text:
George V of the United Kingdom

George V of the United Kingdom (3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India. He was monarch during World War I and the Great Depression. He was succeeded by his sons Edward VIII and George VI, and is the great-grandfather of the United Kingdom's current head of state Charles III.

Quotes

 * The Old Country must wake up if she intends to maintain her old position of pre-eminence in her Colonial trade against foreign competitors.
 * Speech in the Guildhall, London (5 December 1901), quoted in Harold Nicolson, King George V (1952), p. 73

 * Prince Henry of Prussia came to see me on Sunday July 26 [1914] at 9.30 a.m. and asked me if there was any news. I said the news was very bad & it looked like a European war & that he better go back to Germany at once. He said he would go down to Eastbourne to see his sister (Queen of Greece) & he would return to Germany that evening. He then asked what England would do if there was a European war. I said "I don't know what we shall do, we have no quarrel with anyone & I hope we shall remain neutral. But if Germany declared war on Russia, & France joins Russia, then I am afraid we shall be dragged into it. But you can be sure that I & my Government will do all we can to prevent a European war!" He then said—"Well, if our two countries shall be fighting on opposite sides, I trust that it will not affect our own personal friendship". He then shook hands & left the room, having been with me about eight minutes.
 * Note, quoted in Harold Nicolson, King George the Fifth: His Life and Reign (1953), pp. 245-246

 * Tuesday August 4th. I held a Council at 10.45. to declare war with Germany. It is a terrible catastrophe, but it is not our fault. An enormous crowd collected outside the Palace; we went on the balcony both before & after dinner. When they heard that war had been declared, the excitement increased & May & I with David went on to the balcony; the cheering was terrific. Please God it may soon be over & that he will protect dear Bertie's life.
 * Diary entry (4 August 1914), quoted in Harold Nicolson, King George the Fifth: His Life and Reign (1953), p. 247

 * At this grave moment of our national history I send to you, and through you to the officers and men of the Fleets of which you have assumed command, the assurance of my confidence that, under your direction, they will revive and renew the old glories of the Royal Navy and prove once again the sure shield of Britain and of her Empire in the hour of trial.
 * Signal to Sir John Jellicoe (5 August 1914), quoted in Harold Nicolson, King George the Fifth: His Life and Reign (1953), p. 257

 * Yesterday morning, four large German cruisers, it being foggy, appeared off the east coast of Yorkshire about 8.0 o'clock, & shelled Hartlepool & Scarborough for 40 minutes, doing considerable damage, killing about 40 women, children & civilians and maiming & wounding about 400. This is German kultur.
 * Diary entry on the raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby (17 December 1914), quoted in Harold Nicolson, King George the Fifth: His Life and Reign (1953), p. 257

 * I may be uninspiring but I'll be d——d if I'm alien.
 * Said after H. G. Wells referred to "an alien and uninspiring Court" (April 1917), quoted in Harold Nicolson, King George the Fifth: His Life and Reign (1953), p. 308

 * It has always been my dream that the two English-speaking nations should some day be united in a great cause, and to-day my dream is realized. Together we are fighting for the greatest cause for which peoples could fight. The Anglo-Saxon race must save civilization.
 * Remarks to John J. Pershing, the commander of the American Expeditionary Forces (9 June 1917), quoted in John J. Pershing, My Experiences in the World War, Volume I (1931), p. 48

 * After a struggle longer and far more terrible than anyone could have foretold, the soil of Britain remains inviolate. Our Navy has everywhere held the seas, and wherever the enemy could be brought to battle it has renewed the glories of Drake and Nelson.
 * Speech in the Royal Gallery of the Palace of Westminster (19 November 1918), quoted in The Times (20 November 1918), p. 7

 * These new soldiers, drawn from the civil population, have displayed a valour equal to that of their ancestors, who have carried the flag of Britain to victory in so many lands in bygone times... Not less prompt was the response, not less admirable the devotion to the common cause, of those splendid troops which eagerly hastened to us from the Dominions overseas, men who showed themselves more than ever to be bone of our bone, inheriting all the courage and tenacity that have made Britain great. A hundred battlefields in all parts of the world have witnessed their heroism, have been soaked with their blood, and are for ever hallowed by their graves.
 * Speech in the Royal Gallery of the Palace of Westminster (19 November 1918), quoted in The Times (20 November 1918), pp. 7-8

 * I shall ever remember how the Princes of India rallied to the cause, and with what ardour her soldiers sustained in many theatres of war, and under conditions the most diverse and exacting, the martial traditions of their race. Neither can I forget how the men from the Crown Colonies and Protectorates of Great Britain, also fighting amid novel and perilous scenes, exhibited a constancy and devotion second to none.
 * Speech in the Royal Gallery of the Palace of Westminster (19 November 1918), quoted in The Times (20 November 1918), p. 8

 * In all these ways, and through all these years, there has been made manifest the unconquered and unconquerable spirit of our race, nourished on the glorious traditions of many centuries of freedom. This spirit, conscious of its strength, bore the trials and disappointments of these years with a fortitude that was never shaken and a confidence that never failed. It knew its motives to be pure, and it held fast to its faith that Divine Providence would not suffer injustice and oppression to prevail.
 * Speech in the Royal Gallery of the Palace of Westminster (19 November 1918), quoted in The Times (20 November 1918), p. 8

 * We have to create a better Britain, to bestow more care on the health and well-being of the people, and to ameliorate further the conditions of labour.
 * Speech in the Royal Gallery of the Palace of Westminster (19 November 1918), quoted in The Times (20 November 1918), p. 8

 * In these years Britain and her traditions have come to mean more to us than they had ever meant before. It became a privilege to serve her in whatever way we could; and we were all drawn by the sacredness of the cause into a comradeship which fired our zeal and nerved our efforts. This is the spirit we must try to preserve. It is on a sense of brotherhood and mutual good will, on a common devotion to the common interests of the nation as a whole, that its future prosperity and strength must be built up. The sacrifices made, the sufferings endured, the memory of the heroes who have died that Britain may live, ought surely to ennoble our thoughts and attune our hearts to a higher sense of individual and national duty, and to a fuller realisation of what the English-speaking race, dwelling upon the shores of all the oceans, may yet accomplish for mankind.
 * Speech in the Royal Gallery of the Palace of Westminster (19 November 1918), quoted in The Times (20 November 1918), p. 8

 * For centuries past Britain has led the world along the path of ordered freedom. Leadership may still be hers among the peoples who are seeking to follow that path. God grant to their efforts such wisdom and perseverance as shall ensure stability for the days to come! May good will and concord at home strengthen our influence for concord abroad. May the morning star of peace which is now rising over a war-worn world be here and everywhere the herald of a better day, in which the storms of strife shall have died down and the rays of an enduring peace be shed upon all the nations.
 * Speech in the Royal Gallery of the Palace of Westminster (19 November 1918), quoted in The Times (20 November 1918), p. 8

 * I appeal to all Irishmen to pause, to stretch out the hand of forbearance and conciliation, to forgive and to forget, and to join in making for the land which they love a new era of peace, contentment, and good will... May this historic gathering be the prelude of a day in which the Irish people, North and South, under one Parliament or two, as those Parliaments may themselves decide, shall work together in common love for Ireland upon the sure foundation of mutual justice and respect.
 * Speech to the opening of the Northern Ireland Parliament (22 June 1921), quoted in The Times (23 June 1921), p. 11

 * I said to your predecessor: 'You know what they're all saying, no more coals to Newcastle, no more Hoares to Paris.' The fellow didn't even laugh.
 * Said to Anthony Eden on 23 December 1935 following the furore that erupted over the Hoare-Laval Pact.
 * Quoted in Earl of Avon, Facing the Dictators (1962) pt.2 ch.1

 * After I am dead, the boy will ruin himself in twelve months.
 * Statement to Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, referring to his son, Edward, Prince of Wales
 * Quoted in Keith Middlemas and John Barnes, Baldwin (1969) ch.34

 * How's the Empire?
 * On the morning of his death; quoted in Kenneth Rose, King George V (1983), ch.10

Attributed

 * After you've met one hundred and fifty Lord Mayors, they all begin to look the same.

