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EVIL --- EVOLUTION --- EXAGGERATION
EXAMPLE --- EXCESS --- EXCITEMENT
EXCUSES --- EXECUTIONS

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EVIL

[QUOTES FOLLOW LINKS]

see:

ANTI-SEMITISM

FIDEL CASTRO

CRIME

GENOCIDE

HATE

ADOLPH HITLER

HOLOCAUST

KU KLUX KLAN

INHUMANITY

LYNCHING

MISANTHROPY

MONSTERS

NAZI GERMANY

OPPRESSION

RAPE OF NANKING

SIN

SLAVERY

TERRORISM

TORTURE

TREASON

TYRANNY

WAR

WICKED

WORLD TRADE CENTER DISASTER

WRONG


I would far rather be ignorant
than knowledgeable of evils.
--Aeschylus (525—456 B.C.)
Greek tragic dramatist.
_The Suppliants_ l. 453

I and the public know
What all schoolchildren learn
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return.
--W.H. [Wystan Hugh] Auden (1907—1973)
English-born poet and man of letters.
"September 1, 1939" [1940]

Nothing doth more hurt in a state
than that cunning men pass for wise.
--Francis Bacon (1561—1626)
English philosopher and essayist.
_Essays_ [1625], 22, "Of Cunning"

[Iris] Chang learned from her research [of the Nanking
atrocities] that "civilization itself is tissue-thin." She
adds "Some quirk in human nature allows even the
most unspeakable acts of evil to become banal within
minutes, provided that they occur far enough away
to pose no personal threat."
--Ralph Kinney Bennett
_Reader's Digest_ [September 1998],
"The Woman Who Wouldn't Forget"

Now a new symbol dominates the New York
skyline, and the philosopher Plotinus offers
the best account of it. According to Plotinus,
evil is neither a demon nor Satan nor any
kind of being. Evil is an absence. In the
skyline now, there is an empty space where
the twin towers used to be. I gaze out my
study window, where I am used to seeing
the towers, and I can hardly believe what I
see. I see nothing. Smoke and sky. It is
the symbol of absolute evil.
--Paul Berman,
"Under the Bridge" in
_The New Republic_ [24 September 2001].

-

When bad men combine, the good must associate;
else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice
in a contemptible struggle.
--Edmund Burke (1729—1797)
Irish-born Whig politician and man of letters.
"Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents" [1770]


There is no safety for honest men but by
believing all possible evil of evil men.
--Edmund Burke (1729—1797)
Irish-born Whig politician and man of letters.
_Reflections on the Revolution in France_ [1790]


It is necessary only for the good man
to do nothing for evil to triumph.
--attributed to Edmund Burke (1729—1797)
Irish-born Whig politician and man of letters.
(see John Stuart Mill, below)

-

An evil, at its birth, is easily crushed, but
it grows and strengthens by endurance.
--Marcus Tullius Cicero (106—43 BC)
Roman orator and statesman.
Quoted in D. E. MacDonnel
_A Dictionary of Quotations in Most Frequent Use..._ [5th ed., 1809].

-

He that is good will infallibly become better, and he that is bad
will as certainly become worse; for vice, virtue, and time are
three things that never stand still.
--C.C. Colton (1780—1832)
English clergyman and writer.
_Lacon: or, Many Things in Few Words_, CCCCLVII [1821 ed.]


There is this of good in real evils, they deliver
us while they last from the petty despotism of
all that were imaginary.
--C.C. Colton (1780—1832)
English clergyman and writer.
_Lacon: or, Many Things in Few Words_, CCXIX [1826 ed.]

-

The belief in a supernatural source of evil is
not necessary; men alone are quite capable
of every wickedness.
--Joseph Conrad [Teodor Jσzef Konrad Nalecz-Korzeniowski] (1857—1924)
Polish-born English novelist.
_Under Western Eyes_, pt 2, ch. 4 [1911]

As soon as men decide that all means are permitted to fight
an evil, then their good becomes indistinguishable from the
evil that they set out to destroy.
--Christopher Dawson (1889—1970)
_The Judgement of the Nations_ [1942]

We believe at once in evil; we only believe
in good upon reflection. Is not this sad?
--Madame Dorothιe Deluzy (1747—1830)
French actress.
Quoted in Theodore Taylor (pseud. of John Camden Hotten)
The Golden Treasury of Thought_ p. 88 [1874].

We cannot do evil to others without doing it to ourselves.
--Joseph Francois Eduard Desmahis
French poet.
In Louis Klopsch
_Many Thoughts of Many Minds_, p. 84 [1896].

[Of Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and Richard
Nixon at a reunion of former presidents:]
There they were, See No Evil, Hear No Evil, and Evil.
--Bob Dole (b. 1923)
Republican senator and majority leader and unsuccesful
candidate in the 1996 presidential election.
Speech at Gridiron Club dinner, Washington D.C. [26 March 1983].

Oh, tell me, who first declared, who first proclaimed
that man only does nasty things because he does not
know his own real interests; and that if he were
enlightened, if his eyes were opened to his real normal
interests, man would at once cease to do nasty things,
would at once become good and noble because, being
enlightened and understanding his real advantage, he
would see his own advantage in the good and nothing
else… . Oh, the babe! Oh, the pure, innocent child!
--Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821—1881),
Russian novelist, journalist, and short story writer.
_Notes from the Underground_ [1864]

The real problem is in the hearts and minds
of men. It is not a problem of physics but
of ethics. It is easier to denature plutonium
than to denature the evil spirit of man.
--attributed to Albert Einstein (1879—1955)
German-American physicist who developed
the special and general theories of relativity.

