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. . . MIND (THE) [QUOTES FOLLOW LINKS] see: ABSENTMINDED BELIEF BRAIN (THE) CHANGING (ONE'S MIND) COMMON SENSE CONFUSION CONSCIENCE COUNSELLING DEPRESSION DREAMS EMOTIONS FANTASY FORGETFULNESS GENIUS HYPNOTISM, HYPOCHONDRIA IDEAS, IDIOTS IGNORANCE, IMAGINATION INSANITY INTUITION LOGIC MAD(NESS) MEMORY MENTAL ILLNESS, MENTAL TELEPATHY MORALE MIND CONTROL, MIND READING (below) NEUROSIS OBJECTIVITY OPEN-MINDED OPTIMISM PARANOIA PERCEPTION PHOBIAS POSITIVE ATTITUDE PROPAGANDA PSYCHIATRY, PSYCHICS REASON SPIRIT STUPIDTY SUPERSTITION THINKING THOUGHTS Cheerfulness is the best promoter of health and is as friendly to the mind as to the body. --Joseph Addison (1672—1719) English essayist, poet, and dramatist. In Joseph Collins _The Way with the Nerves: Letters to a Neurologist..._, p. 30 [1911]. - Shhh . . . Don't Say 'Recession.' By Dan Ariely March 16, 2008 _The Washington Post_ If (as is often the case) talking about sex makes people more interested in having it, does that mean that the current talk about a recession could actually be creating one? Well, maybe. Or so one general finding of behavioral economics would have us believe. With all this chatter about a recession, consumers might, for example, hold off on buying that new dishwasher because of the "bad economy," or pass up the more expensive restaurant because "we're in a recession." Without any discussion about recession, we're unlikely to change our pattern of behavior. But talking about it can be a force that affects our decisions and alters our consumption habits. What makes me think that we're such creatures of habit? Consider the experience of eating a Godiva truffle: The chocolate is melting in your mouth, the aroma penetrates your nose, there is a small nut inside. . . . Now think about this familiar experience and try to determine how much it's worth to you. A quarter? 50 cents? 75 cents? $1.25? $2.50? While the experience of eating a truffle is very familiar, figuring out what we would be willing to pay for it proves difficult. So what do we do when we make purchasing decisions? Generally, we use past decisions as a guiding principle. If we have paid 50 cents for a Godiva truffle in the past, we remember this decision, assume it was a good one and probably repeat it again and again. Let's look at the following experiment: What if I asked you for the last two digits of your Social Security number (mine are 79), then asked you whether you would pay that number in dollars (for me this would be $79) for a particular bottle of 1998 Cotes du Rhone. Would the mere suggestion of that number influence how much you would be willing to spend on wine? Sounds preposterous, doesn't it? Well, here's what happened to a group of MBA students at MIT a few years ago. "Now here we have a nice 1998 Cotes du Rhone Jaboulet Parallel," said Drazen Prelec, a professor at MIT's Sloan School of Management, as he lifted a bottle admiringly. Sitting before him were the 55 students from his marketing research class. On this day, Prelec, professor George Loewenstein of Carnegie Mellon University and I had an unusual request for this group of future marketing pros. We asked them to jot down the last two digits of their Social Security numbers and tell us whether they would pay that amount for a number of products, including the wine. Then we asked them to actually bid on these items in an auction. What were we trying to prove? The existence of what we called arbitrary coherence. The basic idea of arbitrary coherence is this: Although initial prices can be "arbitrary," once those prices are established in our minds, they will shape not only present prices but also future ones (thus making them "coherent"). So would thinking about one's Social Security number be enough to create an anchor? And would that initial anchor have a long-term influence? That's what we wanted to find out. "For those of you who don't know much about wines," Prelec continued, "this bottle received 86 points from Wine Spectator. It has the flavor of red berry, mocha and black chocolate; it's a medium-bodied, medium-intensity, nicely balanced red, and it makes for delightful drinking." He held up another bottle, a Jaboulet Hermitage La Chapelle, 1996, with a 92-point rating from the Wine Advocate magazine. "The finest La Chapelle since 1990," he intoned, while the students looked on curiously. "Only 8,100 cases made." Prelec held up four other items one by one: a cordless trackball, a cordless keyboard and mouse, a design book, and a one-pound box of Belgian chocolates. He passed out forms that listed all the items. "Now I want you to write the last