Maer > Maer's Quotes

“Years ago my mother used to say to me, she'd say, "In this world, Elwood, you must be" - she always called me Elwood - "In this world, Elwood, you must be oh so smart or oh so pleasant." Well, for years I was smart. I recommend pleasant. You may quote me. ”
― Mary Chase, Harvey

“What is there to forgive?. . .Ignore forgive and concentrate on living. Life for you is short; far too short to allow small jealousies to infringe on the happiness which can be yours only for the briefest of times.”
― Jasper Fforde, The Eyre Affair

“Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.”
― William Ernest Henley, Invictus

“Where'e're I go, my Soul shall stay with thee:
'Tis but my Shadow I take away...”
― John Dryden, King Arthur: or, the British worthy. A masque. As it is performed at the Theatre-Royal in Crow-street. Altered from Dryden. The music by Purcell. To ... Arthur: extracted from the best historians.

“Solemnity, I don't know what it's for. I mean, what is the point of it? The two most beautiful memorial services that I've ever attended both had a lot of humor. It somehow freed us all and made the services inspiring and cathartic. But solemnity, it serves pomposity. The self important always know at some level of their consciousness that their egotism is going to be punctured by humor. That's why they see it as a threat! And so, dishonestly, they pretend that their deficiency makes their views more substantial.”
― John Cleese.

“Happiness is something that comes into our lives through doors we don't even remember leaving open.”
― Rose Wilder Lane

“I am little concerned with beauty or perfection. I don't care for the great centuries. All I care about is life, struggle, intensity.”
― Emile Zola

“Reading is not just an escape. It is access to a better way of life.”
― Karin Slaughter

“You can take my heart, but I can't let you take my dog.”
― Karin Slaughter

“To be a baby elephant must be wonderful. Surrounded by a loving family 24 hours a day…. I think it must be how it ought to be, in a perfect world.”
― Daphne Sheldrick

“Chingachgook grasped the hand that, in the warmth of feeling, the scout had stretched across the fresh earth, and in that attitude of friendship these intrepid woodsmen bowed their heads together, while scalding tears fell to their feet, watering the grave of Uncas like drops of falling rain.”
― James Fenimore Cooper, The Last of the Mohicans

“History, like love, is so apt to surround her heroes with an atmosphere of imaginary brightness.”
― James Fenimore Cooper, The Last of the Mohicans

“Your young white, who gathers his learning from books and can measure what he knows by the page, may conceit that his knowledge, like his legs, outruns that of his fathers’, but, where experience is the master, the scholar is made to know the value of years, and respects them accordingly.”
― James Fenimore Cooper, The Last of the Mohicans

“I've heard it said that there are men who read in books to convince themselves there is a God. I know not but man may so deform his works in the settlements, as to leave that which is so clear in the wilderness a matter of doubt among traders and priests.”
― James Fenimore Cooper, The Last of the Mohicans

“Is it justice to make evil, and then punish for it?”
― James Fenimore Cooper, The Last of the Mohicans

“...it should be remembered that men always prize that most which is least enjoyed.”
― James Fenimore Cooper, The Last of the Mohicans

“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child—our own two eyes. All is a miracle.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, The Miracle of Mindfulness: An Introduction to the Practice of Meditation