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person quotes

  • To us he is no more a person Now but a whole climate of opinion.

    -W(ystan) H(ugh) Auden
      'In Memory of Sigmund Freud', stanza17.

  • Celuy vit seulement, lequel vit aujourdhuy. Only the person who lives for today lives at all.

    -Joachim du Bellay
      Les Regrets, no.65.

  • I am more stupid about some things than about others; not equally stupid in all directions; I am not a well- rounded person.

    - Saul Bellow
      Mr Sammler's Planet, ch.2.

  • If the dullest person in the world would only put down sincerely what he or she thought about his or her life, about work and love, religion and emotion, it would be a fascinating document.

    - A(rthur) C(hristopher) Benson
      'From  A College Window'.

  • I am not at all the sort of person you and I took me for.

    -Jane Baillie ne  e Jane Baillie Welsh Carlyle
      Letter to Thomas Carlyle, 2 May.

  • There is no such thing on earth as an uninteresting subject; the only thing that can exist is an uninterested person.

    - G(ilbert) K(eith) Chesterton
      Heretics, ch.3.

  • Le temps et le monde et la personne ne se rencontrent qu'une seule fois. Time, the world and the person only encounter one another once.

    - He  le'  ne Cixous
      Dedans.

  • Iam well awarethat Iam theumblest person going† My mother is likewise a very umble person.We live in a numble abode.

    - CharlesJohn Huffam Dickens
    ^50  Uriah Heep. David Copperfield, ch.16.

  • Ce n'est que par la me  moire que nous sommes un me"  me individu pour les autres et pour nous-me"  mes. Il ne me reste peut-e"  tre pas, a'   l'a"  ge quej'ai, une seule mole  cule du corps que j'apportai en naissant. It is only in memory that we are the same person for others and for ourselves. At the age I am now, there is probably not a single molecule of my body that I had when born.

    - Denis Diderot
      Discours sur la poe  sie dramatique.

  • 'My idea of an agreeable person,'said Hugo Bohun,'is a person who agrees with me.'

    - Benjamin, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield Disraeli
      Lothair, ch.35.

  • A person seldom falls sick, but the bystanders are animated with a faint hope that he will die.

    - RalphWaldo Emerson
      The Conduct of Life,'Considerations by the Way'.

  • If I could explain it to the average person,I wouldn't have been worth the Nobel prize.

    - Richard P(hillips) Feynman
      In People Magazine, 22  Jul.

  •    You cannot be absolutely dumb when you live with a person unless you are an inhabitant of the North of England or the State of Maine.

    - Ford Madox originally Ford Hermann Hueffer Ford
      The Good Soldier, pt.3, ch.4.

  • Man kann sich seinenVater nicht w a« hlen. A person cannot choose his father.

    - Max Rudolph Frisch
    Andorra,10.

  •    A poet is a person who thinks there is something special about a poet and about his loving one unattainable woman.You'll usually find he takes the physical out on whores. I am defining a romantic poetand there is no other kind. An unromantic poet is a self-contradiction.

    - Robert Lee Frost
      Letter to Louis Untermeyer, 6  Jun.

  • I see mysteries and complications wherever I look, and I have never met a steadily logical person.

    - Martha Ellis Gellhorn
      The Face of War, introduction.

  • Ich sei nicht nur als Autor, sondern auch als Mann betroffen.Und zwar irgendwie schuldhaft. I am moved, not onlyas an author, but as a person. And feel somehow guilty.

    - Gu«  nter Wilhelm Grass
      Der Butt (translated as The Flounder,1978).

  • I cannot and will not cut my conscience to fit this year's fashions, even though I long ago cameto the conclusion that I was not a political person and could have no comfortable place in any political group.

    - Lillian Florence Hellman
      Letter to  John S  Wood,19 May, on being asked to give information for the McCarthy trials. Collected in US Congress Committee Hearing on Un- American  Activities (1952), pt.8.

  • We at no time stand so highly in our estate royal as in the time of Parliament, wherein we as head, and you as members, are conjoined and knit together into one body politic, so as whatsoever offence or injury is offered to the meanest member of the House is to be judged as done against our person and the whole Court of Parliament.

    -Henry VIII
       Address to a deputation from the House of Commons, 31 Mar.

  • There is no such thing as an unmusical person.

    - Hans Werner Henze
      'Does Music Have to Be Political?'

  • In the lifetime of one person, we went from figuring out where we came from to figuring out how to get rid of ourselves.

    -Jack Horner
      On the 80-year period from Darwin's Origin of Species to the first nuclear bomb. In Time, 26  Apr.

  • Une belle femme qui a les qualite  s d'un honne"  te homme est ce qu'il y a au monde d'un commerce plus de  licieux: l'on trouve en elle tout le me  rite des deux sexes. A beautiful woman who has the qualities of a gentleman is the most pleasing person in all the world: one finds in her all the merit of both sexes.

    -Jean de La Bruye'  re
      Les Caracte'  res ou les m½urs de ce sie'  cle,'Des femmes', no.13.

