Aphorisms Quotes

The best aphorisms are ... portable wisdom, the quintessential extracts of thought and feeling. They furnish the largest amount of intellectual stimulus and nutriment in the smallest compass. About every weak point in human nature, or vicious spot in human life, there is deposited a crystallization of warning and protective proverbs. ~ William Rounseville Alger

Cinderella had to dress up so that the Prince could see her inner beauty. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Settle down and be Good forever. Find the hardest things to accept in me, and reconcile what I am with what I hope to be. ~ Jen Wang

Knowing how to fall is much more valuable than knowing how to walk. ~ Diogo Mainardi

Body language has no translation. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

To many people chess is an extreme sport. It requires a lot of thinking. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Ancient aphorisms outlived centuries. Modern aphorisms can barеly survive from book to book. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Wonderful aphorism - but we can't take refuge in aphorisms. ~ Morton Feldman

Writing is beautiful, like putting on a gold suit and going to sleep in it. ~ Mark Leidner

You can't have love and honor, and neither will bring you peace. ~ W.M. Driscoll

We are entitled to violate history, provided that it results in handsome offspring. ~ Alexandre Dumas

Any concession made from the truth, big or small, does not create a part-truth; it creates a lie. ~ Euphrates Arnaut Moss

Our parents would not be 'The best parents in the world' (to us) if they were not our parents. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

An aphorism needn't be true, but it should sound true. ~ Marty Rubin

The aphorism is already a shadow of itself. ~ Don Paterson

Every single living thing is food to at least one living thing. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

What are the precise characteristics of an epigram it is not easy to define. It differs from a joke, in the fact that the wit of the latter dies in the words, and cannot therefore be conveyed in another language; while an epigram is a wit of ideas, and hence, is translatable. Like aphorisms, songs and sonnets, it is occupied with some single point, small and manageable; but whilst a song conveys a sentiment, a sonnet a poetical, and an aphorism a moral reflection, an epigram expresses a contrast. ~ William Matthews

You cannot force someone to believe something they do not believe; you can only manage to force them to speak or act as if they do. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

One cannot strategize for a hand that has yet to be dealt. ~ Euphrates Arnaut Moss

The world had always loved the saint as being the nearest possible approach to the perfection of God. Christ, through some divine instinct in him, seems to have always loved the sinner as being the nearest possible approach to the perfection of man. His primary desire was not to reform people, any more than his primary desire was to a relieve suffering. To turn an interesting thief into a tedious honest man was not his aim. He would have thought little of the Prisoners' Aid Society and other modern movements of the kind. The conversion of a publican into a Pharisee would not have seemed to him a great achievement. But in a manner not yet understood of the world he regarded sin and suffering as being in themselves beautiful holy things and modes of perfection.

It seems a very dangerous idea. It is - all great ideas are dangerous. That it was Christ's creed admits of no doubt. That it is the true creed I don't doubt myself.

Of course the sinner must repent. But why? Simply because otherwise he would be unable to realise what he had done. The moment of repentance is the moment of initiation. More than that: it is the means by which one alters one's past. The Greeks thought that impossible. They often say in their Gnomic aphorisms, 'Even the Gods cannot alter the past.' Christ showed that the commonest sinner could do it, that it was the one thing he could do. Christ, had he been asked, would have said - I feel quite certain about it - that the moment ~ Oscar Wilde

Fleeing into aphorisms, the last refuge of an adult under siege. ~ Terry Pratchett

Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; women, because they are curious: both are disappointed." "I don't think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. That is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, as I do everything that you say. ~ Oscar Wilde

It's always darkest before you're blinded by the light ~ Josh Stern

Aphorisms are literature's hand luggage. Light and compact, they fit easily into the overhead compartment of your brain. ~ James Geary

Aphorisms are food for thought - like sushi, they come in small portions that are both delicious and exquisitely formed. And, like sushi, I can never get enough. ~ James Geary

If you can't fix it, feature it. ~ Gregory J. Boyle

In the mountains the shortest way is from peak to peak; but for that one must have long legs. Aphorisms should be peaks – and those who are addressed, tall and lofty. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

To have luck and fail to act on it is tantamount to not having luck at all. In fact, it was worse. Barnes thought back to his self-help manuals. They all proclaimed with compelling force the necessity of recognizing opportunity then seizing it when it stuck. ~ Joseph G. Peterson

