MetaChat - What's your favourite quote?

Ich Kann nicht anders.
Martin Luther.
Basically I could not be/or act/ in any other way.

posted by Wilder 29 July | 10:21

Sorry to be exact (I'm not very religiously minded) Gott Hilf Mir, Ich Kann nicht anders.
God help me, I can not be (or do this) any other way.
Translation as you know is never exact.But in German he is explaining why he is challenging the authority of the Holy Catholic Church. Quite an important moment in European history I believe and I love hearing about people who make difficult choices and take the path less well tread because of their personal beliefs.

posted by Wilder 29 July | 10:24

"I used to be disgusted, now I try to be amused...' - Elvis Costello

posted by jonmc 29 July | 10:25

"Ships remain safe in harbor, but that is not why ships are built."

posted by paulsc 29 July | 10:29

I've got three. Although one isn't really a quote.

“Isn’t every human being both a scientist and an artist; and in writing of human experience, isn’t there a good deal to be said for recognizing that fact and for using both methods?”

-James Agee from Let Us Now Praise Famous Men

“The time of getting fame for your name on its own is over. Artwork that is only about wanting to be famous will never make you famous. Any fame is a by-product of making something that means something. You don’t go to a restaurant and order a meal because you want to have a shit.”

-Banksy

A person comes forth to life and enters into death.
Three out of ten are partners of life,
Three out of ten are partners of death,
And the people whose every movement leads them to the
land of death because they cling to life
Are also three out of ten.

Now,
What is the reason for this?
It is because they cling to life.

Indeed,
I have heard that
One who is good at preserving life
does not avoid tigers and rhinoceroses
when he walks in the hills;
nor does he put on armor and take up weapons
when he enters a battle.
The rhinoceros has no place to jab its horn,
The tiger has no place to fasten its claws,
Weapons have no place to admit their blades.

Now,
What is the reason for this?
Because on him there are no mortal spots.

-Tao Te Ching (50)

posted by sciurus 29 July | 11:11

Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly.

Alan Watts

posted by danf 29 July | 11:13

"Problems cannot be solved with the same mind that created them."

-Albert Einstein

"No wife, no duck. JUDGEMENT DAY!"
- overheard onstage at a Stranger Than Fiction show

posted by Lipstick Thespian 29 July | 11:22

Not really a quote, but a Hebrew saying:

"If I try to be like him, who will be like me?"

posted by BoringPostcards 29 July | 11:52

I like that very much.

posted by hadjiboy 29 July | 12:25

Most of these, and they've forgotten this one...

This is Jack Burton in the Pork Chop Express and I'm talking to whoever is listening out there. Like I told my last wife... I said, "Honey I never drive faster than I can see and besides that; it's all in the reflexes."
You just listen to the old Pork Chop Express and take his advice on a dark & stormy night alright... when some wild-eyed nine-foot-tall maniac smacks the back of your favourite head up against a bar-room wall and asks if you have paid your dues,you just stare that big sucker back in the eye and you just remember what old Jack Burton says at a time like this. "Have you paid your dues Jack???"" Yes sir, the cheque is in the mail."
Now ya see I'm not sayin' that I've been everywhere and I've done everything but I do know it's a pretty amazing planet we live on here and a man would have to be some kind of fool to think we're all alone in THIS universe...

posted by Zack_Replica 29 July | 12:26

Z_R I LOVE that movie because of Jack Burton.

posted by small_ruminant 29 July | 12:31

Of course, the guys in the hats with lightening coming out of their fingertips don't hurt.

posted by small_ruminant 29 July | 12:32

The puritan hated bear-baiting, not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectators. -- Thomas Macaulay

posted by agropyron 29 July | 12:36

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.
--H. P. Lovecraft, "The Call of Cthulhu", first line

posted by agropyron 29 July | 12:37

"Where the world ceases to be the stage for personal hopes and desires, where we, as free beings, behold it in wonder, to question and to contemplate, there we enter the realm of art and of science. If we trace out what we behold and experience through the language of logic, we are doing science; if we show it in forms whose interrelationships are not accessible to our conscious thought but are intuitively recognized as meaningful, we are doing art. Common to both is the devotion to something beyond the personal, removed from the arbitrary."

posted by gaspode 29 July | 12:46

s_r - yeah, the whole movie's just perfect: kung fu, special effects, a hero with the IQ of a block of wood, and a six-demon bag. I'm a big fan of the John Carpenter/Kurt Russell trio of Big Trouble, The Thing, and Escape from New York.

Margo: Well... God, aren't you even gonna kiss her goodbye?
(pause)
Jack Burton: Nope.

posted by Zack_Replica 29 July | 13:11

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.