  • Il n'y a pour l'homme que trois e  ve  nements: na|"tre, vivre et mourir. Il ne se sent pas na|"tre, il souffre a'   mourir, et il oublie de vivre. There are only three great events for a person: to be born, to liveand to die.He doesnot feel his own birth, he suffers upon death and he forgets to live.

    -Jean de La Bruye'  re
      Les Caracte'  res ou les m½urs de ce sie'  cle,'De l'homme', no.48.

  • In bygone days, Morag had once believed that nothing could be worsethankilling a person.Nowsheperceived river-slaying as something worse.

    - Margaret Laurence
      The Diviners, ch.1.

  • I take it for granted that every Christian that is in health is up early in the morning; for it is much more reasonable to suppose a person up early because he is a Christian than becausehe is a labourerora tradesmanora servant or has business that wants him.

    -William Law
      A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life.

  • There was an old person of Ware, Who rode on the back of a bear: When they asked,'Does it trot?' He said,'Certainly not! He's a Moppsikon Floppsikon bear.'

    - Edward Lear
      MoreNonsense, Pictures, Rhymes, Botany Etc,'One Hundred Nonsense Pictures and Rhymes'.

  • To be in love with a country or a political regime is a tricky business.You get your heart broken even more surely than by being in love with a person.

    - Doris May ne  e Tayler Lessing
      African Laughter,'Next Time1988'.

  •    A politician is a person with whose politics you don't agree; if you agree with him, he is a statesman.

    - David, 1st Earl Lloyd George (of Dwyfor)
    Attributed.

  • Perhaps no person can be a poet, or can even enjoy poetry, without a certain unsoundness of mind.

    -1st Baron
      'Milton', in the Edinburgh Review,  Aug.

  • The product oftheartist hasbecome less importantthan the fact of the artist.We wish to absorb this person.We wish to devour someone who has experienced the tragic.Inour society thisperson ismuchmore important than anything he might create.

    - David Alan Mamet
      Writing in Restaurants,'Exuvial Magic:  An Essay Concerning Magic'.

  • Und wenn man sich fu«  r das Leben interessiert, so interessiert man sich namentlich fu«  r denTod. If a person concerns himself with life, he also concerns himself with death.

    -Thomas Mann
      Der Zauberberg (The Magic Mountain), vol.2.

  • Man kann sehr wohl in einer Geschichte sein, ohne sie zu verstehen. A person can be fully involved in a story without understanding it.

    -Thomas Mann
      Joseph und seine Bru«  der ('Joseph and his Brothers').

  • What would father say when he found out? For he was bound to find out sooner or later. He always did.'Buried. You two girls had me buried!' She heard his stick thumping.Oh, what would they say? What possible excuse could they make? It sounded such an appallingly heartless thing to do. Such a wicked advantageto take of a person because he happened to be helpless at the moment.

    -Beauchamp
      The Garden Party and Other Stories,'The Daughters of the Late Colonel'.

  • Un malheureux cherche l'autre. One unhappy person seeks out another.

    -Marguerite d'Angoule"  me
      Heptame  ron, pt.21.

  • Qu'est-ce qu'une charite   qui n'a point de pudeur avec le mise  rable, et qui, avant de le soulager, commence par e  craser son amour-propre. What is that charity worth which does not spare the wretched person's feelings, which instead, before providing comfort, beginsby wiping out hisself-esteem.

    - Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux
    La vie de Marianne, ch.14.

  • now and then there is a person born who is so unlucky that he runs into accidents which started to happen to somebody else.

    - Don(ald Robert Perry) Marquis
      archys life of mehitabel,'archy says'.

  • A demagogue is a person with whom we disagree as to which gang should mismanage the country.

    - Don(ald Robert Perry) Marquis
    Quoted in E  Anthony O Rare Don Marquis (1962), ch.11.

  • Nothing so aggravates an earnest person as a passive resistance.

    - Herman Melville
      'Bartleby the Scrivener', in Putnam's Monthly Magazine, Nov^Dec.

  • I hate all sports as rabidly as a person who likes sports hates common sense.

    - H(enry) L(ouis) Mencken
    Quoted in Fred Metcalfe The Penguin Dictionary of Modern Humorous Quotations (1986).

  • Everyone who receives the protection of society owes a return for the benefit, and the fact of living in a society renders it indispensable that each should be bound to observe a certain line of conduct towards the rest. That conduct consists†in each person bearing his share of the labours and sacrifices incurred for defending the society or its members from injuryand molestation.

    -John Stuart Mill
      On Liberty.

  • If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would nomorebejustifiedinsilencingthatonepersonthanhe, if hehadthepower, would bejustified insilencing mankind.

    -John Stuart Mill
      On Liberty.

  • He's the only person I know who's in worse shape than I am.

    - Marilyn pseudonym of  Norma Jean Baker Monroe
      On Montgomery Clift, her co-star in The Misfits.

  • Il faut pleurer les hommes a'   leur naissance, et non pas a' leur mort. A person should be mourned at his birth, not at his death.

