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“I think people attack me because they are fearful that I will then say that you're not equally as patriotic if you're not a religious person. ... I've never said that. I've never acted like that. I think that's just the way it is. (Washington Times, 12 January 2005)”
George W. Bush (born 1946) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“President Thomas Jefferson once wrote, "I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past." As I leave the house he occupied two centuries ago, I share that optimism. America is a young country, full of vitality, constantly growing and renewing itself. And even in the toughest times, we lift our eyes to the broad horizon ahead.”
George W. Bush (born 1946) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The fact that the general incidence of leukemia has doubled in the last two decades may be due, partly, to the increasing use of x-rays for numerous purposes. The incidence of leukemia in doctors, who are likely to be so exposed, is twice that of the general public. In radiologists … the incidence is ten times greater.”
Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) first seen 1965 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Statement of 1965, as quoted without citation of a specific work in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), edited by Asimov and Jason A. Shulman, p. 233
“It is important to remember that the viciousness and wrongs of life stick out very plainly but that even at the worst times there is a great deal of goodness, kindness, and day-to-day decency that goes unnoticed and makes no headlines.”
Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) first seen 1967 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Roman Empire (1967), p. 91
“Consider the most famous pure dystopian tale of modern times, 1984, by George Orwell (1903-1950), published in 1948 (the same year in which Walden Two was published). I consider it an abominably poor book. It made a big hit (in my opinion) only because it rode the tidal wave of cold war sentiment in the United States.”
Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) first seen 1983 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Nowhere!" Asimov's Science Fiction (September 1983)
“At odd and unpredictable times, we cling in fright to the past.”
Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) said by 1992 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“And no, I am not looking for yes-men, and I like it when you call me out on my bullshit. I say some stupid things at times, there needs to be people who just stand up to me and tell me I'm full of shit.”
Linus Torvalds (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Surely it is a great thing to increase the numerous host of fixed stars previously visible to the unaided vision, adding countless more which have never before been seen, exposing these plainly to the eye in numbers ten times exceeding the old and familiar stars.”
Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) said by 1642 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Translation by Stillman Drake in Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo (1957)
“Alas! Your dear friend and servant Galileo has been for the last month hopelessly blind; so that this heaven, this earth, this universe, which I by my marvelous discoveries and clear demonstrations had enlarged a hundred thousand times beyond the belief of the wise men of bygone ages, henceforward for me is shrunk into such a small space as is filled by my own bodily sensations.”
Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) first seen 1638 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Élie Diodati (2 January 1638), as translated in The Private Life of Galileo: Compiled primarily from his correspondence and that of his eldest daughter, Sister Maria Celeste (1870) by Mary Allan-Olney, p. 279
“In ancient times cats were worshiped as gods; they have not forgotten this.”
Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) first seen 2007 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Pratchett is credited as author of this, as quoted in Ghost Cats : Human Encounters with Feline Spirits (2007) by Dusty Rainbolt, p. 7, and in Chicken Soup for the Soul : What I Learned from the Cat (2009) by Jack Canfi…
“God could hardly have been at that wedding or He would not have allowed it to turn from love to something so awful. When he’d asked Solomon, the old man had stroked his chin and mmm’d a few times and then said that surely any Almighty worth believing in would agree. And if not, Solomon would explain it to Him for them.”
Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) said by 2015 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Unexpected always comes at the most awkward times.”
Larry Niven (born 1938) first seen 2003 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Scatterbrain (2003), p. 26
“Wild, dark times are rumbling toward us, and the prophet who wishes to write a new apocalypse will have to invent entirely new beasts, and beasts so terrible that the ancient animal symbols of St. John will seem like cooing doves and cupids in comparison.”
Heinrich Heine (1797–1856) first seen 1842 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Lutetia; or, Paris. From the Augsberg Gazette, 12, VII (1842)
“In early times, the great majority of the male sex were slaves, as well as the whole of the female. And many ages elapsed, some of them ages of high cultivation, before any thinker was bold enough to question the rightfulness, and the absolute social necessity, either of the one slavery or of the other.”