 * I look upon him as the greatest criminal known for having plunged the world into war.
 * Alleged statement about his cousin Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany (1918)

 * You dress like a cad. You act like a cad. You are a cad.
 * Allegedly said to his son, Prince Edward. Quoted by Christopher Warwick in Abdication (Sidgwick and Jackson, 1986)

 * I may be uninspiring, but I'll be damned if I'm alien.
 * Allegedly said in response to H. G. Wells's criticism of his "alien [i.e. German-descended] and uninspiring court"

 * But, remember, I wish to have the best collection, not just one of the best collections in England.
 * Allegedly said to J.A. Tilleard, Honorary Secretary, Philatelic Society, on appointing him as Philatelist to the King.

 * You can't shake hands with a clenched fist.

 * Always go to the bathroom when you have a chance.

 * Golf always makes me so damned angry.

 * My father was frightened of his mother. I was frightened of my father and I am damned well going to see to it that my children are frightened of me.
 * Attributed in Randolph Churchill's Lord Derby (1959), but said by Kenneth Rose in King George V (1983) to be almost certainly apocryphal.

 * What did you do about peeing?
 * Allegedly said to Charles Lindbergh after he flew the Atlantic solo in an aeroplane.

 * It's the shortest one I know.
 * Allegedly said to Sir Thomas Beecham on the opera La Bohème, on why it was his favourite.

 * They make me look like a stuffed monkey.
 * Allegedly said about two postage stamps issued in 1911.

 * Bugger Bognor.
 * Alleged last words in 1936, in response to being told that he would soon be well enough to visit the seaside resort Bognor Regis
 * A second theory is that this dates from the King's 1928/9 recuperative visit there. Local dignitaries went to see the King's private secretary Stamfordham petitioning to have the town renamed Bognor Regis. The King told Stamfordham "Bugger Bognor", which he translated as the King would be pleased to grant their request.  (Nigel Rees, Sayings of the Century page 6, quoting Kenneth Rose's biography of the King.)
 * Goddamn you!
 * Alleged last words, after his nurse administered a sedative.

Quotes about George V

 * There can be no question that one outstanding reason for the high level of loyalty and patriotic effort which the people of this country maintained [during the First World War] was the attitude and conduct of King George V.
 * David Lloyd George, War Memoirs, Volume II (1938), p. 1162

 * For seventeen years, he did nothing at all but kill animals and stick in stamps.
 * Harold Nicolson, diary entry (17 August 1949), quoted in Harold Nicolson, The Later Years: 1945–1962. Volume Three, Diaries and Letters, ed. Nigel Nicolson (1966), p. 174

 * The King feels so strongly that, no matter the crime committed by anyone on whom the VC has been conferred, the decoration should not be forfeited. Even were a VC to be sentenced to be hanged for murder, he should be allowed to wear his VC on the scaffold.
 * Lord Stamfordham, private secretary to George V, on 26 July 1920. The original Royal Warrant involved an expulsion clause that allowed for a recipient's name to be erased from the official register in certain wholly discreditable circumstances and his pension cancelled. Eight were forfeited between 1861 and 1908. George V strongly opposed the concept of revoking a Victoria Cross, and directed Lord Stamfordham to express this view forcefully in a letter.

title: George V of the United Kingdom


text:
Don Marquis

Donald Robert Perry Marquis (29 July 1878 – 29 December 1937) was an American humorist, journalist, novelist, poet, cartoonist, newspaper columnist, and playwright most famous for creating the characters "Archy" the cockroach, and "Mehitabel" the cat.

Quotes

 * I have noticed that when chickens quit quarreling over their food they often find that there is enough for all of them i wonder if it might not be the same with the human race
 * archy's life of mehitabel, random thoughts by archy (1933)

 * If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; but if you really make them think, they'll hate you.
 * As quoted in The Volta Review (1934), p. 574, Clifton Fadiman: The American Treasury 1455-1955 (New York 1955) p. 997 and Hugh Rawson, Margaret Miner: The Oxford Dictionary of American Quotations (2006) p. 431 #5 from archy and mehitabel (1927)

 * A demagogue is a person with whom we disagree as to which gang should mismanage the country.
 * As quoted in O Rare Don Marquis, a Biography, by Edward Anthony (1962), Ch. 11

The Almost Perfect State (1921)

 * "The Almost Perfect State" in Modern Essays (1921), edited by Christopher Morley

 * I
 * No matter how nearly perfect an Almost Perfect State may be, it is not nearly enough perfect unless the individuals who compose it can, somewhere between death and birth, have a perfectly corking time for a few years. The most wonderful governmental system in the world does not attract us, as a system; we are after a system that scarcely knows it is a system; the great thing is to have the largest number of individuals as happy as may be, for a little while at least, some time before they die.

 * Infancy is not what it is cracked up to be. The child seems happy all the time to the adult, because the adult knows that the child is untouched by the real problems of life; if the adult were similarly untouched he is sure that he would be happy. But children, not knowing that they are having an easy time, have a good many hard times. Growing and learning and obeying the rules of their elders, or fighting against them, are not easy things to do.

It is to old age that we look for reimbursement, the most of us. And most of us look in vain. For the most of us have been wrenched and racked, in one way or another, until old age is the most trying time of all. In the Almost Perfect State every person shall have at least ten years before he dies of easy, carefree, happy living. . . things will be so arranged economically that this will be possible for each individual.
 * Of middle age the best that can be said is that a middle aged person has likely learned how to have a little fun in spite of his troubles.

 * Personally we look forward to an old age of dissipation and indolence and unreverend disrepute. In fifty years we shall be ninety-two years old. We intend to work rather hard during those fifty years and accumulate enough to live on without working any more for the next ten years, for we have determined to die at the age of one hundred and two.

 * Between the years of ninety-two and a hundred and two, however, we shall be the ribald, useless, drunken, outcast person we have always wished to be. We shall have a long white beard and long white hair; we shall not walk at all, but recline in a wheel chair and bellow for alcoholic beverages; in the winter we shall sit before the fire with our feet in a bucket of hot water, a decanter of corn whiskey near at hand, and write ribald songs against organized society; strapped to one arm of our chair will be a forty-five calibre revolver, and we shall shoot out the lights when we want to go to sleep, instead of turning them off; when we want air we shall throw a silver candlestick through the front window and be damned to it; we shall address public meetings (to which we have been invited because of our wisdom) in a vein of jocund malice. We shall … but we don’t wish to make any one envious of the good time that is coming to us … We look forward to a disreputable, vigorous, unhonoured, and disorderly old age.

 * We have always been compelled, and we shall be compelled for many years to come, to be prudent, cautious, staid, sober, conservative, industrious, respectful of established institutions, a model citizen. We have not liked it, but we have been unable to escape it. Our mind, our logical faculties, our observation, inform us that the conservatives have the right side of the argument in all human affairs. But the people whom we really prefer as associates, though we do not approve their ideas, are the rebels, the radicals, the wastrels, the vicious, the poets, the Bolshevists, the idealists, the nuts, the Lucifers, the agreeable good-for-nothings, the sentimentalists, the prophets, the freaks. We have never dared to know any of them, far less become intimate with them.

