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 
Rank or add further suggestions…

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

Ranking system:

4 : Excellent - should definitely be used.
3 : Very Good - strong desire to see it used.
2 : Good - some desire to see it used.
1 : Acceptable - but with no particular desire to see it used.
0 : Not acceptable - not appropriate for use as a quote of the day.

Suggestions

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)

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.

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

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

  • 3 Kalki 17:17, 23 September 2009 (UTC) with a strong lean toward 4.
  • 3 Ningauble 23:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

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)

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

  • 3 Kalki 19:31, 23 September 2009 (UTC)
  • 2.5 Ningauble 23:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC) Nice and pithy, but not very original (and little heeded by youth)
  • 2 N6n 16:07, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

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)
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 ~
  • 3 ♞☤☮♌Kalki·†·⚓⊙☳☶⚡ 23:34, 23 September 2015 (UTC)


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