-

Curses always recoil on the head of him who imprecates
them. If you put a chain around the neck of a slave, the
other end fastens itself around your own.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803—1882)
American philosopher and poet.
"Compensation" in _Essays_, First Series [1841]

& note:

No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man
without at last finding the other end fastened about his
own neck.
--Frederick Douglass [Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey]
(c.1818—1895)
American abolitionist, reformer, and writer.
Speech at Civil Rights Meeting, Washington DC [22 October 1883.]

-

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See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.
--"Forum" [February 1913]

& note:

Speak no evil, see no evil, hear no evil.
--"The Dallas Morning News" [9 July 1905]

-

If you do what you should not, you
must bear what you would not.
--Benjamin Franklin (1706—1790)
American politician, inventor, and scientist.
Attributed in Maturin M. Ballou _Treasury of Thought_ [1872].

In my humble opinion non-cooperation with evil
is as much a duty as is cooperation with good.
--Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869—1948)
Indian statesman and leader of the nationalistic
movement against British rule.
Speech in Ahmadabad [23 March 1922].

I herewith commission you to carry out all preparations with
regard to ... a final solution of the Jewish question in those
territories of Europe which are under German influence.
--Hermann Goering (1893—1946)
German Nazi leader.
Instructions to Reinhard Heydrich [31 July 1941].

Don't let us make imaginary evils, when
you know we have so many real ones to
encounter.
--Oliver Goldsmith (1728—1774)
Anglo-Irish writer, poet, and dramatist.
_The Good Natur'd Man_ [1768]

Throughout history, it has been the inaction
of those who could have acted, the indifference
of those who should have known better, the
silence of the voice of justice when it mattered
most, that has made it possible for evil to
triumph.
--Haile Selassie I [Tafari Makonnen] (1892—1975)
Emperor of Ethiopia [1930—1974].
In an address to the General Assembly, United Nations, N.Y.C..

-

No propagation or multiplication is more rapid than
that of evil, unless it be checked; no growth more
certain.
--Julius Charles Hare (1795—1855)
English cleric and author.
_Guesses at Truth_ [1827] (Co-written with brother Augustus)


It is a proof of our natural bias to evil, that gain is
slower and harder than loss in all things good;
but in all things bad getting is quicker and easier
than getting rid of.
--Julius Charles Hare (1795—1855)
English cleric and author.
_Guesses at Truth_ [1827] (Co-written with brother Augustus)


When will talkers refrain from evil speaking?
When listeners refrain from evil hearing. At
present there are many so credulous of evil
that they will receive suspicions and impressions
against persons whom they don't know, from
a person whom they do know — an authority
good for nothing.
--Julius Charles Hare (1795—1855)
English cleric and author.
_Guesses at Truth_ [1827] (Co-written with brother Augustus)

-

To respond to evil by committing another evil
does not eliminate evil but allows it to go on
forever.
--Vaclav Havel (b. 1936)
First President of the Czech Republic.
Letter [5 November 1989].

Goodness alone is *never* enough. A hard, cold wisdom
is required for goodness to accomplish good. Goodness
without wisdom always accomplishes evil.
--Robert A(nson) Heinlein (1907—1988)
American science-fiction writer.
_Stranger In A Strange Land_ [1961]

The man who does evil to another does evil to himself.
--Hesiod (c. 700 B.C.)
Greek poet.
_Works and Days_, tr. Richmond Lattimore [1959]

The great crimes of the twentieth century were
committed not by money-grubbing capitalists but
by dedicated idealists. Lenin, Stalin, and Hitler
were contemptuous of money. The passage from
the nineteenth to the twentieth century has been
a passage from considerations of money to
considerations of power. How naοve the clichι
that money is the root of evil!
--Eric Hoffer (1902—1983)
American longshoreman, philosopher, and author who
received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1982.
_Working and Thinking on the Waterfront_ [1969]

No one ever became thoroughly bad all at once.
[Lat., Nemo repente venit turpissimus.]
--Juvenal (c. 55—130)
Roman satirist.
_Satires_, II, 33

Science may have found a cure for most evils;
but it has found no remedy for the worst of
them all — the apathy of human beings.
--Helen Keller (1880—1968)
American author and educator who was blind and deaf.
_My Religion_ [1927]

What is objectionable, what is dangerous, about
extremists is not that they are extreme, but that
they are intolerant. The evil is not what they
say about their cause, but what they say about
their opponents.
--Robert F. Kennedy (1925—1968)
American Democratic politician
_The Pursuit of Justice_, pt. 3 "Extremism, Left and Right" [1964]

To ignore evil is to become an accomplice to it.
--Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929—1968)
American civil rights leader.
_Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?_ [1967]

The evil of our time is the loss of consciousness of evil.
--attributed to Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895—1986)
Indian spiritual philosopher.

