Table of Contents

“G” Quotations

GAFFE

(see also BLUNDER and MISTAKE and POLITICS and POLITICIANS)

QUOTE NOTE: in a 2014 blog post, this was named as one of “The New Republic’s Best Sentences” over the past 100 years.

GAIN

(see also ADVANCEMENT and LOSS and LOSS & GAIN and PROFIT)

QUOTE NOTE: I’ve also see the passage translated in the following way: “I don’t believe that wealth is always and invariably useful to a man. I am aware that it has given prestige to many a man, yet sometimes it is indisputably better to incur a loss than to make a gain.”

GAMBLING & GAMBLERS

(includes BETTING and GAMING; see also CARDS and CHANCE and DICE and GAMBLING METAPHORS and GAMES and GAMING & GAMES OF CHANCE and LOTTERY and POKER and SPECULATION and WINNING & LOSING)

Chesterton went on to write: “The perils, rewards, punishments, and fulfillments of an adventure must be real, or the adventure is only a shifting and heartless nightmare. If I bet I must be made to pay, or there is no poetry in betting. If I challenge I must be made to fight, or there is no poetry in challenging. If I vow to be faithful I must be cursed when I am unfaithful, or there is no fun vowing.”

QUOTE NOTE: This quotation would be lost to history were if not for the efforts of Hauptman, a New York City copywriter who purchased the original typewritten manuscript and galley proofs of Rand’s May, 1964 Playboy interview at a 2003 Christie’s auction. Rand preceded the foregoing quotation by saying: “As to gambling, I wouldn’t say that a person who gambles occasionally is immoral. That’s more a game than a serious concern. But when gambling becomes more than a casual game, it is immoral because of the premise that motivates it.” For more from the interview, including the fascinating story behind Hauptman’s acquisition of the material, The Atlas Society.

The passage in the Handbook continued: “That is why the bishops dare not denounce it fundamentally.”

Steinem introduced the thought by writing: “Someone once asked me why women don’t gamble as much as men do, and I gave the common-sensical answer that we don’t have as much money. That was a true but incomplete answer.”

GAMBLING METAPHORS

(see also GAMBLING & GAMBLERS and GAMING & GAMES OF CHANCE and POKER and WINNING & LOSING)

ERROR ALERT: In many quotation compilations, come is mistakenly replaced by came. Because of the unusual wording, the quotation is now almost always simply presented as: “All life is six to five against.”

GAMES

(see also ATHLETES & ATHLETICS and COMPETITION and CONTESTS and RECREATION and SPORT and VICTORY & DEFEAT and WINNING & LOSING)

Ciardi preceded the thought by writing: “No chess player finds any real pleasure in playing an obviously inferior opponent.”

GAMESMANSHIP

(see also COMPETITION and CONTESTS and ONE-UPMANSHIP and SPORT and STRATEGY and WINNING & LOSING)

QUOTE NOTE: Potter’s book introduced the world to his neologism gamesmanship, the nature of which was captured in the work’s subtitle. He went on to extend the concept to one-upmanship in a 1950 book. Potter’s book also served as the inspiration for brinksmanship, a Cold War term based on a comment John Foster Dulles made about the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis (see his entry in RISK & RISK-TAKING).

GAMING & GAMES OF CHANCE

(see also CARDS and CHANCE and DICE and GAMBLING & GAMBLERS and GAMBLING METAPHORS and GAMES and LOTTERY and POKER and WINNING & LOSING)

QUOTE NOTE: Byron borrowed the term craving void from Alexander Pope, who introduced it in the poem Eloisa to Abelard (c. 1716). In the throes of love (“Oh happy state!” according to Pope), two souls are drawn so close together that “All then is full” and “No craving void is left aching [aking in the original] in the breast.”)

Dr. Johnson preceded the remark by saying: “Sir, I do not call a gamester a dishonest man; but I call him an unsocial man, an unprofitable man.”

GARDENS & GARDENING

(see also DIRT and FLOWERS and FRUITS and HORTICULTURE and LANDSCAPES & LANDSCAPING and NATURE and PLANTS and SEEDS and VEGETABLES and WEEDS)

QUOTE NOTE: Nearly all sources present the observation without an ellipsis. Here’s the full thought: “A modest garden and a country rectory, the narrow horizon of a garret, contain for those who know how to look and to wait, more instruction than a library.”

Atwood went on to write: “In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.”

Austin continued: “Nature is continually sending even its oldest scholars to the bottom of the class for some egregious blunder. But, by the due exercise of patience and diligence, they may work their way to the top again.”

Bacon added: “It is the greatest refreshment to the spirits of man; without which, buildings and palaces are but gross handiworks.”

Montag continued: “It doesn’t matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that’s like you after you take your hand away. The difference between the man who just cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said. The lawn cutter might just as well not have been there at all; the gardener will be there for a lifetime.”

Damon continued: “It gives scope to the aggressive instinct—what a satisfaction to pull up an enemy by the roots and throw him into a heap! And yet, paradoxically, weeding is the most peaceful of any outdoor task.”

“Man the Reformer” lecture, Boston, MA (Jan. 25, 1841)

In the same essay, McGinley wrote: “The trouble with gardening is that it does not remain an avocation. It becomes an obsession.”

Muir continued: “This natural beauty-hunger is made manifest in the little window-sill gardens of the poor, though perhaps only a geranium slip in a broken cup, as well as in the carefully tended rose and lily gardens of the rich, the thousands of spacious city parks and botanical gardens, and in our magnificent National parks.”

Several weeks earlier (May 28, 1982), Sarton made this additional entry on the subject: “Gardening is a madness, a folly that does not go away with age. Quite the contrary.”

QUOTE NOTE: This beautiful thought was the conclusion to a brief essay Theroux wrote on her first experience as a gardener. Thanks to Garson O’Toole, the Quote Investigator for his help in authenticating this quotation.

From this passage, one gathers that Warner viewed gardening as hard work. But it was work he dearly loved. In a “Preliminary” section earlier in the book, he wrote: “To own a bit of ground, to scratch it with a hoe, to plant seeds, and watch their renewal of life—this is the commonest delight of the race, the most satisfactory thing a man can do.”

GARLIC

(see also APPETITE and BARBECUE and BUTTER & MARGARINE and COOKS & COOKING and DINNERS & DINING and EATING and EPICUREANISM & EPICURES and FOOD and GASTRONOMY and GOURMETS & GOURMANDS and MEALS and MEAT and NUTRITION and PASTRIES and SAUCES and SPICES & SEASONINGS and SOUPS & SALADS and SUPPER)

ERROR ALERT: In numerous books, blogs, and internet sites, this quotation is mistakenly presented as if it ended in one of two different ways: the salad of life and the salad of taste.

GARMENTS

(see also ATTIRE and CLOTHES & CLOTHING and DRESS and DRESSES FASHION and JEANS and SHIRTS and SUITS and T-SHIRTS and TUXEDO)

GAZES & GAZING BEHAVIOR

(see also LOVE and LUST and MALE-FEMALE DYNAMICS and MEN & WOMEN and ROMANCE and SEDUCTION and SEX & SEXUALITY)

The narrator continued: “Less well known is that a woman is not entirely defenseless against that gaze. If she is turned into a thing, then she watches the man with the gaze of a thing.”

GENDER

(includes TRANSGENDERISM; see also ANDROGYNY and BOYS & GIRLS and IDENTITY and MALE–FEMALE DYNAMICS and MASCULINE & FEMININE and MEN & WOMEN and SEX & SEXUALITY and SEXISM and SEX ROLES and SOCIALIZATION and TRANSSEXUALITY)

Boylan preceded the observation by writing: “What transsexuality emphatically is not is a ‘lifestyle,’ any more than being male or female is a lifestyle.”

ERROR ALERT: This observation is often attributed directly to Blake, but it is in fact Farrell’s summary of Blake’s view. About “The Social Condition of Woman,” an anonymously-authored piece that Blake wrote for Knickerbocker magazine (May, 1863), Farrell wrote: “Its radical premise is that gender identity is secondary to human identity. Blake insisted that people share a common nature but are trained in gender roles—in other words, that gender is socially constructed and historically contingent.”

GENERATION GAP

(see GENERATIONS section below)

GENERATIONS

(including GENERATION GAP; see also AGES and ANCESTORS and ERAS and FAMILIES)

Mead introduced the thought by writing: “Even very recently, the elders could say: ‘You know, I have been young and you never have been old.’ But today’s young people can reply: ‘You never have been young in the world I am young in, and you never can be.’”

QUOTE NOTE: In his book, Spurgeon presented this observation as if it were a “quaint saying” he admired, but I believe it is his own creation. He followed it with a comment: “None needs it more than the present.”

GENEROSITY

(see also ALTRUISM and CHARITY and COMPASSION and GIFTS and GIVING and [Doing] GOOD and GOODNESS and HOSPITALITY and KINDNESS and SELFISHNESS and VIRTUE)

QUOTE NOTE: A few months earlier, Carroll had asked Terry—one of the era’s most prominent actresses—if she would be willing to recommend some teachers of elocution for the child of one of his friends (she had recently expressed interest in acting as a career). Terry not only met with the girl, but took the time to provide her with some private lessons on her own). Carroll was so touched by Terry’s kindness and generosity that he wrote at the beginning of the letter: “What is one to do with a friend who does about 100 times more than you ask them to do?”

ERROR ALERT: Almost all Internet sites present an abridged and paraphrased version of the thought: “One of the deep secrets of life is that all that is really worth the doing is what we do for others.”

Dawkins continued: “Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. Let us understand what our own selfish genes are up to, because we may then at least have the chance to upset their designs, something that no other species has ever aspired to do.”

The Dalai Lama continued: “When one desires to alleviate the suffering of others and to promote their well-being, then generosity—in action, word, and thought—is this desire put into practice.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is a wonderful observation on its own, but the story behind it makes it even more special. On the opening night of the the play Once In a Lifetime, which the 25-year-old Hart co-wrote with Broadway veteran George S. Kaufman, Hart was stunned when his esteemed collaborator went onstage to say, “I would like this audience to know that eighty percent of this play is Moss Hart.” Hart was stunned, and here is the full passage describing what that experience was like:

“I stood staring at the stage and at George Kaufman. Generosity does not flower easily or often in the rocky soil of the theatre. Few are uncorrupted by its ceaseless warfare over credit and billing, its jealousies and envies, its constant temptations toward pettiness and mean-spiritedness. It is not only a hard and exacting profession but the most public one as well. It does not breed magnanimity, and unselfishness is not one of its strong points. Not often is a young playwright welcomed into it with a beau geste as gallant and selfless as the one that had just come over those footlights.”

Stone went on to add: “Your most precious, valued possessions and your greatest powers are invisible and intangible. No one can take them. You, and you alone, can give them. You will receive abundance for your giving. The more you give—the more you will have!”

Taylor went on to add: “When you give, therefore, take to yourself no credit for generosity unless you deny yourself something in order that you may give.”

In the book, Tharp also wrote: “I cannot overstate how much a generous spirit contributes to good luck. Look at the luckiest people around you, the ones you envy, the ones who seem to have destiny falling habitually into their laps. If they’re anything like the fortunate people I know, they’re prepared, they’re always working at their craft, they’re alert, they involve their friends in their work, and they tend to make others feel lucky to be around them.”

GENES & GENETICS

(see also HEREDITY and HEREDITY & ENVIRONMENT and NATURE & NURTURE)

QUOTE NOTE: This appears to be the first appearance of a sentiment that—in a variety of similar phrasings—is well on the way to becoming a modern proverb. For example:

“Genes load the gun and the environment pulls the trigger.” Cynthia Bulik, quoted in Woman’s Health magazine (July/August, 2006)

“In the end, genetics loads the gun, but your lifestyle pulls the trigger.” Mehmet C. Oz and Michael F. Roizen, in You: Staying Young (2007)

McKie, the science and technology editor for The Guardian newspaper, originally offered the observation in a discussion of a specific disease: Xeroderma. Here’s the full thought: “Xeroderma is an important example of inherited ailments that do not automatically manifest themselves. Often a factor in the environment must first combine with a genetic predisposition to cause illness. Genes load the gun and the environment pulls the trigger.”