They would sweep their poverty under the carpet if only they had one. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

If you have decided to sail to the sea with great courage and determination, even the storm on the horizon will step aside! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

Good places for aphorisms: in fortune cookies, on bumper stickers, and on banners flying over the Palace of Free Advice. ~ Mason Cooley

Most of my writing consists of an attempt to translate aphorisms into continuous prose. ~ Northrop Frye

If you send someone a snarky Tweet, does that make you an Angry Bird? ~ Avram Ohm

My thoughts on the descent of our moral prejudices – for that is what this polemic is about – were first set out in a sketchy and provisional way in the collection of aphorisms entitled Human, All Too Human. A Book for Free Spirits, which I began to write in Sorrento during a winter that enabled me to pause, like a wanderer pauses, to take in the vast and dangerous land through which my mind had hitherto travelled. This was in the winter of 1876–7; the thoughts themselves go back further. They were mainly the same thoughts which I shall be taking up again in the present essays – let us hope that the long interval has done them good, that they have become riper, brighter, stronger and more perfect! The fact that I still stick to them today, and that they themselves in the meantime have stuck together increasingly firmly, even growing into one another and growing into one, makes me all the more blithely confident that from the first, they did not arise in me individually, randomly or sporadically but as stemming from a single root, from a fundamental will to knowledge deep inside me which took control, speaking more and more clearly and making ever clearer demands. And this is the only thing proper for a philosopher. We have no right to stand out individually: we must not either make mistakes or hit on the truth individually. Instead, our thoughts, values, every 'yes', 'no', 'if ' and 'but' grow from us with the same inevitability as fruits borne on the tree – all related and r ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

A second-thought's kindness can purchase a kingdom of regard. ~ Euphrates Arnaut Moss

I am not a titleholder; I don't steal; I don't lie... ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

1. A time machine on the shoulders of memories, two advisers: on the right shoulder there is good future, in the left past that is evil, two open rays of time in which consciousness travels.
2. A halo of knowledge within life, this is a recording of a projection, one who feels reality can feel the universe: the past, present and future, and that which is timeless.
3. The laugh of rage
Rap beat: Trumpet music ram there beat street rhythm boo boom bang bang there tudum pub bam pa bang boom boom
The laughter of rage and the bloody gloom in a smile in consciousness from an evil joke of reality from the fact that you are not worthy to live like everyone else. The ragged strings of the ever-laughing psyche, like the blinking light of madness where there is insight between light and darkness. The interrupted melody of the harmony of the soul. The silence of insight overcomes the mind, the light is visible, leading to a new dimension of thinking, because everything is visible through the transparent eyelids of the vigilance of fear, and only unconsciousness temporarily closes our eyes from fatigue in the realm of the subconscious.
4. Gangsta music: Car sound Wooo ooo woooo oo drum beat drums pap pap pap
Laughing grin of smiling reality from the fact that billions of internal realities of people form a single reality of the hidden chaos of egoism.
5. There is nothing cheaper than sins.
7. Patience gives friends.
8. The trumpet sounds a symp ~ Musin Almat Zhumabekovich.

Money give value to life. The more money you have, the more valuable you are to others. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Playing a fool is the best paid role. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

I stepped through the doors of the SA Café with a borrowed copy of Isaac Asimov's I, Robot in my hand, expecting to find more of the same, only to find Philip K. Dick sitting at a table, obsessing over Gnostic demiurges and ersatz realities, Robert A. Heinlein across from him, spouting libertarian aphorisms but paying for Dick's coffee. ~ Hal Duncan

Every lesson in life is worth learning except for the ones you can't afford. ~ Euphrates Arnaut Moss

Leftovers come to those who wait. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

You can only master something by loving it. ~ Lera Auerbach

Being young is having the world by the tail
Growing up is tracing it to your own posterior ~ W.M. Driscoll

What you'd have done do; what not delegate. ~ Euphrates Arnaut Moss

Don't draw the line before stupidity. It'll take it as a start. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Life sometimes confuses us by making us discover in someone we hate a quality or qualities we love. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

The excellence of aphorisms consists not so much in the expression of some rare or abstruse sentiment, as in the comprehension of some useful truth in a few words. ~ Samuel Johnson