two digits of your Social Security number at the top of the page," he instructed. "And then write them again next to each of the items in the form of a price. In other words, if the last two digits are 23, write $23." "Now when you're finished with that," he added, "I want you to indicate on your sheets whether you would pay that amount for each of the products." When the students had finished, Prelec asked them to write down the maximum amount they were willing to pay for each of the products (their bids). Then they passed the sheets up to me, and I announced the winners. The students enjoyed this exercise, but when I asked them whether they felt that writing down the last two digits of their Social Security numbers had influenced their final bids, they dismissed my suggestion. No way! When I got back to my office, I analyzed the data. Did the digits from the Social Security numbers serve as anchors? Remarkably, they did: The students with the highest-ending Social Security digits bid highest, while those with the lowest-ending numbers bid lowest. The top 20 percent, for instance, bid an average of $56 for the cordless keyboard; the bottom 20 percent bid an average of $16. In the end, students with Social Security numbers ending in the upper 20 percent placed bids that were 216 to 346 percent higher than those of the students with Social Security numbers ending in the lowest 20 percent. Now, if the last two digits of your Social Security number are a high number, I know what you must be thinking: "I've been paying too much for everything my entire life!" This is not the case, however. Social Security numbers were the anchor in this experiment only because we requested them. We could just as well have asked for the current temperature, or your shoe size. Any question, in fact, would have created the anchor. Does that seem rational? Of course not. But when we make one decision, even when it's about an arbitrary number, we bring this history into our future decisions, and continue to make the same decisions over and over without going back and questioning their wisdom. This suggests that if we just ignored the talk about recession, we would repeat our past behaviors and not deviate much from our pre-recession pattern of purchasing decisions. But when everyone is talking about recession, it's likely to make us stop, rethink our past decisions and feel that something needs to change. And so we change our patterns, start acting as if we're in a recession -- and thereby create one. On the whole, it might be better if we just talked about sex instead. Dan Ariely is the Alfred P. Sloan professor of behavioral economics at MIT's Sloan School of Management and the author of "Predictably Irrational." - It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. --Aristotle (384—322 B.C.) Greek philosopher. The firefly only shines when on the wing; so is it with the mind; when once we rest, we darken. --Philip James Bailey (1816—1902) English poet. The elevation of the mind ought to be the principal end of all our studies. --Edmund Burke (1729—1797) Irish-born Whig politician and man of letters. _A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful_ [1756] Cursed is he that does not know when to shut his mind. An open mind is all very well in its way, but it ought not to be so open that there is no keeping anything in or out of it. It should be capable of shutting its doors sometimes, or may be found a little draughty. --Samuel Butler (1835—1902) English novelist, essayist, and critic. _The Note-Books of Samuel Butler_, ed. Henry Festing Jones [1907], "Falsehood" Cultivation to the mind is as necessary as food to the body. --Marcus Tullius Cicero (106—43 BC) Roman orator and statesman. - For a Time in the '50s, A Huckster Fanned Fears of Ad 'Hypnosis' by Cynthia Crossen _The Wall Street Journal_ [5 November 2007] At a New York press conference 50 years ago, a market researcher, James Vicary, announced he had invented a way to make people buy things whether they wanted them or not. It was called subliminal advertising. He had tested the process at a New Jersey movie theater, he said, where he had flashed the words "Eat Popcorn" or "Coca-Cola" on the screen every five seconds as the films played. The words came and went so fast -- in three-thousandths of a second -- that the audience didn't know they'd seen them. Yet sales of popcorn and Coke increased significantly. "Subliminal Messages -- Friend or Foe?" a newspaper headline asked in early 1959, and the public took sides. Critics called subliminal advertising "merchandising hypnosis" and "remote control of national thought." Rep. William A. Dawson (R., Utah) called