Epictetus

No great thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.

Judith Martin

If you can't be kind, at least be vague.

Justin Townes Earle

I'm no fool, mama / I know the difference / between tempting and choosing my fate


(Editor's Note: Admittedly, the rest of the song doesn't have the most uplifting lyrics, but wow--I loved his performance.)

Francis Beaumont

Let us have a care not to disclose our hearts to those who shut up theirs against us.

Colette

Be happy. It's one way of being wise.

Brett McCracken

Brett McCracken praises Mike Leigh's new film, Another Year:

We live in a time when "authenticity" is equated with those things or those people who are forthright in their brokenness and messiness, while stable, happy people are sometimes looked upon with skepticism, as if their lack of apparent problems makes them phony or untrustworthy. Our jadedness leads us to a sort of self-reinforcing stasis of raw brokenness, because this is what we believe. This is what we know. But what we really need are models of goodness & virtue in our lives… figures of hope who can motivate us out of the cycle of dreary cynicism.

Another Year offers a great example of such people–a happily married, flourishing couple who love people in need but don't pander to them. They stand firm in their principles without condescending to those struggling around them...

from http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2011/01/happy-characters-are-real-too.html

Joan Baez

You don't get to choose how you're going to die, or when. You can only decide how you're going to live. Now!

Thomas Dent Mutter

The world is no place of rest. I repeat, it is no place of rest, but for effort. Steady, continuous, undeviating effort. Our work should never be done and it is the daydream of ignorance to look forward to that as a happy time, when we shall wish for nothing more, and have nothing more to accomplish.

Arnold Schwarzenegger

I can only operate to the utmost and to 100 percent of my potential if I have no safety net. Because it's only then that I'm at my peak. That's one reason I never did TV shows — I didn't want to have that security. What I liked about being governor was never knowing how a meeting would end. The legislative leaders could leave and destroy you to the press. Or they go out and compliment you. So you don't know. You don't know the way the people go. One year they like something, the next year it's number seven on their priority list. So you just never know. That brings excitement and spice to life. And that to me is the difference between living and existing.

Thomas Edison

I have not failed. I have just found 10,000 ways that do not work.

Craig Ferguson

If there's any hope for any of us in this giant explosion in which we inhabit, then surely that's it: intellect and romance triumph over brute force and cynicism.

--summarizing Doctor Who in creative dance and song

Nancy Reagan

A woman is like a tea bag: you cannot tell how strong she is until you put her in hot water.

E.M. Forster

If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country.

E.M. Forster

The people I respect most behave as if they were immortal and as if society was eternal.