There is so much poetry, and yet nothing is more rare than a poetic work. This is what the masses make out of poetical sketches, studies, aphorisms, trends, ruins, and raw material. ~ Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

Trouble never turns down an invitation. ~ Euphrates Arnaut Moss

We are not as important to most people as we are to ourselves. As a matter of fact, we are - to most people - not important at all. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

If I knew he loved me for my wealth, I would have told him I was richer. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Passionate smokers always welcome the peace-pipe without hesitation. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

The Supreme Court of the United States has descended from the disciplined legal reasoning of John Marshall and Joseph Story to the mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie. [Referring to pronouncement by Justice Anthony Kennedy in Obergefell v. Hodges: "The Constitution promises liberty to all within its reach, a liberty that includes certain specific rights that allow persons, within a lawful realm, to define and express their identity."] ~ Antonin Scalia

It is a sign of arrogance to be mad at someone for not acting as per your advice, especially if it was unsolicited. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

You burn like a candle
inside my soul,
showing me a way
through this darkness. ~ Vivid Darkness

At all times pseudoprofound aphorisms have been more popular than rigorous arguments. ~ Mario Bunge

Women's movement has an effect on potency. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Aphorisms are not true or false, but pointed or flat. ~ Mason Cooley

Man who has lived through so many storms will either worship the tranquillity or will detest it! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

Someone who writes aphorisms shouldn't pretend to be competing with Dante or Sophocles. ~ Marty Rubin

Even the wheel of fortune can run over you. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

God within is leading us always aright even when we are in the bonds of the ignorance; but then, though the goal is sure, it is attained by circlings and deviations.

Sri Aurobindo
MCW, vol 10, On Thoughts and Aphorisms, p.258 ~ Sri Aurobindo

Genius guarantees the faculties of the heart. Man is no less immortal than the soul. Great thoughts spring from reason! Fraternity is not a myth. Newborn children know nothing of life, not even greatness. In misfortune, friends increase. ~ Comte De Lautreamont

It all depends on how independent you are. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

It is a sign of immaturity to believe that being older than someone (automatically) makes you more (mentally) mature than them. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

An ignorant man who is regarded as knowledgeable by people who are more ignorant than him is still ignorant. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

Strong women are those who do not do everything they can. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

I've changed so many masks. None suits me. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Aphorisms should be peaks – and those who are addressed, tall and lofty. The air thin and pure, danger near, and the spirit full of gay sarcasm: these go well together. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

1. If from people, it is directed at you: resentment, envy, sarcasm, sarcasm, anger, aggression, hatred, revenge, rage - know that all this is people's sympathy, this does not mean that you are a bad person, just very attractive personality.
2. A love couple who is able to constantly forgive each other is doomed to become the happiest couple in the world.
3. Sleep is a unique museum of our past, present, and future. In which there is a library that holds a unique knowledge.
4. Man does not want people to like him, he wants to tease them.
5. For many people, love with late ignition.
6. The enemy control you with the help of your own anger.
7. We die exactly as much as we cease to be needed by the world.
8. Even in the worst, there is something funny.
9. Laziness as if slows down time and space.
10. Your loved one is your best thought in all your mind, throughout your whole life. ~ Musin Almat Zhumabekovich

A criminal always returns home. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

If I knew more, I wouldn't talk so much. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

In function, Jesus's aphorisms are very much like his parables - provocative and invitational forms of speech. They provoke thought, lead people to reconsider their taken-for-granted assumptions, and invite them to see life differently. ~ Marcus J. Borg

Good-bye,' I said to them, but they didn't seem to hear me, and why would they have wanted to? Why would they have wanted to do with the world outside of each other? Outside each other, they were mean little human beings like the rest of us, the kind of people you both loathed and pitied. Separately, they were characters, and not in a good way. But together they were something to wonder at and maybe even envy. I had this unoriginal thought as I walked out the door and toward my van: love changes us, makes us into people whom others then want to love. That's why, to those of us without it, love is the voice asking, What else? What else? And to those of us who have had love and lost it or thrown it away, then love is the voice that leads us back to love, to see if it might still be ours or if we've lost it, love is also the thing that makes us speak in aphorisms about love, which is why we try to get love back, so we can stop speaking that way. Aphoristically, that is. ~ Brock Clarke

There are no independent people. Even when you are standing aside, you are taking a side. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