We believe no evil till the evil's done.
--Jean de La Fontaine (1621—1695)
French poet.
_Fables_, Book I, fable 8 [1668]

He who does not punish evil commands it to be done.
--Leonardo da Vinci (1452—1519)
Florentine painter, sculptor, musician, and scientist.
_The Notebooks_ [1508—1518]

Men have less lively perception of good than of evil.
--Livy [Titus Livius] (59 BC—17 AD)
With Sallust and Tacitus, one of the three great Roman historians.
_Annales_, XXX, 21

It is a sin to believe evil of others,
but it is seldom a mistake.
--H.L. (Henry Louis) Mencken (1880—1956)
American journalist and literary critic.
_A Little Book in C Major_ [1916]

-

A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by
his inaction, and in either case he is justly accountable to them
for the injury.
--John Stuart Mill (1806—1873)
English philosopher and social reformer.
_On Liberty_, ch. I "Introductory" [1859]


Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends
than that good men should look on and do nothing.
--John Stuart Mill (1806—1873)
English philosopher and social reformer.
"On Education" [1867]

-

Honi soit qui mal y pense.
(Evil [shame] to him who thinks evil.)
--The motto of the Most Noble Order of the Garter

Whoever fights with monsters should see to it that in
the process he does not become one himself. When
you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks back
into you.
--Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (1844—1900)
German classical scholar, philosopher, and critic of culture.
_Beyond Good and Evil_, pt. 4 [1885-1886]

A bad cause will ever be supported
by bad means and bad men.
--Thomas Paine [spelled Pane prior to 1774] (1737—1809)
English-American writer and political pamphleteer.
"The American Crisis" no. 2 [13 January 1777]

Never throw mud. You may miss your
mark; but you must have dirty hands.
--Joseph Parker (1830—1902)
English Nonconformist divine.
Quoted in Rev. Joseph Lucas (comp.)
_Detached Links, Extracts From The Writings And Discourses Of Joseph Parker_ [1873].

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully
as when they do it from religious conviction.
--Blaise Pascal (1623—1662)
French mathematician, physicist, and moralist.
_Pensιes_ ("Thoughts"), no. 894 [1670 ed.]

...Arthur [Loesser] was the brother of the Broadway lyricist
Frank Loesser, who said that, as between the siblings, he
was "the eviler of the two Loessers."
--James Penrose
"Building a musical instrument and a company"
A review of _Piano_ by James Barron in _The Wall Street Journal_ [15 July 2006].

Let us believe neither half of the good people
tell us of ourselves, nor half the evil they say
of others.
--Jean-Antoine Petit-Senn (1792-1870)
French-Swiss lyric poet.
Attributed in Maturin M. Ballou _Edge-Tools of Speech_, p. 88 [1886].

We should consider it a lesser evil to suffer
great wrongs and outrages than to do them.
--Plato (427?—347 B.C.)
Greek philosopher.
_Episles_, tr. John Harward [1932]

An evil-speaker differs from an evil-doer
only in the want of opportunity.
--Quintilian (c. 35—100)
Roman rhetorician.
Attributed in J. K. Hoyt & Anna L. Ward (eds.)
_The Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations_, p. 521 [4th ed., 1882].


-

There are two sides to every issue: one side is right
and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil.
The man who is wrong still retains some respect for
truth, if only by accepting the responsibility of choice.
But the man in the middle is the knave who blanks
out the truth in order to pretend that no choice or
values exist, who is willing to sit out the course of
any battle, willing to cash in on the blood of the
innocent or to crawl on his belly to the guilty, who
dispenses justice by condemning both the robber
and the robbed to jail, who solves conflicts by
ordering the thinker and the fool to meet each
other halfway. In any compromise between food
and poison, it is only death that can win. In any
compromise between good and evil, it is only evil
that can profit. ... When men reduce their virtues
to the approximate, then evil acquires the force
of an absolute.
--Ayn Rand (1905—1982)
Russian-born American writer.
_Atlas Shrugged_ [1957]


The spread of evil is the symptom of a vacuum.
Whenever evil wins, it is only by default: by the
moral failure of those who evade the fact that
there can be no compromise on basic principles.
--Ayn Rand (1905—1982)
Russian-born American writer.
_Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal_ [1966]

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You may either win your peace or buy it; win it by
resistance to evil; buy it by compromise with evil.
--John Ruskin (1819—1900)
English art and social critic.
_The Two Paths_, lecture 5 [1859]

Who knows what evil lurks in the
hearts of men? The Shadow knows.
--"The Shadow" (U.S. radio show 1930—1954)

-

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interred with their bones.
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_Julius Caesar_III, ii [1599]


Hell is empty,
And all the devils are here!
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_The Tempest_, I, ii [1611—1612]


Men's evil manners live in brass, their virtues
We write in water.
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_King Henry VIII_, IV, ii [1613]

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It is easy — terribly easy — to shake a man's faith
in himself. To take advantage of that to break a
man's spirit is devil's work.
--George Bernard Shaw (1856—1950)
Irish comic dramatist, literary critic, Socialist propagandist, and winner
of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1925 [he didn't accept it.]
_Candida_ [1897]

Men think that evil must come in the disguise of
a germ, or a bomb, or a raid, or an explosion, or
a train wreck, or a bank failure, forgetful that
the greatest grief can come to man under the
disguise of human ideals.
--Fulton John Sheen (1895—1979)
Roman Catholic bishop; the first popular preacher to appear on television.
_For God and Country_ [1941]

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If any Senator now, in looking over the record of
crime of all ages, can tell me of an association, a
conspiracy, or a band of men who combined in their
acts and in their purposes more that is diabolical
than this Ku Klux Klan I should like to know where
it is. They are secret, oath-bound; they murder, rob,
plunder, whip, and scourge; and they commit these
crimes, not upon the high and lofty, but upon the
lowly, upon the poor, upon feeble men and women
who are utterly defenseless.