 * We shall know that the Almost Perfect State is here when the kind of old age each person wants is possible to him. Of course, all of you may not want the kind we want . . . some of you may prefer prunes and morality to the bitter end.

Do the best you can, without straining yourself too much and too continuously, and leave the rest to God. If you strain yourself too much you'll have to ask God to patch you up. And for all you know, patching you up may take time that it was planned to use some other way. BUT. . . overstrain yourself now and then. For this reason: The things you create easily and joyously will not continue to come easily and joyously unless you yourself are getting bigger all the time. And when you overstrain yourself you are assisting in the creation of a new self — if you get what we mean.
 * The best good that you can possibly achieve is not good enough if you have to strain yourself all the time to reach it. A thing is only worth doing, and doing again and again, if you can do it rather easily, and get some joy out of it.

 * II
 * Men could not think of THE ALMOST PERFECT STATE if they did not have it in them ultimately to create THE ALMOST PERFECT STATE.

Humanity triumphs over its details.
 * The wise and subtle deities permit nothing worthy to be lost. It was with no thought of beauty that the builders labored; no conscious thought; they were masters or slaves in the bitter wars of commerce, and they never saw as a whole what they were making; no one of them did. But each one had had his dream. And the baffled dreams and the broken visions and the ruined hopes and the secret desires of each one labored with him as he labored; the things that were lost and beaten and trampled down went into the stone and steel and gave it soul: the aspiration denied and the hope abandoned and the vision defeated were the things that lived, and not the apparent purpose for which each one of all the millions sweat and toiled or cheated; the hidden things, the silent things, the winged things, so weak they are easily killed, the unacknowledged things, the rejected beauty, the strangled appreciation, the inchoate art, the submerged spirit — these groped and found each other and gathered themselves together and worked themselves into the tiles and mortar of the edifice and made a town that is a worthy fellow of the sunrise and the sea winds.

The way to encourage yourself about the human race is to look at it first from a distance; look at the lights on the high spots.
 * The individual aspiration is always defeated of its perfect fruition and expression, but it is never lost; it passes into the conglomerate being of the race.

archy and mehitabel (1927)

 * dedicated to babs with babs knows what and babs knows why

 * the octopus's secret wish is not to be a formal fish he dreams that some time he may grow another set of legs or so and be a broadway music show

 * oh i should worry and fret death and i will coquette there s a dance in the old dame yet toujours gai toujours gai
 * the song of mehitabel

 * procrastination is the art of keeping up with yesterday
 * certain maxims of archy

 * an optimist is a guy that has never had much experience
 * certain maxims of archy

 * well boss mehitabel the cat has reappeared in her old haunts with a flock of kittens archy she said to me yesterday the life of a female artist is continually hampered what in hell have i done to deserve all these kittens i look back on my life and it seems to me to be just one damned kitten after another i am a dancer archy and my only prayer is to be allowed to give my best to my art but just as i feel that i am succeeding in my life work along comes another batch of these damned kittens it is not archy that i am shy on mother love god knows i care for the sweet little things curse them but am i never to be allowed to live my own life i have purposely avoided matrimony in the interests of the higher life but i might just as well have been a domestic slave for all the freedom i have gained i hope none of them gets run over by an automobile my heart would bleed if anything happened to them and i found it out but it isn t fair archy it isn t fair these damned tom cats have all the fun and freedom if i was like some of these green eyed feline vamps i know i would simply walk out on the bunch of them and let them shift for themselves but i am not that kind archy i am full of mother love my kindness has always been my curse a tender heart is the cross i bear self sacrifice always and forever is my motto damn them i will make a home for the sweet innocent little things unless of course providence in his wisdom should remove them they are living just now in an abandoned garbage can just behind a made over stable in greenwich village and if it rained into the can before i could get back and rescue them i am afraid the little dears might drown it makes me shudder just to think of it of course if i were a family cat they would probably be drowned anyhow sometimes i think the kinder thing would be for me to carry the sweet little things over to the river and drop them in myself but a mother s love archy is so unreasonable something always prevents me these terrible conflicts are always presenting themselves to the artist the eternal struggle between art and life archy is something fierce yes something fierce my what a dramatic life i have lived one moment up the next moment down again but always gay archy always gay and always the lady too in spite of hell well boss it will be interesting to note just how mehitabel works out her present problem a dark mystery still broods over the manner in which the former family of three kittens disappeared one day she was talking to me of the kittens and the next day when i asked her about them she said innocently what kittens interrogation point and that was all i could ever get out of her on the subject we had a heavy rain right after she spoke to me but probably that garbage can leaks so the kittens have not yet been drowned
 * mehitabel and her kittens

 * dance mehitabel dance caper and shake a leg what little blood is left will fizz like wine in a keg
 * mehitabel dances with boreas

 * i have often noticed that ancestors never boast the descendants who boast of ancestors i would rather start a family than one blood will tell but often it tells too much
 * a roach of the taverns

 * as i was crawling through the holes in a swiss cheese the other day it occurred to me to wonder what a swiss cheese would think if a swiss cheese could think and after cogitating for some time i said to myself if a swiss cheese could think it would think that a swiss cheese was the most important thing in the world just as everything that can think at all does think about itself
 * archygrams

what the ants are saying

 * no insect likes human beings and if you think you can see why the only reason i tolerate you is because you seem less human to me than most of them

 * it wont be long now it wont be long man is making deserts of the earth it wont be long now before man will have used it up so that nothing but ants and centipedes and scorpions can find a living on it man has oppressed us for a million years but he goes on steadily cutting the ground from under his own feet making deserts deserts deserts

 * what man calls civilization always results in deserts

 * men talk of money and industry of hard times and recoveries of finance and economics but the ants wait and the scorpions wait for while men talk they are making deserts all the time getting the world ready for the conquering ant drought and erosion and desert because men cannot learn

 * each generation wastes a little more of the future with greed and lust for riches

 * it wont be long now it won't be long till earth is barren as the moon and sapless as a mumbled bone

 * dear boss i relay this information without any fear that humanity will take warning and reform

archy does his part (1935)

 * it is a cheering thought to think that god is on the side of the best digestion
 * the big bad wolf

 * there is bound to be a certain amount of trouble running any country if you are president the trouble happens to you but if you are a tyrant you can arrange things so that most of the trouble happens to other people
 * archy's newest deal

 * there is always a comforting thought in time of trouble when it is not our trouble
 * comforting thoughts

warty bliggens, the toad

 *  i met a toad the other day by the name of warty bliggens he was sitting under a toadstool feeling contented he explained that when the cosmos was created that toadstool was especially planned for his personal shelter from sun and rain thought out and prepared for him

 * a little more conversation revealed that warty bliggens considers himself to be the center of the said universe the earth exists to grow toadstools for him to sit under the sun to give him light by day and the moon and wheeling constellations to make beautiful the night for the sake of warty bliggens

 * i asked him why is it that you are so greatly favored ask rather said warty bliggens what the universe has done to deserve me

the robin and the worm

 * a robin said to an angleworm as he ate him i am sorry but a bird has to live somehow the worm being slow witted could not gather his dissent into a wise crack and retort he was effectually swallowed before he could turn a phrase