    -Bre'  de et de
    Lettres persanes, no.40.

  • I don't think there's another person in America that wants to tell this story as much as I do.

    - Oliver North
      Invoking the Fifth  Amendment at the House Committee investigating arms sales to Iran,10 Dec.

  •   Crois-tu qu'on puisse e"  tre bien tendre lorsqu'on manque de pain? Do you believe that a person can be trulyaffectionate when he is starving?

    - Abbe   Antoine-Fran c° ois Pre  vost
    Histoire du chevalier Des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut, ch.1.

  • But of good household features her person was made, Nor by faction cry'd up nor of censure afraid, And her beauty was rather for use than parade.

    - Matthew Prior
      'Jinny theJust' (first printed1907).The title was givenbyA R Waller.

  • The person who knows'how' will always have a job. The person who knows 'why' will always be his boss.

    - Diane Silvers Ravitch
      Speech at Reed College commencement. Reported in Time,17 Jun.

  • Ancient Person, for whom I All the flattering youth defy; Long be it ere thou grow old, Aching, shaking, crazy, cold; But still continue as thou art, Ancient person of my heart.

    -JohnWilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester
    'A Song of aYoung Lady to HerAncient Lover', stanza1 (published1691).

  • In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential freedoms.The first isfreedom of speech and expression, everywhere in the world.The second is the freedom of every person to worship God in his own way, everywhere in the world.The third is freedom from want† The fourth is freedom from fear.

    - Franklin D(elano) Roosevelt
      Third inaugural address, 6 Jan.

  •    No person who is not a great sculptor or painter can be an architect. If he is not a sculptor or painter, he can only be a builder.

    -John Ruskin
      Lectures on Architecture and Painting.

  • On ne voit bien qu'avec le c½ur. L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux. Only with the heart can a person see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.

    - Antoine de Saint-Exupe  ry
      Le Petit Prince.

  • J'aime l'homme de  livre   par sa religion et vivifie   par les dieux que je fonde en lui. I admire the person freed from his religion and inspired by the gods inside of himself.

    - Antoine de Saint-Exupe  ry
    Citadelle (published1948).

  • I should be the last person to say anything against temptation, naturally, but we have a proverb down here 'in baiting a mouse-trap with cheese, always leave room for the mouse'.

    -Saki pseudonym of  Hector Hugh Munro
    The Square Egg,'The Infernal Parliament' (published1924).

  • L'homme qui a un peu use   ses e  motions est plus presse de plaire que d'aimer. The person who has used his emotions even a little is more anxious to please than to love.

    - Sir Sydney Samuelson
      Indiana, pt.1, ch.5.

  • La socie  te   ne doit rien exiger de celui qui n'attend rien d'elle. Society should not ask anything of the person who expects nothing from society.

    - Sir Sydney Samuelson
      Indiana, conclusion.

  • Alcohol is a very necessaryarticle† It makes life bearable to millions of people who could not endure their existence if they were quite sober. It enables Parliament to do things at eleven at night that no sane person would do at eleven in the morning.

    - George Bernard Shaw
      Undershaft to Barbara Undershaft. Major Barbara, act 2.

  •    I long for the Person from Porlock To bring my thoughts to an end. I am growing impatient to see him I think of him as a friend.

    - Stevie (Florence Margaret) Smith
      Selected Poems,'Thoughts About the Person from Porlock' (a reference to the'person from Porlock'mentioned in Coleridge's preliminary note to'Kubla Khan').

  • Consumer: A person who is capable of choosing a president but incapable of choosing a bicycle without help from a government agency.

    - Herbert Stein
      Washington Bedtime Stories.

  • Last week I saw a woman flayed, and you will hardly believe, how much it altered her person for the worse.

    -Jonathan Swift
      ATale of aTub, ch.9.

  • Psychiatrists classify a person as neurotic if he suffers from his problems in living, and a psychotic if he makes others suffer.

    -Thomas Stephen Szasz
      The Second Sin.

  • Not onlyareselves conditional buttheydie.Eachday, we wake slightlyaltered, and the person we were yesterday is dead.

    -John Hoyer Updike
      Self-Consciousness,VI.'On Being A Self Forever'.

  •    The odour of sanctity was clearly discernible from his breath and person.

    - Mervyn Wall
      The Unfortunate Fursey.

  • Thereisa species of personcalleda'ModernChurchman' who draws the full salary of a beneficed clergyman and need not commit himself to any religious belief.

    - Evelyn Arthur StJohn Waugh
      Decline and Fall, pt.2, ch.4.

  • Un homme qui lit, ou qui pense, ou qui calcule, appartient a'   l'espe'  ce et non au sexe; dans ses meilleurs moments, il e  chappe me"  me a'   l'humain. A person who reads or thinks or calculates, belongs to a kind and not to a gender; in his or her best moments, he or she escapes being human.

    -Crayencour
    Me  moires d'Hadrien.

Webster's New World Dictionary of Quotations Copyright © 2010 by Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. Published by Wiley, Hoboken, NJ. Used by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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