--Senator John Sherman of Ohio [18 March 1871]
_Congressional Record_, quoted in M.J. Cohan and
John Major (eds.) _History in Quotations_, p. 641 [2004].
Cohan & Major note:
Sherman was castigating the self-styled 'Invisible Empire' of
the Ku Klux Klan, a secret society founded in May 1866 to
defend white interests by force. The name was a bastardization
of the Greek word kuklos (circle). Headed by a Grand Wizard
(the former Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest), its
members wore white hoods to protect their anonymity and
burned fiery crosses in front of their black victims' houses.
The Klan was formally disbanded in 1869 but its values
persisted throughout the South.

-

To do evil a human being must first of all
believe that what he's doing is good. ...
Ideology — that is what gives evildoing
its long-sought justification and gives the
evildoer the necessary steadfastness and
determination. That is the social theory
which helps to make his acts seem good
instead of bad in his own and others' eyes,
so that he won't hear reproaches and
curses but will receive praise and honors.
--Alexander Solzhenitsyn (b. 1918)
Russian novelist.
_The Gulag Archipelago_, ch. 4 [1973]

Those who corrupt the public mind as just as
evil as those who steal from the public purse.
--Adlai E. Stevenson (1900—1965)
American Democratic politician.
Speech in Albuquerque, New Mexico [12 September 1952].

-

We should not believe every word and suggestion, but should carefully
consider all things in accordance with the will of God. For such is the
weakness of human nature, alas, that evil is often more readily believed
and spoken of another than good.

But perfect men do not easily believe every tale that is told them, for
they know that man's nature is prone to evil, and his words to deception.

--Thomas a' Kempis (1380—1471)
German ascetical writer.
_The Imitation of Christ_ [c. 1420], bk. I, ch. 4 "On Prudence in Action"

-

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Work keeps at bay three great evils: boredom, vice, and need.
--Voltaire (Franηois Marie Arouet) (1694—1778)
French writer and philosopher.
_Candide_ [1759] tr. Richard Aldington [1929]


Those who can make you believe
absurdities can make you commit
atrocities.
--attributed to Voltaire (Franηois Marie Arouet) (1694—1778)
French writer and philosopher.

-

[The Frisco Doll (Mae West) speaking:]
Between two evils, I always pick the one I never tried before.
--Mae West (1893—1980)
American stage and film actress.
"Klondike Annie" [1936 film]

There is no denying that Hitler and Stalin are alive
today ... they are waiting for us to forget, because
this is what makes possible the resurrection of
these two monsters.
--"The Washington Post" [6 August 1980]

-----

apotropaic (adjective) [ζ-pκ-trκ-'pey-ik]
Having the power or designed to ward off
evil, as an apotropaic symbol or talisman.

enormity (noun) [i-'nor-mκ-tee]
A monstrously abnormal act, an unspeakable atrocity
or the state of being unspeakably atrocious.

heinous (adj.) ['hey-nκs]
Outlandishly evil, extremely atrocious, abominable.

machination [mack-uh-NAY-shuhn], noun:
1. The act of plotting.
2. A crafty scheme; a cunning design or plot
intended to accomplish some usually evil end.

maleficent (adj.) [mκ-'le-fi-sint]
Evil, intensely spiteful, causing harm to others.

talisman (noun) ['tζ-liz-mκn]
An object with magic apotropaic powers, a charm
to ward off evil and attract good fortune.
Note: A talisman may take almost any form but an
amulet is a charm worn around the neck to protect
against evil and misfortune.




EVOLUTION

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see: "LIFE"
see: "SCIENCE"


I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon
a monkey, without very mortifying reflections.
--William Congreve (1670—1729)
English dramatist.
Letter to Dennis [1695], in John C. Hodges (ed.)
_William Congreve: Letters and Documents_ [1964].

-

I have called this principle, by which, each slight
variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of
Natural Selection.
--Charles Darwin (1809—1882)
English naturalist.
_The Origin of Species_, ch. III [1859]


The expression often used by Mr. Herbert Spencer
of the Survival of the Fittest is more accurate, and
is sometimes equally convenient.
--Charles Darwin (1809—1882)
English naturalist.
_The Origin of Species_, ch. III [1859]

& see:

This survival of the fittest, which I have here
sought to express in mechanical terms, is that
which Mr. Darwin has called 'natural selection,
or the preservation of favored races in the
struggle for life.'
--Herbert Spencer (1820—1903)
English philosopher.
_Principles of Biology_ [1864]

-

What is the question now placed before society with the glib
assurance which to me is most astonishing? That question is
this: Is man an ape or an angel? I, my lord, I am on the side
of the angels. I repudiate with indignation and abhorrence
those new fangled theories.
--Benjamin Disraeli (1804—1881)
British Tory statesman, novelist, and Prime Minister [1868, 1874-80].
Speech at the Oxford Diocesan Conference.

The quizzical expression of the monkey at the zoo comes
from his wondering whether he is his brother's keeper, or
his keeper's brother.
--Evan Esar (1899—1995)
American humorist.
In Connie Robertson _Book of Humorous Quotations_, p. 62 [1998].

