The willow which bends to the tempest,
often escapes better than the oak which resists it;
and so in great calamities,
it sometimes happens that light and frivolous spirits
recover their elasticity and presence of mind sooner
than those of a loftier character.
- Albert Schweitzer
Today's acorns grow into the oak trees of thirty years hence.
But what acorns are we sowing today?
Imagine what an acorn-sized bit of prejudice or hatred would grow into.
Imagine what an acorn-sized bit of pollution can become.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Our ordinary mind always tries to persuade us
that we are nothing but acorns
and that our greatest happiness will be
to become bigger, fatter, shinier acorns;
but that is of interest only to pigs.
Our faith gives us knowledge of something better:
that we can become oak trees.
- E. F. Schumacher
Little strokes,
Fell great oaks.
- Benjamin Franklin
Great oaks from little acorns grow.
- Proverb
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
Twinkle, twinkle little bat
How I wonder what you're at!
Up above the world you fly,
Like a tea-tray in the sky.
- Lewis Carroll
All you need is love.
But a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt.
- Charles M. Schulz
If it's true that our species is alone in the universe,
then I'd have to say that the universe
aimed rather low and settled for very little.
- George Carlin
The seaweed is always greener in somebody else's lake.
- the movie The Little Mermaid (1989)
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
If you can't annoy somebody with what you write,
I think there's little point in writing.
- Kingsley Amis
There is only one thing about which I am certain,
and that is that there is very little
about which one can be certain.
- W. Somerset Maugham
Well excuse me - we've got something
a little unusual going on here -
time travel, parallel universes,
or just a little common ordinary insanity.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Clothes make the man.
Naked people have little or no influence on society.
- Mark Twain
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
Magic is natural to Wizards,
and only a little harder for the rest of us.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
A little girl at the wedding afterwards asked her mother
why the bride changed her mind.
What do you mean? responded her mother.
Well, she went down the aisle with one man,
and came back with another.
- Anonymous
Mother is the name for God
in the lips and hearts of little children.
- William Makepeace Thackeray
"Just living is not enough," said the butterfly,
"one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flower."
- Hans Christian Andersen
There is no pleasure in having nothing to do;
the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it.
- Mary Wilson Little
Sometimes I wonder if we shall ever grow up
in our politics and say definite things which mean something,
or whether we shall always go on using generalities
to which everyone can subscribe, and which mean very little.
- Eleanor Roosevelt
I never accepted the idea
that I had to be guided by
some pattern or blueprint.
- Little Richard
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge:
it is those who know little, and not those who know much,
who so positively assert that this or that problem
will never be solved by science.
- Charles Darwin
Genuine heroes - no batteries needed -
bring lots of open-mind and at least a little courage.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Unlike grown-ups, children have little need to deceive themselves.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Most truths are so naked
that people feel sorry for them
and cover them up,
at least a little bit.
- Edward R. Murrow
Man knows so much and does so little.
- R. Buckminster Fuller
Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back
and realize they were the big things.
- Robert Brault
Sometimes, indeed, there is such a discrepancy
between the genius and his human qualities
that one has to ask oneself whether
a little less talent might not have been better.
- Carl Jung
Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace.
The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things;
knows not the livid loneliness of fear.
- Amelia Earhart
'Tis the business of little minds to shrink,
but they whose heart is firm,
and whose conscience approves their conduct,
will pursue their principles unto death.
- Thomas Paine
Pity may represent little more
than the impersonal concern
which prompts the mailing of a check,
but true sympathy is the personal concern
which demands the giving of one's soul.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize
how little we understand about life,
ourselves, and the world around us.
- Socrates
THE fog comes
on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.
- Carl Sandburg
When was the last time you took
a different route to work ... just because?
Consider shaking up your life a little (or a lot) ...
for no reason, except to do it.
Let your life be an adventure.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
And just dance a little.
- Mary Anne Radmacher
Nothing is enough for the man to whom enough is too little.
- Epicurus
Alone we can do so little;
together we can do so much.
- Helen Keller
We never repent of having eaten too little.
- Thomas Jefferson
A little Consideration, a little Thought for Others, makes all the difference.
- A. A. Milne (Winnie-The-Pooh)
The wise man looks into space,
and does not regard the small as too little,
nor the great as too much;
for he knows that there is no limit to dimensions.
- Lao Tzu
Practice yourself, for heaven's sake in little things,
and then proceed to greater.
- Epictetus
A little simplification would be
the first step toward rational living.
- Eleanor Roosevelt
Little do men perceive what solitude is,
and how far it extendeth.
For a crowd is not company,
and faces are but a gallery of pictures,
and talk but a tinkling cymbal,
where there is no love.
- Francis Bacon
A little neglect may breed great mischief.
- Benjamin Franklin
You give but little when you give of your possessions.
It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.
- Khalil Gibran
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,
adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.
With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. -
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
You should never be content with so little,
when you can reach out for something big.
- Charles L. Allen
(This quote is about making a big difference
in the world - not about greed)
He who knows best knows how little he knows.
- Thomas Jefferson
He who knows only his own side of the case, knows little of that.
- John Stuart Mill, On Liberty (1859)
The effort to understand the universe is one
of the very few things that lifts human life
a little above the level of farce,
and gives it some of the grace of tragedy.
- Steven Weinberg
The choice is to work alone to be a little
more successful than the next person,
or to work together for the great betterment of humanity.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Life is lived in the mists -
little is fully visible, less is certain.
Yet rejoice in the unknowing,
and let all of life be a wonderful adventure.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
He who obtains has little.
He who scatters has much.
- Lao Tzu
Don't let a little dispute injure a great relationship.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama
It is of the small joys and little pleasures
that the greatest of our days are built.
- Mary Anne Radmacher
My definition of success is to live your life in a way
that causes you to feel a ton of pleasure and very little pain -
and because of your lifestyle, have the people around you feel
a lot more pleasure than they do pain.
- Tony Robbins
I have a dream that my four little children will one day
live in a nation where they will
not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
I will dance a little.
I will move with the wind.
- Mary Anne Radmacher
Have compassion for all beings, rich and poor alike.
Each has their suffering.
Some suffer too much, others too little.
- The Buddha
Two little words that can make the difference: START NOW.
- Mary C. Crowley
A great man is always willing to be little.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
If we all worked on the assumption that what is accepted as true
were really true, there would be little hope of advance.
- Orville Wright
Campaign behavior for wives:
Always be on time.
Do as little talking as humanly possible.
Lean back in the parade car
so everybody can see the president.
- Eleanor Roosevelt
Let the refining and improving of your own life
keep you so busy that you have little time to criticize others.
- H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
Patience, persistence, and perseverance.
A little more each day, a little better each day.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
The essence of philosophy is that a man should so live
that his happiness shall depend
as little as possible on external things.
- Epictetus
It is not the man who has too little,
but the man who craves more, that is poor.
- Lucius Annaeus Seneca
If i had known... i would have lingered
over my coffee a little longer.
- Mary Anne Radmacher
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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.