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Common Quotes

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Common Quotes

“Sincere thought, real free thought, ready, in the name of superhuman authority or of humble common sense, to question the basis of what is officially taught and generally accepted, is less and less likely to thrive. It is, we repeat, by far easier to enslave a literate people than an illiterate one, strange as this may seem at first sight. And the enslavement is more likely to be lasting.”

PeopleFirstsMayRealSeemsNamesCommonTaughtStrangeReadyEasierAuthoritySightBasesHumbleAcceptedCommon SenseRepeatsThriveLastingSincereIlliterateEnslavementSuperhumanFree Thought
Book:The Lightning and the Sun
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“Spring comes with joyous laugh, and song, and sunshine, and the burnt sacrifice of the over-ripe boot and the hoary overshoe. The cowboy and the new milch cow carol their roundelay. So does the veteran hen. The common egg of commerce begins to come forth into the market at a price where it can be secured with a step-ladder, and all nature seems tickled.”

DoeSeemsSongCommonStepsLaughingSacrificeSpringSunshineEggsCowsBootsCommerceCowboyVeteranLaddersJoyousRipeSecuredCarolsHens
Author:Edgar Wilson Nye
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“It seems that the ancient Medicine Men understood that listening to another's story somehow gives us the strength of example to carry on, as well as showing us aspects of ourselves we can't easily see. For listening to the stories of others - not to their precautions or personal commandments - is a kind of water that breaks the fever of our isolation. If we listen closely enough, we are soothed into remembering our common name.”

IfsMenGivingWellsKindEnoughStoriesSeemsRememberNamesWaterCommonBreakExampleListeningUnderstoodAspectMedicineAncientIsolationCommandmentsFeverPrecaution
Author:Mark Nepo
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“A common obstruction to a vital intimate relationship is what I call the assumption of clairvoyance. You imagine, perhaps unconsciously, that your partner or friend is somehow magically psychic when it comes to you -\-\ so much so that he or she should unfailingly intuit exactly what you need, even if you don't ask for it. This fantasy may seem romantic, but it can undermine the most promising alliances. To counteract any tendencies you might have to indulge in the assumption of clairvoyance, practice stating your desires aloud.”

IfsNeedsShouldMaySeemsMightDesireAsksCommonPracticeFantasyImaginePartnersTendenciesIntimateAssumptionPsychicsIndulgeAlliancesIndulge InObstructionIntimate RelationshipsClairvoyance
Author:Rob Brezsny
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“Among the words that can be all things to all men, the word "race" has a fair claim to being the most common, most ambiguous and most explosive. No one today would deny that it is one of the great catchwords about which ink and blood are spilled in reckless quantities. Yet no agreement seems to exist about what race means.”

MenMeanSeemsTodayCommonRaceBloodFairsAll ThingsClaimsDenyAgreementQuantityInkRecklessAmbiguousExplosives
Book:Race: a study in superstition
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“Now, the big box office successes are superhero stories. It seems there's a lowest common denominator mentality, in terms of movies that are almost purely visual, that anyone can understand anywhere in the world. Good robot, bad robot: they fight. You don't need to know anything apart from that. And then we can make toys that look like that robot - and sell those toys or video games.”

KnowsWorldNeedsLooksStoriesBigsSeemsFightingGamesTermCommonOfficeSellsBoxesVideoVisualsMentalityToysLowestRobotsSuperheroBox OfficeCommon DenominatorLowest Common DenominatorBox Office Success
Author:Terence Winter
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“What has God given you? Moses had a stick, David had a slingshot, and Paul had a pen. Mother Teresa possessed a love for the poor; Billy Graham, a gift for preaching; and Joni Eareckson Tada, a disability. What did they have in common? A willingness to let God use whatever they had, even when it didn't seem very useful. If you will assess what you have to offer in terms of your time, your treasure, and your talents, you will have a better understanding of how you might uniquely serve.”

