Self De Quotes

It was when a society became most distressed and antiquated that it would recreate an overwhelming fantasy of some Golden Age, a time when all was great and glorious, when people were more noble and causes more magnificent and honorable. ~ Greg Bear

If by being overstudious, we impair our health and spoil our good humor, let us give it up. ~ Michel De Montaigne

Praise, of all things, is the most powerful excitement to commendable actions, and animates us in our enterprises. ~ Jean De La Bruyere

De jure objections are arguments of claims to the effect that Christian belief, whether or not true, is at any rate unjustifiable, or rationally unjustified, or irrational, or not intellectually respectable, or contrary to sound morality, or without sufficient evidence, or in some other way rationally unacceptable, not up to snuff from an intellectual point of view. ~ Alvin Plantinga

Must I dwell in slavery's night And all pleasure take its flight Far beyond my feeble sight, Forever? ~ Juana Ines De La Cruz

For all his understanding of worldly concerns, when it came to fathoming the deeper meaning of his own furious activity, Sir Bob displayed the sort of laziness for which he himself had no patience in others. He appeared to have only a passing interest in the overall purpose of his financial accumulation. ~ Alain De Botton

He had a strong conviction that no government could be ordained that could resist these internal forces, when, they are directed to its destruction by bad men, or unreasoning mobs, and many then believed, as some yet believe, that our government is unequal to such pressure, when the assault is thoroughly desperate. ~ Alexis De Tocqueville

I see several animals that live so entire and perfect a life, some without sight, others without hearing: who knows whether to us also one, two, or three, or many other senses, may not be wanting? ~ Michel De Montaigne

The people only understand what they can feel; the only orators that can affect them are those who move them. ~ Alphonse De Lamartine

I hear a swelling swoosh; from the south a bullet train whizzes into view on the tracks, knives through the landscape in a matter of moments, then disappears with a whoosh. It has just covered in a few seconds what has taken me hours to walk. That very fast train reminds me that, as a pilgrim, travel is made holy in its slowness. I see things that neither the passengers of the train nor the drivers of the automobiles see. I feel things that they will never feel. I have time to ponder, imagine, daydream. I tire. I thirst. In my slow walking, I find me. ~ Kevin A. Codd

Next time you pull a knife on me," Inga growled, "this is vhat I do to you."

She hammered a scruffy bush with the violent and athletic kick of a Chinaman in a kung fu movie.

"Extreme Unction!" the bush howled. "Call de priest! Me need Extreme Unction!"

"Inga!" Aloysius cried. "De bush no trouble you! Him is a Catholic bush! ~ Anthony C. Winkler

It seems to me that we become more dear one to the other, in together admiring works of art, which speak to the soul by their true grandeur. ~ Madame De Stael

During the course of our life we now and then enjoy some pleasures so inviting, and have some encounters of so tender a nature, that though they are forbidden, it is but natural to wish that they were at least allowable. Nothing can be more delightful, except it be to abandon them for virtue's sake. ~ Jean De La Bruyere

It is a stupid presumption to go about despising and condemning as false anything that seems to us improbable; this is a common fault in those who think they have more intelligence than the crowd. ~ Michel De Montaigne

Since 1849 I have studied incessantly, under all its aspects, a question which was already in my mind since 1832. I confess that my scheme is still a mere dream, and I do not shut my eyes to the fact that so long as I alone believe it to be possible, it is virtually impossible ... The scheme in question is the cutting of a canal through the Isthmus of Suez. This has been thought of from the earliest historical times, and for that very reason is looked upon as impracticable. Geographical dictionaries inform us indeed that the project would have been executed long ago but for insurmountable obstacles. [On his inspiration for the Suez Canal.] ~ Ferdinand De Lesseps

That vervey spontaneity became encounter theater therapy under the direction of the Marquis de Paar, who was peerless at grittily vapid chatter, misty bathos, and scenery-chewing controversy. Dick Cavett, who wrote for Paar, said that working for him was like having an alcoholic in the family. ~ James Wolcott

I end with a word on the new symbols which I have employed. Most writers on logic strongly object to all symbols ... I should advise the reader not to make up his mind on this point until he has well weighed two facts which nobody disputes, both separately and in connexion. First, logic is the only science which has made no progress since the revival of letters; secondly, logic is the only science which has produced no growth of symbols. ~ Augustus De Morgan

America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great. ~ Alexis De Tocqueville