-Blaise Pascal (Pensees, 1670)

posted by chuckdarwin 29 July | 13:22

The greatest power one may possess—in any situation—is simply not to care what happens. In fact, it’s the only power, all others being a semblance and mockery of it. But you must also not care about possessing the power itself. So fuck it. (Thomas Ligotti)

This is a world that will, in any case, be destroyed at some time. Working for its destruction seems pointless. It is impossible to save. Between these two facts, life must be lived. (Paavo Haavikko)

posted by misteraitch 29 July | 13:40

One of my favorite quotes:

"I don't like work -- no man does -- but I like what is in the work -- the chance to find yourself. Your own reality -- for yourself, not for others -- what no other man can ever know. They can only see the mere show, and never can tell what it really means." - Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness.

posted by CitrusFreak12 29 July | 14:22

Call me shallow, but most of mine are from Futurama. A couple of favourites are:

If we can hit that bull's-eye, the rest of the dominoes will fall like a house of cards. Checkmate!

And

Michelle, I don't regret this, but I both rue and lament it.

Oh! And my dad mentioned one at my sister's wedding when he was doing the father of the bride speech and said he wasn't going to talk for long. I intend using it a lot in meetings:

The longer the spoke the bigger the tyre

posted by TheDonF 29 July | 14:24

Each of these is my favorite, at some point. I can't decide which to post, so here's 4.

"Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born." -- Anais Nin

"Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself. (I am large, I contain multitudes.)" -- Whitman

"The Buddha taught that the first principle of existence is impermanence. Absolutely everything in this universe is impermanent. Impermanence creates uncertainty. I don't know about you, but I have a very low tolerance for uncertainty. Uncertainty causes me discomfort. Discomfort causes me to think stupid things. Stupid thoughts cause me to take stupid actions. My stupid actions bring about unfortunate results. Luckily, the unfortunate results are impermanent. Is this a great universe or what?" -- Chuck Lorre

"The best thing for being sad is to learn something. That is the only strength that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your extremities, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love... there is only one thing for it then - to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, and never dream of regretting." -- T. H. White

posted by paulus andronicus 29 July | 14:27

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
- Margaret Mead

posted by msali 29 July | 15:02

We humans are manifestly here for problem-solving and, if we are any good at problem-solving, we don't come to utopia, we come to more difficult problems to solve.
-R. Buckminster Fuller

(Punctuation experts: When you set off a citation under a quote like that, what kind of dash are you supposed to use?)

posted by Lentrohamsanin 29 July | 15:32

"There is no enlightenment outside of daily life."
-Thich Nhat Hanh

"What We Think, We Become."
Buddha

and, similar:

"A man is but the product of his thoughts. What he thinks, he becomes."
-Gandhi

posted by LoriFLA 29 July | 16:12

"In this world, you can either be oh so smart or oh so pleasant. Well, I was smart for many years. I recommend pleasant."

-Elwood P. Dowd

posted by the great big mulp 29 July | 16:17

jonmc stole mine.
I am not amused.

posted by wendell 29 July | 17:25

"It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt."
— S. Clemens

posted by rob511 29 July | 18:25

"Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come." -Matt Groening

"Which is worse: ignorance or apathy? I don't know and I don't care." -Garrison Keillor

posted by plinth 29 July | 19:45

Late to the party (again) but currently, I like:

For all the points on the compass, there is but one direction.
- I am paraphrasing from a Tom Stoppard play due to a poor memory

When two great forces oppose each other,
the victory will go
to the one that knows how to yield.
- Tao Ching

And, finally:
"Fuck it dude, let's go bowling."
- Walter Sobchak

posted by richat 29 July | 20:19

"Seek truth from facts," a centuries-old Chinese phrase popularized by Deng Xiaoping.

Wow, two people pick a line from "Red Shoes". That is a great quote, but I'd maybe pick something from "Hoover Factory" as my favorite Elvis quote. Maybe:

"It's not a matter of life or death, but what is? It doesn't matter if I take another breath, who cares?"

But favorite Elvis quotes is a whole 'nother thread.

posted by ibmcginty 29 July | 21:50

"The music is not in the piano"

Clement Mok

posted by Scoo 29 July | 21:54

These two quotes posted earlier:

"Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself. (I am large, I contain multitudes.)" -- Whitman

"Problems cannot be solved with the same mind that created them."
-Albert Einstein

... both make me think of Alberto Gonzales.

posted by ibmcginty 29 July | 22:32

"It is my business to know things. That is my trade." -Arthur Conan Doyle, in the voice of Sherlock Holmes.

"You gwyne to have considable trouble in yo' life, en considable joy." - Mark Twain in the voice of Jim in Huckleberry Finn. Also and related: "Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward," - Job 5:7.