GENIUS

(see also ABILITY and CREATIVITY and GREATNESS and INGENUITY and SKILL and TALENT and TALENT & GENIUS)

QUOTE NOTE: In offering this observation, Acocella was countering the idea that great art is born of neurosis (which she described as “the unhappy-childhood theory”). She was also advancing the intriguing notion that we love great artists “not just for artistic reasons, but for moral reasons.”

Austen continued: “Continuous effort of itself implies,/In spite of countless falls, the power to rise.” To see how the poem continues, go to ”Perseverance Conquers All”.

Baudelaire continued: “Childhood equipped now with man’s physical means to express itself, and with the analytical mind that enables it to bring order into the sum of experience.”

QUOTE NOTE: Many believe this is the observation that originally inspired the English proverb: “Genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains.” See also the Hopkins entry below.

QUOTATION CAUTION: This quotation has enjoyed popular currency since it appeared in Ballou’s impressive quotation anthology, but it does not appear in Lacon’s classic 1820 work Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words.

ERROR ALERT: Most internet sites mistakenly attribute this quotation to D’Israeli’s son, Benjamin Disraeli.

QUOTE NOTE: This is the most famous version of an observation Edison made on many occasions (sometimes changing the exact numbers). An even earlier appearance came from The Delphos [Ohio] Daily Herald (May 18, 1898), which quoted Edison as saying: “Ninety eight per cent of genius is hard work. As for genius being inspired, inspiration is in most cases another word for perspiration.”

Earlier in the essay, Emerson had written: “To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost, and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgment.”

QUOTE NOTE: Goethe preceded the thought by writing: “The child…seems so intelligent and rational, and at the same time so easy, cheerful, and clever, that one can hardly wish it further cultivation.”

QUOTE NOTE: If you failed to notice that lovely little chiastic twist in the first portion of the observation, you might want to take another look.

QUOTE NOTE: This appears to be the earliest expression in print of the now-proverbial phrase to describe genius: an infinite capacity for taking pains. It's possible that Hopkins was inspired by an 1858 observation from Thomas Carlyle (see his observation above). See also the Proverb section below.

QUOTE NOTE: This is the way the quotation was presented after Hugo’s work was first translated into English. The most common translation to be found these days is: “Genius is a promontory jutting out into the infinite.”

Ingersoll was writing about Walt Whitman, whose Leaves of Grass he described as “the true transcript of a soul.” He continued: “A great soul appears and fills the world with new and marvelous harmonies. In his words is the old Promethean flame. The heart of nature beats and throbs in his line. The respectable prudes and pedagogues sound the alarm, and cry, or rather screech: ‘Is this a book for a young person?’”

QUOTE NOTE: A similar observation commonly attributed to the great French naturalist—but never with a source cited—is: “Never think that God’s delays are God’s denials. Hold on; hold fast, hold out. Patience is genius” (the last three words are often referred to simply as Buffon’s Maxim).

QUOTE NOTE: Lincoln added: “It scorns to tread in the footsteps of any predecessor, however illustrious. It thirsts and burns for distinction; and, if possible, it will have it.” For more on the speech, which was instrumental in establishing Lincoln’s skills as an orator, go to Lyceum Address.

QUOTE NOTE: Longfellow is best remembered for his verse, but he also wrote two novels (Hyperion: A Romance, published in 1839, was his first). Kavanagh was greatly admired in its day by such Longfellow contemporaries as Emerson, Hawthorne, and Dickinson. According to Longfellow scholar Charles C. Calhoun, the novel occupies a footnote in history for its depiction of “what is probably the first lesbian relationship in American fiction.”

Melville continued: “And one shock of recognition runs the whole circle round.”

Mill continued: “Persons of genius are, ex vi termini [meaning “by definition”], more individual than any other people—less capable, consequently, of fitting themselves, without hurtful compression, into any of the smaller number of molds which society provides in order to save its members the trouble of forming their own character. If from timidity they consent to be forced into one of these molds, and to let all that part of themselves which cannot expand under the pressure remain unexpanded, society will be little the better for their genius.”

QUOTE NOTE: See the Hopkins entry above.

QUOTE NOTE: This passage served as the inspiration for John Kennedy Toole’s 1980 novel A Confederacy of Dunces, published eleven years after Toole’s death by suicide.

GENTILITY

(see also ARISTOCRACY and BREEDING and CLASS and ELEGANCE and NOBILITY )

GENTLEMAN

(see also COURTESY and BREEDING and ETIQUETTE and MANNERS)

QUOTE NOTE: This is the origin of the popular saying a gentleman and a scholar.

GENTLENESS

(see also KINDNESS and MERCY and TENDERNESS)

GEORGIA

(see UNITED STATES OF AMERICA—SPECIFIC STATES)

GEOGRAPHY

(includes GEOGRAPHY METAPHORS; see also COUNTRIES and GEOLOGY and LAND and MAPS)

QUOTE NOTE: Grosvenor was president of The National Geographic Society when he announced the Society's $20 million initiative to fight ignorance of geography.

GEOLOGY

(see also COUNTRIES and GEOLOGY and LAND and MAPS and MINERALS)

GIFT (as in TALENT)

(see also ABILITY and GENIUS and TALENT and SKILL)

QUOTE NOTE: I’ve always loved seeing the word extortionate in this observation, having expected to see exorbitant instead. Cather found a subtle but effective way of saying the cost to be paid for great beauty is extremely—even grossly—high, and even higher than exorbitant, which is already pretty pricey.

QUOTE NOTE: This appears to be the earliest expression in print of the phrase an infinite capacity for taking pains to describe genius. For more, see the GENIUS section.

Ruskin continued with an enumeration of four separate gifts: “One is curiosity; that is a gift, a capacity of pleasure in knowing; which if you destroy, you make yourselves cold and dull. Another is sympathy; the power of sharing in the feelings of living creatures, which if you destroy, you make yourselves hard and cruel. Another of your limbs of mind is admiration, the power of enjoying beauty or ingenuity, which, if you destroy, you make yourself base and irrelevant. Another is wit; or the power of playing with the lights on the many sides of truth; which if you destroy, you make yourself gloomy, and less useful and cheering to others than you might be.”

GIFTS (as in PRESENTS)

(see also CHARITY and GENEROSITY and GIVING and PHILANTHROPY and PRESENTS)

A bit earlier in the essay, Emerson had written: “Next to things of necessity, the rule for a gift, which one of my friends prescribed, is, that we must convey to some person that which properly belonged to his character, and was easily associated with him in thought.”

GIRLFRIENDS

(see also BOYFRIENDS and FRIENDS & FRIENDSHIP and GIRLS)

GIRLS

(see also BOYS and BOYS & GIRLS and CHILDREN & CHILDHOOD and GIRLFRIENDS and WOMEN & WOMENHOOD and MEN & WOMEN)

GIVING

(includes GIVING & RECEIVING; see also ALTRUISM and CHARITY and COMPASSION and GENEROSITY and GIFTS and [Doing] GOOD and GOODNESS and KINDNESS and PHILANTHROPY and RECEIVING and SELFISHNESS and TAKING and VIRTUE)

QUOTE NOTE: Allende She said she learned this lesson while mourning the death of her 28-year-old daughter Paula—a young woman who lived a life almost completely devoted to service. She concluded her essay by writing: “Give, give, give—what is the point of having experience, knowledge, or talent if I don’t give it away? Of having stories if I don’t tell them to others? Of having wealth if I don’t share it? I don’t intend to be cremated with any of it! It is in giving that I connect with others, with the world, and with the divine. It is in giving that I feel the spirit of my daughter inside me, like a soft presence.”

Anderson preceded the thought by writing: “The most productive, healthy and satisfying relationships are based, not on a quid pro quo but an ebb and flow of mutual support over time.”

Angelou introduced the observation by writing: “The New Testament informs the reader that it is more blessed to give than to receive.” And she concluded it this way: “The size and substance of the gift should be important to the recipient, but not to the donor save that the best thing one can give is that which is appreciated. The giver is as enriched as is the recipient, and more important, that intangible but very real psychic force of good in the world is increased.”

QUOTE NOTE: A more familiar saying comes from Jesus in Acts 20:35 (see below), but Aristotle expressed the sentiment several centuries earlier.

QUOTE NOTE: All observations about cheerful givers and cheerful giving derive from this passage. The full passage in the RSV (Revised Standard Version) goes this way: “He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must do as he has made up his mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”

QUOTE NOTE: See the Aristotle entry for an earlier version of the sentiment.

QUOTE NOTE: I’ve also seen the observation translated this way: “In normal life we hardly realize how much more we receive than we give, and life cannot be rich without such gratitude.”

QUOTE NOTE: A few months earlier, Carroll had asked Terry—one of the era’s most prominent actresses—if she would be willing to recommend some teachers of elocution for the child of one of his friends (she had recently expressed interest in acting as a career). Terry not only met with the girl, but took the time to provide her with some private lessons on her own). Carroll was so touched by Terry’s kindness and generosity that he wrote at the beginning of the letter: “What is one to do with a friend who does about 100 times more than you ask them to do?”

ERROR ALERT: Almost all Internet sites present an abridged and paraphrased version of the thought: “One of the deep secrets of life is that all that is really worth the doing is what we do for others.”

QUOTE NOTE: Almost all internet sites attribute he who gives freely gives twice directly to Cervantes, but the full passage indicates that his character was simply passing along a saying that had recently become popular.

Poirot continued: “At the end of it all he will still be something that he does not want to be.”

QUOTE NOTE: This oxymoronic line from one of Christendom’s most famous prayers—sometimes called The Peace Prayer—is frequently misattributed to St. Francis of Assisi. While there are a number of versions, the most popular goes this way:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace; where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy.

O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console, to be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love; for it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; it is in dying to self that we are born to eternal life.

For more on the history of the prayer, see the Peace Prayer of St. Francis and this 2011 post by The Quote Investigator.

Fromm preceded the thought by writing: “In the sphere of material things, giving means being rich.”

Fromm preceded the thought by writing: “Giving is the highest expression of potency. In the very act of giving, I experience my strength, my wealth, my power. This experience of heightened vitality and potency fills me with joy.”

In the same book, Fuller also offered this thought on the downside of gifts: “That is the bitterness of a gift, that it deprives us of our liberty.”

QUOTE NOTE: Glenconner’s memoir was about her son, Edward, who she affectionately called “Bim” (he died at age nineteen at the Battle of the Somme in 1916). She preceded the thought by writing: “One of Bim’s chief characteristics was his love of giving presents, and his talent for this. For it is a talent; to know what a person wants….”

Long preceded this observation by writing: “Beware of altruism. It is based on self-deception, the root of all evil.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the way the observation is almost always presented in quotation anthologies and on web sites, but it was originally the concluding portion of this slightly larger observation: “Our religion is one of humanity. Our desire is to serve. We know that we can help ourselves only as we help others, tnd that the love we give away is the only love we keep.”

QUOTE NOTE: While this observation has wide applicability, James was actually thinking about her own father—a highly undemonstrative man—when she wrote it. Here’s the original passage: “I don’t think he had known much demonstrative love in his childhood and what a child doesn’t receive he can seldom later give.”

This famous passage has also been translated this way: “The wise man does not lay up his own treasures. The more he gives to others, the more he has for his own.”

After the nun offered this observation to Maugham, he replied: “How true, and yet how hard to remember!”

Noonan went on to explain: “With people who give a lot of themselves, you sometimes lean back—but with people who give little you often lean forward, as if they’re a spigot in the desert and you’re the empty cup. It is the tropism of deprivation: We lean toward those who do not give.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the way the observation is presented in almost all quotation anthologies, but in his letter, Rilke carried the thought further. Here’s the full thought: “This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more they give, the more they possess of that precious nourishing love from which flowers and children have their strength and which could help all human beings if they would take it without doubting.”

Shain preceded the thought by writing: “It can be much harder to be on the receiving end of a transaction than to be the one who gets to give. In fact, being given to can mean being taken from.”

Warren preceded the thought by writing: “Time is your most precious gift because you only have a set amount of it. You can make more money, but you can’t make more time.”

GIVING & RECEIVING

(see GIVING)

GLAMOUR

(see also BEAUTY and CHARM and LOVELINESS and MALE-FEMALE DYNAMICS and PRETTINESS and SEX APPEAL)

QUOTE NOTE: This was Lawson’s reply when she was asked: “How do your son and daughter relate to your celebrity? Does it amuse them that you’ve become a glamorous figure?