it "S.P." or "sneak pitch." "Contemplate, if you will," Mr. Dawson said, "the effect of an invisible but effective appeal to 'drink more beer' being poured into the subconscious of teenage viewers." All three television networks vowed they wouldn't permit subliminal advertising in their broadcasts. Several state legislatures considered bills outlawing it. In 1958, an independent Los Angeles TV station announced it would begin transmitting subliminal ads, starting with public-service messages, such as "Drive Safely" or "Join the Army." The station was deluged with letters, phone calls and petitions from people who were afraid they would be persuaded to do or buy things against their will. The station canceled its test. Brainwashing was a very real fear in the late 1950s. A few dozen American prisoners of the Korean War, indoctrinated by their Chinese jailers, had publicly defected to communism. Meanwhile, people were spending more time staring at screens, exposed to new kinds of ads based on motivational research. Vance Packard's best-selling exposé, "The Hidden Persuaders," published in 1957, had warned people of the "mass psychoanalysis" that was turning them into "Pavlov's conditioned dog." A newspaper columnist, George Dixon, wrote, only partly in jest, "We might be made to unconsciously absorb the suggestion that it is always Christmas and normal to be flat broke." It didn't take long before rationality reasserted control of the national brain. People began trying to replicate Mr. Vicary's experiment. The Canadian Broadcasting Corp. flashed the message "Telephone now" 352 times on a 30-minute program. Of the more than 500 viewers who responded to a follow-up survey, 51% said they felt compelled to "do something" after watching the show. Many said they felt like having something to eat or drink. Only one said she felt like making a phone call. In another test in San Francisco, 150 viewers, most of them television and radio broadcasters, watched a 25-minute film with an advertising message flashed every five seconds. The viewers then got a ballot with nine product names from which to identify the advertiser. Only 14 people chose the right name, a soft drink. More than twice as many chose a brand of chewing gum. [ . . . ] In 1962, Mr. Vicary, in an interview, admitted that he had fabricated the results of the popcorn test to drum up business for his market-research firm. Subliminal ads were tossed into the invention junkyard. "All I accomplished," he said, "was to put a new word into common usage." - In order to improve the mind, we ought less to learn, than to contemplate. --René Descartes (1596—1650) French philosopher and mathematician. Minds are like parachutes, they only function when they are open. --attributed to James Dewar (1842—1923) Scottish physicist. Men's minds are raised to the level of the women with whom they associate. --Alexandre Dumas (1802—1870) French novelist and dramatist. Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young. --Henry Ford (1863—1947) American car manufacturer. The deadliest of poisons cannot be analyzed in any laboratory, for they are in the mind. --in Raquella Berto-Anirul, _The Biology of the Soul_, chapter epigraph, written by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson, attributed to a character in _Dune: The Battle of Corrin_. It is a man's own fault, it is from want of use, if his mind grows torpid in old age. --Samuel Johnson (1709—1784) English poet, critic, and lexicographer. In James Boswell _The Life of Samuel Johnson_ [1791]. The only means of strengthening one's intellect is to make up one's mind about nothing - to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts. --John Keats (1795—1821) English poet. The blessings of fortune are the lowest; the next are the bodily advantages of strength and health; but the superlative blessings, are those of the mind. --Sir Roger L'Estrange (1616—1704) English journalist and pamphleteer. No affectation of peculiarity can conceal a commonplace mind. --W. Somerset Maugham (1874—1965) English novelist, playwright, and short-story writer. _The Moon and Sixpence_ [1919], ch. 17 The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven. --John Milton (1608—1674) English poet. "Paradise Lost" [1667] The mind ought sometimes to be amused, that it may better return to thought, and to itself. --Gaius Julius Phaedrus (c. 15 B.C.