“We think- oh, we will never forget these northern lights, but we do. What we remember is only the curling picture in the left-hand drawer (Presque Isle, Maine, 1934) or a gorgeous half-page photo in an old travel magazine, but what we saw when we held hands, lifting our chins to the sky as if we could leap into the jagged, jeweled brilliance above us, was seen for ten seconds only, and never again.”
Source: White Houses
“We think only through the medium of words. Languages are true analytical methods. Algebra, which is adapted to its purpose in every species of expression, in the most simple, most exact, and best manner possible, is at the same time a language and an analytical method. The art of reasoning is nothing more than a language well arranged.”
“We think our fathers fools, so wise we grow. Our wiser sons, no doubt will think us so.”
Source: The works of Alexander Pope. With notes by dr. Warburton
“We think our hearts break only from endings - the love gone, the rooms empty, the future unhappening as we stand ready to step into it - but what about how they can shatter in the face of what is possible.”
Source: Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations
“We think our PS3 game is better than their Xbox game.”
“We think our world into being.”
Source: Painted Oxen
“We think ourselves possessed, or, at least, we boast that we are so, of liberty of conscience on all subjects, and of the right of free inquiry and private judgment in all cases, and yet how far are we from these exalted privileges in fact!”
Source: The Adams-Jefferson Letters: The Complete Correspondence Between Thomas Jefferson & Abigail & John Adams
“We think passengers who forget to print their boarding passes should pay €60 for being so stupid.”
“We think people can spend 35–40 years working and saving, then stop working and go on for another 20–30–40 years at the same comfort level – but with a growing percentage of retirees and a shrinking number of workers paying into the system. I’m sorry, but that’s magical thinking.”
“We think people who make a lot of income and have a lot of net-worth are pretty well served.”