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Return Quotes

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Return Quotes

“If you are leaping a ravine, the moment of takeoff is a bad time for considering alternative strategies... Do it in the 'closed' mode. But the moment the action is over, try to return to the 'open' mode... because in that mode we are the most aware, most receptive, most creative, and therefore at our most intelligent.”

“No one knows how greatness comes to a man. It may lie in his blackness, sleeping, or it may lance into him like those driven fiery particles from outer space. These things, however, are known about greatness: need gives it life and puts it in action; it never comes without pain; it leaves a man changed, chastened, and exalted at the same time--he can never return to simplicity.”

“An idea is growing in foreign policy circles in Washington ... that there is no turning back. We are stuck in Iraq and Afghanistan for 25 to 40 years, we are embedded in our prideful unilateralism, and nothing can return us to more traditional American values and principles of action. The hubristic creators of this "inevitability" planned it this way. ... Their failures in Iraq have not stopped the fanatic, power-hungry neoconservatives. ... The hard-liners who dominate this administration ... have led us to eternal conflict with Muslims.”

“We cannot escape our destiny, nor should we try to do so. The leadership of the free world was thrust upon us two centuries ago in that little hall of Philadelphia. In the days following World War II, when the economic strength and power of America was all that stood between the world and the return to the dark ages, Pope Pius XII said, 'The American people have a great genius for splendid and unselfish actions. Into the hands of America God has placed the destinies of an afflicted mankind.' We are indeed, and we are today, the last best hope of man on earth.”

“Courtesy is doing that which nothing under the sun makes you do but human kindness. Courtesy springs from the heart; if the mind prompts the action, there is a reason; if there be a reason, it is not courtesy, for courtesy has no reason. Courtesy is good will, and good will is prompted by the heart full of love to be kind. Only the generous man is truly courteous. He gives freely without a thought of receiving anything in return.”

“It can be shown that maximum diversification is achieved by holding each stock in proportion to its value to the entire market (italics added)... Hindsight plays tricks on our minds... often distorts the past and encourages us to play hunches and outguess other investors, who in turn are playing the same game. For most of us, trying to beat the market leads to disastrous results... our actions lead to much lower returns than can be achieved by just staying in the market.”

“While all men within our territories are protected in worshipping the Deity according to the dictates of their consciences; it is rationally to be expected from them in return, that they will [demonstrate] the innocence of their lives and the beneficence of their actions; for no man, who is profligate in his morals, or a bad member of the civil community, can possibly be a true Christian, or a credit to his own religious society.”

“Human memory awakens and extinguishes at will. It dulls and sharpens actions, enlarges and shrinks those who perform them. It humbles and exalts as it desires. When summoned, it slips away, and when it returns, it will do so at the time and place that suits it. It recognizes no chief, no overseer, no classifier, no ruler. Stories mix and mingle, facts sprout new shoots. The situations and words and scents-oh, the scents!-encrusted there are stored in the most disorganized and wonderful manner, not chronologically, not according to size or importance or even the alphabet.”

“You're in a terrible spot. It's too late for you to retreat but too soon to act. All you can do is witness. You're in the miserable position of an infant who cannot return to the mother's womb, but neither can he run around and act. All an infant can do is witness and listen to the stupendous tales of action being told to him. You are at that precise point now. You cannot go back to the womb of your old world, but you cannot act with power either. For you there is only witnessing acts of power and listening to tales of power.”

“The last image created in verse four of this hymn, ["Come, O Thou Glorious King"] that of the promised Messiah coming into his temple, seems appropriate for the day when Jesus was in the Jerusalem temple, teaching and establishing his authority. As with the Triumphal Entry, his actions then seem but a foretaste of even greater fulfillment when he comes again in glory. Just as the early Latter-day Saints were reassured by the promised return of the Savior, so we too can look forward with faith to his return as King.”

“Nostalgia is a necessary thing, I believe, and a way for all of us to find peace in that which we have accomplished, or even failed to accomplish. At the same time, if nostalgia precipitates actions to return to that fabled, rosy-painted time, particularly in one who believes his life to be a failure, then it is an empty thing, doomed to produce nothing but frustration and an even greater sense of failure.”

“When evening comes, I return home and go into my study. On the threshold I strip off my muddy, sweaty clothes of everyday, and put on the robes of court and palace, and in this graver dress I enter the antique courts of the ancients and am welcomed by them, and there I taste the food that alone is mine, and for which I was born. And there I make bold to speak to them and ask the motives of their actions, and they, in their humanity, reply to me. And for the space of four hours I forget the world, remember no vexation, fear poverty no more, tremble no more at death; I pass indeed into their world.”

“The great wheel of fire of ancient wisdom, silence and word engendering the myth of the origin, human action engendering the epic voyage toward the other; historical violence revealing the tragic flaw of the hero who must then return to the land of origin; myth of death and renewal and silence from which new words and images will arise, keeps on turning in spite of the blindness of purely lineal thought.”