Entries in Quotes (8)
Undeniable Truths Department
"The chief achievement of Britney Spears in the last couple years has been to make us all appreciate the depth and substance of Jessica Simpson."
I Wonder As I Wander Department
"A writer I like named Ravi Zacharias says that the heart desires wonder and magic. He says technology is what man uses to supplant the desire for wonder. Ravi Zacharias says that what the heart is really longing to do is worship, to stand in awe of a God we don't understand and can't explain."
--Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz
Good Questions Department
Thomas Sowell is a professor of economics and a prolific writer, and every once in a while comes up with a column of "Random Thoughts." Here's one from his latest:
E-mail from a reader: "Here is Washington, we are looking at another round of teacher strikes because they want us to pay them more. And the literature they give us explaining their views contains so many errors in grammar and spelling that it really makes you wonder why we pay them at all."
Why indeed.
Roy M. Jacobsen
in Modern Life, Quotes
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Mysterious Ways Department
How did Dawn know I needed to see this today?
“Okay, so what advice do you have for people who are facing hurdles in their lives?”
“Jump.”
“What?”
“Jump over the hurdles. Isn’t that what hurdles are there for, to be jumped over?”
“You are one smart cookie Tylor.”
“Yeah, I know.”
I've linked to Trevor's blog about Tylor before. Tylor is one of those meteors you hear about that light up the sky so brilliantly as they pass.
Roy M. Jacobsen
in Quotes, Feelgood Stories, Worldviews
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2 References
Heroics Department
How about a bit of Patrick O'Brian? Dr. Maturin is talking to Mr. Jagiello in this dialog from The Surgeon's Mate:
"Your agility in the upper rigging excites wonder and admiration, my dear sir; but at the same time it causes a very great uneasiness of mind, and uneasiness proportionable to the esteem in which you are held; and it would please the Captain if you would confine yourself to the lower portions, technically known as tops."
"Does he believe that I shall fall?"
"He believes that the laws of gravity bear more severely on soldiers than on seamen; and since you are a hussar, he is convinced that you will fall."
"I shall do as he wishes, of course. But he is mistaken, you know: heroes never fall. At least, not fatally."
"I was not aware that you were a hero, Mr Jagiello."
..."Of course I am a hero," he said, getting up and laughing very cheerfully. "Every man is a hero of his own tale. Surely, Dr Maturin, every man must look on himself as wiser and more intelligent and more virtuous than the rest, so how could he see himself as the villain, or even as a minor character? And you must have noticed that heroes are never beaten. They may be undone for a while, but they always do themselves up again, and marry the virtuous young gentlewoman."
Root Causes Department
John Derbyshire points to a delightful analysis of “what’s wrong with the world” from none other than Ethel Merman (in the movie It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World):
[Unidentified gent]: “Take it easy, Honey. These things happen”
Mrs. Marcus (Ethel Merman): “Now what kind of an attitude is that, ‘these things happen?’ They only happen because this whole country is just full of people who, when these things happen, they just say ‘these things happen,’ and that’s why they happen!”
Imports From Erehwon Department
"...the weakness of all Utopias is this, that they take the greatest difficulty of man and assume it to be overcome, and then give an elaborate account of the overcoming of the smaller ones. They first assume that no man will want more than his share, and then are very ingenious in explaining whether his share will be delivered by motor-car or balloon."
-- G.K. Chesterton, Heretics
Underestimating Our Opponent Department
I am staggered by the level of naïveté that most people live with regarding evil. They don't take it seriously. They don't live as though the Story has a Villain. Not the devil prancing about in red tights, carrying a pitchfork, but the incarnation of the very worst of every enemy you've met in every other story. Dear God--the Holocaust, child pristitution, terrorist bombings, genocidal governments. What is it going to take for us to take evil seriously?
Life is very confusing if you do not take into account that there is a Villain. That you, my friend, have an enemy.
John Eldridge, Epic
I think that a great many people believe that they have enemies, whether that would be the bullies in the schoolyard, the members of the opposition party, or even "the man," but many have entirely lost sight of the fact that all of us together have an Enemy. Thus, we're only hurting ourselves when we fight against our perceived enemies instead of the the real one.