— c. 50 A.D.) The versifier of Aesop's Fables in Latin. ^ Dan Quayle (1947— ) American politician; vice-president [1989-1993] Speaking at a college graduation, Quayle managed to mangle the slogan of the United Negro College Fund ("A mind is a terrible thing to waste"), saying, 'What a terrible thing it is to lose one's mind.' --_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_ edited by Clifton Fadiman and André Bernard [2000 ed.] ^ The mind is but a barren soil--a soil which is soon exhausted, and will produce no crop, or only one, unless it be continually fertilized and enriched with foreign matter. --Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723—1792) English painter. Great minds discuss ideas; Average minds discuss events; Small minds discuss people. --Hyman G. Rickover (1900—1986) American naval officer and engineer who developed the world's first nuclear-powered engines and the first atomic-powered submarine, the USS Nautilus, launched in 1954 {EB}. In _The Saturday Evening Post_ [28 November 1959] There is no absurdity so obvious that it cannot be firmly planted in the human head if you only begin to impose it before the age of five, by constantly repeating it with an air of great solemnity. --Arthur Schopenhauer (1788—1860) German philosopher. - As the soil, however rich it may be, cannot be productive without culture, so the mind, without cultivation, can never produce good fruit. --Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 B.C.— 65 A.D.) Roman philosopher and poet. Difficulties strengthen the mind, as well as labor does the body. --Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 B.C.— 65 A.D.) Roman philosopher and poet. - When people will not weed their own minds, they are apt to be overrun with nettles. --Horace Walpole (1717—1797) English writer and connoisseur. Letter to Caroline, Countess of Ailesbury [10 July 1779]. ----- dotage DOH-tij, noun: Feebleness of mind due to old age; senility.  . . see "MIND" (above) for related links The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed. --Steve Biko (1946-1977) South African anti-apartheid campaigner. ;void(0)) MINDING OWN BUSINESS . . see: "BUSYBODIES" see: "CURIOSITY" see: "GLASS HOUSES" [The makers of the Constitution] conferred, as against the government, the right to be let alone — the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized man. --Louis Brandeis (1856—1941) American lawyer and associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court [1916—1939]. In "Olmstead et al. vs. United States," 277 U.S. 438, 478 [1928]. Most of the trouble in this world has been caused by folks who can't mind their own business, because they have no business of their own to mind, any more than a smallpox virus has. --William S. Burroughs (1914—1997) American author associated with the Beat Generation. 'If everyone minded their own business,' said the Duchess in a hoarse growl, 'the world would go round a great deal faster than it does.' --Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832—1898) English writer and logician. _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_ [1865], Ch. 6 America should have minded her own business and stayed out of the [first] World War. If you hadn't entered the war the Allies would have made peace with Germany in the Spring of 1917. Had we made peace then there would have been no collapse in Russia followed by Communism, and Germany would not have signed the Versailles Treaty, which has enthroned Nazism in Germany. If America had stayed out of the war, all these "isms" wouldn't today be sweeping the continent in Europe and breaking down parliamentary government, and if England had made peace early in 1917, it would have saved over one million British, French, American, and other lives. --Winston Churchill (1874—1965) British Conservative statesman and Prime Minister [1940—1945, 1951—1955]. Speaking with an American reporter [1937)]. ^^ Ralph Waldo Emerson was once asked to speak at a ceremony commemorating the sixtieth anniversary of the famous battle of Concord (and the two hundredth anniversary of the town's founding). Emerson considered the request a great honor and resolved to produce a literary work based on the battle. Indeed, he decided to question the surviving veterans about their experiences. One day in the course of his investigation, Emerson met a barefooted farmer driving his oxen. Curious, the poet asked the man whether everyone in the area went without shoes and stockings. "Wal, some on 'em does," the farmer replied, "and the rest on 'em minds their own business." --http://anecdotage.com/ ^^ Those who in quarrels interpose Must often wipe a bloody nose. --John Gay (1685—1732) English poet and dramatist. _Fables_, pt. 1 [1727], "The Mastiffs" There's only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that's your own self. --Aldous Huxley (1894—1963) English novelist {grandson of T.H. Huxley}. _Time