When you were a tadpole, and I was a fish,
In the Palaeozoic time,
And side by side in the sluggish tide
We sprawled through the ooze and slime.
--Langdon Smith (1858—1908)
American journalist, writer and poet.
"Evolution" [1895]

-

The aged hold far too obstinately to their outmoded ideas.
Perhaps that is why the natives of the Fiji Islands kill their
parents when they grow old. They facilitate evolution by
garroting their ancestors.
--unattributed in "The New Freeman" [1930-1931 U.S. magazine].




Click picture to ZOOM
EXAGGERATION
..
..
Remember, exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.

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see: "BRAGGING"
see: "DISHONESTY"
see: "LYING"
see: "COMMUNICATION" for other related links


Exaggerated sensitiveness is an expression
of the feeling of inferiority.
--Alfred Adler (1870—1937)
Austrian psychologist.
_Social Interest: A Challenge to Mankind_ [1938]

The speaking in perpetual hyperbole
is comely in nothing but love.
--Francis Bacon (1561—1626)
English philosopher and essayist.
_Essays_ [1625] "Of Love"

The older I get, the faster I was.
--Charles Barkley (b. 1963)
American professional basketball player.
Bob Costa television interview [22 January 1995].

There's no disappointment in memory, and one's
exaggerations are always on the good side.
--George Eliot [Mary Ann Evans] (1819—1880)
English novelist.
_Daniel Deronda_, ch. XXXV [1876]

The biggest fish he ever caught were those that got away.
--Eugene Field (1850—1895)
American journalist and writer of children's verse.
"Our Biggest Fish"

An exaggeration is a truth
that has lost its temper.
--Kahlil Gibran (1883—1931)
Lebanese poet.
_Sand and Foam_ [1926]

During my service in the United States Congress,
I took the initiative in creating the Internet.
--Al Gore (b. 1948)
American politician.
CNN television interview [9 March 1999].

-

You should also know that we have birds called griffins who can
easily carry an ox or a horse into their nest to feed their young.
We have still another kind of birds who rule over all other fowl
in the world. They are of fiery color, their wings are as sharp as
razors, and they are called Yllerion. In the whole world there are
but two of them. They live for sixty years, at the end of which they
fly away to plunge into the sea. But first they hatch two or three
eggs for forty days till the young ones come out. . . . Likewise,
you would know that we have other birds called tigers who are
so strong and bold that they lift and kill with ease an armored man
together with his horse.

Know that in one province of our country is a wilderness and that
there live horned men who have but one eye in front and three or
four in the back. There are also women who look similar. We have
in our country still another kind of men who feed only on raw flesh
of men and women and do not hesitate to die. And when one of
them passes away, be it their father or mother, they gobble him
up without cooking him. They hold that it is good and natural
to eat human flesh and they do it for the redemption of their sins.
This nation is cursed by God and it is called Gog and Magog
and there are more of them than of all other peoples. With the
coming of Antichrist they will spread over the whole world,
for they are his friends and allies.

--One of the forged Prester John's letters [c. 12th-14th cent.)
Legendary Christian ruler of the East.

-

-

Lord Ronald said nothing. He flung himself from
the room, flung himself upon his horse, and rode
off in all directions.
--Stephen Butler Leacock (1869—1944)
Canadian humorist.
__Nonsense Novels_ [1911] "Gertrude the Governess"


Lord Nosh stood upon the hearthrug of the library.
Trained diplomat and statesman as he was, his
stern aristocratic face was upside down with fury.
--Stephen Butler Leacock (1869—1944)
Canadian humorist.
_Nonsense Novels_ [1911] "Gertrude the Governess, or Simple Seventeen"

-

kap informs USENET of a 1997 walk in the woods:

The trail started out very straight for about 2 miles and then
it became pretty steep moving into switchbacks. We rested
often despite Michael's encouragement to continue. To tell
the truth the bottom half of my body could have gone on
forever, my legs are strong — but the top half due to my
smoking, lagged behind. There were times today when my
top half was at least 1 mile behind my bottom half. It was
an interesting sight to say the least.

kap

-

Antiphanes said merrily that in a certain city the cold was
so intense that words were congealed as soon as spoken,
but that after some time they thawed and became audible;
so that the words spoken in winter were articulated next
summer.
--Plutarch (A.D. 46?—119?)
Greek philosopher and biographer.
"Of Man's Progress in Virtue"

-

He was so skinny, you could actually see through
him in a bright light. At the beach, he once drank
too much strawberry pop and looked like a tall
thermometer.
--Mike Royko (1932—1997)
American journalist.
_One More Time: The Best of Mike Royko_
[The University of Chicago Press, 1999]


It rained hard enough to fill a wire basket.
--attributed to Mike Royko (1932—1997)
American journalist.

-

Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day.
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_King Henry V_, IV, iii [1598—1599]

-

The report of my death was an exaggeration.
--Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835—1910)
American humorist, novelist, journalist, and river pilot.
In the "New York Journal" [2 June 1897].


I was 6 feet 4 in those days, Now I am 5 feet 8 1/2 and daily
diminishing in altitude, and the shrinkage of my principles goes
on . . . . In those days you could have carried Kipling around
in a lunch-basket; now he fills the world. I was young and
foolish then; now I am old and foolisher.
--Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835—1910)
American humorist, novelist, journalist, and river pilot.
Quoted in Albert Bigelow Paine _Mark Twain: A Biography_ [3 vol., 1912].

