Quotessence
Home / Topics / Instance Quotes

Instance Quotes

Browse 1503 quotes about Instance.

Related topics

IfsPeopleThinkingMenWayKnowsFirstsWorldHas BeensMayYearsHumansWellsBelieveWritingShouldFeelsMeanTryingWantGivingDifferentBookKindMadeParticularCountryDoeLooksMightCertainIdeasPersonsImportantMindTwoFactsLittlesSaidMatterNeedsStatesSeemsStillsArtShowsUseWarCasesCoursesLongRealDoneEndsI CanStoriesBodyCharacterChildrenGovernmentFeelingsFormLawReasonAbleProblemSometimesTogetherEffectsHandsNumbersWould BeFilmHelpingPoliticalScienceWholeFoundHappensObjectsPastSelfTodayUsedInterestThreeYoungAbilityBlackCircumstancesReligiousGivenHardKnownMomentsOrderRememberAmericaBigsCausesmore

Instance Quotes

“If we look more closely, we see that any violent display of power, whether political or religious, produces an outburst of folly in a large part of mankind; indeed, this seems actually to be a psychological and sociological law: the power of some needs the folly of others. It is not that certain human capacities, intellectual capacities for instance, become stunted of destroyed, but rather that the upsurge of power makes such an overwhelming impression that men are deprived of their independent judgment, and...give up trying to assess the new state of affairs for themselves.”

IfsMenNeedsGivingTryingHumansLooksStatesSeemsLawPoliticalCertainReligiousMankindProduceGiving UpJudgmentIntellectualCapacityIndependentAffairViolentImpressionPsychologicalDestroyedInstanceFollyOverwhelmingDisplayDeprivedOutburstSociologicalHuman Capacity
Book:Letters Papers from Prison
Create image

“We define our identity always in dialogue with, sometimes in struggle against, the things our significant others want to see in us. Even after we outgrow some of these others—our parents, for instance—and they disappear from our lives, the conversation with them continues within us as long as we live.”

WantLongSometimesParentStruggleOur LivesIdentityConversationDisappearSignificantDialogueInstance
Book:Philosophical Arguments
Create image

“My own view of myself was that I was small and innocuous, a marshmallow compared to the others. I was a poor shot with a 22, for instance, and not very good with an ax. It took me a long time to figure out that the youngest in a family of dragons is still a dragon from the point of view of those who find dragons alarming.”

LongStillsMy OwnPoorViewsFiguresLong TimeShotsVery GoodPoint Of ViewInstanceDragonsMarshmallow
Book:Negotiating with the Dead: A Writer on Writing
Create image

“For instance, dragons are deeply revered by the Chinese. According to legend they have megapowers that include weather control and life creation. And they’re seen as kind, benevolent creatures. Funny. Every fairy tale I’d ever heard involving dragons starred daring knights trotting off to kill said dragons. Probably the real reason every time East meets West they get pissed off and throw tea in our faces.”

KindSaidRealReasonFacesHeardCreationCreaturesWestEastTalesWeatherInstanceTeaChineseFairyDragonsLegendsDaringFairy TaleKnightsInvolvingBenevolentPissed OffTrotting
Book:Another One Bites The Dust: Book two in the Jaz Parks sequence
Create image

“But the law is an odd thing. For instance, one country in Europe has a law that requires all its bakers to sell bread at the exact same price. A certain island has a law that forbids anyone from removing its fruit. And a town not too far from where you live has a law that bars me from coming within five miles of its borders.”

CountryLawCertainFiveEuropeTownsSellsFruitLawyerMilesBarsBreadInstanceOddBordersIslandsBakersWhere You LiveOdd Things
Author:Daniel Handler
Create image

“Simply put, dramatic irony is when a person makes a harmless remark, and someone else who hears it knows something that makes the remark have a different, and usually unpleasant, meaning. For instance, if you were in a restaurant and said out loud, "I can't wait to eat the veal marsala I ordered," and there were people around who knew that the veal marsala was poisoned and that you would die as soon as you took a bite, your situation would be one of dramatic irony.”