Must Have a Stop_ [1944] He who has so little knowledge of human nature, as to seek happiness by changing any thing but his own dispositions, will waste his life in fruitless efforts, and multiply the griefs which he purposes to remove. --Samuel Johnson (1709—1784) English poet, critic, and lexicographer. "The Rambler" (English journal), Number 6 [7 April 1750]. One of the marks of a certain type of bad man is that he can't give up a thing without wanting everyone else to give it up. That isn't the Christian way. --C.S. [Clive Staples] Lewis (1898—1963) British scholar and novelist. _Christian Behavior_ [1944] - One whose chief regard is for his own mind, and for the divinity within him and the service of its goodness, will strike no poses, utter no complaints, and crave neither for solitude nor yet for a crowd. --Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121—180) Roman emperor [161—180] and Stoic philosopher. _Meditations_, trans. Maxwell Staniforth [1964 How much time he gains who does not look to see what his neighbor says or does or thinks, but only at what he does himself, to make it just and holy. --Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121—180) Roman emperor [161—180] and Stoic philosopher. _Meditations_, trans. Maxwell Staniforth [1964] - Live and let live. --Scottish proverb If an American were condemned to confine his activity to his own affairs, he would be robbed of one half of his existence. --Alexis de Tocqueville (1805—1859) French historian and politician. _Democracy in America_ [1835—1840] Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits. --Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835—1910) American humorist, novelist, journalist, and river pilot. "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" _Pudd'nhead Wilson_ [1894]  MIND READING . . see "MIND" (above) for related links If we were all given, by magic, the power to read each other's thoughts, I suppose the first effect would be to dissolve all friendships. --Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) British philosopher, mathematician, and Nobel laureate. - 28 Percentage of adults who, if they could have a single superpower, say they would most like to be able to read minds, according to a survey for Activision 15 Percentage who say they would like to be able to fly 11 Percentage who say they would like to be able to be invisible 9 Percentage who say they would like to be able to have super strength --blurb in _Las Vegas Business Press_ [28 August 2006] - ;void(0)) MINNESOTA . . see "PLACES" for related links Minnesotans are just different, that's all. On the day of which I speak, with the wind-chill factor hovering at fifty-seven below, hundreds of them could be perceived through the slits in my ski mask out ice fishing on the frozen lake. It was cold out there, bitter, biting, cutting, piercing, hyperborean, marmoreal cold, and there were all these Minnesotans running around outdoors, happy as lambs in the spring. --Charles Kuralt (1934—1997) American journalist and broadcaster. _Dateline America_ [1979] ^ From the Blue Earth (Minn.) Faribault County Register. About 18,000 deer in the state will take part in a postcard survey asking them to report information about wild turkey sightings while hunting. --_New Yorker_ (magazine) [24 December 2007] ^ . . see "INDIVIDUALITY" for related links The most certain test by which we judge whether a country is really free is the amount of security enjoyed by minorities. --Lord Acton (1834-1902) British historian. "The History of Freedom in Antiquity" [1877], address to the Members of the Bridgnorth Institute [26 February 1877]. I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And that which I can do, by the grace of God, I will do. --Dwight Lyman Moody (1837-1899) American evangelist and publisher. How a minority, Reaching majority, Seizing authority, Hates a minority! --Leonard H. Robbins (1877-1947) American author, "Minorities" - "Well, there were sixty-eight people there, and sixty-two of them had no more desire to throw a stone than you had." "Satan!" "Oh, it's true. I know your race. It is made up of sheep. It is governed by minorities, seldom or never by majorities. It suppresses its feelings and its beliefs and follows the handful that makes the most noise. Sometimes the noisy handful is right, sometimes wrong; but no matter, the crowd follows it. The vast majority of the race, whether savage or civilized, are secretly kind-hearted and shrink from inflicting pain, but in the presence of the aggressive and pitiless minority they don't dare to assert themselves. Think of it! One kind-hearted creature spies upon