-

^

Voltaire (1694—1778)
French philosopher, writer, and wit.

At the funeral of a certain nobleman,
Voltaire declared, 'He was a great
patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal
friend — provided, of course, that
he really is dead.'

--_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_
edited by Clifton Fadiman and Andrι Bernard [2000 ed.]

^

Hyperbole . . ., a recognized figure of rhetoric, meaning
an extravagant statement or assertion, which, when used
for conscious effect, is not to be taken too seriously or
too literally. Yet the hyperbole is often used unconsciously
by the men of vivid yet unbalanced imagination whom the
world sometimes calls liars and sometimes fools.
--William Shepard Walsh (1854—1919)
_Handy-Book of Literary Curiosities_ [Lippincott, 1892]

Thirty-five is a very attractive age. London society
is full of women of the very highest birth who have,
of their own free choice, remained thirty-five for
years.
--Oscar Wilde (1854—1900)
Anglo-Irish dramatist and poet.
_The Importance of Being Earnest_ , act III [1895]

-

It isn't difficult to make a mountain out
of a molehill — just add a little dirt.
--anon.

-----

confabulate (verb) [kκn-‘fζb-yu-leyt]
To chat, converse; (psychology) to fill lapses of memory
with fabrications that one believes are facts.
The process is "confabulation," the person confabulating
is a confabulator and the adjective is "confabulatory."

dithyramb (noun)
A passionate or inflated poem, speech, or writing.

histrionic (adj.) [his-tree-'ahn-ik]
Exaggerated or melodramatic in behavior
or speech, extremely theatrical.

hyperbole (noun) [hI-'pκr-bκ-lee]
Overstatement; a figure of speech that uses exaggeration
for effect, without intending to be taken literally.

perfervid [puhr-FUR-vid], adjective:
Ardent; impassioned; marked by exaggerated
or overwrought emotion.




EXAMPLE

.
.

see: "CHARACTER"
see: "IMITATION"
see: "INFLUENCE"
see: "PERSUASION"


If you can't be a good example, then
you'll just have to be a horrible warning.
--Catherine Aird [Kinn Hamilton McIntosh] (b. 1930)
English detective fiction writer.
Quoted in "St. Louis Post Dispatch" [1 November 1989].

He that gives good advice, builds with one hand; he that
gives good counsel and example, builds with both; but he
that gives good admonition and bad example, builds with
one hand and pulls down with the other.
--Francis Bacon (1561—1626)
English philosopher and essayist.
Attributed in _The Millennial Harbinger_ [August 1860, no. VIII].

Children have never been very good at listening
to their elders, but they have never failed to
imitate them.
--James Baldwin (1924—1987)
American author and playwright.
_Nobody Knows My Name_, ch. 3 [1961]

Whatever parent gives his children good instruction
and sets them at the same time a bad example, may
be considered as bringing them food in one hand
and poison in the other.
--John Balguy (1686—1748)
English divine and philosopher.
In James Comper Gray
_The Biblical Museum. Old Testament_, p. 69 [1879].

A good example is the best sermon.
--Thomas Fuller (1654—1734)
English writer and physician.
Comp., _Gnomologia: Adages and Proverbs_ [1732]

You can preach a better sermon
with your life than with your lips.
--Oliver Goldsmith (1728—1774)
Anglo-Irish writer, poet, and dramatist.
Attributed in _The Children's Friend_, vol. XII [1913].

I am satisfied that we are less convinced
by what we hear than by what we see.
--Herodotus (484—c.425 BC)
Greek author of the first great narrative
history produced in the ancient world.
In Tryon Edwards _A Dictionary of Thoughts_, p. 154 [1908].

Do not let your deeds belie your words; lest when
you speak in church someone may mentally reply,
'Why do you not practice what you profess?'
--Saint Jerome (c. 340—c. 420)
Translator of the Bible from Greek and Hebrew into Latin.
Letter LII to Nepotian [394], as quoted in Philip Schaff &
Henry Wace (eds.) _A Select Library of Nicene and Post-
Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church_, vol. VI [1893].

Old men are fond of giving good advice to console
themselves for their inability to give bad examples.
--attributed to Franηois de La Rochefoucauld (1613—1680)
French classical author.

A worn-out sinner is sometimes found
to make the best declaimer against sin.
--Charles Lamb (1775—1834)
English essayist.
_The Works of Charles Lamb_, p. 528 [London: E. Moxon, 1852]

Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.
--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807—1882)
American poet.
_A Psalm of Life_ [1838] "Voices of the Night"

-

It is a great deal better to live a holy life than
to talk about it. . . . Light-houses don't ring
bells and fire cannon to call attention to their
shining — they just shine.
--Dwight Lyman Moody (1837—1899)
American evangelist and publisher.
Quoted in S. P. Linn _Golden Gleams of Thought_, p. 140 [1906, 9th ed.].


The best way to show that a stick is crooked is
not to argue about it or to spend time denouncing
it, but to lay a straight stick alongside it.
--Dwight Lyman Moody (1837—1899)
American evangelist and publisher.
Attributed in The Missionary Review [1936].

-

It is a good thing to learn caution by the misfortunes of others.
--Publilius Syrus (85—43 B.C.)
Latin writer of mimes who was originally a slave.
Quoted by Sir Richard Steele in "The Guardian", # 147 [29 August 1713].

