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. . . OBSTINACY see: "DETERMINATION" see: "PERSISTENCE" see: "RESOLUTION" see: "STUBBORN" - Obstinacy in a bad cause is but consistancy in a good. --Sir Thomas Browne (16051682) English writer and physician. _Religio Medici_, 1.25 [1642], ed. John Addington Symonds [1886] & see: Perseverance in a good cause is obstinacy in a bad one. --anon. In "The New-York Mirror" [20 March 1824]. - The obstinate man does not hold Opinions, but they hold him; for once he is possessed with an Error, 'tis like the Devil, not to be cast out but with great Difficulty. --Joseph Butler (16921752) English bishop and philosopher. Attributed in Josiah H. Gilbert _Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers_, p. 437 [1895]. Obstinacy and heat in argument are surest proofs of folly. Is there anything so stubborn, obstinate, disdainful, contemplative, grave, or serious, as an ass? --Michel Eyquem de Montaigne (15331592) French moralist and essayist. Attributed in Maturin M. Ballou _Treasury of Thought_, p. 368 [10th ed. 1884]. Stubbornness and stupidity are twins. --Sophocles (496?406 B.C.) Greek dramatist. "Antigone", tr. Elizabeth Wyckoff [1954]. - The difference between perseverance and obstinacy: The first is a strong will; the second a strong won't. --anon. Quoted in "The Leisure Hour" [1 January 1857]. ----- froward (adj.) ['fro-wκ(r)d] Contrary, disobedient, obstinate, even perversely so.   OBVIOUS . . 'Excellent,' I cried. 'Elementary,' said he. --Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (18591930) Scottish-born writer of detective fiction. _The Adventures of the Crooked Man_ [1893] The most important things to say are those which often I did not think necessary for me to say because they were too obvious. --Andrι Gide (18691951) French novelist and critic; awarded Nobel Prize for Literature in 1947. _The Journals of Andrι Gide: 19141927_ [23 August 1926] She plunged into a sea of platitudes, and with the powerful breast stroke of a channel swimmer made her confident way towards the white cliffs of the obvious. --W. Somerset Maugham (18741965) English novelist, playwright, and short-story writer. _A Writer's Notebook_ [1949] Smoking ... kills you, and if you are killed, you have lost a very important part of your life. --Brooke Shields (b. 1965) American actress. Testimony at the House of Representatives [25 June 1981]. Women have a wonderful instinct about things. They can discover everything except the obvious. --Oscar Wilde (18541900) Anglo-Irish dramatist and poet. _An Ideal Husband_, act II [1895] ----- arrant (adj.) Thoroughgoing; downright; out-and-out; confirmed; extreme; notorious. diaphanous (adj.) [dy-AF-uh-nus] So delicate as to be transparent or translucent, or it is airy, insubstantial, vague, or ethereal. prima facie [PRY-muh-FAY-shee; -shuh], adverb: At first view; on the first appearance. adjective: 1. True, valid, or adequate at first sight; as it seems at first sight; ostensible. 2. Self-evident; obvious. 3. (Law) Sufficient to establish a fact or a case unless disproved. ;void(0)) OCCUPATIONS . . see: ACTORS ACTUARIES ARCHAEOLOGISTS, ARCHITECTS AUTHORS BAKERS, BANKERS, BARTENDERS BASEBALL CLOWNS CONDUCTORS COWBOYS DENTISTS DIPLOMATS DOCTORS FARMING FOOTBALL HISTORIANS JOURNALISM LAWYERS MAGICIANS MISSIONARIES PAINTING, PARENTING PLUMBERS POLICE POLITICIANS POST OFFICE PREACHERS PUBLISHING REPORTERS SCULPTURE SOCCER SOLDIERS SPY TEACHERS UNIONS see "WORK" for other related links "Never mind how I got it. Bank it." --Attributed to Tallulah Bankhead in 1933. When FDR called in the gold she showed up at the bank with a large stack of gold coins and the teller raised his eyebrows and said, "Why, Miss Bankhead, you've been hoarding." (Tallulah Bankhead (19031968) American actress.) It took me 15 years to discover I had no talent for writing, but I couldn't give it up because by that time I was too famous. --Robert Benchley (18891945) American humorist and newspaper columnist. Quoted in "Reader's Digest" [September 1949]. An excellent plumber is infinitely more admirable than an incompetent philosopher. The society that scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity, and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water. --John