Brian > Brian's Quotes

“Wherever such a teacher lives or stays, Walks, sits, or lies down, Or teaches even a verse, There a stupa should be erected.   It should be wonderfully And beautifully adorned. And offerings of many kinds Should be made to it.   When children of the Buddha live in such a place, It means that the Buddha accepts them And always lives among them, Whether walking, sitting, or lying down.”
― Gene Reeves, The Lotus Sutra: A Contemporary Translation of a Buddhist Classic

“Therefore, after the extinction of the Tathagata, you should all wholeheartedly embrace, read and recite, explain and copy, and practice it as you have been taught. In any land, wherever anyone accepts and embraces, reads and recites, explains and copies, and practices it as taught, or wherever a volume of the sutra is kept, whether in a garden, or in a woods, or under a tree, or in a monk’s cell or a layman’s house, or in a palace, or in a mountain valley or an open field, in all these places you should put up a stupa and make offerings. Why? You should understand that all such places are places of the Way. They are where the buddhas attain supreme awakening; they are where the buddhas turn the Dharma wheel; they are where the buddhas reach complete nirvana.”
― Gene Reeves, The Lotus Sutra: A Contemporary Translation of a Buddhist Classic

“Bertie old man I say Bertie could you possibly come down here at once. Everything gone wrong hang it all. Dash it Bertie you simply must come. I am in a state of absolute despair and heart-broken. Would you mind sending another hundred of those cigarettes. Bring Jeeves when you come Bertie. You simply must come Bertie. I rely on you. Don’t forget to bring Jeeves. Bingo. For a chap who’s perpetually hard-up, I must say that young Bingo is the most wasteful telegraphist I ever struck. He’s got no notion of condensing. The silly ass simply pours out his wounded soul at twopence a word, or whatever it is, without a thought.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, The Inimitable Jeeves

“Not at all; and therein consisted his chief peculiarity. He would say the most terrific things to his crew, in a tone so strangely compounded of fun and fury, and the fury seemed so calculated merely as a spice to the fun, that no oarsman could hear such queer invocations without pulling for dear life, and yet pulling for the mere joke of the thing. Besides he all the time looked so easy and indolent himself, so loungingly managed his steering-oar, and so broadly gaped— open-mouthed at times—that the mere sight of such a yawning commander, by sheer force of contrast, acted like a charm upon the crew. Then again, Stubb was one of those odd sort of humorists, whose jollity is sometimes so curiously ambiguous, as to put all inferiors on their guard in the matter of obeying them.”
― Herman Melville, Moby Dick: or, the White Whale

“Flask mounted upon gigantic Daggoo was yet more curious; for sustaining himself with a cool, indifferent, easy, unthought of, barbaric majesty, the noble negro to every roll of the sea harmoniously rolled his fine form. On his broad back, flaxen-haired Flask seemed a snow-flake. The bearer looked nobler than the rider. Though truly vivacious, tumultuous, ostentatious little Flask would now and then stamp with impatience; but not one added heave did he thereby give to the negro's lordly chest. So have I seen Passion and Vanity stamping the living magnanimous earth, but the earth did not alter her tides and her seasons for that.”
― Herman Melville, Moby Dick: or, the White Whale

“Such, gentlemen, is the inflexibility of sea-usages and the instinctive love of neatness in seamen; some of whom would not willingly drown without first washing their faces.”
― Herman Melville, Moby-Dick or, The Whale

“As with the Hawaiian savage, so with the white sailor-savage. With the same marvellous patience, and with the same single shark's tooth, of his one poor jack-knife, he will carve you a bit of bone sculpture, not quite as workmanlike, but as close packed in its maziness of design, as the Greek savage, Achilles's shield; and full of barbaric spirit and suggestiveness, as the prints of that fine old Dutch savage, Albert Durer.”
― Herman Melville, Moby Dick: or, the White Whale

“Even if someone were to give a three-thousand great thousandfold world full of the seven precious materials as an offering to the Buddha, great bodhisattvas, pratyekabuddhas, and arhats, the blessings such a person would gain would not equal those of someone who receives and embraces even a single four-line verse of this Dharma Flower Sutra. Happiness greater than this won’t be found.”
― Gene Reeves, The Lotus Sutra: A Contemporary Translation of a Buddhist Classic

“If any living beings are afflicted with a great deal of lust, let them keep in mind and revere Regarder of the Cries of the World Bodhisattva and they will be freed from their desire. If they have a great deal of anger and rage, let them keep in mind and revere Regarder of the Cries of the World Bodhisattva and they will be freed from their anger. If they are deluded by great folly, let them keep in mind and revere Regarder of the Cries of the World Bodhisattva and they will be freed from their stupidity.”
― Gene Reeves, The Lotus Sutra: A Contemporary Translation of a Buddhist Classic

“Inexhaustible Mind, such are the blessings attained by this Regarder of the Cries of the World Bodhisattva and the various forms in which he travels around in many lands to save the living. This is why all of you should wholeheartedly make offerings to Regarder of the Cries of the World Bodhisattva. This Regarder of the Cries of the World Bodhisattva, this great one, is able to bestow freedom from fear on those who are faced with a frightening, urgent, or difficult situation. This is why in this world everyone gives him the name Bestower of Freedom from Fear.”
― Gene Reeves, The Lotus Sutra: A Contemporary Translation of a Buddhist Classic