GLANCE

(see also COMMUNICATION and BODY LANGUAGE and EYE CONTACT and FLIRTATION and MALE-FEMALE DYNAMICS)

Emerson continued: “The communication by the glance is in the greatest part not subject to the control of the will. It is the bodily symbol of identity with nature. We look into the eyes to know if this other form is another self, and the eyes will not lie, but make a faithful confession what inhabitant is there.”

GLOBAL WARMING

(see also CLIMATE and CLIMATE CHANGE and ENVIRONMENT and ENVIRONMENTALISM and POLLUTION)

GLORY

(see also CELEBRITY and EMINENCE and GREATNESS and HONOR and RENOWN and TRIUMPH)

GLUTTONY

(see also APPETITE and DIETS & DIETING and DINNER & DINING and EATING and EPICUREANISM & EPICURES and FOOD and GOURMETS & GOURMANDS and HUNGER and MEALS and OBESITY)

GOALS & GOAL-SETTING

(see also ACCOMPLISHMENT and ACHIEVEMENT and AIMS & AIMING and ASPIRATION and DESTINATION and DREAMS and HOPES and MISSION and MOTIVATION and OBJECTIVES and PURPOSE)

ERROR ALERT: This popular saying is widely attributed to French writer Antoine de Saint Exupéry, but there is no evidence he ever wrote—or even thought—such a thing. The saying, which sometimes appears with dream being substituted for wish, is a classic orphan quotation that is also commonly misattributed to Dale Carnegie. For more, see quotation researcher Barry Popik's post on the saying at The Big Apple.

ERROR ALERT: This saying—so popular it might even be considered a modern proverb—is commonly attributed to the success guru Napoleon Hill, but there is no evidence he said or wrote anything like it. A similar saying (“Goals are dreams with deadlines”) is also commonly attributed to time-management writer Diana Scharf-Hunt, but never with conclusive documentation. Quotation sleuth Barry Popick has also weighed in on this and similar sayings. See his 2012 post at The Big Apple.

ERROR ALERT: Slight variations of this saying have been attributed to English religious writer and philanthropist Hannah More, Henry Ford, mail-order guru E. Joseph Cossman, and even to David Byrne of the rock group “Talking Heads.” Despite years of sleuthing by quotation investigators, an original author and citation have never been found.

QUOTE NOTE: I was almost certain that I had discovered an error when I first came across this quotation, suspecting Bateson meant blinders, not blinkers. Turns out I was wrong. When I wrote Dr. Bateson for clarification, I received this lovely reply: “‘Blinkers’ is the term I learned as a child for the pieces of a harness that prevent a horse being distracted. When I started saying it I discovered that ‘blinders’ is more common, at least in American English. You sometimes see ‘blinkered vision’ but never ‘blindered vision.’ Blinders seems to me way too strong for what is really a narrowed vision, but blinkers is occasionally confusing. Go figure. Sometimes copy editors change it and I don’t notice.”

QUOTE NOTE: Most quotation anthologies and internet sites ignore the first portion of the observation and present only the concluding portion: “To love is not to look at one another but to look together in the same direction.”

Covey added: “It unifies your efforts and energy. It gives meaning and purpose to all you do. And it can finally translate itself into daily activities so that you are proactive, you are in charge of your life.”

Davis introduced the observation by writing: “I am doomed to an eternity of compulsive work.”

ERROR ALERT: Most internet sites mistakenly attribute an extremely similar observation to John Dewey—and most of them employ this clumsy grammatical construction: without some goals and some efforts to reach it, no man can live.

ERROR ALERT: On almost all internet sites, this quotation is mistakenly presented as if it ended: it is the things that are met along the way.

Forbes continued: “The man or woman who has a star toward which to press cannot be thrown off course, no matter how the world may try, no matter how far things may seem to go wrong.”

QUOTATION CAUTION: This is the first appearance of a Frankl sentiment that has become quite popular, even though the precise words have never been found in Frankl’s works. It’s likely that Leslie was paraphrasing Frankl rather than quoting him directly. Here’s how he presented it in his 1965 book: “Life can be pulled by goals, as Frankl phrases it, just as surely as it can be pushed by drives.”

Keyes continued: “Far more is at risk when we do what we really want to do rather than something less. I don’t think we’ll ever fully appreciate the role of not daring to risk a shattered dream in limiting people to second-choice careers and third-choice lives.”

Kuhn added: “There must be a goal! And the goal that is going to be really satisfying is the goal that transcends your own survival. Just staying alive and getting ahead is not a good enough goal.”

Lockerbie added: “In our younger years other people establish our goals. Sometimes it is not until we are fifty plus that we find we can activate a dream and turn it into a goal.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is one of the first observations to lay out the metaphor that a goal is a particular type of dream. Observations like this one laid the foundation for, and almost certainly evolved into, the modern proverb A goal is a dream with a deadline).

Maltz continued: “People who say that life is not worthwhile are really saying that they themselves have no personal goals which are worthwhile.”

Mays, the longtime president of Atlanta’s Morehouse College, continued: “It isn’t a calamity to die with dreams unfulfilled, but it is a calamity not to dream. It is not a disaster to be unable to capture your ideal, but it is a disaster to have no ideal to capture. It is not a disgrace not to reach the stars, but it is a disgrace to have no stars to reach for. Not failure, but low aim is sin.”

Pavlova added: “But success? What exactly is success? For me it is to be found not in applause, but in the satisfaction of feeling that one is realizing one’s ideal.”

Pirsig introduced the thought by writing: “Mountains should be climbed with as little effort as possible and without desire. The reality of your own nature should determine the speed. If you become restless, speed up. If you become winded, slow down. You climb the mountain in an equilibrium between restlessness and exhaustion. Then, when you are no longer thinking ahead, each footstep isn’t just a means to an end but a unique event in itself.”

Plath continued: “Try always, as long as you have breath in your body, to take the hard way, the Spartan way—and work, work, work to build yourself into a rich, continually evolving entity.”

Thoreau continued: “What we do best or most perfectly is what we have most thoroughly learned by the longest practice, and at length it falls from us without our notice, as a leaf from a tree.”

QUOTE NOTE: Most quotation anthologies present the observation as A goal properly set is halfway reached. It is likely this latter version emerged in one of Ziglar’s many seminars.

QUOTATION CAUTION: So far, I’ve been unable to locate a quotation phrased in this exact way in any of Ziglar’s works. The closest I found was this one from Great Quotes from Zig Ziglar (2005): “What you get by reaching your destination isn’t nearly as important as what you become by reaching that destination.”

GOD

(includes SUPREME BEING; see also ATHEISM & AGNOSTICISM and CHRIST and DEITY and DEVIL and PRAYER and RELIGION and SPIRITUALITY and THEOLOGY and WORSHIP)

QUOTATION CAUTION: This quotation appears on the web sites of hundreds—perhaps thousands—of churches, and it even became the centerpiece of a 2005 national advertising campaign by the United Church of Christ (“God is Still Speaking”). The quotation has never been authenticated, however. It is commonly reported that Allen addressed the saying to husband George Burns in a letter she wrote to him just before her death. The story is almost certainly false—and, as often happens with apocryphal stories, it is often embellished with tantalizing details (the most popular is that Burns discovered the long-lost letter in his deceased wife’s papers many years after her death).

Amiel continued: “Every successful massacre is consecrated by a Te Deum and the clergy have never been wanting in benedictions for any victorious enormity.” [Te Deum is the title of an early Christian hymn of praise to God]

QUOTE NOTE: Anthony preceded the remark by saying: “The religious persecution of the ages has been carried on under what was claimed to be the command of God.”

The full passage is: “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.”

QUOTE NOTE: I believe this is the first appearance in the Bible of the God is Love metaphor. The full passage is: “He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.”

QUOTE NOTE: The metaphor of God-as-a-hypothetical construct was first advanced by the legendary French mathematician Pierre-Simon La Place. See his entry below.

QUOTE NOTE: Piccalilli is a relish made with vegetables and spices. For more, go to: Piccalilli.

QUOTE NOTE: This observation was almost certainly inspired by one of Plato’s lesser-known remarks. In Moralia (1st. c. A.D.), Plutarch quoted Plato as saying: “God ever geometrizes.”

This is the conclusion to an eighteen-line poem that began this way: “Create no images of God./Accept the images/that God has provided./They are everywhere,/in everything.”

President Carter preceded the observation by writing: “Except during my childhood, when I was probably influenced by Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel depiction of God with a flowing white beard, I have never tried to project the Creator in any kind of human likeness. The vociferous debates about whether God is male or female seem ridiculous to me.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the origin of popular saying: “The Lord moves in mysterious ways.” The saying is also often often wrongly believed to be a biblical passage.

QUOTE NOTE: For an earlier expression of this sentiment, see the R. Buckminster Fuller entry below.

QUOTE NOTE: Einstein sometimes described himself as an agnostic, and at other times as something closer to a pantheist. Never, however, did he express a belief in a personal God. In 1929, Herbert S. Goldstein a rabbi at the Institutional Synagogue in New York sent a cable to Einstein in which he famously asked: “Do you believe in God? Stop. Prepaid reply fifty words.” Einstein needed only twenty-nine words to reply, and his answer has become part of his legacy: “I believe in Spinoza’s God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings.”

Einstein went on to add: “My religiosity consists of a humble admiration of the infinitely superior spirit that reveals itself in the little that we can comprehend of the knowable world. That deeply emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God.”

QUOTE NOTE: The Pope’s address contradicted the support of his predecessor (Benedict XVI) for theories of creationism and intelligent design. Pope Francis added: “The Big Bang, which today we hold to be the origin of the world, does not contradict the intervention of the divine creator but, rather, requires it. Evolution in nature is not inconsistent with the notion of creation, because evolution requires the creation of beings that evolve.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is one of the earliest retail/wholesale metaphors I've found, and I think it holds up very well more than a century after it was first made. A retail business is concerned with individual customers, of course, and the God recognized by science, according to James, was a wholesaler, not a retailer. See also the later section on RETAIL/WHOLESALE METAPHORS.

QUOTE NOTE: Lamott wasn’t passing off this observation as her own, but said she got it in a conversation with “my priest friend Tom.” Later in the book, she attributed one additional observation to her clerical friend: “A priest friend of mine has cautioned me away from the standard God of our childhoods, who loves and guides you and then, if you are bad, roasts you: God as high school principal in a gray suit who never remembered your name but is always leafing unhappily through your files.”

QUOTE NOTE: This was said to be Laplace’s reply when asked by Napoleon why Méchanique celeste (Celestial Mechanics), his five-volume work on astronomy and the solar system made no reference to God. It is history’s first appearance of the metaphor of God as a hypothetical construct.

ERROR ALERT: The observation is often attributed directly to Lewis, but he was clearly quoting a friend. Earlier, Lewis had written: “Everyone has noticed how hard it is to turn our thoughts to God when everything is going well with us.” And then he went on to add: “Now God who has made us, knows what we are and that our happiness lies in him. Yet we will not seek it in Him as long as he leaves us any other resort where it can even plausibly be looked for.”

ERROR ALERT: This quotation is commonly misattributed—even in some otherwise respected sources—to Voltaire in the form: “God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.”

Later in the book, Merton wrote: “Anything our imagination tells us about Him is ultimately misleading and therefore we cannot know Him as He really is unless we pass beyond everything that can be imagined and enter into an obscurity without images and without the likeness of any created thing.”

O’Hair continued: “It won’t get them anywhere; it certainly won’t make them happier or more compassionate human beings; but if they want to chew that particular cud. they’re welcome to it.”

QUOTE NOTE: This popular example of chiasmus has also been commonly translated: “Which is it? Is man only God’s mistake or God only man’s mistake?”

QUOTE NOTE: This was originally part of a larger observation in which O’Rourke, a card-carrying Republican, advanced the argument that “God is a Republican and Santa Claus is a Democrat.” To see his complete analysis, go to: O’Rourke on God.

QUOTE NOTE: I’ve also seen the passage translated: “God, that checkroom of our dreams.”

Mother Teresa continued with the pencil metaphor by writing: “He does everything and sometimes it is really hard because it is a broken pencil and He has to sharpen it a bit.” In an even more quotable version of the sentiment, found in Gwen Costello’s Spiritual Gems from Mother Teresa (2008), the Albanian-born nun said: “I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world.”