PeopleIfsKnowsPersonsSaidI CanDifferentWould BeDiesWaitingSituationInstanceLoudIronyDramaticRestaurantsBitesRemarks
Author:Daniel Handler
Create image

“It is a delicious thing to write, to be no longer yourself but to move in an entire universe of your own creating. Today, for instance, as man and woman, both lover and mistress, I rode in a forest on an autumn afternoon under the yellow leaves, and I was also the horses, the leaves, the wind, the words my people uttered, even the red sun that made them almost close their love-drowned eyes.”

PeopleMenWritingMadeEyeTodayMovingUniverseSunWindLoversCreatingMen And WomenRedHorseForestsInstanceAutumnYellowAfternoonDeliciousMistressYellow Leaves
Author:Gustave Flaubert
Create image

“People can do great things. However, there are somethings they just can't do. I, for instance, have not been able to transform myself into a Popsicle, despite years of effort. I could, however, make myself insane, if I wished. (Though if I achieved the second, I might be able to make myself think I'd achieved the first....) Anyway, if there's a lesson to be learned, it's this: great success often depends on being able to distinguish between the impossible and the improbable. Or, in easier terms, distinguishing between Popsicles and insanity. Any questions?”

PeopleIfsThinkingYearsFirstsMightAbleTermCan DoEffortImpossibleDependsEasierLessonsGreat ThingsInsaneDespiteInstanceInsanityGreat SuccessImprobableLessons To Be LearnedPopsicles
Book:Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians
Create image

“I think the function of suffering is to let me know that my perception is skewed; what I’m doing is judging natural events in such a way that I am creating suffering within myself. For instance, you have pain over certain conditions, certain situations that occur. And if you just say ‘ok, here I am, I’m going to experience the pain,’ you don’t suffer. The resistance and the degree of the resistance to the natural phenomenon of life causes tremendous suffering.”

IfsThinkingKnowsWayPainCertainSufferingCausesNaturalSituationConditionsEventsJudgingDegreesPerceptionCreatingLet MeFunctionResistanceInstancePhenomenonHere I AmNatural Phenomena
Author:Hubert Selby, Jr.
Create image

“George's son had done his work so thoroughly that he was considered too good a workman to live, and was, in fact, taken and tragically shot at twelve o'clock that same day—another instance of the untoward fate which so often attends dogs and other philosophers who follow out a train of reasoning to its logical conclusion, and attempt perfectly consistent conduct in a world made up so largely of compromise.”

WorldMadeDoneFactsTakenFateDogSonShotsTrainPhilosopherConclusionInstanceCompromiseClockReasoningConsistentLogicalTwelveWorkmen
Book:Far from the Madding Crowd: Works of Hardy
Create image

“How can you see something that isn't there?" yawned the Humbug, who wasn't fully awake yet. "Sometimes, it's much simpler than seeing things that are,"he said. "For instance, if something is there, you can only see it with your eyes open, but if it isn't there, you can see it just as well with your eyes closed. That's why imaginary things are often easier to see than real ones." "Then where is Reality?" barked Tock. "Right here,"cried Alec, waving his arms.”

IfsWellsSaidRealSometimesRealityEyeSeeingArmsEasierInstanceAwakeImaginaryCriedReal OnesHumbugTockImaginary Things
Author:Norton Juster
Create image

“There again," said Syme irritably, "what is there poetical about being in revolt? You might as well say that it is poetical to be sea-sick. Being sick is a revolt. Both being sick and being rebellious may be the wholesome thing on certain desperate occasions; but I'm hanged if I can see why they are poetical...It is things going right," he cried, "that is poetical! Our digestions, for instance, going sacredly and silently right, that is the foundation of all poetry...the most poetical thing in the world is not being sick.”

IfsWorldWellsMaySaidI CanMightCertainSeaSickFoundationInstanceOccasionsDesperateCriedRebelliousRevoltDigestionBeing Sick
Book:The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton
Create image

“As a nation, we began by declaring that 'all men are created equal.' We now practically read it 'all men are created equal, except negroes.' When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read 'all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and Catholics.' When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty – to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.”

