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Usage Quotes

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Usage Quotes

“We set up a certain aim, and put ourselves of our own will into the power of a certain current. Once having done that, we find ourselves committed to usages and customs which we had not before fully known, but from which we cannot depart without giving up the end which we have chosen. But we have no right, therefore, to claim that we are under the yoke of necessity. We might as well say that the man whom we see struggling vainly in the current of Niagara could not have helped jumping in.”

MenGivingWellsEndsDoneMightCertainFreedomKnownStruggleHe ManGiving UpClaimsAimCurrentsCommittedChosenCustomsJumpingUsageYokeNiagaraJumping In
Author:Anna Brackett
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“Usage ain't always a matter of ought.”

MatterOughtUsage
Book:Alphabet Juice: The Energies, Gists, and Spirits of Letters, Words, and Combinations Thereof; Their Roots, Bones, Innards, Piths, Pips, and Secret Parts, Tinctures, Tonics, and Essences; With Examples of Their Usage Foul and Savory
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“One of the things I like about my job is that it draws on the entire person: not just your knowledge of grammar and punctuation and usage and foreign languages and literature but also your experience of travel, gardening, shipping, singing, plumbing, Catholicism, midwesternism, mozzarella, the A train, New Jersey. And in turn it feeds you more experience.”

PersonsJobsTurnsLiteratureLanguageSingingDrawsTrainCatholicismGardeningGrammarJerseyNew JerseyUsagePunctuationForeign LanguagePlumbingShippingMozzarella
Book:Between You & Me: Confessions of a Comma Queen
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“The tendency to cruelty should be watched in children and if they incline to any such cruelty, they should be taught the contrary usage. For the custom of tormenting and killing other animals will, by degrees, harden their hearts even toward man. Children should from the beginning, be brought up in an abhorrence of killing or tormenting living beings.”

IfsMenShouldHeartChildrenAnimalTaughtDegreesKillingContraryCrueltyTendenciesCustomsUsageInclineAbhorrenceKilling Others
Author:John Locke
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“Lexical variety, eccentric constructions and punctuation, variant spellings, archaisms, the ability to pile clause on clause, the effortless incorporation of words from other languages: flexibility, and inclusiveness, is what makes English great; and diversity is what keeps it healthy and growing, exuberantly regenerating itself with rich new forms and usages.”

FormLanguageAbilityRichGrowingHealthyDiversityVarietyConstructionFlexibilityEccentricSpellingUsageEffortlessPunctuationClausesInclusivenessIncorporation
Author:Donna Tartt
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“Before you judge me as some kind of 'anything goes' language heathen, let me just say that I'm not against usage standards. I don't violate them when I want to sound like an educated person, for the same reason I don't wear a bikini to a funeral when I want to look like a respectful person. There are social conventions for the way we do lots of things, and it is to everyone's benefit to be familiar with them. But logic ain't got nothin' to do with it.”

WayWantLooksKindPersonsReasonLanguageSocialSoundJudgingBenefitsStandardsLogicLet MeFamiliarEducatedFuneralConventionsRespectfulUsageBikinisHeathenJudge MeAnything GoesEducated PersonBefore You Judge Me
Author:Arika Okrent
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“All living beings have received their weapons through the same process of evolution that moulded their impulses and inhibitions; for the structural plan of the body and the system of behaviour of a species are parts of the same whole.... Wordsworth is right: there is only one being in possession of weapons which do not grow on his body and of whose working plan, therefore, the instincts of his species know nothing and in the usage of which he has no correspondingly adequate inhibition.”

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Book:King Solomon's ring: new light on animal ways
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“The territorial aristocracy of former ages was either bound by law, or thought itself bound by usage, to come to the relief of its serving-men and to relieve their distresses. But the manufacturing aristocracy of our age first impoverishes and debases the men who serve it and then abandons them to be supported by the charity of the public.”

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Author:Alexis de Tocqueville
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“MID-TWENTIES BREAKDOWN: A period of mental collapse occurring in one's twenties, often caused by an inability to function outside of school or structured environments coupled with a realization of one's essential aloneness in the world. Often marks induction into the ritual of pharmaceutical usage.”

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Book:Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture
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“I was struggling against the flypaper of other arts harnessing film to their own usages, which means essentially as a recording device or within the long historical trap of picture - by which I mean a collection of nameable shapes within a frame. I don't even think still photography, with few exceptions, has made any significant attempt to free itself from that.”

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Author:Stan Brakhage
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“How can we appraise a proposal if the terms hurled at our ears can mean anything or nothing, and change their significance with the inflection of the voice? Welfare state, national socialism, radical, liberal, conservative, reactionary and a regiment of others ... these terms in today's usage, are generally compounds of confusion and prejudice. If our attitudes are muddled, our language is often to blame. A good tonic for clearer thinking is a dose of precise, legal definition.”

IfsThinkingMeanStatesTodayLanguageVoiceTermAttitudeEarsPrejudiceBlameDefinitionsConservativeSocialismConfusionRadicalWelfareSignificancePreciseProposalCompoundsDoseReactionariesUsageWelfare StateAppraise
Author:Dwight D. Eisenhower
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“It is difficult to disturb the common usage of Korean that is bent to the perspective of a male-oriented society. Korean society is based on both a politics and history that have been disguised as a solid society of solid male poems, a solid written language, fixed rules of how to write literature, and a narrative language.”

WritingHas BeensLiteratureLanguageDifficultCommonWrittenPerspectiveMalesNarrativeFixedBentKoreanUsageWritten Language
Author:Kim Hyesoon
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“Because [Russel Westbrook] is so rare and impacts the game in so many different ways, you see the usage and the amount of time he's playing and say, 'is this sustainable?' I look at it the other way. Are we playing the right way, are we playing together as a team, and what are his minutes like? This is not a guy that's playing 42 minutes a night. When he goes out there he's going to play to who he is, and I think he also understands that in order for our team to be the best we can be he's got to incorporate and help everybody grow as players.”

ThinkingWayLooksDifferentPlayHelpingTogetherNightGuyOrderGamesGrowsPlayerTeamMinutesAmountImpactDifferent WaysBeing The BestRight WayUsagePlaying Together
Author:Russell Westbrook
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