Motivational Quotes

Quotations

Great speeches have always had great soundbites. The problem now is that the young technicians who put together speeches are paying attention only to the soundbite, not to the text as a whole, not realizing that all great soundbites happen by accident, which is to say, all great soundbites are yielded up inevitably, as part of the natural expression of the text. They are part of the tapestry, they aren't a little flower somebody sewed on.

- Noonan, Peggy

Best Quotes about Quotations

A fine quotation is a diamond in the hand of a man of wit and a pebble in the hand of a fool.

Roux, Joseph

Misquotation is, in fact, the pride and privilege of the learned. A widely-read man never quotes accurately, for the rather obvious reason that he has read too widely.

Pearson, Hesketh

Now we sit through Shakespeare in order to recognize the quotations.

Orson Welles

Quotation, n: The act of repeating erroneously the words of another.

Ambrose Bierce

Some for renown, on scraps of learning dote, And think they grow immortal as they quote.

Edward Young

The next best thing to saying a good thing yourself, is to quote one.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

I quote others in order to better express myself.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

There are two kinds of marriages -- where the husband quotes the wife and where the wife quotes the husband.

Odets, Clifford

We rarely quote nowadays to appeal to authority... though we quote sometimes to display our sapience and erudition. Some authors we quote against. Some we quote not at all, offering them our scrupulous avoidance, and so make them part of our white mythology. Other authors we constantly invoke, chanting their names in cerebral rituals of propitiation or ancestor worship.

Hassan, Ihab

10.

Misquotation is, in fact, the pride and privilege of the learned. A widely- read man never quotes accurately, for the rather obvious reason that he has read too widely.

Hesketh Pearson

11.

In quoting of books, quote such authors as are usually read; others you may read for your own satisfaction, but not name them.

Selden, John

12.

The wisdom of the wise and the experience of the ages is preserved into perpetuity by a nation's proverbs, fables, folk sayings and quotations.

William Feather

13.

He wrapped himself in quotations -- as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.

Kipling, Rudyard

14.

An epigram often flashes light into regions where reason shines but dimly.

Edwin P. Whipple

15.

I think we must quote whenever we feel that the allusion is interesting or helpful or amusing.

Fadiman, Clifton

16.

A short saying oft contains much wisdom.

Sophocles

17.

I never have found the perfect quote. At best I have been able to find a string of quotations which merely circle the ineffable idea I seek to express.

Caldwell O'Keefe

18.

In the dying world I come from quotation is a national vice. It used to be the classics, now it's lyric verse.

Waugh, Evelyn

19.

Quotation... A writer expresses himself in words that have been used before because they give his meaning better than he can give it himself, or because they are beautiful or witty, or because he expects them to touch a cord of association in his reader, or because he wishes to show that he is learned and well read. Quotations due to the last motive are invariably ill-advised; the discerning reader detects it and is contemptuous; the undiscerning is perhaps impressed, but even then is at the same time repelled, pretentious quotations being the surest road to tedium.

Fowler, Henry W.

20.

Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.

Oscar Wilde

21.

I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.

Seneca

22.

Classical quotation is the parole of literary men all over the world.

Samuel Johnson

23.

He presents me with what is always an acceptable gift who brings me news of a great thought before unknown. He enriches me without impoverishing himself.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

24.

Write a wise saying and your name will live forever.

25.

I not only use all the brains I have but all I can borrow.

Wilson, Woodrow T.

26.

When one begins to live by habit and by quotation, one has begun to stop living.

Baldwin, James

27.

Have you ever observed that we pay much more attention to a wise passage when it is quoted than when we read it in the original author?

Philip G. Hamerton

28.

To be amused by what you read--that is the great spring of happy quotations.

C. E. Montague

29.

Next to the originator of a good sentence is the first quoter of it.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

30.

Quotes from Mao, Castro, and Che Guevara... are as germane to our highly technological, computerized society as a stagecoach on a jet runway at Kennedy airport.

Alinsky, Saul

31.

When a thing has been said and well, have no scruple. Take it and copy it.

Anatole France

32.

The essence of a quote is the compression of a mass of thought and observation into a single saying.

Morely, John

33.

I love quotations because it is a joy to find thoughts one might have, beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognized wiser than oneself.

Marlene Dietrich

34.

What's the use of a good quotation if you can't change it?

Doctor Who

35.

Misquotations are the only quotations that are never misquoted.

Hesketh Pearson

36.

He wrapped himself in quotations- as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.

Rudyard Kipling

37.

People will accept your ideas much more readily if you tell them Benjamin Franklin said it first.

David H. Comins

38.

I might repeat to myself slowly and soothingly, a list of quotations beautiful from minds profound - if I can remember any of the damn things.

Dorothy Parker

39.

Stronger than an army is a quotation whose time has come.

Gates, W. I. E.

40.

The American people would not want to know of any misquotes that Dan Quayle may or may not make.

Dan Quayle

41.

Fidelity to the subject's thought and to his characteristic way of expressing himself is the sine qua non of journalistic quotation.

Malcolm, Janet

42.

I am reminded of the professor who, in his declining hours, was asked by his devoted pupils for his final counsel. He replied,'Verify your quotations.'

Sir Winston Churchill

43.

Quotations offer one kind of break in what the eye can see, the ear can hear.

Hassan, Ihab

44.

A book of quotations . . . can never be complete.

Robert M. Hamilton

45.

What is an epigram? A dwarfish whole, its body brevity, and wit its soul.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

46.

A quotation, like a pun, should come unsought, and then be welcomed only for some propriety of felicity justifying the intrusion.

Robert Chapman

47.

If you have any doubts that we live in a society controlled by men, try reading down the index of contributors to a volume of quotations, looking for women's names.

Elaine Gill

48.

Everything of importance has been said before by somebody who did not discover it.

Alfred North Whitehead

49.

Our best thoughts come from others.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

50.

I didn't really say everything I said.

Yogi Berra