KnowsMenShouldCountryNationsFreedomLibertyTakenPureEqualCatholicEqualityRussiaTyrannyInstanceHypocrisyBigotryForeignersPretenseDespotismDeclaringPretenceEmigrating
Author:Abraham Lincoln
Create image

“In every possible instance Saint Paul begged Christians to restrain themselves to contain their carnal yearnings to live solitary and sexless lives on earth as it is in heaven. "But if they cannot contain " Paul finally conceded then "let them marry for it is better to marry than to burn." Which is perhaps the most begrudging endorsement of matrimony in human history.”

IfsHumansEarthChristianHeavenSaintInstanceYearningSolitaryHuman HistoryMatrimonyEndorsementsConcededSaint Paul
Author:Elizabeth Gilbert
Create image

“What a good thing, for instance, it was that one princess should sleep for a hundred years! Was she not saved from all the plague of young men who were not worthy of her? And did not she come awake exactly at the right moment when the right prince kissed her? For my part, I cannot help wishing a good many girls would sleep till just the same fate overtook them. It would be happier for them, and more agreeable to their friends.”

MenShouldYearsMomentsHelpingWould BeYoungGirlWishSleepFateHundredGood ThingsWorthySavedInstanceYoung ManAwakePrincessPlagueRight MomentNot Worthy
Book:George MacDonald: The Complete Fantasy Collection - 8 Novels & 30+ Short Stories and Fairy Tales (Illustrated): The Princess and the Goblin, Lilith, Phantastes, The Princess and Curdie, At the Back of the North Wind, Portent, The Lost Princess, Adela Cathcart, Dealings with the Fairies and many more
Create image

“We live with such easy assumptions, don't we? For instance, that memory equals events plus time. But it's all much odder than this. Who was it said that memory is what we thought we'd forgotten? And it ought to be obvious to us that time doesn't act as a fixative, rather as a solvent. But it's not convenient--- it's not useful--- to believe this; it doesn't help us get on with our lives; so we ignore it.”

BelieveSaidHelpingEasyMemoriesOur LivesEventsOughtForgottenObviousInstanceAssumptionPlusConvenient
Author:Julian Barnes
Create image

“What is less often noticed is that it is precisely the kind of moral instruction that parents are constantly trying to give their children — concrete, imaginative, teaching general principles from particular instances, and seeking all the time to bring the children to appreciate and share the parent's own attitudes and view of life… The all-embracing principles of conduct”

GivingTryingKindChildrenParentViewsAttitudeMoralPrinciplesShareTeachingParticularAppreciateSeekingInstanceInstructionConcreteImaginative
Author:J. I. Packer
Create image

“The expression "following suit" is a curious one, because it has nothing to do with walking behind a matching set of clothing. If you follow suit, it means you do the same thing somebody else has just done. If all of your friends decided to jump off a bridge into the icy waters of an ocean or river, for instance, and you jumped in right after them, you would be following suit. You can see why following suit can be a dangerous thing to do, because you could end up drowning simply because somebody else thought of it first.”

IfsFirstsMeanEndsDoneWould BeWaterBehindsDangerousExpressionWalkingOceanRiversDecidedFollowingInstanceSuitsCuriousBridgesThings To DoClothingsDrowningDangerous ThingsIcyMatchingSuits You
Author:Daniel Handler
Create image

“Every time a crime was committed by a Muslim, that person's faith was mentioned, regardless of its relevance. When a crime is committed by a Christian, do they mention his religion? ... When a crime is committed by a black man, it's mentioned in the first breath: 'An African American man was arrested today...' But what about German Americans? Anglo Americans? A white man robs a convenience store and do we hear he's of Scottish descent? In no other instance is the ancestry mentioned.”

MenFirstsPersonsTodayChristianBlackWhiteCrimeBreathsCommittedStoresInstanceAfrican AmericanWhite ManConvenienceRelevanceArrestedAncestryScottishDescent
Author:Dave Eggers
Create image

“I do not believe that I am made of the stuff which constitutes heroes, because, in all of the hundreds of instances that my voluntary acts have placed me face to face with death, I cannot recall a single one where any alternative step to that I took occurred to me until many hours later.”