IfsUseSeemsMightMotherGivenUnderstandingTermPoorCommonTalentOffersLetting GoSticksTreasureWillingnessPensDisabilityPossessedPreachingMosesTeresaSlingshots
Book:The Hole in Our Gospel: What does God expect of Us? The Answer that Changed my Life and Might Just Change the World
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“Intriguingly, in poll after poll, when Americans are asked what public institutions they most respect, three bodies are always at the top of their list: the Supreme Court, the armed forces, and the Federal Reserve System. All three have one thing in common: they are insulated from the public pressures and operate undemocratically. It would seem that Americans admire these institutions, precisely because they lead rather than follow.”

BodySeemsThreeForceCommonOne ThingPressureInstitutionsCourtListsSupremeAdmireReservesSupreme CourtPollsFederal ReserveArmed Forces
Author:Fareed Zakaria
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“There is an inconvenience which attends all abstruse reasoning. that it may silence, without convincing an antagonist, and requires the same intense study to make us sensible of its force, that was at first requisite for its invention. When we leave our closet, and engage in the common affairs of life, its conclusions seem to vanish, like the phantoms of the night on the appearance of the morning; and 'tis difficult for us to retain even that conviction, which we had attain'd with difficulty.”

FirstsMaySeemsNightForceDifficultCommonSilenceMorningStudyDifficultyAffairConvictionAppearanceInventionIntenseConclusionReasoningSensibleClosetsConvincingPhantomsInconvenienceAntagonist
Book:A Treatise of Human Nature: Top Philosophy Collections
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“Nothing in finance is more fatuous and harmful, in our opinion, than the firmly established attitude of common stock investors regarding questions of corporate management. That attitude is summed up in the phrase: "If you don't like the management, sell your stock." ... The public owners seem to have abdicated all claim to control over the paid superintendents of their property.”

IfsSeemsCommonAttitudeOpinionClaimsPaidManagementSellsPropertyFinanceCorporatePhrasesOwnersInvestorsSuperintendents
Author:Benjamin Graham
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“Many writers-in-waiting spend a lot of time avoiding the work at hand. The most common way to avoid writing is by procrastination. This is the writer's greatest enemy. There is little to say about it except that once you decide to write every day, you must make yourself sit at the desk or table for the required period whether or not you are putting down words. Make yourself take the time even if the hours seem fruitless. Ideally, after a few days or weeks of being chained to the desk, you will submit to the story that must be told.”

IfsWayWritingLittlesStoriesHandsSeemsWaitingHoursCommonEnemyWeekPeriodsTablesSubmitProcrastinationDesksAvoidingChained
Book:This Year You Write Your Novel
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“It has become a common feeling, I believe, as we have watched our heroes falling over the years, that our own small stone of activism, which might not seem to measure up to the rugged boulders of heroism we have so admired, is a paltry offering toward the building of an edifice of hope. Many who believe this choose to withhold their offerings out of shame. This is the tragedy of the world. For we can do nothing substantial toward changing our course on the planet, a destructive one, without rousing ourselves, individual by individual, and bringing our small, imperfect stones to the pile.”

WorldYearsBelieveFeelingsSeemsMightFallCoursesIndividualI BelieveCan DoCommonBuildingPlanetsHeroStonesTragedyShameActivismDestructiveImperfectOfferingHeroismEdificeRuggedBoulders
Book:Anything We Love Can Be Saved: A Writer's Activism
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“Religions have been universal in the sense that all the people we know anything about have had a religion. But the differences among them are so great and so shocking that any common element that can be extracted is meaningless.... The older apologists for Christianity seem to have been better advised than some modern ones in condemning every religion but one as an impostor, as at bottom some kind of demon worship or at any rate a superstitious figment.”

PeopleKnowsKindHas BeensSeemsDifferencesCommonChristianityAtheismModernElementsWorshipUniversalBottomRatePositive AtheismDemonMeaninglessShockingSuperstitiousCondemningFigments
Book:The Essential Dewey: Pragmatism, education, democracy
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“The one function that most gods seem to have in common is to give human existence some ultimate purpose - and, while it is not possible to disprove an ultimate purpose, there does not seem to be any evidence for it. This is not to say, of course, that there is no purpose in life at all: we all make our own purposes as we go through life. And life does not lose its value simply because it it not going to last forever.”

