Sunday, July 25, 2010

today's quotes

All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of every organism to live beyond its income.
           -- Samuel Butler, Notebooks, 1912

I suspect this is actually true.


A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone.
           -- Henry David Thoreau

A very interesting observation.

Mankind have a great aversion to intellectual labor; but even supposing knowledge to be easily attainable, more people would be content to be ignorant than would take even a little trouble to acquire it.
           -- Samuel Johnson, quoted in Boswell's Life of Johnson

There's something to this. I wonder if stretching the mind is more painful than we suspect?


Lies are like children: they're hard work, but it's worth it because the future depends on them.
           -- Pam Davis, House M.D., It's A Wonderful Lie, 2008

Pretty sardonic, but funny.

7 comments:

  1. Mark Twain said: "A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes."

    Laurence J Peter said: " Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than going to the garage makes you a car."

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  2. Thanks for your two cents, Bron. Where would we be without your genius comments?

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  3. Well, in less words, I was nice to someone, and you, wordy as usual, prove you're a jackass.

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  4. See what I mean, everyone? Genius!

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  5. Yeah, I wouldn't have noticed you were a jackass if the genius hadn't explained it to me. :-P

    Some of us can be "slow" like that. We only notice unpleasant things like mean people when they hit us in the face.

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  6. Bron's got the edge on pretentiousness.

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