 * demons and fishhooks he exclaimed i am losing my personal identity as a worm my individuality is melting away from me odds craw i am becoming part and parcel of this bloody robin so help me i am thinking like a robin and not like a worm any longer yes yes i even find myself agreeing that a robin must live i still do not understand with my mentality why a robin must live and yet i swoon into a condition of belief

 * amen said a beetle who had preceded him into the interior that is the way i feel myself is it not wonderful when one arrives at the place where he can give up his ambitions and resignedly nay even with gladness recognize that it is a far far better thing to be merged harmoniously in the cosmic all and this confortable situation in his midst so affected the marauding robin that he perched upon a blooming twig and sang until the blossoms shook with ecstacy he sang i have a good digestion and there is a god after all which i was wicked enough to doubt yesterday when it rained'''

 * breakfast breakfast i am full of breakfast and they are at breakfast in heaven they breakfast in heaven all s well with the world

 * how beautiful is the universe when something digestible meets with an eager digestion how sweet the embrace when atom rushes to the arms of waiting atom

 * well well boss there is something to be said for the lyric and imperial attitude believe that everything is for you until you discover that you are for it sing your faith in what you get to eat right up to the minute you are eaten for you are going to be eaten

 * there are more things twixt the vermiform appendix and nirvana than are dreamt of in thy philosophy horatio

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Don Marquis


text:
Talk:God

Yuri Gagarin
It wasn't Gagarin who said "I didn't see God up here.", it was Khrushchev. Gagarin was a Christian Orthodox. http://www.oodegr.com/english/epistimi/gagarin1.htm

Deleted Humanist statement
The following statement was deleted, probably because person who erased it simply did not like it, but it is an unattributed statement, and until an author or source can be declared, I will place it here on the talk page:
 * "The Humanist says he does not believe in God because the supposed God behaves in a morally arbitrary way: allowing innocents to die, scoundrels to live, some to have wealth, others to be poor, some to be in pain, and others to be healthy. This, they say, is morally arbitrary, and does not fit with how they think a real God would behave. Then THEY get to play God, by deciding on the fate of the unborn child: will they let it live or kill it. This, they insist, is their moral right. These two positions are completely contradictory, a thoroughly unreasonable philosophy for people who claim their philosophy is based entirely on reason."

Deletions of quotations or statements within articles should generally not be made without giving some reason for the removal. ~ Kalki 19:31, 6 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Atheism-related quotes
Shouldn't those quotes which have more to do with atheism than God be merged with Atheism? Or is the standard that any quote that mentions God be considered relevant here? (Just asking. I honestly don't know.)  --Ardonik 20:57, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)

 * This is probably a good idea, as it would minimze the flood of hostile comments that anti-religious zealots can be as prone to as religious ones often are about atheism, agnosticism, and other religions, but a link to Atheism should be prominent at the top of the page, and perhaps a page for agnosticism created as well. All of the related sites should probably have such a set of related links at the top. ~ Moby 21:11, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)

 * That's a good idea; perhaps something like (a non-existent) Template:Religion could allow people to jump between pages? I don't think people will consider inserting a  template into the Atheism quotes page to be POV, will they?  --Ardonik 21:32, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)

 * Yeah seriously, This is an article about quotes dealing with God. I believe the atheism quotes should go there. But the most offensive is the houmorous quotes, (ironicly aren't funny). Expesicaly Nietche is God. That is terrible and even Nietche would be offended, for he didn't believe in God.---Seadog.M.S 23:25, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

One-word names
Who are "Sidney", "Hall", and "Franklin"? I'll try to research a little. Quintessent

Religion quotes
I get the feeling that some of these quotes would be better suited in Religion, but I don't feel that I have the authority to move them around. --KaiSeun 02:07, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * I consider God to be a subset of religion. Having a page for God quotes reduces the clutter on the Religion(s) page.  My method for adding quotes is as follows:
 * if it is about God or mentions God it goes in the God article
 * if it is about religion or mentions religion it goes in the Religion article.
 * Now that I have enunciated my case it does seem to make sense! Alan Liefting 03:24, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Einstien
I removed the following quote: The first part of the quote seems to be fabricated completely, and the second is slightly out of context. What he actually said is available here: http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/einprayr.htm
 * I pity the man who says there isn't a Supreme Being [...] every one who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe. ~ Albert Einstein

210.89.149.89 08:35, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Massive cleanup
Three images were added to this once imageless page at a fairly large size, and without any context. I certainly promote the use of images in articles, but do believe they should generally be tied to specific quotes, as to make any implied relevance a bit more clear. I intended to reduce their size, and caption some quotes with which they might have mutual relevance, if I could find some, perhaps add a few others as well, and do much format cleanup.

I then found that these images added were only recently uploaded to Wikimedia Commons without essential source information. The character of the images make their licensing under GFDL or other free licenses rather dubious, and I have thus not used them but intend to use some similar images that are not slated for deletion.

I have thus far removed duplicated quotes, a quote by one author linked to a deleted vanity page, and a few quotes by "anonymous" or other unknowns, that appeared only on this page or in mirrors of WIkiquote in a Google search. I have not thoroughly tested all of the quotes that I don't recognize, but I have not otherwise removed any that might yet be dubious attributions or which might be disputed as perhaps only loosely relevant. I did correct the text or the comments about a few, added wikilinks, and a few quotes, and did some sourcing.

I will probably work on this page a bit more, later today or within the next few days, but right now I have to take a bit of a break and get at least a few personal tasks done before proceeding on to this and a few other Wikiquote tasks. ~ Kalki 13:51, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Lyrics
Am I way off here? Or are lyrics lyrics and quotations quotations? I've removed the following:

 * Just what God needs — one more victim. Why do we crucify ourselves?
 * Tori Amos in "Crucify" on Little Earthquakes (1992)

 * God, sometimes you just don't come through Do you need a woman to look after you?
 * Tori Amos in "God" on Under the Pink (1994)

I'm actually a HUGE fan myself, but it doesn't belong here. --dc —This unsigned comment is by 12:46, 17 January 2007 (talk • contribs) 12.110.49.81.

 * Lyrics are fine as quotes. The real question is whether these are quotes specifically about God, or whether they just mention God while making some other point. The first strikes me as only tangentially involving God in a statement (question) about destructive social expectations. The second is a harder call, apparently being a somewhat oblique criticism of God. Judging by the song's remaining lyrics, when she talks about 9-irons and 4-wheels, she sounds like she's talking more about either men in general or earth-bound religious figures, maybe male-dominated conservative society — I'm never quite sure with Tori. The amhiguity makes it feel insufficiently on-topic, to me at least. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 13:09, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Oneness of God
There's a long quotation from Ali about Oneness of God. Where should I add it. The foremost in religion is the acknowledgement of Him, the perfection of acknowledging Him is to testify Him, the perfection of testifying Him is to believe in His Oneness, the perfection of believing in His Oneness is to regard Him Pure, and the perfection of His purity is to deny Him attributes, because every attribute is a proof that it is different from that to which it is attributed and everything to which something is attributed is different from the attribute.

Thus whoever attaches attributes to Allah recognises His like, and who recognises His like regards Him two; and who regards Him two recognises parts for Him; and who recognises parts for Him mistook Him; and who mistook Him pointed at Him; and who pointed at Him admitted limitations for Him; and who admitted limitations for Him numbered Him.