“Most knights today would rather rustle in damasks, brocades, and the other rich fabrics of their clothes than creak in chain mail; no longer do knights sleep in the fields, subject to the rigors of heaven, wearing all their armor from head to foot; no longer does anyone, with his feet still in the stirrups and leaning on his lance, catch forty winks, as they say, as the knights errant used to do.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“Do you mean to say, Sancho,” responded Don Quixote, “that I felt no pain when you were tossed in the blanket? If that is what you mean, do not say it and do not think it, for at the time I felt more pain in my spirit than you did in your body. But let us put that aside for now; there will be time for us to ponder this and draw the proper conclusion;”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“Oh, woe is me,” said the niece, “my uncle’s a poet, too! He knows everything, he understands everything, and I’d wager that if he wanted to be a mason, he’d know how to build a house as well as a cage.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“Oh, now I have it,” responded Don Quixote. “You mean to say that you are so pliant, so docile and softhearted, that you will accept what I tell you and learn what I teach you.” “I’ll bet,” said Sancho, “you knew what I was saying and understood me from the beginning, but wanted to mix me up so you could hear me make another two hundred mistakes.” “That may be,” replied Don Quixote. “Tell me, then, what does Teresa say?”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“Well, the same thing happens in the drama and business of this world, where some play emperors, others pontiffs, in short, all the figures that can be presented in a play, but at the end, which is when life is over, death removes all the clothing that differentiated them, and all are equal in the grave.” “That’s a fine comparison,” said Sancho, “though not so new that I haven’t heard it many times before, like the one about chess: as long as the game lasts, each piece has its particular rank and position, but when the game’s over they’re mixed and jumbled and thrown together in a bag, just the way life is tossed into the grave.”1 “Every day, Sancho,” said Don”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“And as for what you have said, Señor, regarding your son’s lack of esteem for poetry in the modern languages, it is my understanding that he is mistaken, for this reason: the great Homer did not write in Latin because he was Greek, and Virgil did not write in Greek because he was Latin. In short, all the ancient poets wrote in their mother tongues, and they did not look for foreign languages in order to declare the nobility of their ideas.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“Fire wasn’t even supposed to happen in void. There was no phlogiston. Fire didn’t, couldn’t, happen without phlogiston.”
― K. Eason, How the Multiverse Got Its Revenge

“Then he took a closer, more complete look, and understood how she had evaded detection. Rupert had been the Vizier of Thorne when last he had seen her, and that had been twenty years and a lifetime ago on a distant planet, but one does not forget a fairy.”
― K. Eason, How the Multiverse Got Its Revenge

“The precise origins of the Mage Wars have been lost in the fogs of Time, but Disc philosophers agree that the First Men, shortly after their creation, understandably lost their temper.”
― Terry Pratchett, The Color of Magic

“There are some essential skills that I lack. Yet I am Goldeneyes Silverhand Dactylos,” said the craftsman. “I made the Metal Warriors that guard the Tomb of Pitchiu, I designed the Light Dams of the Great Nef, I built the Palace of the Seven Deserts. And yet—” he reached up and tapped one of his eyes, which rang faintly, “when I built the golem army for Pitchiu he loaded me down with gold and then, so that I would create no other work to rival my work for him, he had my eyes put out.” “Wise but cruel,” said the Arch-astronomer sympathetically.”
― Terry Pratchett, The Color of Magic

“No wonder everyone sought, by hook or by crook, alliance with the Heike. All alive within the four seas mimicked the ways of Rokuhara,14 down to the mere cut of a robe or crease of a hat.”
― Anonymous, The Tale of the Heike

“They cannot and should not be called deceptions,” said Don Quixote, “since their purpose was virtuous.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“You have said more, Sancho, than you realize,” said Don Quixote, “for there are some who exhaust themselves learning and investigating things that, once learned and investigated, do not matter in the slightest to the understanding or the memory.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“skirmish, or are shot by artillery, or blown up by a mine? It”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“and Don Quixote went up to Sancho, and in his ear he whispered: “Sancho, just as you want people to believe what you have seen in the sky, I want you to believe what I saw in the Cave of Montesinos. And that is all I have to say.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“When there can and should be a place for impartiality, do not bring the entire rigor of the law to bear on the offender, for the reputation of the harsh judge is not better than that of the compassionate one.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“who, finding Don Quixote in his house, sought ways to make his madness public without harming him; for jests that cause pain are not jests, and entertainments are not worthwhile if they injure another. The”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“I don’t print my books to achieve fame in the world, because I’m already well-known for my work; I want profit: without it, fame isn’t worth a thing.” “God grant your grace good fortune,” responded Don Quixote.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“thus he is one who reunites those who are divided, a promoter of friendships, who enjoys concord, rejoices in concord, delights in concord, a speaker of words that promote concord.”
― Bhikkhu Bodhi, In the Buddha's Words: An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Canon

“Then the child of Zeus, Helen, decided she would mix the wine220 with drugs to take all pain and rage away, to bring forgetfulness of every evil. Whoever drinks this mixture from the bowl will shed no tears that day, not even if her mother or her father die, nor even if soldiers kill her brother or her darling son with bronze spears before her very eyes. Helen had these powerful magic drugs from Polydamna, wife of Thon, from Egypt, where fertile fields produce the most narcotics:230 some good, some dangerous. The people there are skillful doctors. They are the Healer’s people.”
― Homer, The Odyssey