If you have had no tension in your life, never been screwed up by problems, your mortality well within your own grasp, and someone tells you that God so loved you that He gave His Son to die for you, nothing but good manners will keep you from being amused.

~ Oswald Chambers, Daily Thoughts, Nov. 10th

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The opposite of joy is not sorrow. It is unbelief. ~ Leslie Weatherhead
Picture me with my ground teeth stalking joy--fully armed too, as it's a highly dangerous quest. ~ Flannery O'Connor

Don't express your ideas too clearly. Most people think little of what they understand, and venerate what they do not.~Baltasar Gracian (1601-1658), The Art of Worldly Wisdom[1647]

I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.~Oscar Wilde

That must be wonderful; I have no idea of what it means.~Moliere

* * *
Since we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our minds, our one duty is to furnish it well~Peter Ustinov

It's all right letting yourself go as long as you can let yourself back.
~ Mick Jagger

***
Things ain't what they used to be and probably never was. ~ Will Rogers

Every woman should marry--and no man.~Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881), Lothair [1870], Chapter 30

Sister Sara: (Shirley MacLaine)
Don't you want a woman of your own?

Hogan: (Clint Eastwood)
What for?

Sister Sara:
To share your name, bear your children, be a companion.

Hogan:
To ask me to quit drinking, quit gambling and save
my money, and to bitch about her aches and pains
all day? No thanks!

Sister Sara:
It must be a lonely life.

Hogan:
It's a great life. Women when I want 'em and none
with the name of Hogan.

~Dialogue from film Two Mules For Sister Sara [1970]; written by Budd Boetticher; screenplay by Albert Maltz

* * *
Since we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our minds, our one duty is to furnish it well~Peter Ustinov

One of my most often repeated quips was the one I made when former Presidents Carter, Ford and Nixon stood by each other at a White House event. 'There they are,' I said. 'See no evil, hear no evil, and . . . evil.'
~ Bob Dole, Laughing (Almost) All the Way to the White House

***
Things ain't what they used to be and probably never was. ~ Will Rogers

What a chimera then is man. What a novelty! What a monster, what a chaos, what a contradiction, what a prodigy. Judge of all things, imbecile worm of the earth; depositary of truth, a sink of uncertainty and error: the pride and refuse of the universe.
~Blaise Pascal, Pensées 131

***
He wrapped himself in quotations—as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.
—Rudyard Kipling

In England and America, a beard usually means that its owner would rather be considered venerable than virile; on the continent of Europe, it often means that its owner makes a special claim to virility.~Rebecca West (1892-1983), The Thinking Reed [1936], Chapter 10

* * *
Since we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our minds, our one duty is to furnish it well~Peter Ustinov

Man is a strange animal, he doesn't like to read the handwriting on the wall until his back is up against it.
~ Adlai Stevenson

***
Things ain't what they used to be and probably never was. ~ Will Rogers

Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best; it removes all that is base.~George S. Patton, Jr. (1885-1945)

There's only one proper way for a professional soldier to die. That's from the last bullet, of the last battle, of the last war.~Ibid.

A pint of sweat will save a gallon of blood.~Ibid.

* * *
Since we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our minds, our one duty is to furnish it well~Peter Ustinov

There's nothing sadder in this world than to awake Christmas morning and not be a child.
~ Erma Bombeck

I once bought my kids a set of batteries for Christmas with a note on it saying, toys not included.
~ Bernard Manning

The Supreme Court has ruled that they cannot have a nativity scene in Washington, D.C. This wasn't for any religious reasons. They couldn't find three wise men and a virgin.
~ Jay Leno

***
Things ain't what they used to be and probably never was. ~ Will Rogers

This is the irrational season
Where love blooms bright and wild.
Had Mary been filled with reason
There'd have been no room for the child.
~Madeline L'Engle (1918-2007), from Weather of the Heart [2001]

Calvin: Well. I've decided I do believe in Santa Claus, no matter how preposterous he sounds.
Hobbes: What convinced you?
Calvin: A simple risk analysis. I want presents. Lots of presents. Why risk not getting them over a matter of belief? Heck, I'll believe anything they want.
Hobbes: How cynically enterprising of you.
Calvin: It's the spirit of Christmas.
~"Calvin and Hobbes" strip by Bill Watterson

* * *
Since we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our minds, our one duty is to furnish it well~Peter Ustinov

Christmas is the keeping-place for memories of our innocence.
~ Joan Mills

It was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us!
~Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

***
He wrapped himself in quotations—as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.
—Rudyard Kipling

I heard the bells on Christmas Day. Their old familiar carols play. And wild and sweet the words repeat. Of peace on earth goodwill to men.
~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

***
Things ain't what they used to be and probably never was. ~ Will Rogers

Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination.~Oscar Wilde

The first Noel
The angels did say
You'll be paying your bills
From now until May
~MAD magazine

* * *
Since we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our minds, our one duty is to furnish it well~Peter Ustinov

Your parents put a curse on you - Someday your kids are going to act just like you.
~ Bill Cosby

***
Things ain't what they used to be and probably never was. ~ Will Rogers

We do not need to proselytise either by our speech or by our writing. We can only do so really with our lives.
~Gandhi

***
He wrapped himself in quotations—as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.
—Rudyard Kipling

If at first you don't succeed, failure may be your style.~Quentin Crisp (1908-1999)

* * *
Since we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our minds, our one duty is to furnish it well~Peter Ustinov

Here, in this little Bay,
Full of tumultuous life and great repose,
Where, twice a day,
The purposeless, glad ocean comes and goes,
Under high cliffs, and far from the huge town,
I sit me down.
~Coventry Patmore, The Unknown Eros

***
He wrapped himself in quotations—as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.
—Rudyard Kipling

Habit is habit and not to be flung out of the window by any man, but coaxed downstairs a step at a time.
~ Mark Twain

***
Things ain't what they used to be and probably never was. ~ Will Rogers

No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear.~Edmund Burke 1729 - 1797, A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (1756)

* * *
Since we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our minds, our one duty is to furnish it well~Peter Ustinov