Whoever said in what is He, held that He is contained; and whoever said on what is He held He is not on something else. He is a Being but not through phenomenon of coming into being. He exists but not from non-existence. He is with everything but not in physical nearness. He is different from everything but not in physical separation. He acts but without connotation of movements and instruments. He sees even when there is none to be looked at from among His creation. He is only One, such that there is none with whom He may keep company or whom He may miss in his absence. --Sa.vakilian 02:51, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

 * We try to keep quotes cited in Wikiquote pithy — short and powerful. Long quotes tend to detract from the focus on succinct, powerful, memorable statements. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 03:04, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Quotes... from God?
Why are Jesus' quotes listed but not God's? I found a few in there, and I apologize for not figuring out the system for finding them, but there needs to be separate articles for quotes about God and quotes from him directly.

 * "Let there be light."
 * "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever."
 * "I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high.  Make a roof for it and finish the ark to within 18 inches of the top. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks.  I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish.  But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons' wives with you.   You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you.  Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive.  You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them."

I'd be surprised if someone found some reason not to have one for him. 68.251.175.61 01:40, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Unsourced
There are quite a few wholly unsourced quotes on this page. Moving them here.

 * "Does God know he [exists]?" "Of course he does. Otherwise, you could not have asked the question, and I could not have answered."
 * Douglas Adams

 * When I observe into what inconsistent absurdities those persons run who make speculative, metaphysical religion a matter of importance, I am fully determined never to puzzle myself in the mazes of religious discussion, [and] to content myself with practicing the dictates of God and reason so far as I can judge for myself...
 * John Adams

 * Facts are the words of God, and we may heap them together endlessly, but they will teach us little or nothing till we place them in their true relations, and recognize the thought that binds them together.
 * Louis Agassiz

 * It is the job of prophets and scientists alike to proclaim the glories of God
 * Louis Agassiz

 * "We have one life; it soon will be past; what we do for God is all that will last."
 * Muhammad Ali

 * God will not place a burden on a man's shoulders knowing that he cannot carry it.
 * Muhammad Ali

 * God is not a limited individual who sits alone up in the clouds on a golden throne. God is pure Consciousness that dwells within everything. Understanding this truth, learn to accept and love everyone equally.
 * Amma

 * To surrender to ignorance and call it God has always been premature, and it remains premature today.
 * Isaac Asimov

 * In God alone, essence (what He is) and existence (that he is) coincide.
 * Avicenna

 * God alone is real, nothing matters but love for God.
 * Meher Baba

 * It is true, that a little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion; for while the mind of man looketh upon second causes scattered, it may sometimes rest in them, and go no further; but when it beholdeth the chain of them confederate, and linked together, it must needs fly to Providence and Deity.
 * Francis Bacon

 * There are two books laid before us to study, to prevent our falling into error; first, the volume of the Scriptures, which reveal the will of God; then the volume of the Creatures, which express His power.
 * Francis Bacon

 * The orthodox faith painted God as a revengeful being, and yet people talk about loving such a being.
 * P. T. Barnum

 * That men should live honestly, quietly, and comfortably together, it is needful that they should live under a sense of God's will, and in awe of the divine power, hoping to please God, and fearing to offend Him, by their behaviour respectively.
 * Isaac Barrow, teacher of Isaac Newton.

 * Stop telling God what to do with his dice.
 * Niels Bohr

 * When with bold telescopes I survey the old and newly discovered stars and planets, when with excellent microscopes I discern the unimitable subtility of nature's curious workmanship; and when, in a word, by the help of anatomical knives, and the light of chemical furnaces, I study the book of nature, I find myself oftentimes reduced to exclaim with the Psalmist, 'How manifold are Thy works, O Lord! In wisdom hast Thou made them all!
 * Sir Robert Boyle

 * An outlook through this peephole [that manned space flight had opened] at the vast mysteries of the universe should only confirm our belief in the certainty of its Creator. I find it as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of a superior rationality behind the existence of the universe as it is to comprehend a theologian who would deny the advances of science.
 * Wernher Von Braun

 * To the lexicographer, God is simply the word that comes next to go-cart
 * Samuel Butler

 * God is a metaphor for that which transcends all levels of intellectual thought. It's as simple as that.
 * Joseph Campbell

 * Well, you have to say yes to [Eternity], you have to say it's great this way. It's the way God intended it.
 * Joseph Campbell

 * At best, God can be viewed as nothing more than an uncaring incompetent father-figure.
 * George Carlin

 * Religion has never really had a big problem with murder. Not really. More people have been killed in the name of God than for any other reason.
 * George Carlin

 * Religion easily has the greatest bullshit story ever told. Think about it. Religion has actually convinced people that there's an invisible man living in the sky who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do. And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever 'til the end of time! But He loves you. He loves you. He loves you and he needs money! He always needs money! He's all-powerful, all-perfect, all-knowing and all-wise, but somehow, just can't handle money!
 * George Carlin

 * Once abolish the God, and the government becomes the God.
 * Chesterton

 * Nihil est, quod deus efficere non possit ("there is nothing that God cannot do").
 * Cicero

 * I don't believe in God, but I'm very interested in Her.
 * Arthur C. Clarke

 * Perhaps our role on this planet is not to worship God — but to create Him.
 * Arthur C. Clarke

 * I've steered clear of God. He was an incredible sadist.
 * John Collier

 * We spoke to God about the children, and we were afraid to ask God for specific things. We thought that it might be too much. So we said to God 'Please give us a healthy child' and left it at that, not knowing that God is a generous God, but also has a sense of humor. And if you leave that much open for God, some wonderful jokes are going to come about.
 * Bill Cosby

 * Realization of Happiness Itself Is Realization of God, Truth, or Reality Itself
 * Adi Da

 * I don't believe in God because I don't believe in Mother Goose.
 * Clarence Darrow

 * I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created parasitic wasps with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of caterpillars.
 * Charles Darwin

 * Nothing is discovered without God's intention and assistance, and I suppose every new knowledge of His works that is conceded to man to be distinctly a revelation by which men are to guide themselves.
 * Charles Dickens

 * God made the world round so we would never be able to see too far down the road.
 * Isak Dinesen

 * I do not know whether there are gods, but there ought to be.
 * Diogenes of Sinope

 * With God, every moment is the moment of beginning again.
 * Catherine Doherty

 * God says do what you wish, but make the wrong choice and you will be tortured for eternity in hell. That, sir, is not free will. It would be akin to a man telling his girlfriend, 'Do what you wish, but if you choose to leave me, I will track you down and blow your brains out.' When a man says this we call him a psychopath and cry out for his imprisonment/execution. When a god says the same, we call him loving and build churches in his honor.
 * Computer programmer, -Chuck Easttom

 * Before God we are all equally wise — and equally foolish
 * Albert Einstein

 * I believe in Spinoza's God, Who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God Who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind.
 * Albert Einstein (24 April 1929)

 * I cannot conceive of a personal God who would directly influence the actions of individuals, or would directly sit in judgment on creatures of his own creation. I cannot do this in spite of the fact that mechanistic causality has, to a certain extent, been placed in doubt by modern science. My religiosity consists in a humble admiration of the infinitely superior spirit that reveals itself in the little that we, with our weak and transitory understanding, can comprehend of reality. Morality is of the highest importance — but for us, not for God.
 * Albert Einstein

 * Quantum mechanics is certainly imposing. But an inner voice tells me that it is not yet the real thing. The theory says a lot, but does not really bring us any closer to the secret of the Old One. I, at any rate, am convinced that He does not throw dice.
 * Albert Einstein

 * The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and true science. Whoever does not know it and can no longer wonder, no longer marvel, is as good as dead, and his eyes are dimmed. It was the experience of mystery — even if mixed with fear — that engendered religion. A knowledge of the existence of something we cannot penetrate, our perceptions of the profoundest reason and the most radiant beauty, which only in their most primitive forms are accessible to our minds: it is this knowledge and this emotion that constitute true religiosity. In this sense, and only this sense, I am a deeply religious man.
 * Albert Einstein
 * Variant translation: The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed.

