Great Quotes

“Everybody has their own America, and then they have pieces of a fantasy America that they think is out there but they can’t see.” - Andy Warhol

"What the human being is best at doing is interpreting all new information so that their prior conclusions remain intact."

— Warren Buffett

"In great contests each party claims to act in accordance with the will of God. Both may be, and one must be, wrong. God cannot be for and against the same thing at the same time."

--Abraham Lincoln, Meditation On The Divine Will, 1862

' ... there is nothing to indicate that self-consciousness can be lessened by proof of the world's indifference.'

- Clive James

At certain moments I felt that the entire world was turning into stone: a slow petrification, more or less advanced depending on people and places but one that spared no aspect of life. It was as if no one could escape the inexorable stare of Medusa. The only hero able to cut off Medusa's head is Perseus, who flies with winged sandals; Perseus, who does not turn his gaze upon the face of the Gorgon but only upon her image reflected in his bronze shield. Thus Perseus comes to my aid even at this moment, just as I too am about to be caught in a vise of stone— which happens every time I try to speak about my own past. Better to let my talk be composed of images from mythology.

To cut off Medusa's head without being turned to stone, Perseus supports himself on the very lightest of things, the winds and the clouds, and fixes his gaze upon what can be revealed only by indirect vision, an image caught in a mirror. I am immediately tempted to see this myth as an allegory on the poet's relationship to the world, a lesson in the method to follow when writing. But I know that any interpretation impoverishes the myth and suffocates it. With myths, one should not be in a hurry. It is better to let them settle into the memory, to stop and dwell on every detail, to reflect on them without losing touch with their language of images. The lesson we can learn from a myth lies in the literal narrative, not in what we add to it from the outside.

—Italo Calvino

"The foundation of irreligious criticism is: Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d’honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo."

'There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.'

- Hemingway

"Sticking frozen potatoes up any part of your body sounds dangerous, unhygienic, and the reason why I fear for the future of humanity. You shouldn’t stick potatoes up your ass. You should drink fluids, see a doctor, and get professional consultations."
-- Yosh Hsin, public heath professional

"If you are fighting for a progressive future, if you are fighting for everyday people, if you are fighting for working people, there's a lot of folks out there that want you to be demoralized. There's a lot of folks out there that don't want you to vote. If you're feeling sad, if you're feeling down, let yourself feel that way, but the number one rule in politics -- in my opinion -- and in organizing in general is to never, ever, ever, ever let your heart turn black. You can't do it. We cannot afford to do that. There are too many people's hearts that are on the line."

-- Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

'The despisers of mankind - apart from the mere fools and mimics of that creed - are of two sorts. They who believe their merit neglected and unappreciated, make up one class; they who receive adulation and flattery, knowing their own unworthiness, compose the other. Be sure that the coldest-hearted misanthropes are ever of this last order.'

- Barnaby Rudge, Charles Dickens

"When I was a boy, on Good Friday in my parish, in order to dramatize the extent of Jesus' suffering, a group of priests used to get together and crucify one of the children."  - Goerge Carlin 

'We are all broken — that's how the light gets in.'

- Hemingway