La Nebuleuse is a poem of lovely & deep perspective, where, symboloized by artless beings, are seen the successive generations of men following each other uncomprehendingly, almost undiscerningly, so different are their souls, & always summed up, to the moment of their decline, by the child, the future, the "nebula", whose birth, finally confirmed, brings death. Under its morning clearness, to the faded smiles of aged stars. And, the vision ended, it is urged that this morrow, which is becoming today, will be altogether likes its dead brothers, & that in short there is nothing new in the spectacle which amuses the dead years leaning…

But this "nothingness" has no importance for the human atoms that form & determine it; it is the delightful newness that we breathe & of which we live. The new! The new! And let each intelligence, though short-lived, affirm his will to exist, & to be dissimilar to all antecedent or surrounding manifestations, & let each nebula aspire to the character of a star whose light shall be distinct & clear among other lights. ~ Remy De Gourmont

Heart on fire, ashes everywhere
- there's no return from a red like that ~ Manuel De Freitas

One feels rather lonely in the dessert.'
'It is just as lonely among men. ~ Antoine De Saint Exupery

Yet I saw crypts when I looked at him, and I heard the beat of kettledrums. I saw torchlit fields where I had never been, heard vague incantations, felt the heat of raging fires on my face. And they didn't come out of him, these visions. Rather I drew them out on my own.
Yet I never had Nicolas, mortal or immortal, been so alluring. Never had Gabrielle held me so in thrall.
Dear God, this is love. This is desire. And all my past amours have been but the shadow of this.
- Lestat de Lioncourt ~ Anne Rice

It is easier to say new things than to reconcile those which have already been said. ~ Luc De Clapiers

Novelty is both delightful and deceptive. ~ Honore De Balzac

There is neither spirit nor matter in the world. The stuff of the universe is spirit-matter. No other substance but this could have produced the human molecule. ~ Pierre Teilhard De Chardin

The townsfolk in their darkened rooms were dazed as if by some cataclysm, some devastating earthquake, against which all wisdom and all resistance is of no avail. Such a feeling is produced every time the established order of things is upset, when security is destroyed and everything is hitherto protected by the laws of man or nature is suddenly at the mercy of wild unreasoning brutality. ~ Guy De Maupassant

In the shadow of death he produces life, and though the senses are terrified, faith taking all for the best, is full of courage and assurance. ~ Jean-Pierre De Caussade

O Prosperina,
For the flowers now that, frighted, thou let'st fall
From Dis's wagon; daffodils,
That come before the swallow dares, and take
The winds of March with beauty; violets dim,
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes
Or Cytherea's breath; pale primroses,
That die unmarried, ere they can behold
Bright Phoebus in his strength
a malady
Most incident to maids; bold oxlips and
The crown imperial; lilies of all kinds,
The flower-de-luce being one. ~ William Shakespeare

The works of God are not accomplished when we wish them, but whenever it pleases Him. ~ Vincent De Paul

The simple fact is that all magick is psychological and subjective. Real magick is poetic and imaginary. ~ Jean De Cabalis

,,,we forget our good actions only slowly, and in fact never truly forget them. ~ Machado De Assis

Always that damned discipline that you wear like chain mail ... You would have got on well with Bernard de Clairvaux and his gang of Knights Templar. If you'd been captured by Saladin, I'm sure you'd rather have had your throat cut than renounce your faith. But not from devotion, from pride. ~ Arturo Perez Reverte

In giving us his Son, his only and definitive word, God spoke everything to us at once in this sole word, and he has no more to say. ~ Juan De La Cruz

The bees pillage the flowers here and there but they make honey of them which is all their own; it is no longer thyme or marjolaine: so the pieces borrowed from others he will transform and mix up into a work all his own. ~ Michel De Montaigne

Many a man has risen to eminence under the powerful reaction of his mind in fierce counter-agency to the scorn of the unworthy, daily evoked by his personal defects, who with a handsome person would have sunk into the luxury of a careless life under the tranquillizing smiles of continual admiration. ~ Thomas De Quincey

And why have you burnt our Gods, when others are brought from other Regions by the Spaniards? Are the Gods of other Provinces more sacred than ours? ~ Bartolome De Las Casas

Everyone, left to his own devices, forms an idea about what goes on in language which is very far from the truth. ~ Ferdinand De Saussure

Flattery is false money, which would not be current were it not for our vanity. ~ Francois De La Rochefoucauld

It is the final proof of God's omnipotence that he need not exist in order to save us. ~ Peter De Vries

Poetry is necessary, but is the poet? ~ Carlos Drummond De Andrade