Jakub > Jakub's Quotes

“Statečnost začíná tehdy, když víš, že jsi poražen, ještě než se do něčeho dáš, a přesto se do toho dáš a dovedeš to až do konce, ať se děje co děje.”
― Anonymous

“A soldier came to Hakuin and asked "Is there really a paradise and a hell?"
"Who are you?" inquired Hakuin.

"I am a samurai," the warrior replied.

"You, a samurai!" exclaimed Hakuin. "What kind of ruler would have you as his guard? Your face looks like that of a beggar!"

The soldier became so angry that he began to draw his sword, but Hakuin continued. "So you have a sword! Your weapon is probably as dull as your head!"

As the soldier drew his sword Hakuin remarked "Here open the gates of hell!"

At these words, the samurai, perceiving the discipline of the master, sheathed his sword and bowed.

"Here open the gates of paradise," said Hakuin”
― Hakuin Ekaku

“A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us.”
― Franz Kafka

“We live as we dream--alone....”
― Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

“It's only those who do nothing that make no mistakes, I suppose.”
― Joseph Conrad, An Outcast of the Islands

“In a tough situation, don't avoid acting just because it's easier or comfortable. Don't lapse into a passive state. People who give up, die.”
― Gregory Benford and Larry Niven Bowl of Heaven Beth

“If you don't have a strategy, you're part of someone else's strategy. ”
― Alvin Toffler

“You’ve got to think about big things while you’re doing small things, so that all the small things go in the right direction.”
― Alvin Toffler

“No one can construct for you the bridge upon which precisely you must cross the stream of life, no one but you yourself alone.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

“Keep the company of those who seek the truth- run from those who have found it”
― Vaclav Havel

“Hope is the deep orientation of the human soul that can be held at the darkest times.”
― Vaclav Havel

“Truth and love will overcome lies and hatred.”
― Vaclav Havel

“Death gives meaning to our lives. It gives importance and value to time. Time would become meaningless if there were too much of it.”
― Ray Kurzweil

“When I discover who I am, I’ll be free.”
― Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

“Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving us wordy evidence of the fact.”
― George Eliot, Impressions of Theophrastus Such

“People change and forget to tell each other.”
― Lillian Hellman

“Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself.”
― George Bernard Shaw

“Maybe there is a beast… maybe it's only us.”
― William Golding, Lord of the Flies

“Don't wait for a light to appear at the end of the tunnel, stride down there and light the bloody thing yourself.”
― Sara Henderson

“Only a fool learns from his own mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others.”
― Otto von Bismarck

“Im a scientist, once I do something, I want to do something else.”
― Clifford Stoll

“Why is it drug addicts and computer aficionados are both called users? ”
― Clifford Stoll

“I claim that this bookless library is a dream, a hallucination of on-line addicts; network neophytes, and library-automation insiders...Instead, I suspect computers will deviously chew away at libraries from the inside. They'll eat up book budgets and require librarians that are more comfortable with computers than with children and scholars. Libraries will become adept at supplying the public with fast, low-quality information.

The result won't be a library without books--it'll be a library without value.”
― Clifford Stoll

“Life is a very bad novelist. It is chaotic and ludicrous.”
― Javier Marías

“Read, read, read. That's all I can say.”
― Carolyn Keene, The Secret of the Old Clock

“I was taught to strive not because there were any guarantees of success but because the act of striving is in itself the only way to keep faith with life.”
― Madeleine Albright, Madam Secretary

“The main thing is to remain oneself, under any circumstances; that was and is our common purpose.”
― Madeleine Albright

“I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing.”
― Herman Melville, Moby-Dick or, The Whale

“Whether he is an artist or not, the photographer is a joyous sensualist, for the simple reason that the eye traffics in feelings, not in thoughts.”
― Walker Evans

“I haven't been everywhere, but it's on my list.”
― Susan Sontag