QUOTE NOTE: The “grave divine” is believed to be John Donne.

GODS

(see also ATHEISM & AGNOSTICISM and CHRIST and DEITY and DEVIL and GOD and RELIGION and SPIRITUALITY and THEOLOGY)

This observation has also been commonly translated this way: “Man is certainly stark mad: he cannot make a flea, yet he makes gods by the dozens.”

QUOTE NOTE: Shakespeare was intimately familiar with the works of Plautus, borrowing plot elements as well as stock characters from his plays; it is also highly likely that his observation below was inspired by this passage.

GOLD

(see also ASSETS and CASH and DOLLAR and MILLIONAIRES & BILLIONAIRES and RICH & RICHES and RICH & POOR and SILVER and WEALTH)

Bierce continued: “The word was formerly spelled “God”—the l was inserted to distinguish it from the name of another and inferior deity.” Bierce was not the first to make the god/gold connection. That honor goes to the English writer Ben Jonson (see his entry below).

QUOTE NOTE: Here, Gray simply rephrases a proverbial saying from ancient times and immortalized in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice (to be seen below).

QUOTE NOTE: Jonson was the first to suggest that gold had a kind of divinity, cleverly tweaking the phrase almighty God into the expression almighty gold. For a later attempt at a similar metaphor, see Washington Irving’s almighty dollar observation in DOLLAR.

QUOTE NOTE: Another popular translation of the passage goes this way: “You know as well as I:/That daring enterprises go awry/Without hard cash. The metal men adore/Makes conquests possible in love and war.”

GOLDEN RULE

(see also ETHICS and MAXIMS and MORALITY and PRINCIPLES and RULES)

TOPIC NOTE: The Golden Rule—most commonly expressed as “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”—is one of history’s oldest ethical principles. The sentiment has been around for longer than most people realize, with the earliest versions appearing independently in China, India, Mesopotamia (current-day Iraq), and Egypt over four thousand years ago! Since the seventeenth century, the admonition has been known as The Golden Rule, but it is also commonly referred to it as The Law of Reciprocity.

Ash preceded the dehortation (yes, dehortation; check out my Neverisms book) by writing: “If you are an entrepreneur planning to start your own company, I can't think of a better place to begin than by operating your business by the Golden Rule. Make this a high priority.”

In Caring Enough to Hear and Be Heard (1982), Augsburger expressed the idea in a slightly different way: “Monologists, verbal road hogs who take up both sides of a conversation by usurping all the time or constantly turning the topic back to the self rather than pursuing common, similar of shared experiences, are violating the golden rule of hearing as I want to be heard.”

QUOTE NOTE, In Luke 6:31, Jesus is quoted as saying: “And as you wish that men would do to you, do so to them.”

Fielding continued: “This will most certainly oblige us to treat all mankind with the utmost civility and respect, there being nothing that we desire more than to be treated so by them.”

Gandhi went on to add: “The danger is that when we are surrounded by falsehood on all sides, we might be caught in it and begin to deceive ourselves.”

QUOTE NOTE: These are among Dr. King’s earliest public words, delivered when he was a fifteen-year-old high school junior. By winning the competition, young Martin won the right to represent his high school (Atlanta’s Booker T. Washington High School) in the statewide competition.

Twain went on to add: “It is strictly religious furniture, like an acolyte, or a contribution-plate, or any of these things. It is never intruded into business.”

GOLF

(see also ARCHERY and ATHLETES & ATHLETICISM and BADMINTON and BASEBALL and BASKETBALL and BODYBUILDING and BOWLING and BOXING and CANOEING & RAFTING and CAR RACING and CRICKET and CURLING and CYCLING and FENCING and FISHING and FOOTBALL and GYMNASTICS and HOCKEY and HORSE RACING and HUNTING and ICE SKATING and LACROSSE and MOUNTAINEERING & ROCK-CLIMBING and PICKLEBALL and POLO and POOL & BILLIARDS and RODEO and ROLLER SKATING and RUGBY and RUNNING & JOGGING and SAILING & YACHTING and SNOW SKIING & SKI-JUMPING and SOCCER and SPORT and SPORTS—MISC. TYPES and SURFING and TENNIS and TRACK & FIELD and VOLLEYBALL and SWIMMING & DIVING and WALKING and WEIGHTLIFTING and WRESTLING and YACHTING)

In his book, Adams also offered these thoughts:

“The game of golf has a way of divulging aspects of our character that we would probably prefer were left hidden, sometimes even from ourselves.”

“One of the things that makes the game of golf so unique is that professional golfers are independent contractors. Play well, you get paid. Miss the cut, and you get nothing.”

Alcott added: “Just when you think you’ve got it all figured out, the game jumps up and reminds you that nobody ever quite gets it.”

Andrews preceded the thought by writing: “Golf is a mistake. You must understand this elemental fact if you are ever going to come to terms with it. By rights golf should have remained a solitary Scottish occupation like tossing the caber, which is something a Scot would only be foolish enough to do.”

About the game, Bayan added: “The favored pastime of businessmen and their cronies, probably without a full appreciation of its metaphorical implications.”

I love books of quotable definitions and Beard—one of the founders of the satirical magazine National Lampoon—offered countless choice specimens in the book. Here’s a sampling:

“Triple Bogey: Three strokes more than par. Four strokes more than par is a quadruple bogey, 5 more is a quintuple, 6 is a sextuple, 7 is a throwuple, 8 is a blowuple, and 9 is a ohshutuple.”

In the book, Beard also offered these thoughts:

“Never wash your ball on the tee of a water hole.”

“It is as easy to lower your handicap as it is to reduce your hat size.”

Bishop went on to write: “Golf is played by 20 million immature American men whose wives think they are out there having fun.”

QUOTE NOTE: This was Bolt’s way of saying that Jack Nicklaus was a student of the game in a way that Ben Hogan never was. Nicklaus was famous for his work ethic and many stories have been told about how he was constantly trying to improve his game. The day after winning the 1986 Masters tournament at age 46, for example, he was seen taking a lesson on an aspect of his game that he felt wasn’t clicking for him.

Browning added: “Kentucky has done something similar, but less healthy, with fried chicken.”

Chopra continued: “Approaching the game from spirit, golf is no longer about winning but about growing. As much as some people make this game their religion, they haven’t yet found its spiritual core. Golf is meant to be a journey to mastery, and when you achieve that mastery, your life in general will be enormously expanded.”

QUOTATION CAUTION: Over the years, this observation has appeared in a number of slightly different phrasings, including this one:

“Golf is a game whose aim is to hit a very small ball into an even smaller hole, with weapons singularly ill-designed for the purpose.”

The observation is regarded by many as one of the best golf quotations of all time, even though serious quotation researchers are in general agreement that Churchill is not the original author, and probably didn't even say it. For example, in his respected Churchill by Himself (2008) book, Richard Langworth includes the saying in an appendix titled “Red Herrings: False Attributions”). For more, see this 2011 Quote Investigator post.

QUOTE NOTE: While Cleghorn wrote about many subjects, she was passionately devoted to social causes and frequently wrote poems to express her rage at social injustice, as she does in this stinging portrayal of the evils of child labor. What makes the poem so effective is the powerful reversal of what is with what should be true: in a just society, laboring men should be looking out and seeing children at play. In his Dictionary of Quotations (1968), Bergen Evans called this poem “One of the world’s great strokes of irony.”

I'm a big fan of irony, and one of my favorite experiences in life is seeing people say things about any topic without sensing the irony in their remarks. Clinton said this exactly ten years after making one of the most egregious self-inflicted wounds in the history of the U. S. presidency.

A little later in the essay, Cooke wrote: “For every game of golf is an open exhibition of overweening ambition, courage deflated by stupidity, skill soured by a whiff of arrogance.”

Cooke continued: “To get an elementary grasp of the game, a human must learn, by endless practice, a continuous and subtle series of highly unnatural movements, involving about sixty-four muscles, that result in a seemingly ‘natural’ swing, taking all of two seconds to begin and end.”

ERROR ALERT: Many internet sites mistakenly attribute this quotation to the New York Times sportswriter Arthur Daley.

Dobereiner continued: “The unimaginative clod with a sound method can make a good golfer, but it takes brains to make a great one.”

Dobereiner continued: “He was in no mind to make the game easier or less trying, but rather sought to increase its natural difficulties, recognizing even in his recreation, that the harder the struggle, the greater was the joy of mastery.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the way the quotation is typically presented, but it was originally the conclusion to this larger observation: “While there are critics who believe my courses are too difficult, the ardent golfer would play Mount Everest if somebody would put a flagstick on top.”

Eichler went on to add: “It is the kind of game that must be played enthusiastically and constantly.”

The narrator, who is describing a golf shot by James Bond, continued: “In this case, the club face had gone through just that one millimeter too low under the ball. The arc of flight was high and soft—no legs. Why the hell hadn’t he taken a spoon or a two iron off that lie? The ball hit the lip of the far bunker and fell back. Now it was the blaster, and fighting for a half.”

The golf scene between Bond and Goldfinger was inspired by Fleming’s own experience with the game, mirroring in part his participation in a 1957 doubles tournament at the Berkshire Golf Club, when he partnered with the British Open-winner Peter Thomson.

QUOTE NOTE: This thought comes to Bond’s mind during a golf match with Goldfinger, a notorious golf cheater. In the book, the narrator continued: “But that was no good in this match. Bond had no intention of playing the man again. And it was no use starting a you-did-I-didn’t argument unless he caught Goldfinger doing something even more outrageous. Bond would just have to try and beat him, cheating and all.”

See also the Robin Williams entry below.

In the book, Gallwey also offered these other observations:

“Golf is one of the few sports in which a novice can, on occasion, perform like a champion.”

“There is…a seductive quality to golf found in few other sports. In moments of frustration many players vow to quit, but few are able to. For some reason, the two or three ‘triumphs’ during a round are remembered long after the exasperating failures and dull mediocrity are forgotten.”

The Doctor continued: “In a golf course everything is calculated, limited, and foreseen—even the hazards. Every blade of grass is registered—even the weeds.”

QUOTE NOTE: The words come from Justice Trout, who is ruling in a legal proceeding against a golfer accused of “ungentlemanly conduct” on a golf course. He began his ruling by saying: “Elderly gentlemen, gentle in all respects, kind to animals, beloved by children, and fond of music, are found in lonely corners of the downs, hacking at sandpits or tussocks of grass, and muttering in a blind, ungovernable fury elaborate maledictions which could not be extracted from them by robbery or murder. Men who would face torture without a word become blasphemous at the short fourteenth.”

In Pickering’s book, he also quoted Hope as saying this about a recent game of golf he had with U. S. President Gerald Ford: “Whenever I play with him, I usually try to make it a foursome—Ford, me, a paramedic, and a faith healer.” To see a remark Ford made about Bob Hope, see the Ford entry above.

Hutchinson, one of the leading golfers of his era, was also, through his books and essays, one of the great popularizers of the sport. He preceded the thought by writing: “There is every reason to believe that the golf ball is obedient to the laws of dynamics rather than to your modest impassioned prayers or imprecations. Any good effect that can ensue from giving vent to the feelings must therefore be purely subjective.”

QUOTE NOTE: At the time, a niblick was a pitching iron with an extra-heavy head and typically used when playing out of bunkers. It had a loft equivalent to a modern nine-iron or sand wedge.

Jenkins continued: “And it was. In that moment on the 1st tee, I suddenly felt blinded and flushed, and that I would like to be somewhere else. Bolivia, maybe.”

The obituary quoted Jenkins as continuing this way: “He knows he has used straight shafts, curved shafts, shiny shafts, dull shafts, glass shafts, oak shafts and Great Uncle Clyde’s World War I saber, which he found in the attic. Attached to these shafts have been putter heads made of large lumps of lead (‘weight makes the ball roll true,’ salesmen explain) and slivers of aluminum (‘lightness makes the ball roll true,’ salesmen explain) as well as every other substance harder than a marshmallow. He knows he has tried 41 different stances, inspired by everyone from the club pro to Fred Astaire in ‘Flying Down to Rio’ and as many different strokes. Still, he knows he is hopelessly trapped. He can’t putt, and he never will, and the only thing left for him to do is bury his head in the dirt and live the rest of his life like a radish.”

