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Maxims Quotes

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Maxims Quotes

“The best Maxim I know in this life is, to drink your Coffee when you can, and when you cannot, to be easy without it. While you continue to be splenetic, count upon it I will always preach. Thus much I sympathize with you that I am not cheerful enough to write, for I believe Coffee once a week is necessary to that.”

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Book:Works: Containing Interesting and Valuable Papers Not Hitherto Published
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“The best Maxim I know in this life is, to drink your Coffee when you can, and when you cannot, to be easy without it.”

KnowsLife IsEasyDrinkCoffeeThis LifeMaximsCaffeineDrinking CoffeeGreat Coffee
Book:Letters Written By The Late Jonathan Swift, D. D. Dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin; And Several Of His Friends: From The Year 1703 To 1740
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“Muhammad professed to derive from Heaven, and he has inserted in the Koran, not only a body of religious doctrines, but political maxims, civil and criminal laws, and theories of science. The gospel, on the contrary, only speaks of the general relations of men to God and to each other - beyond which it inculcates and imposes no point of faith. This alone, besides a thousand other reasons, would suffice to prove that the former of these religions will never long predominate in a cultivated and democratic age, whilst the latter is destined to retain its sway at these as at all other periods.”

MenLongReasonBodyAgeLawPoliticalSpeakHeavenReligiousTheoryPeriodsThousandProveRelationDemocraticIslamCriminalsContraryDoctrineFormerLatterDestinedMaximsNo PointMuhammadCriminal Law
Author:Alexis de Tocqueville
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“Islam in its origins is just as shady and approximate as those from which it took its borrowings. It makes immense claims for itself, invokes prostrate submission or "surrender" as a maxim to its adherents, and demands deference and respect from nonbelievers into the bargain. There is nothing-absolutely nothing-in its teachings that can even begin to justify such arrogance and presumption.”

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Book:Long Live Hitch: Three Classic Books in One Volume
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“The good old maxims of the Bible are applicable, and truly applicable to human affairs, and in this as in other things, we may say here that he who is not for us is against us; he would gathereth not with us scattereth.”

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Book:LINCOLN – Complete 7 Volume Edition: Biographies, Speeches and Debates, Civil War Telegrams, Letters, Presidential Orders & Proclamations: Including the Introduction by Theodore Roosevelt & 3 Biographies: The Every-day Life of the President, Lincoln by Carl Shurz and Abraham Lincoln by Joseph H. Choate
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“Sir Hiram Maxim is a genuine and typical example of the man of science, romantic, excitable, full of real but somewhat obvious poetry, a little hazy in logic and philosophy, but full of hearty enthusiasm and an honorable simplicity. He is, as he expresses it, "an old and trained engineer," and is like all of the old and trained engineers I have happened to come across, a man who indemnifies himself for the superhuman or inhuman concentration required for physical science by a vague and dangerous romanticism about everything else.”

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Author:Gilbert K. Chesterton
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“Nothing is accomplished all at once, and it is one of my great maxims, and one of the most completely verified, that Nature makes no leaps: a maxim which I have called the law of continuity.”

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Book:New Essays Concerning Human Understanding with an Appealing...: Transtated from the Original Latin, French and German Writeen
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“[Science] dissipates errors born of ignorance about our true relations with nature, errors the more damaging in that the social order should rest only on those relations. TRUTH! JUSTICE! Those are the immutable laws. Let us banish the dangerous maxim that it is sometimes useful to depart from them and to deceive or enslave mankind to assure its happiness.”

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Author:Pierre-Simon Laplace
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“When we were the political slaves of King George, and wanted to be free, we called the maxim that "all men are created equal" a self evident truth; but now when we have grown fat, and have lost all dread of being slaves ourselves, we have become so greedy to be masters that we call the same maxim "a self evident lie" The fourth of July has not quite dwindled away; it is still a great day-for burning fire-crackers!!!”

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Book:Abraham Lincoln: Speeches & Writings Part 1: 1832-1858: Library of America #45
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“There exists in the economy and course of nature, an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness; between duty and advantage; between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy, and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity; since we ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained.”

