Some of My Favorite Wise Quotes

            I love quotes. While I’m reading books from the classics list I’m going through, or just reading any book even if it’s for school, I try to keep an eye out for sentences that strike me. It is important to note that while I don’t agree with all the opinions and views of the people, whose books I read, indeed sometimes I don’t even enjoy the books, it is still possible to find a golden needle of wisdom in amongst the haystack.

Ducks

For instance recently I came across this quote, “How fleeting are all human passions compared with the massive continuity of ducks.”(1) on Pinterest (by the way I’m on Pinterest so come follow me).  I should back up. I saw a picture of a Tumblr post on Pinterest. On it, a person was discussing how humans from the past would find it very difficult to adapt to the present, while ducks would find it very easy to live in the present as they need very few things to stay the same in order to function. At the time, I was feeling very overwhelmed with how many things were changing in my life and are still about to change. For one strange reason or another, I found it very comforting to realize that ducks could withstand drastic shifts in the world. If ducks could, maybe I could survive living off campus, purchasing my own groceries, and paying my electric bill.

Young

Many people think that being a teenager, or a college student, or a twenty-something, or someone who just graduated etc. etc. Therefore, when I read The Lonesome Gods by Louis l’amour this quote stood out to me, "People only talk about how wonderful youth is when they have forgotten how hard it was." Previously, I talked about my feelings on this topic in my “I Can Smell The Roses FromHere” post. While I understand that previous problems seem smaller in the light of new ones, that doesn’t diminish the difficulty and effort it took to get through them the first time. In other words, minimalizing the problems of someone younger, not only ignores their effort, but also neglects to recognize how much you have grown and become stronger. Therefore, I appreciate this quote, because it helps me remember to ignore neither how much I have grown nor how much others are still growing.

Napoleon-Bismark

"Although everyone cannot be a Gargantuan-Napoleon-Bismarck and walk off with the great bells of Notre Dame, everyone must bear his own universe, and most persons are moderately interested in learning in how their neighbors have managed to carry theirs," said Henry Adams in his book The Education of Henry Adams. This quote is in the About section of this blog. There I said about this quote, “Therefore, watch me as I bear my own universe and maybe my method will resonate with you. In other words, I’m a person living life and so are you…so read my blog.” But I didn’t have the time or the space in that section to fully unpack this quote. Henry Adams starts off with a hyperbolic suggestion. “everyone cannot be a Gargantuan-Napoleon-Bismarck” in this section, Henry Adams takes the two great political leaders of his time Napoleon Bonaparte of France and Otto Von Bismarck of Prussia.

These two men dwarfed most others on the political scene, which given he was descended from two U.S. presidents Henry Adams was expected to enter. He didn’t enter the political scene, though he wrote plenty about it as a journalist and historian. We all have people we look at and think that we are supposed to be them or we want to be them. Aspirations are fine, but envy or lusting after the fame of someone who can seem to accomplish anything (“walk off with the great bells of Notre Dame”) is unproductive at best and potentially life-destroying at worst. Nevertheless, everyone has problems they have to work through and found solutions. Therefore, whenever possible we should all avoid reinventing the wheel when others have gone before us.

What about you?

What are some of your favorite quotes? Comment them below as well as what made you drawn to them in the first place. I'd love to hear them from you!

Sources:

Image Credit: 

Duck- "Duck!" by Laura Suarez

Bell-  "Etienne" by Groume

Youth- "berks" by gezelle rivera 

(1) Sayers, Dorothy L. Gaudy Night