W. Gardner (19122002) American administrator. Quoted in "New York State Education" [pub. by New York State Teachers Association, 1956]. The ugliest of trades have their moments of pleasure. Now, if I were a grave-digger, or even a hangman, there are some people I could work for with a great deal of enjoyment. --Douglas Jerrold (18031857) English playwright and journalist. Quoted in _The Knickerbocker_ vol. LII [November 1858]. We are challenged on every hand to work untiringly to achieve excellence in our lifework. Not all men are called to specialized or professional jobs; even fewer rise to the heights of genius in the arts and sciences; many are called to be laborers in factories, fields and streets. But no work is insignificant. All labor that uplifts should be undertaken with painstaking excellence. If a man is called to be a street sweeper he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say "Here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well." --Martin Luther King, Jr. (19291968) American civil rights leader. Sermon at New Covenant Baptist Church, Chicago, Ill. [9 April 1967]. - "THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (18071882) American poet. Under a spreading chestnut-tree The village smithy stands; The smith, a mighty man is he, With large and sinewy hands; And the muscles of his brawny arms Are strong as iron bands. His hair is crisp, and black, and long, His face is like the tan; His brow is wet with honest sweat, He earns whate'er he can, And looks the whole world in the face, For he owes not any man. Week in, week out, from morn till night, You can hear his bellows blow; You can hear him swing his heavy sledge, With measured beat and slow, Like a sexton ringing the village bell, When the evening sun is low. And children coming home from school Look in at the open door; They love to see the flaming forge, And hear the bellows roar, And catch the burning sparks that fly Like chaff from a threshing-floor. He goes on Sunday to the church, And sits among his boys; He hears the parson pray and preach, He hears his daughter's voice, Singing in the village choir, And it makes his heart rejoice. It sounds to him like her mother's voice, Singing in Paradise! He needs must think of her once more, How in the grave she lies; And with his haul, rough hand he wipes A tear out of his eyes. Toiling,rejoicing,sorrowing, Onward through life he goes; Each morning sees some task begin, Each evening sees it close Something attempted, something done, Has earned a night's repose. Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend, For the lesson thou hast taught! Thus at the flaming forge of life Our fortunes must be wrought; Thus on its sounding anvil shaped Each burning deed and thought. - The verdict you pronounce upon the source of your livelihood is the verdict you pronounce upon your life. --Ayn Rand (19051982) Russian-born American writer. _Atlas Shrugged_ [1957] - The plumber should be put down with the tax-gatherer as a being as certain as fate and as inexorable [..] You will come to have an un-natural hatred for the man and his myrmidons. He leaves nothing behind you to eat as does the butcher, nothing to wear as does the tailor, nothing to delight you nothing finally, in which you may exult among your acquaintance. Whoever spoke among his friends of his plumber, or boasted of his intimacy with that dark, silent and seemingly sullen man who comes so frequently and on his coming has nothing to say for himself? The plumber is doubtless aware that he is odious. He feels himself like Dickens' turnpike man, to be the enemy of mankind. --Anthony Trollope (18151882) English novelist [son of Frances Trollope.] "The Plumber" [1880] - ----- avocation (noun) A secondary occupation, usually one pursued for recreation; hobby. Similar: pastime, diversion, sideline, interest mιtier [met-YAY; MET-yay], noun: 1. An occupation; a profession. 