another, and sees to it that he loyally helps in iniquities which revolt both of them. Speaking as an expert, I know that ninety-nine out of a hundred of your race were strongly against the killing of witches when that foolishness was first agitated by a handful of pious lunatics in the long ago. And I know that even to-day, after ages of transmitted prejudice and silly teaching, only one person in twenty puts any real heart into the harrying of a witch. And yet apparently everybody hates witches and wants them killed. Some day a handful will rise up on the other side and make the most noise -- perhaps even a single daring man with a big voice and a determined front will do it -- and in a week all the sheep will wheel and follow him, and witch-hunting will come to a sudden end." --Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835-1910) American humorist, novelist, journalist, and river pilot. _The Mysterious Stranger_ [1916], ch. 9 ----- arcane ar-KAYN, adjective: Understood or known by only a few. . . see "SUPERNATURAL" for related links As any honest magician knows, true magic inheres in the ordinary, the commonplace, the everyday, the mystery of the obvious. Only petty minds and trivial souls yearn for supernatural events, incapable of perceiving that everything—everything!—within and around them is pure miracle. --Edward Abbey (1927—1989) American author. _Abbey's Road_ [1979] The world presents enough problems if you believe it to be a world of law and order; do not add to them by believing it to be a world of miracles. --Louis Brandeis (1856—1941) American lawyer and associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court [1916—1939]. There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle. --Albert Einstein (1879—1955) German-American physicist who developed the special and general theories of relativity. To live at all is miracle enough. --Mervyn Peake (1911—1968) British novelist, poet, and artist. _The Glassblower_ [1950] ----- numinous [NOO-min-nus, NYOO-min-nus], adjective: Indicating or suggesting the presence of a god— spiritual, divine; inspiring awe and reverence— holy. Ex.: All Quests are concerned with some numinous Object, the Waters of Life, the Grail, buried treasure etc. --W. H. Auden, "Secular Hobbitism," review of "The Fellowship of the Ring" in _New York Times_ . . see: "THE BODY" It's indecent and inhuman to put full length mirrors in bathroom doors. They cause narcissism in the young and unhappiness in the old. --Frederic Brown (1906-1972) American science fiction and mystery writer. _The Lights In the Sky Are Stars_ [1953] Just tonight I stood before the tavern, Nothing seemed the way it used to be; In the glass I saw a strange reflection, Was that lonely woman really me? --Mary Hopkin (singer) "Those Were The Days" [1968 song] (Music and lyrics by Gene Raskin) It is now eleven years since I have seen my figure in a glass, and the last reflection I saw there was so disagreeable, that I resolved to spare myself the mortification in the future. --Lady Mary Wortley Montagu [née Pierrepont] (1689-1762) English writer. Letter to Countess of Bute [c. 1758]. . . see "EVIL" for related links I like long walks - especially when they are taken by people who annoy me. --Fred Allen [John Florence Sullivan] (1894-1956) American humorist. Though no man hates himself, the coldest among us having too much self-love for that, yet most men unconsciously judge the world from themselves, and it will be very generally found that those who sneer habitually at human nature, and affect to despise it, are among its worst and least pleasant samples. --Charles Dickens (1812-1870) English novelist. _Nicholas Nickleby_ [1839], ch. 44 - I detest my fellow-beings and do not feel that I am their fellow at all. --Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880) French novelist. Contact with the world, with which I have been steadily rubbing shoulders now for fourteen months, makes me feel more and more like returning to my shell. I hate the crowd, the herd. It seems to me always atrociously stupid or vile. --Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880) French novelist. - O woman, woman, when to ill they mind Is bent, all hell contains no fouler fiend. --"Agamemnon" in Homer (c. 850? BC) Greek Epic Poet, _The Odyssey_, c800BC - The Cornish people still attract me. They have become detestable, I think, and yet they _aren't_ detestable. They are of course, strictly anti-social and un-Christian... But curse them they are entirely mindless, and yet they are living purely for social advancement. They ought to be living in the darkness and warmth and passionateness of