QUOTE NOTE: In 1931 Warner Brothers produced a series of twelve short films that were designed to be shown just prior to the feature films being shown in American movie theaters (they added six more in 1933). The films also featured appearances from such popular Warner Brothers actors as James Cagney, Joe E. Brown, Edward G. Robinson, W.C. Fields, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., and Loretta Young.

The films were so popular—and so much of a moneymaker for Jones—that he was forced to give up his amateur golfing status. After a few years, the films were put into storage and lost for decades. When a surviving print was finally located in the 1990s, they were put into video format for preservation. All in all, 18 shorts were preserved and ultimately released in a 2012 DVD collection. They still occasionally air on Turner Classic Movies (TCM). Here’s one other quotation from the series:

“Golf is the closest game to the game we call life. You get bad breaks from good shots; you get good breaks from bad shots—but you have to play the ball where it lies.”

In the book, Jones also wrote: “In order to win, you must play your best golf when you need it most, and play your sloppy stuff when you can afford it. I shall not attempt to explain how you achieve this happy timing.”

In the book, Jones also wrote:

“The real way to enjoy playing golf is to take pleasure not in the score, but in the execution of strokes.”

“I always like to see a person stand up to a golf ball as though he were perfectly at home in its presence.”

“I get as much fun as the next man from whaling the ball as hard as I can and catching it squarely on the button. But from sad experience I learned not to try this in a round that meant anything.”

“Golf is recognized as one of the more difficult games to play or teach. One reason for this is that each person necessarily plays by feel, and a feel is almost impossible to describe.”

In the book, Lansky also wrote: “Talking to a golf ball won't do you any good, unless you do it while your opponent is teeing off.”

In the book, Lema also wrote: “Golf is like solitaire. When you cheat, you cheat only yourself.”

In his book, Pickering also quoted Lloyd George as saying, “You get to know more of the character of a man in a round of golf than in six months of political experience.”

I love to see familiar sayings altered in humorous ways, and Martin’s tweak of the popular PSA slogan “If you drink, don’t drive” was absolutely inspired, in my opinion.

QUOTE NOTE: Milne, the creator of Winnie the Pooh, was an exceptional golfer, at one point even getting his handicap down to single figures. He often golfed as many as three times a week at such famous English courses as The Addington, Walton Heath, and Royal Wimbledon.

In the book, Nicklaus also wrote: “Nobody—but nobody—has ever become really proficient at golf without practice, without doing a lot of thinking and then hitting a lot of shots. It isn’t so much a lack of talent; it’s a lack of being able to repeat good shots consistently that frustrates most players. And the only answer to that is practice.”

Ochoa was referring to the 2005 Safeway International tournament, in which she blew a four-shot lead with three holes to play, and then lost to Annika Sorenstam in a playoff. She won the tournament in 2007.

Oman went on to add: “If eighteen minutes aren’t enough, go for twenty-seven or thirty-six…whatever feels right.”

O’Rourke went on to add: “A good golf bore can produce a regular Odyssey of tedium. And golf allows banal sports chitchat to be elevated to the plane of theoretical physics. An absolute lunkhead…turns into Stephen Hawking on the subject of golf.”

QUOTE NOTE: In making this observation, Palmer was almost certainly inspired by a similar observation from Bobby Jones, first offered in 1931 and seen above.

In the book, Palmer was also quoted as saying, “The most rewarding things you do in life are often the ones that look like they cannot be done.”

ERROR ALERT: In Paul Dickson’s otherwise wonderful book Golf is . . .: Defining the Great Game (2012), this quotation is mistakenly attributed directly to Chopra. In his Foreword to the book, Parnevik continued: “No other sport gives you the roller-coaster ride of emotions that golf does. The peaks consist of pure ecstasy and the lows are full of despair and anger. The danger lies in letting the latter get the upper hand.”

Penick preceded the thought by writing: “Playing golf you learn a form of meditation. For the four hours you are on the course, you learn to focus on the game and clean your mind of worrisome thoughts.”

Penick continued: “There’s no need to get your body twisted into some kind of funny shape. If you were going to shake hands with someone, you wouldn’t bend sideways or slump sharply forward like so many beginners do.”

In the book, Penick also offered these thoughts:

“Play the shot you can play the best, not the shot that would look the best if you could pull it off.”

“All seasoned players know, or at least have felt, that when you are playing your best, you are much the same as in a state of meditation. You are free of tension and chatter. You are concentrating on one thing. It is the ideal condition for good golf.”

In the book, Rodriguez also wrote: “Remember you have to be comfortable. Golf is not a life or death situation. It’s just a game and should be treated as such. Stay loose.”

In his book, Liebman also quoted Rodriquez as once saying: “I never exaggerate. I just remember big.”

In making this observation, Suggs was almost certainly inspired by a famous 1933 remark by Arnold Daly, seen above.

quoted in David Pickering, Cassell’s Sports Quotations (2000)

QUOTE NOTE: Trevino was famous for his clever quips and wisecracks, and this is one of his most famous. He was replying to a reporter who asked what he would do the next time he was caught in a thunderstorm. At the 1975 Western Open, Trevino was sheltering from a storm when he was struck by a bolt of lightning and knocked unconscious. He was hospitalized for his injuries and ultimately required two back surgeries to repair the damage.

ERROR ALERT: Despite its widespread popularity, this observation has never been found in any of Twain’s writings or talks, and should be considered apocryphal. According to Fred Shapiro and his Yale Dictionary of Quotations (2006), a Wisconsin newspaper, The Stevens Point Daily Journal, offered the first published version of the sentiment in a Dec. 19, 1913 issue: “Golf, of course, has been defined as a good walk spoiled.” The original author of the sentiment remains unknown.

According to Garson O’Toole, AKA “The Quote Investigator,” the earliest attribution to Twain appeared in an August, 1948 edition of The Saturday Evening Post. For more, see this 2010 Quote Investigator post.

Updike continued: “But, unlike marriage, golf is war from the start; it is out of its regulated contention, its mathematical bloodshed, that the fervor of golf camaraderie blossoms and, from week to week, flourishes. We slay or are slain, eat or are eaten: golf camaraderie is founded on the solid and ancient ground of animal enmity, pleasantly disguised in checked slacks and small courtesies.”

Updike continued: “Since its rules can be infracted in the privacy of a sand bunker or a sumac grove, it tests the conscience. And it is the only professional game that, under the stress of ever bigger bucks and crowds, hasn’t lost its manners.”

Updike continued: “On the ski slopes, the daughter quickly outspeeds the father; at the backgammon table, the mother consistently outsmarts the son; but on the golf course, we play our parents and our children with unfeigned competitive excitement, once the handicap strokes are in place on the card.”

Updike continued: “Like children trying to walk and bear cubs trying to climb a tree, they are lovable in their imperfection and then all the more lovable in their occasional triumphs of muscle and will.”

QUOTE NOTE: For a similar comment, see the Kinky Friedman entry above. And to view Robin Williams’s classic comedy routine on how the Scottish invented golf go here.

In the book, Wodehouse also wrote:

“It is the glorious uncertainty of golf that makes it the game it is.”

“Back horses or go down to Throgmorton Street and try to take it away from the Rothschilds, and I will applaud you as a shrewd and cautious financier. But to bet at golf is pure gambling.”

QUOTE NOTE: “The Prelude” is an lengthy autobiographical poem written in blank verse. Originally intended as the introduction to the never-finished philosophical poem “The Recluse,” it is a deeply personal work that reveals a host of information about Wordsworth’s life. Wordsworth began writing the poem in 1798, at the age of 28, and continued to work on it throughout his life (he died in 1850). He never gave it a title, but called it the “Poem (title not yet fixed upon) to Coleridge” in letters to his sister Dorothy Wordsworth. The work was largely unknown until the final version was published shortly after Wordsworth’s death. Wordsworth’s widow Mary formally titled the work.

In the book, Zaharias also wrote:

“Some of us are fortunate enough to play championship golf, but this isn’t essential in the enjoyment of the game.”

“I expect to play golf until I am 90—even longer if anybody figures out a way to swing a club from a rocking chair.”

GOOD & BAD

(see also BAD and GOOD and GOOD & EVIL and VICE and VICE & VIRTUE and)

GOOD & EVIL

(see also BAD and DARKNESS METAPHORS and DEVIL and EVIL and GOOD and GOOD & BAD and SIN and VICE and VICE & VIRTUE and WICKEDNESS)

A moment earlier, Dyson introduced the thought by writing: “We all know that religion has been historically, and still is today, a cause of great evil as well as great good in human affairs.”

Greene continued: “Human nature is not black and white but black and grey.”

Jackson continued: “Evil is arguable, but good is not. Therefore the Devil always wins the argument.”

Galt added: “In that transfusion of blood which drains the good to feed the evil, the compromiser is the transmitting rubber tube.”

QUOTE NOTE: This comes from Marc Antony’s funeral oration. It was preceded by the famous words: “Friends, Romans, countryman, lend me your ears;/I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.”

Solzhenitsyn preceded the thought by writing: “If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them.”

ERROR ALERT: This is how the quotation appears in Princeton University Press’s English translation of Todorov’s Hope and Memory. Almost all internet sites, however, present the following version of the observation: “We should not be simply fighting evil in the name of good, but struggling against the certainties of people who claim always to know where good and evil are to be found.”

GOOD WILL

[Doing] GOOD

(in clouds [Good] DEEDS; see also ALTRUISM and COMPASSION and DEEDS and GENEROSITY and GIFT and GIVING and GOODNESS and HOSPITALITY and KINDNESS and SELFISHNESS and VIRTUE)

Franklin continued: “And the Scripture assures me, that at the last Day, we shall not be examin’d [for] what we thought, but what we did; and our Recommendation will not be that we said Lord, Lord, but that we did GOOD to our Fellow Creatures.”

Yet another example of the literary device of chiasmus.

QUOTE NOTE: This comes from Quindlen’s bestselling (over a million copies sold) book, an expanded version of a commencement address she planned to deliver—but did not give—at Villanova University’s graduation ceremonies in 1999. Quindlen, a liberal-leaning Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, withdrew after learning that a group of conservative students were planning to demonstrate against her appearance (she explained that she didn’t want to “ruin the day or case a shadow” on the ceremonies, adding: “I don’t think you should have to walk through demonstrators to get to your college commencement”). After e-mailing the text of her speech to a Villanova student who expressed disappointment about not being able to hear it, the written address exploded in popularity on the internet. It is now often described as one of history’s best commencement speeches, even though it was never actually delivered. Elements of the speech—along with thoughtful commentary on it—may be seen at Quindlen Commencement Speech.

Schweitzer continued: “You must give some time to your fellow man. Even if it is a little thing, do something for those who have need of help, something for which you get no pay but the privilege of doing it. For remember, you don’t live in a world all your own. Your brothers are here too.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the way the quotation is almost always presented these days, but you should know that it is a fairly liberal translation of an observation that has traditionally been presented this way: “A minister of state is excusable for the harm he does when the helm of government has forced his hand in a storm; but in the calm he is guilty of all the good he does not do.”

GOODBYE

(see also FAREWELL and PARTING)

Lyon continued: “Good-bye/hello, good-bye/hello, like the sound of a rocking chair.”

GOODNESS & THE GOOD

(see also ALTRUISM and COMPASSION and GENEROSITY and GIFT and GIVING and [Doing] GOOD and GOOD & BAD and GOOD & EVIL and KINDNESS and SELFISHNESS and VIRTUE)

Mrs. March continued: “Even if it is, the consciousness of possessing and using it well should satisfy one, and the great charm of all power is modesty.”

QUOTE NOTE: Auden preceded this passage by writing the familiar words: “Evil is unspectacular and always human,/And shares our bed and eats at our own table.”

QUOTE NOTE: The title of Brecht’s play has been presented in different ways over the years. In 1990, it was presented by Michael Hofmann as The Good Person of Sichuan, in 1997 by Tony Kushner as The Good Person of Szechwan, and in 2008 by David Harrower as The Good Soul of Szechuan.

QUOTE NOTE: Brooks felt his admonition was especially relevant to those leadership and management positions. He preceded the thought by writing: “I beg you to think of this, you who are set in positions of superintendence and authority.”

Brooks continued: “People of small caliber are always carping. They are bent on showing their own superiority, their knowledge or their prowess or good breeding.”

