Quotes by Columnists - Page 10

She said it was beautiful to be loved, and that it made everything on earth look brighter.
Fanny Fern
According to just about every poll on happiness, people on the Left are generally less happy than conservatives.
Dennis Prager
I have devoted much of my life to studying, writing, and lecturing about the subject of happiness. In particular, I have advocated that people act as happy as possible even when they do not feel happy. This is, I believe, both a moral obligation to all those who are in our lives—it is unfair to others to inflict our bad moods on them—and a particularly effective way to increase our own happiness, since acting happy elevates one’s mood. This is hardly controversial—in just about every area of life, human beings deeply influence how they feel by how they act. As a rule, those who object to this idea of acting contrary to how one feels are people on the Left—because on the Left, feelings are sacrosanct.
Dennis Prager
Money won't buy happiness, but it will pay the salaries of a huge research staff to study the problem.
Bill Vaughan
How can you tell somebody who is pursuing happiness that they're somehow not American when that was the very first promise that America made?
Dan Savage
The truly revolutionary promise of our nation's founding document is the freedom to pursue happiness-with-a-capital-H.
Dan Savage
Those who value wisdom know that when you give people something for nothing, you produce ungrateful people; that when you obscure the differences between men and women, you end up with many aimless men and angry women; that when you give children “self-esteem” without their earning it, you produce narcissists who enter adulthood often incapable of empathy and of handling life; that if you do not destroy evil, it will proliferate; and that if you are kind to the cruel, you will end up being cruel to the kind. If you really want goodness to prevail, wisdom is a key to unlocking it. The heart is not.
Dennis Prager
Wisdom is the reward for a lifetime of listening when you would have preferred to talk.
Doug Larson
To acquire knowledge, one must study;but to acquire wisdom, one must observe.
Marilyn Vos Savant
Sigmund Freud, the father of psychiatry and an atheist, theorized that one’s attitude toward one’s father largely shaped one’s attitude toward God.
Dennis Prager
Any moral system that is detached from God, no matter how noble and sincerely held, will likewise fail.
Dennis Prager
We live in a world filled with evil and moral confusion. There is only one way out: affirmation of a God Whose primary demand of us is that we treat our fellow human beings decently. Faith in any god who makes any other primary demand will ultimately fail to solve the problem of evil. And any moral system that is detached from God, no matter how noble and sincerely held, will likewise fail
Dennis Prager
Without God, right and wrong are just personal beliefs. Personal opinions. I think shoplifting is okay, you don’t.
Dennis Prager
Unless there is a God, all morality is just opinion and belief. And virtually every atheist philosopher has acknowledged this.
Dennis Prager
My friend Adele describes fundamentalism as holding so tightly to your beliefs that your fingernails leave imprints on the palm of your hand... I think she's right. I was a fundamentalist not because of the beliefs I held but because of how I held them: with a death grip. It would take God himself to finally pry them out of my hands. (p.17-18)
Rachel Held Evans
(About changing faith) At our best, Christians embrace it, leaving enough space within orthodoxy for God to surprise us every now and then.
Rachel Held Evans
Caring for the poor, resting on the Sabbath, showing hospitality and keeping the home—these are important things that can lead us to God, but God is not contained in them.
Rachel Held Evans
What a comfort to know that God is a poet.
Rachel Held Evans
God's ways are higher than our ways not because he is less compassionate than we are but because he is more compassionate than we can ever imagine.
Rachel Held Evans
Once you’ve read too many trashy best-sellers, you begin to look for something with substance, something that attempts to define the universe.
Jessica Zafra
Any clod can have the facts, but having opinions is an art.
Charles McCabe
Like all who search for truth out of fear, I desperately wanted someone else to tell me exactly what to do.
Rachel Held Evans
Never assume the obvious is true.
William Safire
Politics determines who has the power, not who has the truth.
Paul Krugman
Hobbies of any kind are boring except to people who have the same hobby. This is also true of religion, although you will not find me saying so in print.
Dave Barry
If God had wanted us to be concerned for the plight of the toads, he would have made them cute and furry.
Dave Barry
Eating rice cakes is like chewing on a foam coffee cup, only less filling.
Dave Barry
I love the Olympics, because they enable people from all over the world to come together and--regardless of their political or cultural differences--accuse each other of cheating.
Dave Barry
How can such scary looking parents create something so cute?
Chetan Bhagat
Camping is nature's way of promoting the motel business.
Dave Barry
Although golf was originally restricted to wealthy, overweight Protestants, today it's open to anybody who owns hideous clothing.
Dave Barry
Have you noticed that whatever sport you're trying to learn, some earnest person is always telling you to keep your knees bent?