You can make fun of yourself and people will laugh at you. If you're smart, you'll end up as a comedian. If you're not, you'll end up as a clown. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

What are your Axioms, and Categories, and Systems, and Aphorisms? Words, words ... Be not the slave of Words ... ~ Thomas Carlyle

Don't let the devil fool you! Unless he's handsome. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

The hunter for aphorisms on human nature has to fish in muddy water, and he is even condemned to find much of his own mind. ~ F.H. Bradley

Nothing holds back human progress as frequently as the misbelief that the words 'impossible' and 'improbable' are synonyms. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

A good imagination doesn't eschew limitations, it embraces them! ~ Euphrates Arnaut Moss

Long live the King, said the Queen. Without him I would have been nothing. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Most people are willing to promise you a lot. A few are those who can promise you a little, just as much as they can. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

What one should add here is that self-consciousness is itself unconscious: we are not aware of the point of our self-consciousness. If ever there was a critic of the fetishizing effect of fascinating and dazzling "leitmotifs", it is Adorno: in his devastating analysis of Wagner, he tries to demonstrate how Wagnerian leitmotifs serve as fetishized elements of easy recognition and thus constitute a kind of inner-structural commodification of his music. It is then a supreme irony that traces of this same fetishizing procedure can be found in Adorno's own writings. Many of his provocative one-liners do effectively capture a profound insight or at least touch on a crucial point (for example: "Nothing is more true in pscyhoanalysis than its exaggeration"); however, more often than his partisans are ready to admit, Adorno gets caught up in his own game, infatuated with his own ability to produce dazzlingly "effective" paradoxical aphorisms at the expense of theoretical substance (recall the famous line from Dialectic of Englightment on how Hollywood's ideological maniuplation of social reality realized Kant's idea of the transcendental constitution of reality). In such cases where the dazzling "effect" of the unexpected short-circuit (here between Hollywood cinema and Kantian ontology) effectively overshadows the theoretical line of argumentation, the brilliant paradox works precisely in the same manner as the Wagnerian leitmotif: instead of serving as a nodal point in the complex n ~ Slavoj Zizek

I have nothing to lose. I keep all my valuables in a safe. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

One of the aphorisms occurred to me now and I wrote it under the picture: "Fate and temperament are two words for one and the same concept." That was clear to me now. ~ Hermann Hesse

Few things are more absurd than wise saws originally designed to inculcate or maintain the social needs of a society long past - when they are applied to today. ~ Idries Shah

If they could, women would put make-up on the rainbow. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

Meanings are translatable. Words are untranslatable… More briefly – a word is translatable, its sound is not. ~ Marina Tsvetaeva

Hmm,' said the King. 'I must write that down in my book of aphorisms. I don't know if it is deep, but it sounds deep. ~ Stephen Mitchell

It is up to man to be an angel or a devil! You become whatever you choose to be! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

Being a playwright, a film producer, a minister, a general; these are all masks one wears over one's face in the society; masks don't mean anything, for a man is what he is! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

...[Mystery] delivered one of the many great aphorisms that that he used to turn defeat into triumph. "Where there's a problem, there's an opportunity. ~ Neil Strauss

Pity is nary a friend you want to invite, nor an acquaintance you would accompany. ~ Euphrates Arnaut Moss

Before you criticize a woman, try walking in her high heels. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

People will never get in touch with democracy. It's always surrounded by bodyguards. ~ Ljupka Cvetanova

It is by now proverbial that every proverb has its opposite. For every Time is money there is a Stop and smell the roses. When someone says You never stand in the same river twice someone else has already replied There is nothing new under the sun. In the mind's arithmetic, 1 plus -1 equals 2. Truths are not quantities but scripts: Become for a moment the mind in which this is true. ~ James Richardson

Euphonic and harmonious expressions, forcible and just expressions, profound and comprehensive expressions, and especially apt and witty expressions, each have their specific influence upon different minds, and their common influence upon all minds ... It is therefore high time our most valuable aphorisms and paragraphs were put in order for frequent perusal, and for handy reference, as the circumstances of life call up subjects. ~ Charles Simmons

I lost many literary battles the day I read 'Their Eyes Were Watching God.' I had to concede that occasionally aphorisms have their power. I had to give up the idea that Keats had a monopoly on the lyrical. ~ Zadie Smith