September 24

Quotes of the day from previous years:

2003

Since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

• selected by Nanobug

2004

To do evil that good may come of it is for bunglers in politics as well as morals. ~ William Penn

• selected by Kalki

2005

I wait . . . Wait for the mists and for the blacker rain — Heavier winds that stir the veil of fate, happier winds that pile her hair; Again they tear me, teach me, strew the heavy air upon me, winds that I know, and storm. ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald (born 24 September 1896, and correlation to the current period of powerful storms)

• selected by Kalki

2006

To act with common sense, according to the moment, is the best wisdom I know; and the best philosophy, to do one's duties, take the world as it comes, submit respectfully to one's lot, bless the goodness that has given us so much happiness with it, whatever it is, and despise affectation. ~ Horace Walpole

• proposed by Kalki

2007

My generation of radicals and breakers-down never found anything to take the place of the old virtues of work and courage and the old graces of courtesy and politeness. ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald

• proposed by Kalki

2008

At any rate, let us love for a while, for a year or so, you and me. That's a form of divine drunkenness that we can all try. There are only diamonds in the whole world, diamonds and perhaps the shabby gift of disillusion. ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald

• proposed by Kalki

2009

Extremism. It is an almost infallible sign — a kind of death-rattle — when a human institution is forced by its members into stressing those and only those factors which are identificatory, at the expense of others which it necessarily shares with competing institutions because human beings belong to all of them. ~ John Brunner (born 24 September 1934)

• proposed by Ningauble

2010

Once one is caught up into the material world not one person in ten thousand finds the time to form literary taste, to examine the validity of philosophic concepts for himself, or to form what, for lack of a better phrase, I might call the wise and tragic sense of life. ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald

• proposed by Kalki

2011

The whole secret of life is to be interested in one thing profoundly and in a thousand things well. ~ Hugh Walpole

• proposed by Kalki — this was originally proposed and selected as a statement cited to Horace Walpole — but this has since been determined to be a misattribution which began as early as the 1930s. ~ ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 00:49, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

2012

If there is such a phenomenon as absolute evil, it consists in treating another human being as a thing.

~ John Brunner ~

• proposed by Kalki

2013

Either you think — or else others have to think for you and take power from you, pervert and discipline your natural tastes, civilize and sterilize you.

~ F. Scott Fitzgerald ~

• proposed by Kalki

2014

Great art is the contempt of a great man for small art.

~ F. Scott Fitzgerald ~

• proposed by Kalki

2015

Papa Hegel he say that all we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history. I know people who can't even learn from what happened this morning. Hegel must have been taking the long view.

~ John Brunner ~

• proposed by Kalki

2016

If a passion for freedom is not in vogue, patriots may sound the alarm till they are weary. The Act of Habeas Corpus, by which prisoners may insist on being brought to trial within a limited time, is the corner-stone of our liberty.

~ Horace Walpole ~

• proposed by Kalki

2017

The world is a comedy to those that think; a tragedy to those that feel.

~ Horace Walpole ~

• proposed by DanielTom

2018

Whenever you feel like criticizing any one... just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had.

~ F. Scott Fitzgerald ~

• proposed by Kalki

2019

First you use machines, then you wear machines, and then ...? Then you serve machines.

~ John Brunner ~

• proposed by Kalki

2020

You have many years to live — do things you will be proud to remember when you're old.

~ John Brunner ~

• proposed by Kalki

2021

Men are often capable of greater things than they perform. They are sent into the world with bills of credit, and seldom draw to their full extent.

~ Horace Walpole ~

• proposed by Kalki

2022

None of us chose this war. Not the Ukrainians, who knew the crushing toll it would take. Not the United States, which warned that it was coming and worked to prevent it. Not the vast majority of countries at the United Nations. And neither did our people, or the people of virtually every UN member-state, who are feeling the war's consequences in greater food insecurity and higher energy prices. Nor did the Russian mothers and fathers whose children are being sent off to fight and die in this war, or the Russian citizens who continue to risk their freedom to protest against it, including those who came out into the streets of Moscow after President Putin announced his mobilization to chant, "Let our children live!" Indeed, it must be asked: How has this aggression against Ukraine by President Putin improved the lives or prospects of a single Russian citizen? One man chose this war. One man can end it. Because if Russia stops fighting, the war ends. If Ukraine stops fighting, Ukraine ends.

~ Antony Blinken ~

• proposed by Kalki; recent remarks on the Russo-Ukrainian War.

2023

LOGIC The principle governing human intellection. Its nature may be deduced from examining the following propositions, both of which are held by human beings to be true and often by the same people: “I can’t so you musn’t,” and “I can but you musn’t.”

~ John Brunner ~

• proposed by Kalki

2024

Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft, where we are hard, cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is very difficult to understand.

~ F. Scott Fitzgerald ~

• proposed by Kalki

2025

Rank or add further suggestions…

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Quotes by people born this day, already used as QOTD:

• There are no days in life so memorable as those which vibrated to some stroke of the imagination. ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • used 21 December 2008, proposed by UDScott

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The people made the Constitution, and the people can unmake it. It is the creature of their own will, and lives only by their will. ~ John Marshall

• 2 Zarbon 04:03, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
• 2 InvisibleSun 22:24, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
• 2 Kalki 23:57, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
• 2 Ningauble 23:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

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There are two kinds of fool. One says, "This is old, and therefore good." And one says, "This is new, and therefore better." ~ John Brunner (born September 24, 1934)

• 3.5 ~ Ningauble 23:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC) * 3 Ningauble 15:57, 23 September 2009 (UTC)
• 0 – Misattributed: this is a close paraphrase of Dean Inge ~ Ningauble 12:33, 3 October 2010 (UTC)
• 3 Kalki 17:17, 23 September 2009 (UTC) with a strong lean toward 4.

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It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is … If two laws conflict with each other, the courts must decide on the operation of each...This is of the very essence of judicial duty. ~ John Marshall

• 3 Kalki 17:17, 23 September 2009 (UTC)
• 2.5 Ningauble 23:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC) An important quote, but maybe not for this context

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Prognostics do not always prove prophecies, — at least the wisest prophets make sure of the event first. ~ Horace Walpole

• 3 Kalki 17:17, 23 September 2009 (UTC)
• 2 Ningauble 23:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

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HIPCRIME You committed one when you opened this book. Keep it up. It's our only hope. ~ John Brunner

• 3 Kalki (talk · contributions) 01:49, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

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