GivingHumansDoeSeemsLastsPurposeValuesCoursesLosesCommonExistenceForeverAtheismEvidenceUltimateFunctionPositive AtheismPurpose Of LifeHuman Existence
Author:Barbara Smoker
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“Nature seems to exult in abounding radicality, extremism, anarchy. If we were to judge nature by its common sense or likelihood, we wouldn't believe the world existed. In nature, improbabilities are the one stock in trade. The whole creation is one lunatic fringe. ... No claims of any and all revelations could be so far-fetched as a single giraffe.”

IfsWorldBelieveWholeSeemsNatureCommonCreationJudgingClaimsTradeCommon SenseRevelationsAnarchyFringeExtremismLunaticLikelihoodGiraffeImprobability
Author:Annie Dillard
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“When all moves equally (says Pascal), nothing seems to move as in a vessel under sail; and when all run by common consent into vice, none appear to do so. He that stops first, views as from a fixed point the horrible extravagance that transports the rest.”

FirstsSeemsRunningMovingViewsCommonVicesHorribleFixedSailConsentVesselTransportExtravagancePascal
Book:Lacon: Or Many Things in Few Words Addressed to Those who Think
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“Nature seems to have taken a particular care to disseminate her blessings among the different regions of the world, with an eye to their mutual intercourse and traffic among mankind, that the nations of the several parts of the globe might have a kind of dependence upon one another and be united together by their common interest.”

WorldKindDifferentSeemsMightEyeCareTogetherNationsInterestUnitedCommonTakenMankindParticularBlessingRegionsMutualCommerceGlobesTrafficDependenceIntercourseCommon Interests
Book:The Works of Joseph Addison: The Spectator, no. 1-314
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“Ah! the curse of slavery, as the common phrase goes, has fallen not merely on the black but perhaps at this moment still more upon the white, because it has warped his sense of truth and has degraded his moral nature. The position and the treatment of the blacks, however, really improve from year to year; while the whites do not seem to advance in enlightenment.”

YearsStillsMomentsSeemsBlackWhiteCommonMoralPositionEnlightenmentSlaveryCurseFallenPhrasesTreatment
Book:America of the Fifties: Letters of Fredrika Bremer
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“The impulse to confession almost always requires the presence of a fresh ear and a fresh heart; and in our moments of spiritual need, the man to whom we have no tie but our common nature, seems nearer to us than mother, brother, or friend. Our daily familiar life is but a hiding of ourselves from each other behind a screen of trivial words and deeds, and those who sit with us at the same hearth, are often the farthest off from the deep human soul within us, full of unspoken evil and unacted good.”

MenNeedsHumansHeartSoulMomentsSeemsSpiritualLife IsMotherEvilCommonBehindsHe ManBrotherEarsDeedsScreensFamiliarImpulseTiesHidingConfessionHuman SoulUnspoken
Book:Delphi Complete Works of George Eliot (Illustrated)
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“American culture in particular has instilled in us the bizarre notion that to ask for help amounts to an admission of failure. But some of the most powerful, successful, admired people in the world seem, to me, to have something in common: they ask constantly, creatively, compassionately, and gracefully. And to be sure: when you ask, there's always the possibility of a no on the other side of the request. If we don't allow for that no, we're not actually asking, we're either begging or demanding. But it is the fear of the no that keeps so many of our mouths sewn tightly shut.”

PeopleIfsWorldHelpingSeemsCultureAsksSidesPowerfulCommonSuccessfulPossibilityParticularAmountMouthsAskingNotionMost PowerfulBizarreAmerican CultureRequestBeggingAdmission
Author:Amanda Palmer
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“What quality is shared by all objects that provoke our aesthetic emotions? Only one answer seems possible— significant form. In each, lines and colors combined in a particular way; certain forms and relations of forms, stir our aesthetic emotions. These relations and combinations of lines and colors, these aesthetically moving forms, I call ‘Significant Form’; and ‘Significant Form’ is the one quality common to all works of visual art.”