 * Either God wants to abolish evil, and cannot; or he can, but does not want to... If he wants to, but cannot, he is impotent. If he can, but does not want to, he is wicked... If, as they say, God can abolish evil, and God really wants to do it, why is there evil in the world?... If he is unable to do either, then why call him 'God'?
 * Epicurus

 * If the gods listened to the prayers of men, all men would quickly have perished: for they are always praying for evil against one another.
 * Epicurus

 * When people expect God to plan their lives for them, and protect them, they tend to lose their motivation to guide and control their own lives.
 * Charles W. Faulkner

 * God heals, and the doctor takes the fee.
 * Benjamin Franklin

 * God helps those who help themselves.
 * Benjamin Franklin

 * Beer is proof God loves us. (misattributed)
 * Benjamin Franklin

 * If a kid asks where rain comes from, I think a cute thing to tell him is 'God is crying.' And if he asks why God is crying, another cute thing to tell him is 'Probably because of something you did.'
 * Jack Handey

 * Men rarely (if ever) managed to dream up a god superior to themselves. Most gods have the manners and morals of a spoiled child.
 * Robert A. Heinlein

 * Faith must have adequate evidence, else it is mere superstition.
 * Alexander Hodge

 * Never tell a young person that something cannot be done. God may have been waiting for centuries for somebody ignorant enough of the impossibility to do that thing.
 * Dr. J.A. Holmes

 * All laws for the purpose of making man worship God, are born of the same spirit that kindled the fires of the auto da fe, and lovingly built the dungeons of the Inquisition. All laws defining and punishing blasphemy — making it a crime to give your honest ideas about the Bible, or to laugh at the ignorance of the ancient Jews, or to enjoy yourself on the Sabbath, or to give your opinion of Jehovah, were passed by impudent bigots, and should be at once repealed by honest men. An infinite God ought to be able to protect himself, without going in partnership with State Legislatures.
 * Robert Ingersoll

 * An honest God is the noblest work of man.
 * Robert Ingersoll

 * I do not believe in forgiveness as it is preached by the church. We do not need the forgiveness of God, but of each other and of ourselves.
 * Robert Ingersoll

 * I have made up my mind that if there is a God, he will be merciful to the merciful. Upon that rock I stand. That he will not torture the forgiving. Upon that rock I stand. That every man should be true to himself, and that there is no world, no star, in which honesty is a crime. Upon that rock I stand. The honest man, the good woman, the happy child, have nothing to fear, either in this world or the world to come. Upon that rock I stand.
 * Robert Ingersoll

 * The old doctrine that God wanted man to do something for him, and that he kept a watchful eye upon all the children of men; that he rewarded the virtuous and punished the wicked, is gradually fading from the mind. We know that some of the worst men have what the world calls success. We know that some of the best men lie upon the straw of failure. We know that honesty goes hungry, while larceny sits at the banquet. We know that the vicious have every physical comfort, while the virtuous are often clad in rags.
 * Robert Ingersoll

 * When gods quarrel, it is the mortals who suffer
 * Tatsuya Ishida|

 * It is easy to understand God as long as you don't try to explain him.
 * Joseph Joubert (1754-1824)

 * It is not God's will merely that we should be happy, but that we should make ourselves happy.
 * Immanuel Kant

 * Reason can never prove the existence of God.
 * Immanuel Kant

 * The wish to talk to God is absurd. We cannot talk to one we cannot comprehend — and we cannot comprehend God; we can only believe in Him. The uses of prayer are thus only subjective.
 * Immanuel Kant

 * I had the intention of becoming a theologian...but now I see how God is, by my endeavors, also glorified in astronomy, for 'the heavens declare the glory of God.'
 * Johannes Kepler

 * [God] is the kind Creator who brought forth nature out of nothing."
 * Johannes Kepler

 * "The Creator, the fountain of all wisdom, the approver of perpetual order, the eternal and superessential spring of geometry and harmonics."
 * Johannes Kepler

 * We say the name of God, but that is only out of habit.
 * Nikita Krushchev

 * God created the world and then created the devil, to blame for his mistakes.
 * Simon Le Bon

 * God is love, but get it in writing.
 * Gypsy Rose Lee

 * God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.
 * C. S. Lewis

 * God will look to every soul like its first love because He is its first love.
 * C. S. Lewis

 * If God thinks this state of war in the universe a price worth paying for free will... then we may take it it is worth paying.
 * C. S. Lewis

 * I believe our limited minds are unable to grasp such a concept
 * Jared Leto

 * I'm not against God. I'm against the Misuse of God.
 * Marilyn Manson

 * When people ask what my beliefs are, I respond that if I try to explain I would get lost.
 * Edgar Mendez

 * God is a word to express, not our ideas, but the want of them.
 * John Stuart Mill

 * And God said, 'Let there be light' and there was light, but the Electricity Board said he would have to wait until Thursday to be connected.
 * Spike Milligan

 * Is man merely a mistake of God's? Or God merely a mistake of man?
 * Friedrich Nietzsche

 * I cannot believe that God is a weak left-hander.
 * Wolfgang Pauli after hearing of experiments that violated parity conservation

 * I talk to God but the sky is empty.
 * Sylvia Plath

 * God, that checkroom of our dreams.
 * Jean Rostand

 * So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence.
 * Bertrand Russell

 * We must be greater than God, for we have to undo His injustice.
 * Jules Renard

 * God is absence. God is the solitude of man.
 * Jean-Paul Sartre

 * [God is] a force more powerful than mom and dad put together.
 * "Lisa Simpson" in The Simpsons

 * Get out of our schools God, get out of our textbooks God, get out of our government God, go away God, go away God, go away God, Katrina hits, God, where are you?
 * Brad Stine

 * I bring up God a lot in my show, know why? Because I miss him.
 * Brad Stine

 * It is an insult to God to believe in God. For on the one hand it is to suppose that he has perpetrated acts of incalculable cruelty. On the other hand, it is to suppose that he has perversely given his human creatures an instrument — their intellect — which must inevitably lead them, if they are dispassionate and honest, to deny his existence. It is tempting to conclude that if he exists, it is the atheists and agnostics that he loves best, among those with any pretensions to education. For they are the ones who have taken him most seriously.
 * Galen Strawson

 * Bondage and liberation are not antagonistic in love. For love is most free and at the same time most bound. If God were absolutely free there would be no creation. The infinite being has assumed unto himself the mystery of finitude. And in him who is love the finite and the infinite are made one.
 * Rabindranath Tagore

 * I believe in a spiritual world — not as anything separate from this world — but as its innermost truth. With the breath we draw we must always feel this truth, that we are living in God.
 * Rabindranath Tagore

 * Those who have everything but thee, my God, laugh at those who have nothing but thyself.
 * Rabindranath Tagore

 * The meaning of our self is not to be found in its separateness from God and others, but in the ceaseless realisation of yoga, of union.
 * Rabindranath Tagore

 * The self-expression of God is in the endless variety of creation; and our attitude toward the Infinite Being must also in its expression have a variety of individuality ceaseless and unending. Those sects which jealously build their boundaries with too rigid creeds excluding all spontaneous movement of the living spirit may hoard their theology but they kill religion.
 * Rabindranath Tagore

 * Your idol is shattered in the dust to prove that God's dust is greater than your idol.
 * Rabindranath Tagore

 * We cannot know whether we love God, although there may be strong reason for thinking so; but there can be no doubt about whether we love our neighbor or not. Be sure that, in proportion as you advance in fraternal charity, you are increasing your love of God.
 * Teresa of Avila

 * "Time is the brush of God, as he paints his masterpiece on the heart of humanity."
 * Ravi Zacharias

Unsourced "anonymous" quotes and proverbs

 * Call on God, but row away from the rocks.
 * English proverb

 * God does not love those who have not suffered.
 * Croatian Proverb

 * God is like a barber: don't expect him to give you a haircut, you must first get at his barbershop.
 * Anonymous.