They asked Lucman, the fabulist,
'From whom did you learn manners?'
He answered: 'From the unmannerly.'
--Sa'di [Muslih-uddin] (c. 1184—1291?)
Iranian poet.
_The Gulistan_ (Rose Garden) [1258]

The sight of a drunkard is a better sermon against that vice
than the best that was ever preached on that subject.
--George Savile [Lord Halifax] (1633—1695)
English politician and essayist.
_The Lady's New Year's Gift: or Advice to a Daughter_ [1688]

'A fig-tree looking on a fig-tree becometh fruitful,' says the
Arabian proverb. And so it is with children; their first great
instructor is example.
--Samuel Smiles (1812—1904)
Scottish author.
_Character_ [1883 ed.]

Few things are harder to put up with
than the annoyance of a good example.
--Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835—1910)
American humorist, novelist, journalist, and river pilot.
_Pudd'nhead Wilson_ [1894] ch. 19 epigraph: "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar"




EXCESS

.
.

see: "GLUTTONY"
see: "GREED"


I'm the foe of moderation, the champion of excess.
If I may lift a line from a die-hard whose identity
is lost in the shuffle, 'I'd rather be strongly wrong
than weakly right.'
--Tallulah Bankhead (1903—1968)
American actress.
_Tallulah_ [1952]

^

Sir James Matthew Barrie (1860—1937)
British journalist and playright known especially for _Peter Pan_.

'You'll be sick tomorrow, Jack, if you eat
any more chocolates,' said Sylvia Llewelyn-
Davies to her young son. 'I shall be sick
tonight,' said the child calmly as he helped
himself to yet another. Barrie, who overheard
this exchange, was so delighted with it that
he incorporated it in _Peter Pan_ and paid
the young Llewelyn-Davies a copyright fee
of a halfpenny a performance.

--_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_
edited by Clifton Fadiman and Andrι Bernard [2000 ed.]

^

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.
--William Blake (1757—1827)
English poet.
_The Marriage of Heaven and Hell_ [1790—1793] "Proverbs of Hell"

The excesses of our youth, are drafts upon our old age,
payable with interest, about thirty years after date.
--C.C. Colton (1780—1832)
English clergyman and writer.
_Lacon: or, Many Things in Few Words_, LXXVI [1820]

Everything in excess! To enjoy the flavor of life,
take big bites. Moderation is for monks.
--Robert Heinlein (1907—1988)
American science-fiction writer.
_The Notebooks of Lazarus Long_ [1978]

Excess on occasion is exhilarating. It prevents
moderation from acquiring the deadening effect
of habit.
--W. Somerset Maugham (1874—1965)
English novelist, playwright, and short-story writer.
_The Summing Up_ [1938]

In everything the middle course is best:
all things in excess bring trouble to men.
--Titus Maccius Plautus (254—184 BC)
Roman comic dramatist.
_Poenulus_, I, 2, 29

ROSALIND: Why then, can one
desire too much of a good thing?
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_As You Like It_ [1599]

Use, do not abuse; neither abstinence
nor excess ever renders man happy.
--Voltaire (Franηois Marie Arouet) (1694—1778)
French writer and philosopher.
_Sept discours en vers sur l'homme_ [1738]

-----

cloy KLOY, transitive verb:
1. To weary by excess, especially of sweetness,
richness, pleasure, etc.
2. To become distasteful through an excess
usually of something originally pleasing.

fulsome (adjective) ['fκl-sκm]
1: Abundant, plentiful, copious (as a fulsome meal or harvest)
hence, of a body, overly plump, fat and, perhaps, repugnantly
so.
2: Exceeding the bounds of good taste, excessive in flattery
and hence offensive, repugnant, repulsive in general.

nimiety (noun)
The state of being too much; excess.

plethora (noun) ['ple-thκ-rκ]
A superabundance of red cells in the blood;
an (unhealthy) excess or superfluity of anything.

surfeit (noun) ['sκr-fit]
Excess, superfluity; overindulgence, especially of food and
drink, and the suffering accompanying such overindulgence.




EXCITEMENT

.
.

see: "ACTION"
see: "ADVENTURE"
see: "EMOTIONS & FEELINGS"


Let's take a boat to Bermuda-
Let's take a plane to Saint Paul-
Let's take a kayak
To Quincy or Nyack,
Let's get away from it all.
Let's take a trip in a trailer-
No need to come back at all-
Let's take a powder
To Boston for chowder,
Let's get away from it all.
We'll travel 'round from town to town,
We'll visit ev'ry state.
I'll repeat "I love you, Sweet!"
In all the forty-eight.
Let's go again to Niag'ra,
This time we'll look at the Fall.
Let's leave our hut, Dear,
Get out of our rut, Dear,
Let's get away from it all.

--Tom Adair (1913—1988)
American lyricist.
"Let's Get Away From It All" [1940 song] (music by Matt Dennis)

-

Be still, my beating heart, be still!
--Mary Elizabeth Coleridge (1861—1907)
English poet.
"All One" [1910]

[O]n general principles it is best that I should not leave
the country. Scotland Yard feels lonely without me, and
it causes an unhealthy excitement among the criminal
classes.
--Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859—1930)
Scottish-born writer of detective fiction.
_The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax_ [1911]

[Of motorsport commentator Murray Walker:]
Sounds, in his quieter moments, as if his trousers are on fire.
--Clive [Vivian] James (b. 1939)
Expatriate Australian writer, poet, and critic.