OrderCoursesHeavenNationsEconomyVirtueHonestPolicyDutyOughtEternalAdvantageUnionsRewardsProsperityExpectedGenuineMaximsDisregardFelicityInauguralMagnanimousVirtue And Happiness
Author:George Washington
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“Is it not time to awake from the deceitful dream of a golden age, and to adopt as a practical maxim for the direction of our political conduct, that we, as well as the other inhabitants of the globe, are yet remote from the happy empire of perfect wisdom and perfect virtue?”

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Book:The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers
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“I can't make head or tail of Life. Love is a fine thing, Art is a fine thing, Nature is a fine thing; but the average human mind and spirit are confusing beyond measure. Sometimes I think that all our learning is the little learning of the maxim. To laugh at a Roman awe-stricken in a sacred grove is to laugh at something today.”

ThinkingLoveMindHumansLittlesArtI CanSometimesTodaySpiritLove IsLaughingFineArt IsSacredAverageAweLove LifeHuman MindTailsConfusingMaximsGroveFine ThingsHeads Or Tails
Book:Letters of Wallace Stevens
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“[I]n the next place, to show that unless these departments be so far connected and blended as to give to each a constitutional control over the others, the degree of separation which the maxim requires, as essential to a free government, can never in practice be duly maintained.”

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Book:The Federalist, on the New Constitution, Written in 1788
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“Well, let’s start with the maxim that the best writing is understated, meaning it’s not full of flourishes and semaphores and tap dancing and vocabulary dumps that get in the way of the story you are telling. Once you accept that, what are you left with? You are left with the story you are telling. The story you are telling is only as good as the information in it: things you elicit, or things you observe, that make a narrative come alive; things that support your point not just through assertion, but through example; quotes that don’t just convey information, but also personality.”

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Author:Gene Weingarten
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“Muhammad brought down from heaven and put into the Koran not religious doctrines only, but political maxims, criminal and civil laws, and scientific theories. The Gospels on the other hand, deal only with the general relations between man and God and between man and man. Beyond that, they teach nothing and do not oblige people to believe anything. That alone, among a thousand reasons, is enough to show that Islam will not be able to hold its power long in ages of enlightenment and democracy, while Christianity is destined to reign in such ages, as in all others.”

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Author:Alexis de Tocqueville
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“The first maxim of a man who loves liberty, should be never to grant to rulers an atom of power that is not most clearly and indispensably necessary for the safety and well being of society.”

MenShouldFirstsWellsPoliticalFreedomLibertyPowerSocietyPoliticianSafetyWell BeingGrantsAtomsRulersIndispensableMaxims
Book:Memoir of the Life of Richard H. Lee, and His Correspondence with the Most Distinguished Men in America and Europe
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“If we consider the manner in which those who assume the office of directing the conduct of others execute their undertaking, it will not be very wonderful that their labours, however zealous or affectionate, are frequently useless. For what is the advice that is commonly given? A few general maxims, enforced with vehemence, and inculcated with importunity, but failing for want of particular reference and immediate application.”

IfsWantGivenWonderfulFailingAdviceParticularOfficeAssumingUselessLabourApplicationMaximsUndertakingsAffectionateZealousVehemence
Book:Murphy's essay. The rambler. The adventurer. The idler. Rasselas. Tales of the imagination. Letters. Irene. Miscellaneous poems
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“No one seriously doubts Socrates' maxim: The unexamined life isn't worth living. Self-assessment and attempts at self-improvement are essential aspects of "the good life." Yes, we should engage in ruthless self-reflection and harsh scrutiny, but we should simultaneously acknowledge that such introspection will, at best, only result in a partial view of our minds at work. Complete objectivity is not an option.”

ShouldMindSelfResultsViewsDoubtHumilityEssentialsSelf ImprovementReflectionAspectImprovementAcknowledgeGood LifeHarshIntrospectionMaximsRuthlessSelf ReflectionWorth LivingObjectivityAssessmentScrutinySelf AssessmentUnexamined Life
Book:On Being Certain: Believing You Are Right Even When You're Not
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