2. An area in which one excels; an occupation for which one is especially well suited. . . see: "BOATING" see: "FISH" see: "SHIPS" see: "NATURE" for other related links How inappropriate to call this planet Earth when it is clearly Ocean. --Sir Arthur C. Clarke (19172008) English science-fiction writer. Quoted in "Nature" [8 March 1990]. Water, water, every where, And all the boards did shrink; Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink. --Samuel Taylor Coleridge (17721834) English poet, critic, and philosopher. "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" [1798] Love the sea? I dote upon it from the beach. --Douglas Jerrold (18031857) English playwright and journalist. Quoted in Blanchard Jerrold (ed) _Specimens of Douglas Jerrold's Wit_ [1858]. Whosoever commands the sea, commands the trade; whosoever commands the trade of the world, commands the riches of the world, and consequently the world itself. --Sir Walter Raleigh (c. 15521618) English explorer and courtier. Quoted in Samuel Johnson _A Dictionary of the English Language_ [1805 ed.]. ;void(0)) OCTOBER . . see: "AUTUMN" see: "FALL" see: "TIME" for other related links There is no season when such pleasant and sunny spots may be lighted on, and produce so pleasant an effect on the feelings, as now in October. --Nathaniel Hawthorne (18041864) American novelist and short-story writer. _American Note-Books_ [7 October 1841] At every turn the maples burn, The quail is whistling free, The partridge whirs, and the frosted burs Are dropping for you and me. [...] In the clear October morning. --Edmund Clarence Stedman (18331908) American poet and anthologist. "Autumn Song" in _The Blameless Prince, and Other Poems_ [1869] ;void(0)) OFFENSE . . see: "ARROGANCE" see: "BOLDNESS" see: "INSULTS" see: "RUDENESS" Justice consists in doing no injury to men; decency in giving them no offense. --Marcus Tullius Cicero (10643 B.C.) Roman orator and statesman. _De officiis_ (On Duties), bk. 1, ch. 28, sec. 99 [44 B.C.] You must not mind me, madam; I say strange things, but I mean no harm. --Samuel Johnson (17091784) English poet, critic, and lexicographer. In Fanny Burney's diary [23 August 1778]. Civil society depends on people agreeing to two things: Don't deliberately give offense to others, and don't be too easily offended. Too few people are giving any thought to either. --attributed to Karl Lembke To be civilized is to be incapable of giving unnecessary offense, it is to have some quality of consideration for all who cross our path. --Agnes Repplier (18551950) American author. _Americans and Others_ [1912] "A Question of Politeness" I'll not willingly offend, Nor be easily offended; What's amiss I'll strive to mend, And endure what can't be mended. --Isaac Watts (16741748) English hymn writer. "Good Resolutions in _Moral Songs_ [1715] ----- peccadillo [peck-uh-DIL-oh], noun: A slight offense; a petty fault. (Related to impeccable, "without flaw or fault.")  OFFER . . I'll make him an offer he can't refuse. --Mario Puzo (19201999) American novelist. _The Godfather_ [1969] [When Isadora Duncan regretted that they could not have a child together, saying, 'Think what a child it would be with my body and your brains':] I know, but suppose the child was so unlucky as to have my body and your brain? --George Bernard Shaw (18561950) Irish dramatist and critic. Quoted in Lewis Copeland and Faye Copeland _10,000 Jokes, Toasts & Stories_ [1939]. She offered her honour. He honoured her offer. And all night long it was honour and offer. --anon. ;void(0)) OIL . . All our defence requirements in the Middle East ... demand that an essential feature of our policy should be to retain the cooperation of the Arab States, and to ensure that the Arab world does not gravitate towards the Russians ... We cannot stress too strongly the importance of Middle East oil resources to us both in peace and war. --British chiefs of staff memorandum [10 July 1946]; in William Roger Louis and Robert W. Stookey (eds.) _The End of the Palestine Mandate_, pp. 13-14 [1986]. Iraq controls some 10 per cent of the world's proven oil reserves. Iraq plus Kuwait controls twice that. An Iraq permitted to swallow Kuwait would have the economic and military power, as well as the arrogance, to intimidate and coerce its neighbors neighbors who control the lion's share of the world's remaining oil reserves. We cannot permit a resource so vital to be dominated by one so ruthless. And we won't. --George