Burns continued: “And whatever injures society at large or any individual in it, this is my measure of iniquity.”

The narrator continued: “But, as it often happens, that the best men are but little known, and consequently cannot extend the usefulness of their examples a great way; the writer may be called in aid to spread their history farther, and to present the amiable pictures to those who have not the happiness of knowing the originals; and so, by communicating such valuable patterns to the world, he may, perhaps, do a more extensive service to mankind than the person whose life originally afforded the pattern.”

QUOTE NOTE: Frank was talking about her ideals here. Here’s the full passage: “I’s really a wonder that I haven’t dropped all my ideals because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death.”

QUOTATION CAUTION: Benham notes that this quotation has been attributed to Marcus Aurelius, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and others, but he finds “some authority in favor of Stephen Grellett” (an American of French birth), even though it has not been found in his works. In the Yale Book of Quotations (2006), Fred Shapiro traced the simple expression “I will not pass this way again” to 1858, where it was quoted anonymously.

QUOTE NOTE: Haley offered this thought in a number of slightly different variations over the years, and he did it with such frequency that it became his signature saying (the earliest published version has never been found, however). The words are inscribed on Haley’s gravestone in Henning, Tennessee, and the saying became the official slogan of a U.S. Coast Guard ship in honor of Haley, who served in the USCG from 1939 to 1959. Haley’s biographer Robert J. Norrell believes the first version of the saying was “Find something good and praise it,” and that it first emerged when Haley worked for Reader’s Digest in the early 1960s.

In yet another meditation on the same theme, Marcus Aurelius wrote: “Live not as though there were a thousand years ahead of you. Fate is at your elbow; make yourself good while life and power are still yours.”

QUOTE NOTE: This comes from an essay with a lengthy title: “That the Taste of Good and Evil Depends in Large Part on the Opinion we Have of Them.” The quotation above has also been translated this way: “Confidence in the goodness of another is good proof of one’s own goodness.”

Thoreau preceded the observation by writing: “There is never an instant’s truce between virtue and vice.”

GOSSIP

(see also BACKBITING and CALUMNY and CRITICISM and NEWS and PETTINESS and PUBLICITY and REPUTATION and RUMOR and SCANDAL and SECRECY & SECRETS and SLANDER)

Alexander continued: “And once the first stone, or word, is cast, it is already beyond recall.”

QUOTE NOTE: According to quotation researcher Barry Popik, this was the first appearance of the saying in print.

The narrator continued: “Irresponsible because it is at the expense of another person who is not there to defend herself. Irresponsible because it is not constructive: it helps no one, least of all the person being gossiped about.”

Buckrose added: “But the wrong sort of gossip is responsible for half the misery of the world.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is how the quotation is usually presented, but it was part of a fuller observation when Capote first advanced the thought. Earlier in the year, Esquire magazine printed three chapters from Capote’s long-anticipated novel Answered Prayers. The chapters were filled with numerous gossipy tidbits that resulted in widespread speculation about the real identities of the novel’s characters. In response to the question, “Is gossip literature?” Capote replied:

“Of course it is—and, in fact, my entire book is gossip. I don’t deny that for an instant. What I say is that all literature is gossip, certainly all prose-narrative literature. What in God’s green earth is Anna Karenina or War and Peace or Madame Bovary if not gossip? Or Jane Austen? Or Proust? Gossip is the absolute exchange of human communication. It can be two ladies at the back fence or Tolstoy writing War and Peace.”

In her 1988 writing guide Starting From Scratch, Rita Mae Brown picked up on the theme when she wrote: “I believe all literature started as gossip.”

This was the conclusion to an oft-quoted passage that went this way: “Men have always detested women’s gossip because they suspect the truth: their measurements are being taken and compared. In the most paranoid societies (Arab, Orthodox Jewish) the women are kept completely under wraps (or under wigs) and separated from the world as much as possible. They gossip anyway: the original form of consciousness-raising. Men can mock it, but they can’t prevent it.”

McGinley added: “Gossip is the tool of the poet, the shop-talk of the scientist, and the consolation of the housewife, wit, tycoon, and intellectual. It begins in the nursery and ends when speech is past.”

Russell continued: “Accordingly most gossip is untrue, but care is taken not to verify it. Our neighbor’s sins, like the consolations of religion, are so agreeable that we do not stop to scrutinize the evidence closely.”

QUOTE NOTE: According to quotation sleuth Barry Popik, this is the earliest appearance of a metaphor Smith would repeat many times in her career. For example, in a 1982 article in Working Woman magazine, she wrote: “Gossip is not always bad or slanderous. I always say that gossip is just news running ahead of itself in a red satin dress.” In that 1978 Times Herald interview, Smith also attributed a memorable gossip metaphor to Walter Winchell. See his entry below.

Smith continued: “Gossip is for leisure, for fun, for entertainment, for relaxation. Should the day come when we are enduring big, black headlines about war, famine, terrorism, and natural disaster—then that kind of news will drive gossip underground and out of sight. Then, we won’t have gossip to kick around any longer.”

Spacks went on to add: “The atmosphere of erotic titillation suggests gossip’s implicit voyeurism. Surely everyone feels—although some suppress—the same prurient interest in others’ privacies, what goes on behind closed doors. Poring over fragments of other people’s lives, peering into their bedrooms when they don’t know we’re there, we thrill to the glamour and the power of secret knowledge, partly detoxified but also heightened by being shared.”

GOVERN & GOVERNING

(see also GOVERNMENT & THE STATE)

GOVERNMENT & THE STATE

(see also BUREAUCRACY and CHURCH & STATE and DEMAGOGUES & DEMAGOGY and GOVERNING and POLITICS & POLITICIANS and POLITICIANS—DESCRIBING THEMSELVES and POLITICIANS—DESCRIBED BY OTHERS and POLITICS & BUSINESS and POLITICS & RELIGION)

Adams continued: “There may be more danger of this than some even of our well disposed citizens may imagine.”

ERROR ALERT: All over the Internet, this quotation is mistakenly presented in the following way: “Secrecy, being an instrument of conspiracy, ought never to be the system of a regular government.”

Justice Brandeis preceded this famous judicial opinion by writing: “Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers.”

Caldicott preceded the thought by writing: “The problem with addicted people, communities, corporations, or countries is that they tend to lie, cheat, or steal to get their ‘fix’.”

QUOTE NOTE: Child (1802-1880) was writing in opposition to a 1789 Massachusetts law prohibiting marriage between “any white person” and “any Negro Indian, or Mulatto” (the law was repealed in 1843). She continued: “A man has at least as good a right to choose his wife as he has to choose his religion. His taste may not suit his neighbors; but so long as his deportment is correct, they have no right to interfere with his concerns.”

QUOTE NOTE: Croker used the English terms Tory and Whig (corresponding to the American terms Conservative and Liberal) to describe these two streams of thought. He added: “The human mind divides itself into these classes as naturally and as inconsiderately…as it does into indolence and activity, obstinacy and indecision, temerity and versatility, or any other of the various different or contradictory moods of the mind.”

QUOTE NOTE: Houston’s observation, a clever oxymoronic observation, also brings to mind Sen. Eugene McCarthy’s legendary 1979 observation: “The only thing that saves us from the bureaucracy is inefficiency.”

QUOTE NOTE: Ivins first introduced this thought six years earlier in an article (titled “Wiggy Republicans”) in Mother Jones magazine (Sep./Oct., 1992): “Government is just a tool, like a hammer. There’s nothing intrinsically good or evil about the hammer; it all depends on what it’s used for and the skill with which it is used.”

After mentioning abuses of power in Monarchies and Aristocracies, Madison went on to write: “In Republics, the great danger is that the majority may not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority.”

QUOTATION CAUTION; In Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations (2010), the editors at The Library of Congress say of this quotation: “Unverified in Nathan’s works.”

These are the concluding words of the book. O’ Rourke preceded the thought by writing: “Authority has always attracted the lowest elements in the human race. All through history mankind has been bullied by scum. Those who lord it over their fellows and toss commands in every direction and would boss the grass in the meadow about which way to bend in the wind are the most depraved kind of prostitutes. They will submit to any indignity, perform any vile act, do anything to achieve power.”

ERROR ALERT: Many web sites, especially those with a conservative or libertarian bent, mistakenly present intolerant instead of the correct intolerable. As a result, the error continues to be repeated (libertarian columnist John Stossel made the mistake in a 2013 Tweet of Paine’s famous observation).

QUOTE NOTE: Reagan was simply a former actor with political aspirations when he made this remark in a stump speech during his 1965 run for governor of California. The idea was not original to Reagan, however; he simply re-worked an observation from English clergyman Ronald Knox (1888–1957), who had defined baby this way: “A loud noise at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.”

Reagan, who was President-elect at the writing of the piece, continued: “If you turn the wheel a few degrees, it must come along gradually, lest it capsize. So, though we shall move deliberately, with clearly identified goals, we won’t do so in haste.”

QUOTE NOTE: Ronald Reagan may not have been the first person to liken the government to a slow-moving ocean liner, but he was the first American president to do so. President Barack Obama employed versions of the metaphor on several occasions—and often gets credit for originating it—but he was simply repeating a sentiment that President Reagan had offered three decades earlier. For more, including a sampling of Obama’s similar observations, see Barry Popik’s informative 2016 post in The Big Apple website.

QUOTE NOTE: This is the first appearance of a metaphor about governments strategically leaking information to journalists in an attempt to serve their own purposes. Reporting on the deliberations of The Big Four at the end of WWII, Reston more fully wrote:

“Reports of what went on at those meetings got out. Some of the reports were false and misleading, but since governments are the only vessels that leak from the top, a good deal of accurate information leaked out, including the central point that the Big Four agreed on practically nothing.”

Reston continued to offer the metaphor—in slightly varying ways—over the next several decades. In a 1956 New York Times article, for example, he wrote: “A government is the only known vessel that leaks from the top.” For more, see this 2010 post from master quotation researcher Barry Popik

Tuchman continued: “In this sphere, wisdom, which may be defined as the exercise of judgment acting on experience, common sense, and available information, is less operative and more frustrated than it should be. Why do holders of high office so often act contrary to the way reason points and enlightened self-interest suggests? Why does intelligent mental process seem so often not to function?”

QUOTE NOTE: In his review of recent political books, Wicker explained his decision to forego the reading of one book “because I have come to know enough about government not to expect to see much done about waste and mismanagement, and not to expect my taxes to go down if anybody should do anything about waste and mismanagement. Wicker’s Law is that government expands to absorb revenue, and then some.” A little over a decade later, Harold Faber formally enshrined the observation as “Wicker’s Law” in The Book of Laws (1979). Thanks to Barry Popik for his research on the quotation.

GRACE

(see also ADROITNESS and BREEDING and CULTIVATION and DIGNITY and DISGRACE and ELEGANCE and ETIQUETTE and FINISH and FORM and GALLANTRY and [State of] GRACE and GRACEFULNESS and POLISH and POISE and REFINEMENT and STYLE)

QUOTE NOTE: Here’s how Parker introduced the topic in her profile: “That brings me to the point which I have been trying to reach all this time: Ernest Hemingway’s definition of courage—his phrase that, it seems to me, makes Barrie’s ‘Courage is immortality’ sound like one of the more treble trillings of Tinker Bell. Mr. Hemingway did not use the term ‘courage.’ Ever the euphemist, he referred to the quality as ‘guts,’ and he was attributing its possession to an absent friend.” Parker then asked: “Exactly what do you mean by ‘guts’?” Hemingway matter-of-factly replied, “I mean, grace under pressure.” Hemingway had used the phrase once before (in an April 20, 1926 letter to F. Scott Fitzgerald), but it was the New Yorker profile that gave it currency. It is now one of Hemingway’s most popular quotations, and is sometimes mistakenly presented on internet sites as courage is grace under pressure.

Later in the essay, Schiller went on to add: “Grace can be found only in movement, for a modification which takes place in the soul can only be manifested in the sensuous world as movement.”

William preceded the thought by writing: “Faith defies logic and propels us beyond hope because it is not attached to our desires.”