Dave Barry
As you get older; you've probably noticed that you tend to forget things. You'll be talking with somebody at a party, and you'll know that you know this person, but no matter how hard you try, you can't remember his or her name. This can be very embarassing, especially if he or she turns out to be your spouse.
Dave Barry
Why should any guy want to be only friends with a girl? It’s like agreeing to be near a chocolate cake and never eat it. It’s like sitting in a racing car but not driving it.
Chetan Bhagat
Gravity is a contributing factor in nearly 73 percent of all accidents involving falling objects.
Dave Barry
I believe it was Shakespeare, or possibly Howard Cosell, who first observed that marriage is very much like a birthday candle, in that 'the flames of passion burn brightest when the wick of intimacy is first ignited by the disposable butane lighter of physical attraction, but sooner or later the heat of familiarity causes the wax of boredom to drip all over the vanilla frosting of novelty and the shredded coconut of romance.' I could not have phrased it better myself.
Dave Barry
Perhaps you are thinking: 'But a tank costs several million dollars, not including floor mats. I don't have that kind of money.'Don't be silly. You're a consumer, right? You have credit cards, right?Perhaps you are thinking: 'Yes, but how am I going to pay the credit-card company?'Don't be silly. You have a tank, right?
Dave Barry
I can win an argument on any topic, against any opponent. People know this, and steer clear of me at parties. Often, as a sign of their great respect, they don't even invite me.
Dave Barry
The leading cause of death among fashion models is falling through street grates.
Dave Barry
Aside from velcro, time is the most mysterious substance in the universe. You can't see it or touch it, yet a plumber can charge you upwards of seventy-five dollars per hour for it, without necessarily fixing anything.
Dave Barry
The problem with winter sports is that -- follow me closely here -- they generally take place in winter.
Dave Barry
The nice part about being a pessimist is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised.
George F. Will
When trouble arises and things look bad, there is always one individual who perceives a solution and is willing to take command. Very often, that individual is crazy.
Dave Barry
It is a well-documented fact that guys will not ask for directions. This is a biological thing. This is why it takes several million sperm cells... to locate a female egg, despite the fact that the egg is, relative to them, the size of Wisconsin.
Dave Barry
I like the relaxed way in which the Japanese approach religion. I think of myself as basically a moral person, but I'm definitely not religious, and I'm very tired of the preachiness and obsession with other people's behavior characteristic of many religious people in the United States. As far as I could tell, there's nothing preachy about Buddhism. I was in a lot of temples, and I still don't know what Buddhists believe, except that at one point Kunio said 'If you do bad things, you will be reborn as an ox.'This makes as much sense to me as anything I ever heard from, for example, the Reverend Pat Robertson.
Dave Barry
If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word would be 'meetings.
Dave Barry
Being defeated is often a temporary condition. Giving up is what makes it permanent.
Marilyn Vos Savant
Ladies and gentlemen of the class of '97:Wear sunscreen.If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now.Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth. Oh, never mind. You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they've faded. But trust me, in 20 years, you'll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can't grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked. You are not as fat as you imagine.Don't worry about the future. Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 p.m. on some idle Tuesday.
Mary Schmich
Life is not to be taken seriously, as we are really temporary here. We are like a pre-paid card with limited validity. If we are lucky, we may last another 50 years. And 50 years is just 2,500 weekends. Do we really need to get so worked up? It’s ok, bunk a few classes, goof up a few interviews, fall in love. We are people, not programmed devices.
Chetan Bhagat
Love? I need a lot of love."Of course you do. Everyone does. It's funny that we never say it. It's OK to scream, 'I'm starving' in public if you are hungry; it's OK to make a fuss and say, 'I'm so sleepy', if you are tired; but somehow we cannot say, 'I need some more love.' Why can't we say it? It's just as basic a need.
Chetan Bhagat
I believe that love--not imitation--is the sincerest form of flattery. Your imitator thinks that you can be duplicated your lover knows you can't.
Marilyn Vos Savant
I'll understand if you don't want me. But I will be heartbroken. You are all I ever dreamed of and hoped for. You are much, much more. Please know that I didn't think I was mean-minded. But I realize I am. I don't want you to put your arms around me and say it's all right, that you forgive me. I want you to be sure that you do, and my love for you will last as long as I live. I can see no lightness, no humour, no joke to make. I just hope that we will be able to go back to when we had laughter, and the world was coloured, not black and white and grey. I am so sorry for hurting you. I could inflict all kinds of pain on myself, but it would not take back any I gave to you. - David Power
Maeve Binchy