H. W. Bush (b. 1924) American Republican statesman and President [19891993]. [11 September 1990] ^ J. Paul Getty (18921976) American oil executive and art collector. Getty once received a request from a magazine for a short article explaining his success. A check for two hundred pounds was enclosed. The multimillionaire obligingly wrote, 'Some people find oil. Others don't.' --_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_ edited by Clifton Fadiman and Andrι Bernard [2000 ed.] ^ - In an industrial park in Philadelphia sits a new machine that can change almost anything into oil. [...] The process is designed to handle almost any waste product imaginable, including turkey offal, tires, plastic bottles, harbor-dredged muck, old computers, municipal garbage, cornstalks, paper-pulp effluent, infectious medical waste, oil-refinery residues, even biological weapons such as anthrax spores. [...] [From the grinder] it flows into a series of tanks and pipes, which hum and hiss as they heat, digest, and break down the mixture. Two hours later, a white-jacketed technician turns a spigot. Out pours a honey-colored fluid, steaming a bit in the cold warehouse as it fills a glass beaker. It really is a lovely oil. [...] If a 175-pound man fell into one end, he would come out the other end as 38 pounds of oil, 7 pounds of gas, and 7 pounds of minerals, as well as 123 pounds of sterilized water. --Brad Lemley _Discover_ (magazine), Vol. 24 No. 5 [May 2003] "Anything into Oil: Technological savvy could turn 600 million tons of turkey guts and other waste into 4 billion barrels of light Texas crude each year." - Let me tell you something that we Israelis have against Moses. He took us 40 years through the desert in order to bring us to the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil. --Golda Meir (18981978) A founder and the fourth prime minister [1969-74] of the State of Israel. Speech in Jerusalem [10 June 1973]. . . see "PLACES" for related links [In 1899] the last big tract of Indian land was declared open for settlement, in Oklahoma. The claimants and the speculators mounted their horses and lined up like trotters waiting for a starting gun. The itchy ones jumped the gun and were ever after known as Sooners as Oklahoma was thereafter called the Sooner State. --Alistair Cooke [Alfred Cooke] (19082004) British-born American broadcater and journalist. _America_ [1973] - Tall tales come out of Oklahoma, just as out of Texas, one favorite describes the 'crowbar hole.' This is a hole through the wall that many houses have, designed to check the weather. You shove a crowbar through the hole; if it bends, the wind velocity outside is normal; if the bar breaks off, 'it is better to stay in the house.' --John Gunther (19011970) American author. _Inside USA_ [1947] On a single day [during the Dust Bowl disaster of 1935], I heard, fifty million *tons* of soil were blown away. People sat in Oklahoma City, with the sky invisible for three days in a row, holding dust masks over their faces and wet towels to protect their mouths at night, while the farms blew by. --John Gunther (19011970) American author. _Inside USA_ [1947] - Oklahoma, Where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain, And the wavin' wheat Can sure smell sweet When the wind comes right behind the rain. --Oscar Hammerstein II (18951960) American songwriter. "Oklahoma" song from the 1943 musical Oklahoma". Okie use' ta mean you was from Oklahoma. Now it means you're a dirty son-of-a-bitch. Okie means you're scum. Don't mean nothing itself, it's the way they say it. --John Steinbeck (19021968) American novelist. _The Grapes of Wrath_ [1939] end page | NAME CALLING - NASTINESS | NATIONALISM - NATIONS | NATURE | NAVY - NEGLECT | NEIGHBORS/NEIGHBORHOOD - NEW YORK | NEW YORK CITY | NEWS - NEWSPEAK | NICE - NONCONFORMITY | NIXON YEARS | NONSENSE - NOVEMBER | NUCLEAR WAR - NURSERY RHYMES | OBESITY - OBSTACLES | OBSTINACY - OKLAHOMA | OLD - OLD AGE | OLD-FASHIONED - OPERA | OPINION | OPPORTUNITY - ORGANIZATION | ORIGINALITY - OYSTERS | | H | I - J | K - L | M | N - O | P - Q | | Return Home | The Credits | The Cast | Act 1 | Act 2 | Act 3 | The Reviews | |
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