the blood, sudden, incalculable. Whereas they are like insects gone cold, living only for money, for _dirt_. They are foul in this. They ought all to die. Not that I've seen very much of them. --D.H. (David Herbert) Lawrence (1885-1930) English novelist and poet. - - A misogynist is a man who hates women as much as women hate each other. --H.L. (Henry Louis) Mencken (1880-1956) American journalist and literary critic. The American people, taken one with another, constitute the most timorous, sniveling, poltroonish, ignominious mob of serfs and goose-steppers ever gathered under one flag in Christendom since the end of the middle ages. --H.L. (Henry Louis) Mencken (1880-1956) American journalist and literary critic. [1922 remark.] - It's silly to go on pretending that under the skin we are all brothers. The truth is more likely that under the skin we are all cannibals, assassins, traitors, liars, hypocrites, poltroons. --Henry Miller (1891-1980) American novelist and essayist. Every year, back comes Spring, with nasty little birds yapping their fool heads off and the ground all mucked up with plants. --Dorothy Parker (1893-1967) American critic and humorist. Practically everyone but myself is a pusillanimous son of a bitch. --George S. Patton, Jr. (1885-1945) American general. Women are one and all a set of vultures. --Gaius Petronius Arbiter (?-AD 66) Roman writer and senator. _Satyricon_, 1st century AD I wish I loved the Human Race; I wish I loved its silly face; I wish I liked the way it walks; I wish I liked the way it talks; And when I'm introduced to one, I wish I thought "What Jolly Fun!" --Sir Walter A Raleigh (1861-1922) English lecturer and critic, "Wishes of an Elderly Man" [1923] Any man who hates dogs and babies can't be all bad. --Leo Rosten (1908-1997) American writer and social scientist (of W.C. Fields, and often attributed to him.) I hope to paint something that will ruin the appetite of every son of a bitch who eats in that room. --Mark Rothko, (On his commission for the Four Seasons restaurant.) I am sorry to have to introduce the subject of Christmas in these articles. It is an indecent subject; a cruel, gluttonous subject; a drunken, disorderly subject; a wasteful, disastrous subject; a wicked, cadging, lying, filthy, blasphemous, and demoralising subject. Christmas is forced on a reluctant and disgusted nation by the shopkeepers and the press: in its own merits it would wither and shrivel in the fiery breath of universal hatred; and anyone who looked back to it would be turned into a pillar of greasy sausages. --George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) Irish comic dramatist, literary critic, Socialist propagandist, and winner of the Nobel Prize, for Literature in 1925 {EB} _Our Theatres in the Nineties_ - Woman is as hard to know as a melon. --Spanish proverb From the sea, much salt; from women, much evil. --Spanish proverb - I hate and despise the animal called Mankind but I like the occasional Tom, Dick, and Harry. --Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) Anglo-Irish poet and satirist There are times when one would like to hang the whole human race, and finish the farce. --Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835-1910) American humorist, novelist, journalist, and river pilot ----- misanthropy (noun) Distrust or hatred of human beings. . . see "UNHAPPINESS" for related links There will always be a lost dog somewhere that will prevent me from being happy. --Jean [-Marie-Lucien-Pierre] Anouilh (1910—1987) French playwright. _La Sauvage_ It is a general error to imagine the loudest complainers for the public to be the most anxious for its welfare. --Edmund Burke (1729—1797) Irish-born Whig politician and man of letters. _Observations on a publication entitled 'The Present State of the Nation'_ [1769] If the misery of others leaves you indifferent and with no feeling of sorrow, then you cannot be called a human being. --Jimmy Carter (1924— ) American Democratic statesman, President [1977—1981]. _Keeping Faith_ [1982] We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same. --Carlos Castaneda (1925—1998) Peruvian-born American author. 'Tis the only comfort of the miserable to have partners in their woes. --Miguel de Cervantes (1547—1616) Spanish novelist. _Don Quixote de la Mancha_ [1605-1615] I read big fat "Les Miserables" for weeks while I took the IRT subway for my Wednesday allergy shots. I needed to know Jean Valjean lived a more miserable life than I did. --E.L. (Edgar Lawrence) Doctorow (1931— ) American writer. _Lives of the Poets_ [The] great part of the miseries of mankind are brought upon them by the false estimates they have made of the value of things, and by their *giving too much for their whistles.