 * God is beatiful. He loves beauty.
 * Muslim proverb

 * Trust in God but tie your camel.
 * Muslim proverb (possibly attributed in the Masnavi of Rumi).

 * If God lived on earth, people would break his windows.
 * Yiddish proverb

 * To make God laugh at you, tell him your plans.
 * Yiddish proverb

 * Black holes are where God is dividing by zero.
 * Anonymous.

 * God is real, unless you declare him an integer.
 * Anonymous.

 * Well you may throw your rock and hide your hand Workin' in the dark against your fellow man But as sure as God made black and white What's down in the dark will be brought to the light.
 * Anonymous, "God's Gonna Cut You Down", traditional folk song, recorded by many artists.

 * Go tell that long tongue liar Go and tell that midnight rider Tell the rambler, the gambler, the back biter Tell 'em that God's gonna cut 'em down.
 * Anonymous "God's Gonna Cut You Down", traditional folk song

Atributed
Other quotation are sorted to sections =attributed= and =about=.

Why not here? Anyone against sorting out this ?
 * —previous unsigned comment by Donald ducke Anglosaxon (talk, contribs)
 * Yes, I'm against. This page, like pages about other mythological personae, is a topic/theme page, not a person page. ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 12:58, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Images
Per WQ:MOBILEFRIENDLY.

- Rupert Loup 06:30, 21 September 2020 (UTC)

Marcus Aurelius quote

 * Perhaps an editor able to put the following quote on the protected/high security page will do so. I don't have the authority to.
 * Rememberest the gods, and that they wish not to be flattered, but wish all reasonable beings to be made like themselves
 * Marcus Aurelius, MeditationsBook X, 8 (c. AD 121–180) Best wishes, anon 97.64.219.134 00:36, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:God


text:
Hebraic proverbs

'''This page is for Hebrew proverbs, in alphabetical order, with English translations.

'''

א

 * אין הנחתום מעיד על עיסתו
 * Eyn Hanah'tom Meid Al Eesato
 * The baker shouldn't comment on his dough.
 * English equivalent: Don't blow your own horn/trumpet.

 * אין עשן בלי אש
 * Eyn Ashan Bli Esh
 * English equivalent: "No smoke without fire", or "Where there's smoke, there's fire".
 * "There is no effect without some cause. also It is supposed that if there is a rumour, there must be some truth behind it."

 * אל תסתכל בקנקן, אלא במה שבתוכו
 * Al tistakel baqanqan, ela bemah shebetokho
 * Don't look at the jar, but at what's inside it.
 * Meaning: Don't be fooled by external appearances - find the real value.
 * English equivalent: Don't judge a book by its cover.

 * אל תקנה חתול בשק
 * Al Tiqneh Hatul Basaq
 * Don't buy a cat in the sack.
 * English equivalent: Don't buy a.
 * "The more honesty a man has, the less he affects the air of a saint."
 * Johann Kaspar Lavater, as quoted in Many Thoughts of Many Minds (1862) edited by Henry Southgate, p. 290.

ט

 * טוב להיות זנב לאריות מאשר ראש לשועלים
 * Tov Lihiyoth Zanav La'arayoth Ma'asher Rosh Lashu'alim
 * Better be a tail for the lions than the head of the foxes
 * Meaning: It is better to be a minor member of a good group, than a prominent leader of a bad one.
 * Meaning: It is better to be a minor member of a good group, than a prominent leader of a bad one.

 * טובה ציפור אחת ביד משתיים על העץ
 * Tova Tzipor Ahath Bayad Mishtayim Al Ha'etz
 * One bird in the hand is better than two on the tree.
 * English equivalent: Better is one bird in the hand than two in the bush.
 * Meaning: "Something you have for certain now is of more value than something better you may get, especially if you risk losing what you have in order to get it."
 * Source for meaning of English equivalent:

כ

 * כי בתחבולות תעשה לך מלחמה
 * Ki betah'boloth ta'aseh lekha milhama
 * Because with wise advice you should do a war.
 * Origin: The Bible - Proverbs 24, 6
 * "Once a man has tasted freedom he will never be content to be a slave."
 * Walt Disney, Radio address "Our American Culture" broadcast during an intermission of the Metropolitan Opera. (1 March 1941)

 * כל המרחם על אכזרים סופו שיתאכזר על רחמנים
 * Kol hamerachem al achzarim sofo shitachzer al rachmanim
 * Who is merciful to the cruel eventually would be cruel to the merciful.
 * Origin: כל שנעשה רחמן על האכזרים, לסוף נעשה אכזר על רחמנים Eleazar ben Pedat statement in Midrash Tanhuma, Parashat Metzora, Siman A

ל

 * תכו נגד ברזל בעודו חם
 * Taku Neged Barzel B’odo Kham
 * Hit against iron while it’s hot.

מ

 * מה ששנוא עליך - אל תעשה לחברך
 * Mah Shesanu Aleikha Al Ta'aseh Lehaberkha
 * don't do to another what is hated by you.

 * מרוב עצים לא רואים את היער
 * Merov etzim lo ro'im eth ha'ya'ar
 * Can't see the forest for the trees.
 * Meaning: While overlooking every detail you might miss out the big picture.

נ

 * נאה דורש - נאה מקיים
 * Na'eh doresh - na'eh meqayem
 * He who demands well, should fulfill his demands well.
 * English equivalent: "You've got to practice what you preach".
 * 'Twas good advice, and meant, "My son, be good."
 * George Crabb, The Learned Boy, Volume V, Tale XXI. Reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 10-11.

ס

 * סנונית אחת אינה מבשרת את בוא האביב
 * Snonith ahath eyna mevasereth eth bo ha'aviv
 * one swallow does not herald the coming of spring.
 * Meaning: one occurrence does not indicate a general pattern.
 * Origin: Aristotle's "Nicomachean Ethics".

ע

 * על דאטפת אטפוך וסוף מטיפייך - יטופון (Mishnah Avot 2,7)
 * 'Al d'ateft atfu'kh, v'sof m'tifaikh ytufun
 * Because you have drowned others, you were drowned — and in the end, those who drowned you will be drowned.
 * Meaning: Sins shall be punished, but people are not allowed to take the law into their own hands. or what you do to others will come back at you (some sort of karma)

צ

 * צוחק מי שצוחק אחרון
 * Tsoheq mi shetsoheq aharon
 * laughs he who laughs last.
 * "Your laugh is of the sardonic kind."
 * Caius Gracchus, when his adversaries laughed at his defeat, as reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 428-30

 * צרות באות בצרורות
 * Tsaroth ba'oth bitsro'oth
 * troubles come in packs.
 * English equivalent: Misery loves company.
 * Corollaries:
 * צרה צרורה
 * Tsarah Tsrurah
 * a packed trouble.
 * proverbs in Hebrew (misle) which mean Solomaon Proverbs.

