No written law has ever been more binding
than unwritten custom supported by popular opinion.
- Carrie Chapman Catt
In all of his bestsellers, the Divine has told the truth,
custom-tailored to the comprehension of the times.
- Ernest Holmes
We are strange beings, we seem
to go free, but we go in chains -
chains of training, custom, convention,
association, environment -
in a word, Circumstance -
and against these bonds
the strongest of us struggle in vain.
- Mark Twain
Laws are sand, customs are rock.
Laws can be evaded and punishment escaped,
but an openly transgressed custom brings sure punishment.
The penalty may be unfair, unrighteous, illogical, and a cruelty;
no matter, it will be inflicted, just the same.
Certainly, then, there can be but one wise thing
for a visiting stranger to do -
find out what the country's customs are,
and refrain from offending against them.
- Mark Twain
Customs do not concern themselves
with right or wrong or reason.
But they have to be obeyed;
one reasons all around them until he is tired,
but he must not transgress them, it is sternly forbidden.
- Mark Twain
Why does a woman work ten years to change a man's habits
and then complain that he's not the man she married?
- Barbra Streisand
Live life on the edge, not with an edge.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
It's not the size of the dog in the fight,
it's the size of the fight in the dog.
- Mark Twain
Be careful not to do your good deeds
when there's no one watching you.
- Tom Lehrer
If you are not one of us, you are one of them.
- the movie The Matrix (1999)
"It's not that important,
don't worry about it" is the answer,
now what was the question?
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Yeah I called her up. She gave me a bunch of ...
about me not listening to her, or something.
I don't know, I wasn't really paying attention.
- the movie Dumb & Dumber (1994)
Marriage is a fine institution -
but I'm not ready for an institution yet.
- Mae West
It's not as great a day for the bride as she thinks.
She's not marrying the best man.
- Anonymous
In order to be happy with a man,
you must understand him a lot and love him a little.
To be happy with a woman, you must love her a lot
and not try to understand her at all.
- Helen Rowland
Do not marry a man to reform him.
That is what reform schools are for.
- Mae West
Never argue at the dinner table, for the one who is not hungry
always gets the best of the argument.
- Voltaire
Yield to temptation. It may not pass your way again.
- Robert A. Heinlein
I care not much for a man's religion
whose dog and cat are not the better for it.
- Abraham Lincoln
DON'T get officious.
You're not yourself when you're officious -
That is the curse of a government job.
- the movie Harold and Maude (1971)
I'm not a complete idiot, some parts are missing.
- Anonymous
Mr. President, I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed.
But I do say no more than ten to twenty million killed, tops.
Uh, depending on the breaks.
- the movie Dr. Strangelove
If at first you don't succeed,
skydiving is not for you.
- Anonymous
No man is truly married until he understands
every word his wife is NOT saying.
- Anonymous
It's not the men in your life that counts,
it's the life in your men.
- Mae West, in the movie I'm No Angel
When you fish for love, bait with your heart, not your brain.
- Mark Twain
The key is, to not think of death as an end,
but as more of a very effective way to cut down on your expenses.
- the movie Love and Death
Be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for.
- Will Rogers
Two things are infinite:
the universe and human stupidity;
and I'm not sure about the universe.
- Albert Einstein
Damn it boss, I like you too much not to say it.
You've got everything except one thing: madness!
- the movie Zorba The Greek
Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love.
- Albert Einstein
One does not leave a convivial party before closing time.
- Winston Churchill
The most important words in the English language
are not "I love you" but "It's benign."
- the Woody Allen movie Deconstructing Harry
I'm not used to feeling so human.
Is it always like this?
- Edward, from Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer
Women marry men hoping they will change.
Men marry women hoping they will not.
- Albert Einstein
I'm not talking about lust.
A woman in lust wants chocolate.
A woman in love wants diamonds.
- the movie How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days
Personally, I'm always ready to learn,
although I do not always like being taught.
- Winston Churchill
Delusion: belief said to be false by someone who does not share it.
- Thomas Szasz
Faith: not wanting to know what is true.
- Friedrich Nietzsche
I am always ready to learn
although I do not always like being taught.
- Winston Churchill
The objection to Puritans is not that
they try to make us think as they do,
but that they try to make us do as they think.
- H. L. Mencken
When I want to be bold about my movement ...
I for sure do not call it exercise!
- Mary Anne Radmacher
Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted.
- John Lennon
It's not very heroic to slay dragons.
Dragons are generally very peaceful and well behaved.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
The mind is not a vessel to be filled
but a fire to be kindled.
- Plutarch
The man who does not read good books
has no advantage over the man who cannot read them.
- Mark Twain
The existence of an anthropomorphic
"Father-figure" deity is not impossible,
merely exceptionally improbable and illogical.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Do not use a hatchet to remove
a fly from your friend's forehead.
- Chinese Proverb
Ever has it been that love knows not its own depth
until the hour of separation.
- Khalil Gibran
What sane person could live in this world and not be crazy?
- Ursula K. Le Guin
The person who says it cannot be done
should not interrupt the person who is doing it.
- Chinese proverb
I think that there is nothing, not even crime,
more opposed to poetry, to philosophy, ay, to life itself
than this incessant business.
- Henry David Thoreau
Genius may have its limitations,
but stupidity is not thus handicapped.
- Elbert Hubbard
The rich are not born skeptical or cynical.
They are made that way by events, circumstances.
- Paul Getty
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems,
but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
- Herm Albright
Too often the strong, silent man is silent only because
he does not know what to say, and is reputed strong
only because he has remained silent.
- Winston Churchill
Normal is not something to aspire to,
it's something to get away from.
- Jodie Foster
Adventure is not outside man; it is within.
- George Eliot
Only two things are infinite,
the universe and human stupidity,
and I'm not sure about the former.
- Albert Einstein
It is only the poor who pay cash,
and that not from virtue,
but because they are refused credit.
- Anatole France
The church is always trying to get other people to reform;
it might not be a bad idea to reform itself a little,
by way of example.
- Mark Twain
The faith that stands on authority is not faith.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
Politics is such a torment that I advise everyone
I love not to mix with it.
- Thomas Jefferson
Do not speak to me of rules.
This is war! This is not a game of cricket!
- from the movie The Bridge On The River Kwai
I once had a rose named after me
and I was very flattered.
But I was not pleased to read
the description in the catalogue:
no good in a bed, but fine up against a wall.
- Eleanor Roosevelt
If you can not answer a man's argument,
all is not lost; you can still call him vile names.
- Elbert Hubbard
A loyal friend laughs at your jokes
when they're not so good,
and sympathizes with your problems
when they're not so bad.
- Arnold H. Glasgow
The trouble with the world is not
that people know too little,
but that they know so many things that ain't so.
- Mark Twain
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us.
- Marianne Williamson
I am not afraid of storms
for I am learning how to sail my ship.
- Louisa May Alcott
We are finally driven to monogamy
not by morality but by exhaustion.
- Erica Jong
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May the world be kind to you,
and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
All materials & writings are copyright © Jonathan Lockwood Huie, except for quotes and other specifically identified material which belong to their respective copyright holders if applicable.