[Saying] GRACE

(see also BLESSING and GRACE and PRAYER)

GRACIOUSNESS

(see also CULTIVATION and DIGNITY and ELEGANCE and FINISH and GALLANTRY and GRACEFULNESS and POLISH and POISE and REFINEMENT and STYLE)

Stoddard Continued: “When we’re conscious of all the good and beautiful things and people in our lives, not judging, but living in continuous gratitude, we’re free to connect with the great, timeless truth. When we show appreciation, we’re recognizing the divinity within us, our true identity.”

GRAMMAR

(see also PARTS OF SPEECH and PUNCTUATION and PUNCTUATION METAPHORS and LANGUAGE USAGE and SPELLING)

Chandler added: “And when I interrupt the velvety smoothness of my more or less literate syntax with a few sudden words of barroom vernacular, this is done with the eyes wide open and the mind relaxed but attentive. The method may not be perfect, but it is all I have. I think your proofreader is kindly attempting to steady me on my feet, but much as I appreciate the solicitude, I am really able to steer a fairly clear course, provided I get both sidewalks and the street between.” For a similar complaint about an over-enthusiastic copyeditor, see the Edward Abbey entry in PUNCTUATION.

Chute added: “You may loathe it, it may bore you, but nothing will replace it, and, once mastered, it will support you like a rock.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the way the quotation is typically presented, but it was originally part of this larger passage: “Grammar is a piano I play by ear, since I seem to have been out of school the year the rules were mentioned. All I know about grammar is its infinite power. To shift the structure of a sentence alters the meaning of that sentence as definitely and inflexibly as the position of a camera alters the meaning of the object photographed.”

Didion may have been influenced by a similar observation from Mark Twain’s Autobiography: “I know grammar by ear only, not by note, not by the rules.” See the complete Twain passage below.

Lynch continued: “Pedantic and vicious debates over knotty matters such as PREPOSITIONS AT THE END, THAT VERSUS WHICH, and SPLIT INFINITIVES may be entertaining to those who enjoy cockfights, but do little to improve writing.”

Sapir preceded the observation by writing: “Were a language ever completely ‘grammatical,’ it would be a perfect engine of conceptual expression. Unfortunately, or luckily, no language is tyrannically consistent.”

Twain continued: “Even this reviewer, this purist, with all his godless airs, has made two or three slips. At least I think he has. I am almost sure, by witness of my ear, but cannot be positive, for I know grammar by ear only, not by note, not by the rules.”

GRANDIOSITY & THE GRANDIOSE

(see also DELUSIONS OF GRANDEUR)

GRANDCHILDREN

(includes GRANDDAUGHTERS and GRANDSONS; see also CHILDREN and FAMILY and FATHERS and GRANDPARENTS and MOTHERS and PARENTS and YOUTH)

ERROR ALERT: This observation is commonly misattributed to Gore Vidal, but he clearly attributed it to his grandfather in his memoir.

GRANDPARENTS

(see also CHILDREN and FAMILY and FATHERS and GRANDPARENTS and MOTHERS and PARENTS and YOUTH & AGE)

According to Kaminski, Mrs. Adams also offered this thought about grandchildren in a 1790 letter: “There is nothing that enlivens us so much as having these little creatures round us.”

QUOTE NOTE: Alcott was twenty-four when she wrote this. It was the conclusion to an entry that began this way: “Grandma Alcott came to visit us. A sweet old lady; and I am glad to know her, and see where Father got his nature. Eighty-four; yet very smart, industrious, and wise.”

QUOTE NOTE: Haley expressed this notion on a number of occasions. In an Oct. 16, 1989 issue of Jet magazine, he was quoted as saying: “No one can do for children what grandparents do. Grandparents sort of sprinkle stardust over the lives of children.”

La Follette continued: “Our parents were busy, hard-working people with a large family. They had little time and not much patience. But there was always Grandpa, who had both in abundance, who was gay, lovable and understanding and whose love never failed us. I shall never cease to be grateful for the sense of security he gave us.”

Shimberg continued: “Mindful of their own child-rearing errors (and acutely aware of those being made daily by their adult child), grandparents become a safe harbor when the sailing gets rough. It offer one that rarity in life—a second chance.”

GRASS

(see also GARDEN and LANDSCAPING and LAWN and NATURE and WEEDS)

[Taking Things For] GRANTED

A moment later, Bardwick added: “In that sense, the pain of failure creates the largest opportunities for progress.”

L’Engle continued: “It stops us from taking anything for granted. It has also taught me a lot about living in the immediate moment. I am somehow managing to live one day, one hour at a time.”

Ozick continued: “And this is the chief vein and deepest point regarding the Ordinary: that it does deserve our gratitude. The Ordinary lets us live out our humanity; it doesn’t scare us, it doesn’t excite us.”

[Instant] GRATIFICATION

(see also GRATIFICATION and NEEDS and DESIRES)

GRATITUDE

(includes GRATEFULNESS and THANKFULNESS; see also APPRECIATION and DUTY and OBLIGATION)

ERROR ALERT: Almost all internet sites mistakenly attribute the first portion of this observation to Henry Ward Beecher.

Ballou continued: “While its opponent, ingratitude is a deadly weed; not only poisonous in itself, but impregnating the very atmosphere in which it grows with fetid vapors.”

QUOTE NOTE: Sadly, many quotation anthologies present only the first portion of this observation. In my view, its full impact can only be felt when it is read in its entirety. The first portion has also been commonly translated this way: “In normal life one is often not at all aware that we always receive infinitely more than we give, and that gratitude is what enriches life.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the way the quotation typically appears, but it originally occurred in an interaction between Daniel and Mrs. Meyrick. After she made a statement about the depth of a mother’s love, Daniel said, “Is not that the way with friendship, too?” adding with a smile, “We must not let the mothers be too arrogant.” Mrs. Meyrick shook her head as she continued darning, replying: “It is easier to find an old mother than an old friend. Friendships begin with liking or gratitude—roots that can be pulled up. Mother’s love begins deeper down.”

ERROR ALERT: This quotation is widely misattributed to Benjamin Franklin.

Jung continued: “The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child.”

QUOTE NOTE: Another popular translation of the maxim goes this way: “In most of mankind gratitude is merely a secret hope for greater favors.”

ERROR ALERT: On hundreds of internet sites, this beautiful sentiment is mistakenly attributed to the writer Doris Lessing, usually in the following phrasing: “A simple grateful thought turned heavenwards is the most perfect prayer.”

Levine went on to add: “Just as in the cultivation of compassion, we may feel the pain of others, so we may begin to feel their joy as well. And it doesn’t stop there.”

QUOTE NOTE: Gratitude is generally associated with “counting your blessings,” but Mann makes a strong case for being grateful for everything that results in our growth as human beings, including the suffering. Mann’s full remarks may be seen at Princeton Alumni Weekly.

QUOTE NOTE: This is how the observation was presented when first presented to an English audience in 1815. The saying went on to become proverbial in the form Gratitude is the memory of the heart. Massieu, born deaf in 1772, came under the tutelage of the Abbé Sicard, a pioneering deaf educator, and himself went on to become an influential teacher of the deaf.

Monson continued: “If ingratitude be numbered among the serious sins, then gratitude takes its place among the noblest of virtues.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the modernized version of one of intellectual history’s most famous observations (Newton’s original wording was: If I have seen further it is by standing on ye sholders of Giants). The metaphor beautifully captures two notions of importance: (1) we all build on the efforts of those who preceded us, and (2) we are all in debt to those who provided assistance in our journey through life. The basic idea was not original with Newton, however. He was merely restating an observation from the twelfth-century French philosopher Bernard of Chartres: “We are like dwarfs on the shoulders of giants.” For more on the history of the quotation, go to: "Shoulders of Giants"

Ozick continued: “And this is the chief vein and deepest point regarding the Ordinary: that it does deserve our gratitude. The Ordinary lets us live out our humanity; it doesn’t scare us, it doesn’t excite us.”

Prager continued: “There is an inverse relationship between expectations and gratitude. The more expectations you have, the less gratitude you will have. If you get what you expect, you will not be grateful for getting it.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the traditional translation, but many internet sites present this more generous rendition of the sentiment: “Gratitude is a duty which ought to be paid, but which none have a right to expect.”

ERROR ALERT: Almost all internet sites and many published quotation anthologies mistakenly attribute this quotation to Gertrude Stein.

ERROR ALERT: All over the internet, this observation is mistakenly attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson.

GRAVENESS & GRAVITY

(see also LEVITY and SOLEMNITY and SERIOUSNESS and SINCERITY)

GREATNESS

(see also ACCOMPLISHMENT and ACHIEVEMENT and EXAMPLE and EXCELLENCE and HEROES & HEROISM and LEADERS & LEADERSHIP)

QUOTE NOTE: Young Mr. Adams was in Paris at the time, accompanying his father, who had been dispatched to France to negotiate a peace treaty with Great Britain. Mrs. Adams, who wrote some of the most beautiful and moving letters ever written to her husband as well as to her sons, went on to add:

“All history will convince you of this, and that wisdom and penetration are the fruit of experience, not the lessons of retirement and leisure. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised and animated by scenes that engage the heart, then those qualities, which would otherwise lie dormant, wake into life and form the character of the of the hero and the statesman.”

Buchan added: “I offer you that reflection as my last word on the subject this afternoon. I believe that it is profoundly true. It is a truth which is the basis of all religion. It is a truth which is the only justification for democracy. It is a truth which is at the foundation and the hope of our mortal lives.”

In that same essay, Carlyle wrote, “No sadder proof can be given by a man of his own littleness than disbelief in great men.”

QUOTE NOTE: Churchill was referring to America here. His belief resulted from America’s decision to enter WWII. He continued: “If the people of the United States had continued . . . absorbed in their own affairs, and a factor of no consequence in the world, they might have remained forgotten and undisturbed beyond their protecting oceans: but one cannot rise to be in many ways the leading community in the civilized world without being involved in its problems, without being convulsed by its agonies and inspired by its causes.”

QUOTE NOTE: Almost all internet sites present the following abridged version of the thought: “Greatness is a road leading towards the unknown.”

Dyer went on to write: “Turning your now into total fulfillment is the touchstone of effective living, and virtually all self-defeating behaviors (erroneous zones) are efforts at living in a moment other than the current one.”

QUOTE NOTE: Einstein was speaking in support of Bertrand Russell, whose appointment to a faculty position at the City University of New York had aroused the opposition of conservative religious groups. After a law suit was filed against Russell’s appointment, CUNY officials caved in to the pressure and rescinded the teaching contract. Einstein continued: “The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding the man who refuses to bow blindly to conventional prejudices and chooses instead to express his opinions courageously and honestly.”

ERROR ALERT: Almost all internet sites mistakenly present the quotation with the word violent before the word opposition.

Emerson preceded the observation by writing: “Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh.”

QUOTATION CAUTION: Most internet sites and many published anthologies present the following translation of Lady Blessington’s thought: “Mountains appear more lofty the nearer they are approached; but great men resemble them not in this particular.” The better translation, I believe, formally lays out the essential idea that greatness must be viewed at a distance. It may be seen in the original 1839 edition of Desultory Thoughts and Reflections.

QUOTE NOTE: The French term au fond means: “at bottom” or “by one’s (or it’s) very nature.”

La Bruyère was contrasting true greatness with its contrary, which he described this way: “False greatness is unsociable and remote: conscious of its own frailty, it hides, or at least averts its face, and reveals itself only enough to create an illusion and not be recognized as the meanness that it really is.”

QUOTE NOTE: The essay was originally written anonymously (by “A Virginian Spending July in Vermont”), and it was not until years later that Melville was formally identified as the author. vMelville preceded the observation above by writing: “It is better to fail in originality, than to succeed in imitation. He who has never failed somewhere, that man cannot be great.” For more on the quotation, see this 2015 post from The Quote Investigator.

QUOTE NOTE: Toohey, a power-hungry socialist created by Rand as an antagonist to the heroic individualism of protagonist Howard Roark, viewed great men as obstacles to his collectivist dream. He continued: “Therefore, we don’t want any great men.”

QUOTE NOTE: This may sound like a compliment, but Tallentyre preceded the thought by writing: “If to be great means to be good, then Denis Diderot was a little man.”

GREED

(see also ACQUISITION and APPETITE and AVARICE and COVETOUSNESS and CUPIDITY and EXCESS and MISERS and RICHES & THE RICH and VICE and WEALTH)

QUOTE NOTE: Lord Krishna, speaking to Prince Arjuna, adds: “For your own sake, Arjuna, give up these three.”

