Sunday, February 14, 2021 – Recommending Patience
I’m extraordinarily patient provided I get my own way in the end. ~ Margaret Thatcher
Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet. ~ Jean Jacques Rousseau
The chess board is the world, the pieces are the phenomena of the universe, the rules of the game are what we call the laws of Nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. We know that his play is always fair, just, and patient. But also we know, to our cost, that he never overlooks a mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance. ~ Thomas Huxley, A Liberal Education (1868)
The key to everything is patience. You get the chicken by hatching the egg – not by smashing it. ~ Arnold H. Glasow
Beware of him that is slow to anger; for when it is long coming, it is the stronger when it comes, and the longer kept. Abused patience turns to fury. ~ Francis Quarles
If the person you are talking to doesn’t appear to be listening, be patient. It may simply be that he has a small piece of fluff in his ear. ~ Alan Alexander Milne, Pooh’s Little Instruction Book
You must first have a lot of patience to learn to have patience. ~ Stanislaw J. Lec
Patience often gets the credit that belongs to fatigue. ~ Franklin P. Jones
I am patient with stupidity but not with those who are proud of it. ~ Dame Edith Sitwell
PATIENCE, n. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue. ~ Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary
MEEKNESS, n. Uncommon patience in planning a revenge that is worthwhile. ~ Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary
Writing is good, thinking is better. Cleverness is good, patience is better. ~ Hermann Hesse
Waiting is painful. Forgetting is painful. But not knowing which to do is the worst kind of suffering. ~ Paulo Coelho
I took a course in speed waiting. Now I can wait an hour in only ten minutes. ~ Steven Wright
Patience is something you admire in the driver behind you, but not in one ahead. ~ Bill McGlashen
Nothing gives one person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and unruffled under all circumstances. ~ Thomas Jefferson
It is hard! But what cannot be removed, becomes lighter through patience. [Durum! sed levius fir patientia Quicquid corrigere est nefas.] ~ Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus), Carmina (I, 24, 19)
Patience, that blending of moral courage with physical timidity. ~ Thomas Hardy
Patience is the art of caring slowly. ~ John Ciardi
What we honor as prudence in our elders is simply panic in action. ~ Umberto Eco, The Island of the Day Before
The time to stop talking is when the other person nods his head affirmatively but says nothing. ~ Henry S. Haskins
It is time for writers to admit that nothing in this world makes sense. Only fools and charlatans think they know and understand everything. The stupider they are, the wider they conceive their horizons to be. And if an artist decides to declare that he understands nothing of what he sees – this in itself constitutes a considerable clarity in the realm of thought, and a great step forward. ~ Anton Chekhov, letter to Alexei Suvorin, May 30, 1888
A decision is the action an executive must take when he has information so incomplete that the answer does not suggest itself. ~ Arthur Radford
Democracy encourages the majority to decide things about which the majority is blissfully ignorant. ~ John Simon
“Protect me from knowing what I don’t need to know. Protect me from even knowing what I don’t need to know. Protect me from knowing there are things to know that I don’t know. Protect me from knowing that I decided not to know about the things that I decided not to know about them. Amen.” That’s it. It’s what you pray silently inside yourself anyway, so you might as well have it out in the open. “Lord, Lord, Lord. Protect me from the consequences of the above prayer. Amen.” And that’s it. Most of the trouble people get into in life comes from leaving out that last part. ~ Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless
It is better to stir up a question without deciding it, than to decide it without stirring it up. It is better to debate a question without deciding it than to decide it without debating it. ~ Joseph Joubert
A weak man has doubts before a decision; a strong man has them afterwards. ~ Karl Kraus
I was a-trembling because I’d got to decide forever betwixt two things, and I knowed it. I studied for a minute, sort of holding my breath, and then says to myself, “All right, then I’ll go to hell.” ~ Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Ever notice that “what the hell” is always the right decision? ~ Marilyn Monroe
If someone tells you he is going to make “a realistic decision,” you immediately understand that he is going to do something bad. ~ Mary McCarthy
Whenever I make a bum decision, I just go out and make another. ~ Harry Truman
A peacefulness follows any decision, even the wrong one. ~ Rita Mae Brown
One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. “Which road do I take?” she asked. “Where do you want to go?” was his response. “I don’t know,” Alice answered. “Then,” said the cat, “it doesn’t matter.” ~ Lewis Carroll
When choosing between two evils, always choose the one you haven’t tried yet. ~ Mae West
Ten men waiting for me at the door? Send one of them home, I’m tired. ~ Mae West
It is easier to find men who will volunteer to die, than to find those who are willing to endure pain with patience. ~ Julius Caesar
Genius is eternal patience. ~ Michelangelo
Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
If you would know strength and patience, welcome the company of trees. ~ Hal Borland
Knowing trees, I understand the meaning of patience. Knowing grass, I can appreciate persistence. ~ Hal Borland
Water does not resist. Water flows. When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress. Water is not a solid wall; it will not stop you. But water always goes where it wants to go, and nothing in the end can stand against it. Water is patient. Dripping water wears away a stone. Remember that, my child. Remember you are half water. If you can’t go through an obstacle, go around it. Water does. ~ Margaret Atwood, The Penelopiad
Just Above Sunset 