BelieveMadeFacesStuffHoursStepsHeroInstanceAlternativesRecallsFace To Face
Book:A Princess of Mars (Science Fiction Classic): From the Author of Tarzan of the Apes, Barsoom Series, Llana of Gathol, Pirates of Venus, The Land That Time Forgot & Pellucidar
Create image

“I don't mean to be insolent. I'm truthful. I tell the truth and the truth sometimes hurts. For instance, you have bad breath, Lieutenant. I can smell it from here. It must offend a lot of people. That's the truth. But how many people have told you that? Instead, they either lie or try to avoid your company.”

PeopleTryingMeanI CanSometimesLyingHurtCompanyBreathsSmellInstanceTelling The TruthTruthfulLieutenantsInsolentBad Breath
Book:Tenderness
Create image

“History can come in handy. If you were born yesterday, with no knowledge of the past, you might easily accept whatever the government tells you. But knowing a bit of history--while it would not absolutely prove the government was lying in a given instance--might make you skeptical, lead you to ask questions, make it more likely that you would find out the truth.”

IfsGovernmentMightPastLyingAsksGivenBitsBornAcceptingKnowingProveYesterdayInstanceSkepticalCritical ThinkingHandyKnowledge Of The Past
Author:Howard Zinn
Create image

“Every instance in my life, I've felt like the exact opposite of Superman. Except this time, this moment right now. I don't care. I don't feel like a weak, insipid sissy. Because right now I know I would save the girl. I know that I would rather risk the planet than let harm befall Eliza Wishart. I would save her in a second. Because I can imagine her and me huddled safe together while the earth falls under evil designs, but I can't imagine the world without her in it.”

KnowsWorldFeelsI CanMomentsCareEarthTogetherFallGirlEvilFeltImagineRiskDesignPlanetsRight NowSafeWeakOppositesDon't CareHarmInstanceI Don't CareBecause I CanInsipidSissy
Author:Craig Silvey
Create image

“The courtroom is one instance of the fact that while our society may be liberal and democratic in some large and vague sense, its moving parts, its smaller chambers--its classrooms, its workplaces, its corporate boardrooms, its jails, its military barracks--are flagrantly undemocratic, dominated by one commanding person or a tiny elite of power.”

MayPersonsFactsMovingMilitaryDemocraticTinyInstanceCorporateOur SocietyJailClassroomElitesVagueWorkplaceChamberCourtroomMoving Parts
Book:You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train: A Personal History of Our Times
Create image

“We have been led to imagine all sorts of things infinitely more marvelous than the imagining of poets and dreamers of the past. It shows that the imagination of nature is far, far greater than the imagination of man. For instance, how much more remarkable it is for us all to be stuck-half of us upside down-by a mysterious attraction, to a spinning ball that has been swinging in space for billions of years, than to be carried on the back of an elephant supported on a tortoise swimming in a bottomless sea.”

MenYearsHas BeensShowsPastImaginationSpaceHalfGreaterImagineSeaPoetBallsAttractionBillionsStuckInstanceMysteriousRemarkableSwimmingDreamerMarvelousElephantsSpinningUpside DownTortoises
Book:The Pleasure of Finding Things Out: The Best Short Works of Richard P. Feynman
Create image

“If you try to avoid every instance of peer pressure you will end up without any peers whatsoever, and the trick is to succumb to enough pressure that you do not drive your peers away, but not so much that you end up in a situation in which you are dead or otherwise uncomfortable. This is a difficult trick, and most people never master it, and end up dead or uncomfortable at least once during their lives.”

PeopleIfsTryingEndsEnoughDifficultSituationMastersPressureTricksInstanceUncomfortablePeersPeer Pressure
Author:Daniel Handler
Create image

“Honestly, I cannot understand what people mean when they talk about the freedom of the human will. I have a feeling, for instance, that I will something or other; but what relation this has with freedom I cannot understand at all. I feel that I will to light my pipe and I do it; but how can I connect this up with the idea of freedom? What is behind the act of willing to light the pipe ? Another act of willing?”

PeopleMenFeelsHumansMeanSaidIdeasFeelingsLightCan DoBehindsWillingRelationHonestlyInstancePipeHuman Will
Author:Albert Einstein
Create image