ERROR ALERT: This famous passage is often mistakenly presented as simply Money is the root of all evil. The saying has inspired numerous spin-offs (many may be seen in ROOT & BRANCH METAPHORS)

GRIEF & GRIEVING

(see also AGONY and ANGUISH and DEATH & DYING and DEPRESSION and MISERY and MOURNING and SADNESS and SORROW and SUFFERING and TEARS)

Anderson preceded the thought by writing: “Grief, I’ve learned, is really love. It’s all the love you want to give but cannot give. The more you loved someone, the more you grieve. All of that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes and in that part of your chest that gets empty and hollow feeling. The happiness of love turns to sadness when unspent.”

QUOTE NOTE: Binder was inspired to compose this thought after visiting Lincoln Castle, where he was touched by the site of an ancient graveyard—adjacent to a crumbling gallows—containing rows of unkempt and disheveled graves of poor English souls who had met their death by hanging. Reflecting on the site, he recalled Macaulay’s History of England, where the great English writer said “there is no sadder spot than that little cemetery” in the Tower of London containing the remains of the many eminent historical figures who were imprisoned in the Tower and executed for their offenses against crown and country. Binder preceded the thought above by writing about Lincoln Castle’s disheveled graveyard: “This burial spot of those who went down with dirty hands and in darkness to their graves has a sadness beyond that of the Tower.”

Before the death of her dear friend Caroline Knapp, Caldwell had only a superficial understanding of the true nature of grief, writing: “I thought grief was a simple, wrenching realm of sadness and longing that gradually receded. What that definition left out was the body blow that loss inflicts, as well as the temporary madness, and a range of less straightforward emotions shocking in their intensity.”

QUOTE NOTE: Caldwell offered this thought in her review of Meghan O’Rourke’s 2011 memoir The Long Goodbye. In 2005, O’Rourke was a fifty-three-year old writer and critic when she was diagnosed with late-stage colorectal cancer. She died less than three years later, leaving behind a husband and three children.

QUOTE NOTE: This is how the line usually appears in quotation collections, but it was originally part of this longer passage: “Grief is itself a med’cine, and bestow’d/T’improve the fortitude that bears the load,/To teach the wand’rer, as his woes increase,/The path of wisdom, all whose paths are peace.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is a beautiful sentiment, but it is not completely original. Ueland might have been inspired by an earlier observation by Mary Ridpath-Mann, to be seen below.

This quatrain introduces the poem, which goes on to explore a number of aspects of grief. The poem can be seen in full at: Poem 561.

Glen is speaking to private detective Kinsey Millhone about the recent death of her twenty-three-year-old son, Bobby. She continues: “What worries me is I notice there’s a certain attraction to the process that’s hard to give up. It’s painful, but at least it allows me to feel close to him. Once in a while, I catch myself thinking of something else, and then I feel guilty. It seems disloyal not to hurt, disloyal to forget even for a moment that he’s gone.”

Kafka continued: “And if I were to cast myself down before you and weep and tell you, what more would you know about me than you know about Hell when someone tells you it is hot and dreadful?”

QUOTE NOTE: Kafka returned to the theme in his 1915 classic The Metamorphosis, when he had protagonist Gregor Samsa say plaintively: “I cannot make you understand. I cannot make anyone understand what is happening inside me. I cannot even explain it to myself.”

QUOTE NOTE: Originally published under the pen name N. W. Clerk, A Grief Observed was a chronicle of Lewis’s attempt to cope with the death of his wife Joy Davidman in 1961 (it was re-issued in 1963 under his real name). In the opening paragraph, he continued: “I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing.”

This is the way the quotation typically appears on internet sites, but it was originally part of a powerful poem inspired by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s theoretical formulation about the stages of grief. The full poem may be seen at Pastan “Circular Staircase” Poem

QUOTE NOTE: This appears to be the first appearance of a sentiment that evolved into a modern proverb (and appropriately acknowledged as such in The Dictionary of Modern Proverbs). In a 2001 memorial service to honor British victims of the 9/11 World Trade Center terrorist attack, Queen Elizabeth said: “Grief is the price we pay for love.”

QUOTE NOTE: Patch here is used in the sense “to mend,” making this one of history’s most succinct sayings on the soothing power of words.

QUOTE NOTE: Tennyson’s poem was written in memory his great and dear friend Arthur Henry Hallam, who died suddenly and unexpectedly of a cerebral hemorrhage in 1833.

QUOTE NOTE: I believe this observation came from the protagonist Inspector Allan Grant, but I’ve been unable to confirm.

GRIEVANCE

(see also COMPLAINT and INJUSTICE and WRONGDOING)

Bruni ended his article this way: “While grievance blows our concerns out of proportion, humility puts them in perspective. While grievance reduces the people with whom we disagree to caricature, humility acknowledges that they’re every bit as complex as we are—with as much of a stake in creating a more perfect union.”

Buechner said many highly quotable things in his career, and this was one of his best. He concluded the observation with this verbal equivalent of a maraschino cherry: “The chief drawback is that what you are wolfing down is yourself. The skeleton at the feast is you.”

De Tocqueville concluded his observation by writing: “The weight, although less heavy, seems then all the more unbearable.”

In the book, Douglas also wrote: “Violence has no constitutional sanction; and every government from the beginning has moved against it. But where grievances pile high and most of the elected spokesmen represent the Establishment, violence may be the only effective response.”

Godin preceded the thought by writing: “Grievance and possibility have confusing roots.”

Halsey continued: “I sometimes think that tinderboxes are inert and powder kegs mere talcum compared to the explosive possibilities in the most commonplace domestic situation.”

QUOTE NOTE: In the speech, now generally referred to as “The Lyceum Address,” Lincoln continued: “In any case that arises, as for instance, the promulgation of abolitionism, one of two positions is necessarily true; that is, the thing is right within itself, and therefore deserves the protection of all law and all good citizens; or, it is wrong, and therefore proper to be prohibited by legal enactments; and in neither case, is the interposition of mob law, either necessary, justifiable, or excusable.”

Sayers preceded the thought by writing: “It is very well known to the more unscrupulous part of the press that nothing pays so well in the newspaper world as the manufacture of schisms and the exploitation of wrath. Turn over the pages of the more popular papers if you want to see how avarice thrives on hatred and the passion of violence.”

QUOTE NOTE: This has become one of Shaw’s most popular quotations. He continued with this less familiar thought: “And also the only real tragedy in life is the being used by personally minded men for purposes which you recognize to be base.”

GROVES

(see ORCHARDS & GROVES)

GROWTH

(includes DEVELOPMENT; see also ADVANCE & ADVANCEMENT and BIRTH METAPHORS and CHANGE and MATURITY & MATURATION and PROGRESS)

QUOTE NOTE: Standiford’s article is the original source of this widely quoted Abbey observation (Standiford said his article was “assembled from correspondence with the author in 1969”). Abbey preceded the observation by writing: “The religion of endless growth—like any religion based on blind faith rather than reason—is a kind of mania, a form of lunacy, indeed a disease. And the one disease to which the growth mania bears an exact analogical resemblance is cancer.” He then concluded the ideology thought by writing: “Cancer has no purpose but growth; but it does have another result—the death of the host.”

Antin preceded the observation by writing: “We are not born all at once, but by bits. The body first, and the spirit later; and the birth and growth of the spirit, in those who are attentive to their own inner life, are slow and exceedingly painful.”

Burkhardt continued: “Crises clear the ground…of a host of institutions from which life has long since departed, and which, given their historical privilege, could not have been swept away in any other fashion.”

ERROR ALERT: Many internet sites, including the respected Wikiquote, mistakenly present the quotation with higher instead of greater.

QUOTE NOTE: This saying is almost always attributed directly to Cardinal Newman, but in his 1864 religious classic he was merely summarizing a doctrine of the English preacher and biblical scholar Thomas Scott (1747–1821). Newman admired the thought and adopted it as a kind of motto. Thanks to David Evans for alerting me to this fact.

Peck continued: “If this path is followed long enough, the pieces of knowledge begin to fall into place. Gradually things begin to make sense.”

QUOTE NOTE: Developing an understanding of the world and our place in it was so important that Peck concluded: “This understanding is our religion.”

Sackville-West continued: “It may be a fallacious persuasion, but at least it is stimulating, and so long as it persists, one does not stagnate.”

Sheehy continued: “With each passage from one stage of human growth to the next we, too, must shed a protective structure. We are left exposed and vulnerable—but also yeasty and embryonic again, capable of stretching in ways we hadn’t known before.”

Sheehy continued: “It may mean a giving up of familiar but limiting patterns, safe but unrewarding work, values no longer believed in, relationships that have lost their meaning. As Dostoevsky put it, ‘taking a new step, uttering a new word, is what people fear most.’ The real fear should be of the opposite course.”

ERROR ALERT: Walker was describing the position of American psychologist Carl Rogers, not directly quoting him. Nonetheless, this observation is now commonly misattributed to him.

GUESTS

(see also COMPANY and ENTERTAINING and ETIQUETTE and HOSPITALITY and HOSTS and HOSTS & GUESTS and PARTIES & PARTYING and VISITING & VISITORS)

Adams continued: “For if there is a virtue which is its own reward, hospitality is that virtue. We remember slight attentions, after we have forgotten great benefits.”

QUOTE NOTE: In a January, 1736 issue of the Almanack, Franklin offered a more familiar observation on the subject: “Fish and visitors stink in three days.” He likely borrowed this latter observation from English writer Thomas Fuller, M.D., who presented a very similar English proverb in a 1732 book (see the Fuller entry below).

QUOTE NOTE: The notion that fish and guests go bad after three days was first presented by English writer John Lyly in a 1579 book (see the Lyly entry below)

QUOTE NOTE: This observation quickly evolved into a proverbial saying (see the Thomas Fuller entry above) that inspired Benjamin Franklin’s well known maxim on the subject (see the Franklin entry above). The underlying sentiment is not original with Lyly, however, for he was almost certainly familiar with an observation made seventeen centuries earlier (see the Plautus entry below)

GUILT

(see also CONSCIENCE and REGRET and REMORSE and SHAME)

In the same book, Arendt wrote: “It is quite gratifying to feel guilty if you haven’t done anything wrong: how noble! Whereas it is rather hard and certainly depressing to admit guilt and to repent.”

QUOTE NOTE: Rentier is a word you don’t see very often. The American Heritage Dictionary defines it this way: “A person who lives on income from property or investments.”

QUOTE NOTE: This was one of the earliest variations of an observation Guisewite made many times over the years. For more, see this 2012 post from quotation researcher Barry Popik.

In that same speech, Lorde said: “Guilt and defensiveness are bricks in a wall against which we all flounder; they serve none of our futures.”

Mitford preceded the thought by writing: “The whole point of muckraking, apart from all the jokes, is to try to do something about what you’ve been writing about.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is the second appearance of the sentiment in the novel. Early in the story, we learn that Sabina, the protagonist, calls random telephone numbers in the middle of the night when she cannot sleep. In one conversation, a man who calls himself “the lie detector” says to her: “You wouldn’t have called me if you were innocent. Guilt is one burden human beings can’t bear alone. As soon as a crime is committed, there is a telephone call, or a confession to strangers.”

QUOTE NOTE: This is how the quotation typically appears, but it originally showed up in this exchange between the characters James Taggart and Lillian Reardon:

“You didn’t think that guilt is a rope that wears thin, did you Lillian?”

She looked at him, startled, then answered stonily, “I don’t think it does.”

“It does, my dear—for men such as your husband.”

GULLIBILITY

(see CREDULITY and IGNORANCE and GREENHORN and INGENUE and INNOCENCE and NAIVETE and SOPHISTICATION)

Kaminer continued: “Faith is not a function of stupidity, but a frequent cause of it.”

GUM

(see CHEWING GUM)

GUNS

(includes ARMS and FIREARMS; see BULLETS and GUN CONTROL and PISTOLS and RIFLES and WEAPONS and [Automatic] WEAPONS)

In his book, Mao also wrote: “War can only be abolished through war, and in order to get rid of the gun it is necessary to take up the gun.”

GUTS

(see also BRAVERY and COURAGE and COWARDICE and DANGER and DARING and FEAR and FEARLESSNESS and RISK & RISK-TAKING)