WayArtSeemsMovingFormCertainLinesAnswersCommonEmotionQualityObjectsParticularColorRelationSignificantCombinationVisualsAestheticProvokingVisual Art
Author:Clive Bell
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“There are at the present time two great nations in the world--the Russians and the Americans. The American relies upon his personal interest to accomplish his ends and gives free scope to the unguided exertions and common sense of the people. The Russian centers all his authority of society in a single arm. The principal instrument of the former is freedom; of the latter, servitude. Their starting point is different and their courses are not the same; yet each of them seems marked by the will of Heaven to sway the destinies of half the globe.”

PeopleWorldGivingTwoDifferentEndsSeemsCoursesHeavenNationsInterestCommonHalfDestinyUnited StatesArmsAuthorityInstrumentsStartingAccomplishCommon SenseFormerRelyLatterPrincipalGlobesScopeStarting PointServitudeExertionGreat NationsPresent TimeRely UponPersonal Interest
Author:Alexis de Tocqueville
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“With a full century of contrary proof in our possession and despite our demonstrated capacity for cooperative teamwork, some among us seem to accept the shibboleth of an unbridgeable gap between those who hire and those who are employed. We miserably fail to challenge the lie that what is good for management is necessarily bad for labor; that for one side to profit, the other must be depressed. Such distorted doctrine is false and foreign to the American scene where common ideals and purpose permit us a common approach toward the common good.”

SeemsLyingPurposeSidesChallengesCommonAcceptingFailingCenturySceneApproachCapacityIdealsLaborManagementProfitPossessionProofContraryDoctrineDespiteGapsTeamworkPermitEmployedEmployersCommon GoodCooperatives
Author:Dwight D. Eisenhower
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“The dominant metaphor of conceptual relativism, that of differing points of view, seems to betray an underlying paradox. Differentpoints of view make sense, but only if there is a common co-ordinate system on which to plot them; yet the existence of a common system belies the claim of dramatic incomparability.”

IfsSeemsViewsCommonExistenceClaimsMetaphorPoint Of ViewMake SenseDramaticPlotParadoxBetrayDominantRelativism
Book:Inquiries Into Truth and Interpretation: Philosophical Essays
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“Common sense … has the very curious property of being more correct retrospectively than prospectively. It seems to me that one of the principal criteria to be applied to successful science is that its results are almost always obvious retrospectively; unfortunately, they seldom are prospectively. Common sense provides a kind of ultimate validation after science has completed its work; it seldom anticipates what science is going to discover.”

KindSeemsResultsCommonSuccessfulUltimatePropertyObviousCommon SenseCuriousWorking ItPrincipalCriteriaAnticipateValidation
Author:Russell L. Ackoff
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“For here we are so blind and foolish that we never seek God until he, of his goodness, shows himself to us. It is when we do see something of him by his grace that we are stirred by that same grace to seek him, and with earnest longing to see still more of his blessedness. So I saw him and sought him; I had him and wanted him. It seems to me that this is and should be an experience common to us all.”

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Author:Julian of Norwich
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“The purpose of life seems to be to acquaint a man with himself and whatever science or art or course of action he engages in reacts upon and illuminates the recesses of his own mind. Thus friends seem to be only mirrors to draw out and explain to us ourselves; and that which draws us nearer our fellow man, is, that the deep Heart in one, answers the deep Heart in another, - that we find we have (a common Nature) - one life which runs through all individuals, and which is indeed Divine.”

MenMindHeartArtSeemsRunningActionPurposeCoursesIndividualAnswersCommonDivineDrawsMirrorsFellowsPurpose Of LifeFellow ManRecessDeep Heart
Author:Ralph Waldo Emerson
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