^

George C. Scott was once required to shoot a love scene
with a certain voluptuous actress. "I apologize if I get an
erection," he said getting into bed. "And I apologize if I
don't."
--anecdotage.com

^

If I don't feel like wearing a bra I don't wear one.
I'd never let my nipples show at a state function
— I'd be frightened the old men would have heart
attacks.
--Margaret Trudeau (b. 1948)
Wife of the 15th Prime Minister of Canada, Pierre Trudeau.
Quoted in Arthur Johnson _Margaret Trudeau_ [1977].

-----

agog (adverb) [κ-'gahg]
Intensely eager; keenly excited about something.

frisson [free-SOHN], noun:
A moment of intense excitement; a shudder; an emotional thrill.




EXCUSES

.
.

see: "ALIBI"
see: "FAILURE" for other related links


Only mediocrity can be trusted to be always
at its best. Genius must always have lapses
proportionate to its triumphs.
--Sir Max Beerbohm (1872—1956)
English satirist and caricaturist.
In obituary of music-hall comic Dan Leno
_Saturday Review_ [5 November 1904].

'I'm very brave generally,' he went on in a
low voice: 'only today I happen to have a
headache.'
--Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832—1898)
_Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_ "Tweedledum and Tweedledee" [1865]

There is something to be said for every error; but,
whatever may be said for it, the most important
thing to be said about it is that it is erroneous.
--G.K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton (1874—1936)
English essayist, novelist, and poet.
_The Illustrated London News_ [25 April 1931]

Experience informs us that the first defence
of weak minds is to recriminate.
--Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772—1834)
English poet, critic, and philosopher.
_Biographia Literaria_ [1817]

-

The boy who is good at excuses is
generally good for nothing else.
--Samuel Foote (1720—1777)
English dramatist and actor.
_The Table-Talk and Bon-Mots of Samuel Foote_,
p. 212, ed. William Cooke [1889]

& note:

He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.
--Benjamin Franklin (1706—1790)
American politician, inventor, and scientist.
Attributed in Tryon Edwards _A Dictionary of Thoughts_ [1891].

-

There was never an angry man that thought his anger unjust.
--Francis, St, de Sales (1567—1622)
French bishop.
_Introduction to the Devout Life_ [1609]

To give a reason for anything is to breed a doubt of it.
--William Hazlitt (1778—1830)
English essayist.
_Table Talk_ [1821—1822] "On the Difference Between Writing and Speaking"

There are many who find a good alibi far more attractive than
an achievement. For an achievement does not settle anything
permanently. We still have to prove our worth anew each day:
we have to prove that we are as good today as we were
yesterday. But when we have a valid alibi for not achieving
anything we are fixed, so to speak, for life.
--Eric Hoffer (1902—1983)
American longshoreman, philosopher, and author who
received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1982.
_The Passionate State of Mind: And Other Aphorisms_ [1955]

A man may fall many times but he won't be a
failure until he says that someone pushed him.
--attributed to Elmer G. Leterman (1897—1982)
American insurance executive and author.
Quoted in Jacob Morton Braude
_Speaker's Desk Book of Quips, Quotes, and Anecdotes_ [1966].

-

He who excuses himself, accuses himself.
--Gabriel Meurier (1530—1601)
Flemish grammarian and writer.
Quoted in _Trιsor des Sentences_ [c.1950].

& see:

Oftentimes excusing of a fault
Doth make the fault worse by the excuse.
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_The Life and Death of King John_, IV, ii [written c. 1596]

-

Don't let yourself be victimized by the age
you live in. It's not the times that will bring
us down, any more than it's society. When
you put blame on the society, then you end
up turning to society for the solution. Just
like those poor neurotics at the Care Fest.
There's a tendency today to absolve
individuals of moral responsibility and treat
them as victims of social circumstance. You
buy that, you pay with your soul. It's not men
who limit women, it's not straights who limit
gays, it's not whites who limit blacks. What
limits people is lack of character. What limits
people is that they don't have the f*cking nerve
or imagination to star in their own movie, let
alone direct it.
--Tom Robbins (b. 1936)
American author.
_Still Life with Woodpecker_ [1980]

All the Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas
Layin' in the sun,
Talkin' bout the things
They woulda-coulda-shoulda done...
But those Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas
All ran away and hid
From one little did.
--Shel Silverstein (1930—1999)
Ameican poet and songwriter.
In _Falling Up_ [1996].

-----

extenuating (adj.) [ik-'sten-yoo-yet-ing]
Diminishing, providing an excuse.

malinger [muh-LING-guhr], intransitive verb:
To feign or exaggerate illness or inability in order to avoid duty or work.




EXECUTIONS

.
.

see: "CRIME & PUNISHMENT" for related links


If the death penalty is to be abolished, let
those gentlemen, the murderers, do it first.
--Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr (1808—1890)
French novelist and journalist.
"Les Guκpes" [January 1849]

I went out to Charing Cross, to see Major-general Harrison
hanged, drawn, and quartered; which was done there, he
looking as cheerful as any man could do in that position.
--Samuel Pepys (1633—1703)
English diarist and naval administrator.
_Diary_ [13 October 1660]

[On feeling the edge of the axe prior to his execution:]
'Tis a sharp remedy, but a sure one for all ills.
--Sir Walter Raleigh (c. 1552—1618)
English explorer and courtier.
Quoted in D. Hume _History of Great Britain_ [1754].


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