“The living self has one purpose only: to come into its own fullness of being, as a tree comes into full blossom, or a bird into spring beauty, or a tiger into lustre." - DH Lawrence

"Lord, thank you for this good life, and forgive us if we do not love it enough." --Garrison Kiellor's grace

"Sheer plod makes plough down sillion shine," -Gerard Manley Hopkins, "The Windhover"

"Feeling comes in aid of feeling, and diversity of strength/attends us, if but once we have been strong." -Wordsworth, "The Prelude"

"But yield who will to their separation
My object in living is to unite
My avocation and my vocation
As my two eyes make one in sight." - Robert Frost, "Two Tramps in Mud-Time"

"I've been absolutely terrified every moment of my life and I've never let it keep me from doing a single thing that I wanted to do." --Georgia O'Keeffe

My real single favorite:

"Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given to you, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without knowing it, live along one day into the answers." -- Rilke

posted by Miko 29 July | 23:02

It's wrong to judge the state of man by whether fate has made him pale or tan -Jonathan Butler (Heal our land)

posted by ramix 29 July | 23:45

"Well, allow me to introduce myself to you as an advocate of Ornamental Knowledge. You like the mind to be a neat machine, equipped to work efficiently, if narrowly, and with no extra bits or useless parts. I like the mind to be a dustbin of scraps of brilliant fabric, odd gems, worthless but fascinating curiosities, tinsel, quaint bits of carving, and a reasonable amount of healthy dirt. Shake the machine and it goes out of order; shake the dustbin and it adjusts itself beautifully to its new position."
- Robertson Davies

posted by tangerine 30 July | 00:34

That's great, tangerine!

posted by taz 30 July | 01:48

"Don't let it end this way! Tell them I said something!"

--Pancho Villa's last words (apocryphal)

posted by BitterOldPunk 30 July | 04:18

"A line is length without breadth."
- Euclid

"I learned him all he got."
- Charles "Lefty" Driesell (on Len Bias)

"Doubt is uncomfortable, certainty is ridiculous."
- Voltaire

"I feel the same way about solitude as some people feel about the blessing of the church. It's the light of grace for me. I never close my door behind me without the awareness that I am carrying out an act of mercy toward myself."
- Peter Høeg

posted by Hugh Janus 30 July | 09:40

"Don't be humble... you're not that great." - Golda Meir

posted by spiderskull 31 July | 03:02

"The dead know only one thing: it is better to be alive." --Pvt. Joker, Full Metal Jacket

posted by DevilsAdvocate 31 July | 16:40

"People are no damned good" - Doug Mulray.

posted by dg 31 July | 22:40

And Nick Cave
ability to typ wainn ing

posted by ethylene 31 July | 22:49

For my own part I would as soon be descended from that heroic little monkey, who braved his dreaded enemy in order to save the life of his keeper; or from that old baboon, who, descending from the mountains, carried away in triumph his young comrade from a crowd of astonished dogs -- as from a savage who delights to torture his enemies, offers up bloody sacrifices, practices infanticide without remorse, treats his wives like slaves, knows no decency, and is haunted by the grossest superstitions.

- Charles Darwin - The Descent of Man, 1871

posted by chuckdarwin 01 August | 05:52

No one has ever hit me that hard in my whole awful fucking life.

-Milo Milodragovitch

posted by Divine_Wino 02 August | 13:54

oh also:

I believe the common denominator of the Universe is not harmony, but chaos, hostility and murder.

-Werner Herzog, in "Grizzly Man"

You are all wrong.
- Responding to booing crowds at the Berlin Film Festival, who disapproved of his Lessons of Darkness (1992).
(IBID)

Stupidity is the devil. Look in the eye of a chicken and you'll know. It's the most horrifying, cannibalistic, and nightmarish creature in this world.

IBID

posted by Divine_Wino 02 August | 14:02

Very late, as usual

"The most important thing in art is The Frame. For painting, literally; for other arts: figuratively -- because, without this humble appliance, you can't know where The Art stops and The Real World begins. You have to put a 'box' around it because otherwise, what is that shit on the wall?"
-- Frank Zappa

“Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant, in this field as in all others. His culture is based on ‘I am not too sure.’”
-- H.L.Mencken

“Waiting, far from being something passive, was the most active state of all. In its heart lay the beginning and end of all action. In it lurked the exact moment to strike.”
-- Sadaharu Oh, A Zen Way of Baseball

posted by Rock Steady 07 August | 23:45

Very late, as usual

Better late than never.

And thanks for sharing! I'm enjoying myself:)

posted by hadjiboy 11 August | 02:07

29 July 2007