John Stuart Mill (1806–1873) said by 1873 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“For passionate emotions of all sorts, and for everything which has been said or written in exaltation of them, he professed the greatest contempt. He regarded them as a form of madness. "The intense" was with him a bye-word of scornful disapprobation. He regarded as an aberration of the moral standard of modern times, compared with that of the ancients, the great stress laid upon feeling.”
John Stuart Mill (1806–1873) said by 1873 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“... it seems that it would take less than half a million years to evolve a good camera eye ... It's no wonder "the" eye has evolved at least 40 times independently around the animal kingdom ... It is a geological blink.”
Richard Dawkins (born 1941) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There were times we regretted The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, And the silken girls bringing sherbet.”
T. S. Eliot (1888–1965) said by 1965 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Dan Chaucer, the first warbler, whose sweet breath Preluded those melodious bursts that fill The spacious times of great Elizabeth With sounds that echo still.”
Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892) first seen 1832 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A Dream of Fair Women", st. 2 (1832)
“We are ancients of the earth, And in the morning of the times.”
Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892) first seen 1879 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Daydream: L'Envoi, lines 231-32, from The Complete Works of Alfred Tennyson (1879)
Also quoted by: Alfred Tennyson
“It asks a little of us here. It asks of us a certain height. So when at times the mob is swayed To carry praise or blame too far, We may take something like a star To stay our minds on and be staid.”
Robert Frost (1874–1963) first seen 1943 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: An Afterword" ("Choose Something Like a Star"), l. 20 (1943)
“How many times it thundered before Franklin took the hint! How many apples fell on Newton's head before he took the hint! Nature is always hinting at us. It hints over and over again. And suddenly we take the hint.”
Robert Frost (1874–1963) first seen 1959 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted in Louis Untermeyer, Lives of the Poets: The Story of One Thousand Years of English and American Poetry (1959)
“Under the pressure of the cares and sorrows of our mortal condition, men have at all times, and in all countries, called in some physical aid to their moral consolations — wine, beer, opium, brandy, or tobacco.”
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) said by 1797 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Always steady in the rejection of a Reform of Parliam[en]t which proved the best sense, & better than some sense they were deficient in at Times.”
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) said by 1797 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Too dangerous an experiment to risque. Not any reform proposed yet that did not appear to him highly hazardous. The least exceptionable that of Lord Chatham's "adding fifty Knights of the shire": but this, as well as the rest already proposed, not to be thought upon in such times as these, or perhaps, ever.”
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) said by 1797 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Back in 1927, an American socialist, Norman Thomas, six times candidate for President on the Socialist Party ticket, said that the American people would never vote for socialism but he said under the name of liberalism the American people would adopt every fragment of the socialist program.”
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) first seen 1961 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine (1961 LP)
“What we have found in this country, and maybe we're more aware of it now, is one problem that we've had, even in the best of times, and that is the people who are sleeping on the grates, the homeless who are homeless, you might say, by choice.”
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) first seen 1984 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Defending himself against charges of callousness on Good Morning America(31 January 1984), cited by Paul Slansky, The Clothes Have No Emperor
“The story is told that one night at dinner here at Mount Vernon, Lafayette said to Washington, "General, you Americans even in war and desperate times have a superb spirit. You're happy and you're confident. Why is it?" And Washington answered, "There is freedom. There is space for a man to be alone and think, and there are friends who owe each other nothing but affection.”
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) said by 2004 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We will at all times be ready to talk, if talk will help. But we must also be ready to resist with force, if force is used upon us. Either alone would fail. Together, they can serve the cause of freedom and peace.”
John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) said by 1963 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Philosophers often behave like little children who scribble some marks on a piece of paper at random and then ask the grown-up "What's that?" — It happened like this: the grown-up had drawn pictures for the child several times and said "this is a man," "this is a house," etc. And then the child makes some marks too and asks: what's this then?”
Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) said by 1951 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“No pleasure is in itself evil, but the things which produce certain pleasures entail annoyances many times greater than the pleasures themselves. (8)”
Epicurus (342–270 BC) said by 270 BC at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is impossible for a man who secretly violates the terms of the agreement not to harm or be harmed to feel confident that he will remain undiscovered, even if he has already escaped ten thousand times; for until his death he is never sure that he will not be detected. (35)”
Epicurus (342–270 BC) said by 270 BC at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We may with advantage at times forget what we know.”
Publilius Syrus (101–101 BC) said by 101 BC at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Also quoted by: Publius Syrus
“The Germans themselves I should regard as aboriginal, and not mixed at all with other races through immigration or intercourse. For in former times, it was not by land but on shipboard that those who sought to emigrate would arrive; and the boundless and, so to speak, hostile ocean beyond us, is seldom entered by a sail from our world.”
Tacitus (55–120) said by 120 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“He left a corsair's name to other times, Linked with one virtue, and a thousand crimes.”
Lord Byron (1788–1824) said by 1824 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is so horrible, I dare at times imagine to my need Some future state revealed to us by Zeus”
Robert Browning (1812–1889) said by 1889 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be, The last of life, for which the first was made: Our times are in his hand Who saith, "A whole I planned, Youth shows but half; trust God: see all, nor be afraid!”
Robert Browning (1812–1889) said by 1889 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“So, take, and use thy work: Amend what flaws may lurk, What strain o' the stuff, what warpings past the aim! My times be in thy hand! Perfect the cup as planned! Let age approve of youth, and death complete the same!”
Robert Browning (1812–1889) said by 1889 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It's hardly in a body's pow'r, To keep, at times, frae being sour.”
Robert Burns (1759–1796) first seen 1786 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Epistle to Davie, st. 2 (1786)
“Much converse do I find in thee, Historian of my infancy! Float near me; do not yet depart! Dead times revive in thee: Thou bring'st, gay creature as thou art! A solemn image to my heart.”
William Wordsworth (1770–1850) first seen 1801 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To a Butterfly ("Stay Near Me"), st. 1 (wr. 1801; pub. 1807)
“These feeble and fastidious times.”
William Wordsworth (1770–1850) first seen 1830 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Alexander Dyce (April 19, 1830)
“A multitude of causes unknown to former times are now acting with a combined force to blunt the discriminating powers of the mind, and unfitting it for all voluntary exertion to reduce it to a state of almost savage torpor.”
William Wordsworth (1770–1850) first seen 1800 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Preface (1800)
“Full twenty times was Peter feared, For once that Peter was respected.”
William Wordsworth (1770–1850) said by 1850 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A jolly place," said he, "in times of old! But something ails it now: the spot is cursed.”
William Wordsworth (1770–1850) said by 1850 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“An intellectual dapperling of these times boasts chiefly of his irresistible perspicacity, his “dwelling in the daylight of truth,” and so forth; which, on examination, turns out to be a dwelling in the rush-light of “closet logic,” and a deep unconsciousness that there is any other light to dwell in or any other objects to survey with it.”
Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) said by 1881 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It was a rude gross error, that of counting the Great Man a god. Yet let us say that it is at all times difficult to know what he is, or how to account of him and receive him!”
Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) said by 1881 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Noble in the high place, the Ignoble in the low; that is, in all times and in all countries, the Almighty Maker's Law.”
Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) said by 1881 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“By labor and intent study (which I take to be my portion in this life), joined with the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps leave something so written to after-times, as they should not willingly let it die.”
John Milton (1608–1674) first seen 1641 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Reason of Church Government (1641), Book II, Introduction
“I love everything that's old: old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wines.”
Oliver Goldsmith (1728–1774) said by 1774 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Times of general calamity and confusion, have ever been productive of the greatest minds. The purest ore is produced from the hottest furnace, and the brightest thunderbolt is elicited from the darkest storm.”
Charles Caleb Colton (1777–1832) said by 1832 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Thrice is he armed that hath his quarrel just, But four times he who gets his blow in fust”
Josh Billings (1818–1885) said by 1885 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source