* --Benjamin Franklin (1706—1790) American politician, inventor, and scientist. {Referring to the time when at age 7 he was charmed by another boy's whistle which he bought with all the money he had , letter to Madame Brillion [10 November 1779] - Q} Lonely people talking to each other can make each other lonelier. --Lillian Hellman (1905—1984) American dramatist. _The Autumn Garden_ [1951], act I You wallow in the guilt; you wallow in the pain You wave it like a flag, you wear it like a crown Got your mind in the gutter, bringin' everybody down Complain about the present and blame it on the past I'd like to find your inner child and kick its little ass. Get over it. --Don Henley (1947— ) American rock musician. - The misery of man proceeds not from any single crush of overwhelming evil, but from small vexations continually repeated. --Samuel Johnson (1709—1784) English poet, critic, and lexicographer. "Pope" _Lives of the English Poets_ [1781] Depend upon it that if a man talks of his misfortunes there is something in them that is not disagreeable to him; for where there is nothing but pure misery there never is any recourse to the mention of it. --Samuel Johnson (1709—1784) English poet, critic, and lexicographer. In James Boswell _The Life of Samuel Johnson_ [1791] - Most men make use of the first part of their life to render the last part miserable. --Jean de La Bruyère (1645—1696) French essayist and moralist. _Les Caractères_ [1688] "De l'Homme" - Few things are needed to make a wise man happy; nothing can make a fool content; that is why most men are miserable. --François de La Rochefoucauld (1613—1680) French classical author. Happiness and misery depend as much on temperament as on fortune. --François de La Rochefoucauld (1613—1680) French classical author. _Reflexions ou Sentences et Maximes Morales_ - He who walks through a great city to find subjects for weeping, may, God knows, find plenty at every corner to wring his heart; but let such a man walk on his course, and enjoy his grief alone — we are not of those who would accompany him. The miseries of us poor earthdwellers gain no alleviation from the sympathy of those who merely hunt them out to be pathetic over them. The weeping philosopher too often impairs his eyesight by his woe, and becomes unable from his tears to see the remedies for the evils which he deplores. Thus it will often be found that the man of no tears is the truest philanthropist, as he is the best physician who wears a cheerful face, even in the worst of cases. --Charles Mackay (1814—1889) Scottish poet and newspaperman. _Extraordinary Popular Delusions And The Madness Of Crowds_ Is it worthwhile that we jostle a brother, Bearing his load on the rough road of life? Is it worthwhile that we jeer at each other, In blackness of heart—that we war to the knife? God pity us all in our pitiful strife. --Joaquin Miller [Cincinnatus Hiner Miller] (1837—1913) American poet and journalist. _Is it Worthwhile?_ It is a consolation to the wretched to have companions in misery. --Publilius Syrus (85—43 B.C.) Latin writer of mimes who was originally a slave. "Maxim" #995 It is solace to haue companie in peyne. --Richard de Hampole Rolle (c. 1300—1349) English solitary and writer. _Meditations on Passion_ [1349] The secret of being miserable is to have leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not. --George Bernard Shaw (1856—1950) Irish comic dramatist, literary critic, Socialist propagandist, and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1925. "Children's Happiness" _Parents and Children _ [1914] If misery loves company, misery has company enough. --Henry David Thoreau (1817—1862) American essayist, poet, and practical philosopher. _Journal_" [1906] "1 September 1851" - I would not anticipate the relish of any happiness, nor feel the weight of any misery, before it actually arrives. --unattributed author _Spectator_ (no. 7), English periodical [1711—1712]. end page | MACARTHUR (DOUGLAS) - MALICE | MAN - MARINES | MARRIAGE | MARTYRS - MAUGHAM (WILLIAM SOMERSET) | MAXIMS - MEANNESS | MEDICINE - MEMORIAL DAY | MEMORIES - MEMORY | MEN - MEN v. WOMEN | MENTAL ILLNESS - MILK | MIND (THE) - MISERY | MISFORTUNE - MISSOURI | MISTAKES | MISTAKEN IDENTITY - MODESTY | MONEY | MONROE - MOON | MORAL ASSASINATION - MORALITY | MORNING - MOUNTAINS | MOVIE DIALOGUE - MUSHROOMS | MUSIC - MYTHOLOGY | | H | I - J | K - L | M | N - O | P - Q | | Return Home | The Credits | The Cast | Act 1 | Act 2 | Act 3 | The End | The Reviews | Photos | |
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