ר

 * רחוק מהעין - רחוק מהלב
 * Rahoq Meha'ayin - Rahoq Mehalev
 * "Far from the eye - far from the heart".
 * English equivalent: "out of sight - out of mind"

ת

 * תפסת מרובה - לא תפסת
 * Tafasta Merubeh - Lo Tafasta
 * (sort of) Caught lots - got nothing.
 * English equivalent: Grasp all, lose all.
 * Meaning: if one tries to achieve too many goals at once, he'll achieve none or few of them.

 * .נפלה האבן על הקדרה, אוי לקדרה. נפלה הקדרה על האבן, אוי לקדרה
 * The stone fell on the pitcher? Woe to the pitcher. The pitcher fell on the stone? Woe to the pitcher. (This is from Cervantes' Don Quixote. Was it a Hebrew proverb before that? What is the cite or authority?)
 * Esther Rabbah 7:10, quoted in Lewis Browne: The Wisdom of Israel, an Anthology

 * בכל החזיתות שאנו מטילים על אחרים אנחנו מדגימים את הפוטנציאל שלנו, דרך הילדים שלנו אנחנו מגלים את המציאות שלנו. - לורנס קלמן, כדי ללבות עמ 'נשמה
 * In the facades we put on for others we demonstrate our potential; through our children we reveal our reality.
 * Lawrence Kelemen, To Kindle A Soul p. 195

 * Love is blind.

א ב ג ד ה ו ז ח ט י כ ל מ נ ס ע פ צ ק ר ש ת

פתגמים עבריים

title: Hebraic proverbs


text:
Talk:Sun Tzu

Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak
This is a quote commonly attributed to Art of War, but I haven't noticed it in any translations. It appears to be derived from the "All warfare is based on deception" line from Chapter I, but it is far from a literal translation --Thisisbossi (talk) 04:05, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

 * i get what you mean, I've been looking for it for ages, but it's more likely a boiled down, shortened version of "when able to attack, we must seem unable. When using our forces, we must seem inactive. When we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away...", which is the teaching 18 of chapter one. 212.95.5.219 16:50, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Every battle is won or lost before it is fought
I notice that "every battle is won or lost before it is fought" appears absent both from the article and the discussion. It's frequently invoked and attributed to Sun Tzu--could someone add something on it? I'm not even remotely qualified to do so myself. --149.142.112.2, 2/11/2014

Misattributed Quotes
The following alleged Sun Tzu quotations are inventions. There is nothing in Sun Tzu akin to what is stated here; in fact, most of this is quite silly and completely contrary to the Sun Tzu admonitions. --D.G. Jones, 2005

 * 1) "The more you read and learn, the less your adversary will know."
 * 2) "He who is prudent and lies in wait for an enemy who is not, will be victorious."
 * 3) "Opportunities multiply as they are seized."
 * 4) "Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat."
 * 5) "Too frequent rewards indicate that the general is at the end of his resources; too frequent punishments that he is in acute distress."
 * 6) "A leader leads by example not by force."
 * 7) "A skilled commander seeks victory from the situation and does not demand it of his subordinates."
 * 8) "To know your Enemy, you must become your Enemy...Keep your Friends close and your Enemies closer."
 * 9) "Build your opponent a golden bridge to retreat across."

It's really stupid how some quotes are repeated more than once, maybe you should pick one variation and stick with it? --195.229.236.213 08:21, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

 * Why should that be? When a statement is translated in many ways, especially from ideograms, there is no "authoritative" translation, and many people might search for a widely quoted variant of an assertion that is not listed. Better to list many major variations, than to behave as if there is only one should be presumed to be "ideal". ~ Gandalf 08:30, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

 * Thanks for confirming this. I was completely at odds to some of the quotes, for anyone familiar with military texts, Sun Tzu among many other military thinkers and leaders believed in fate and determination from the correct application of theory, the state of the opponent's and one's own power, and a code for the general and a code for the soldier to follow, rather than the Machiavellian type of intuition that evokes for an evolution of opportunism that brought great historical consequences as it dominated over the classical and medieval ethical doctrines.

 * That is the reason the quote opportunities multiply as they are seized is contrary to Sun Tzu principles. First and last ones you list there are as you say silly. Second and 4th quotes are just strange. 5th was a surprise though; even though I think it has a small chance to be related to Sun Tzu now, I had thought it a variant of one of Sun Tzu's quotes. 6th is stupid with all due respect to the inventor, and to 7th and 8th, they seem more like movie quotes than anything from a military thinker. --AC, 2012

Unsourced

 * The more you read and learn, the less your adversary will know.

 * The art of giving orders is not to try to rectify the minor blunders and not to be swayed by petty doubts.

 * Engage people with what they expect; it is what they are able to discern and confirms their projections. It settles them into predictable patterns of response, occupying their minds while you wait for the extraordinary moment — that which they cannot anticipate.

 * Show him there is a road to safety, and so create in his mind the idea that there is an alternative to death. Then strike.  --Tu Mu, Ch. 7 (p. 110 in Samuel B. Griffith edition)  For "golden bridge," see 'misattributed,' below.

 * Do what you say, don't say what you do.

eText for Verification
''I have placed the link to the eText of The Art of War for the purpose of verification. Although some quotes are from different translations. If you refer to the eText's introduction it says that being this work is so old it is hard to truly attribute to Sun Tzu himself. Being that some of the initial translations are considered to be of poor accuracy.'' --Jascha

"Make an uproar in the east, strike in the west."
I see this quote attributed to Sun Tzu here and a paraphrase is used in "Arcarsenal" by At the Drive-In, although it is not attributed to Sun Tzu in the song. I have searched through The Art of War for the quote but it doesn't seem to be in there in any form. Is this not a genuine Sun Tzu quote or is it from some other, more obscure piece of writing? --Editor510 (talk) 21:48, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

"Let your plans be dark and impenetrable like night and move like a thunderbolt."
Chapter 7: maneuvering. verify 209.232.149.23 22:01, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

title: Talk:Sun Tzu


text:
User:Distributed~enwikiquote

Vikram D IL, USA

69.214.250.101 11:28, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

title: User:Distributed~enwikiquote


text:
Harold II of England

Harold II Godwinson (c. 1022 – 14 October 1066) was the last crowned Anglo-Saxon king of England. Harold reigned from 6 January 1066 until his death at the Battle of Hastings, fighting the Norman invaders led by William the Conqueror during the Norman conquest of England. His death marked the end of Anglo-Saxon rule over England.

Attributed

 * Seven feet of English ground, or as much more as he may be taller than other men.
 * Variant translation: He will give him seven feet of English ground, or as much more as he may be taller than other men.
 * Attributed by the Icelandic writer Snorri Sturluson (1178-1241) in his Saga of Harald Hardrade.
 * When asked by his traitorous brother, Tostig, how much of England he was prepared to give up to the invading King Harald Hardrada of Norway, he said 6 feet of ground for a grave.

title: Harold II of England


text:
Louis VII of France

Louis VII (1120 – 18 September 1180) was a Capetian King of the Franks from 1137 until his death. He was the son and successor of King Louis VI of France, hence his nickname, and married Eleanor of Aquitaine, one of the wealthiest and most powerful women in western Europe. Eleanor came with the vast Duchy of Aquitaine as a dowry for Louis, thus temporarily extending the Capetian lands to the Pyrenees, but their marriage was annulled in 1152 after no male heir was produced.

Unsourced

 * Now in Ireland, now in England, now in Normandy — he must fly rather than go by horse or ship.
 * On his enemy, King Henry II of England.

title: Louis VII of France