“We have radios which can bring to everybody the best in music and literature. What we hear instead is, to a large extent, trash at the pulp magazine level or advertising which is an insult to intelligence and taste. We have the most wonderful instruments and means man has ever had, but we do not stop and ask what they are for.”
Erich Fromm Man for Himself (written in 1947)
“12. You do not need a parachute to skydive. You only need a parachute to skydive twice.”
One in a list of “Paraprosdokians : Winston Churchill loved them. They are figures of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected, and are frequently humorous” emailed by William Adamson January 25, 2014
"A specialist is someone who does everything else worse."
"U.S. violinist Ruggiero Ricci" quoted as "Thought du jour" in "Social Studies" in Globe & Mail Oct. 13, 2006.
"The devil can quote Scripture for his purpose; and the text of Scripture which he now most commonly quotes is, 'The kingdom of heaven is within you.'"
G.K. Chesterton, “The Spirit of America,” in What I Saw in America, quoted in Gilbert Magazine Vol. 7 #8 (July-August 2004)
“But things aren’t all puppies and hugs either.”
Letter from Bonnie Tompkins (a “bar server” writing about the Ottawa antismoking bylaw) in Ottawa Citizen Dec. 27, 2001
"The contemplative life is often miserable. You should do more, think less and not watch yourself living."
Nicholas-Sebastien Chamfort, quoted as "Thought du jour" in Globe & Mail Oct. 22, 2002
"War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth a war, is much worse. When a people are used as mere human instruments for firing cannon or thrusting bayonets, in the service and for the selfish purposes of a master, such war degrades a people. A war to protect other human beings against tyrannical injustice; a war to give victory to their own ideas of right and good, and which is their own war, carried on for an honest purpose by their free choice, — is often the means of their regeneration. A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for, nothing which he cares more about than he does about his personal safety, is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. As long as justice and injustice have not terminated their ever-renewing fight for ascendancy in the affairs of mankind, human beings must be willing, when need is, to do battle for the one against the other."
John Stuart Mill, Principles of Political Economy (quoted on https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/679-war-is-an-ugly-thing-but-not-the-ugliest-of)
"After the first silence the small man said to the other: 'Where does a wise man hide a pebble?' And the tall man answered in a low voice: 'On the beach.' The small man nodded, and after a short silence said: 'Where does a wise man hide a leaf?' And the other answered: 'In the forest.'"
G.K. Chesterton, Favorite Father Brown Stories