William James Quotes

As Charles Lamb says, there is nothing so nice as doing good by stealth and being found out by accident, so I now say it is even nicer to make heroic decisions and to be prevented by 'circumstances beyond your control' from ever trying to execute them.

William James

• Trying
• Nice
• Decision
• Heroic

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Quotes to Explore

• My first 'Tonight Show' was just one of those things - I mean this seriously - a cosmic, meant-to-be coming together of circumstance. You walk out there to do your first 'Tonight Show': Is the audience going to be hot? Are you going to be on fire? It's like an athlete: Are you going to have your moves at a peak?

  

  Garry Shandling
  • Together
  • Fire
  • Athlete

• When I first started writing songs, I never intended on singing. I didn't really consider myself a singer at all. I was just kind of recording the demo vocals as a holding place until someone else came and sang.

  

  Washed Out
  • Writing
  • Myself
  • Singing

• I felt audiences are happier to take comedy people who play darker people because there's a link between the psychosis of comedy and the psychosis of being a twisted character.

  

  Eddie Izzard
  • People
  • Character
  • Comedy

• A newspaperman said, 'You have to have a team in New York.' I replied, 'Who says you have to have a team in New York?' What came out in the papers was a headline that said, Giles Says, 'Who needs New York?' I confess that quote bothered me, and there seemed to be no way to dispose of it. It was repeated again and again.

  

  Warren Giles
  • New York
  • Papers
  • Headline

• Definitely, I think I'm a life coach for real. The lessons I give are lessons you can take to the bank.

  

  Flavor Flav
  • Life
  • Real
  • Think

• It's still going on. I guess it will be until Redmond quits, dies or is jailed.

  

  Farrah Fawcett
  • Will
  • Going
  • Guess

• It's always cool to go to different places and see what's really out there in the world.

  

  Patrick Kane
  • World
  • Different
  • Cool

• My parents live out in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of this peach orchard. It's actually Peach County, one of the largest peach-growing counties in Georgia. It's very rural, and there is nothing much going on, so I guess that's had a big influence on everything as far as just not having much to do.

  

  Washed Out
  • Live
  • Parents
  • Growing

• Futurists don't consider overpopulation one of the issues of the future. They consider it the issue of the future.

  

  Dan Brown
  • Future
  • Overpopulation

• There's an unintended consequence when it comes to drone attacks in Yemen. Yeah, you take out the al-Qaida stronghold, but you also wipe out the other half of the block. That makes Yemenis against the United States for the rest of their lives and all their descendants.

  

  Gary Johnson
  • You
  • Rest
  • United States

• All the definitions people want to put on you in terms of what kind of writer you are come with hidden meanings. If you're writing science fiction, you're writing rocket ships. If you write dystopian fiction, it's inequity where The Man must be fought.

  

  Paolo Bacigalupi
  • People
  • Writing
  • Man

• There are people who are very resourceful, at being remorseful, and who apparently feel that the best way to make friends is to do something terrible and then make amends.

  

  Ogden Nash
  • People
  • Friends
  • Best

• We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of 'separate but equal' has no place.

  

  Earl Warren
  • Education
  • Place
  • Equal

• I'm thrilled to be joining Gap Inc., a company that understands the importance of integrating technology and retail in ways that improve the lives of its customers.

  

  Padmasree Warrior
  • Technology
  • Company
  • Retail

• You count a man's U.S. Amateur titles after he starts winning professional majors. That's something any intelligent golf writer with a sense of history is supposed to know.

  

  Dan Jenkins
  • History
  • Man
  • Winning

• To hear of a thousand deaths in war is terrible, and we 'know' that it is. But as it registers on our hearts, it is not more terrible than one death fully imagined.

  

  Wendell Berry
  • War
  • Death
  • Know

• To a mind like mine, restless, inquisitive, and observant of everything that was passing, it is easy to suppose that religion was the subject to which it would be directed; and, although this subject principally occupied my thoughts, there was nothing that I saw or heard of to which my attention was not directed.

  

  Nat Turner
  • Mind
  • Attention
  • Religion

• Reggie Jackson hit one off me that's still burrowing its way to Los Angeles.

  

  Dan Quisenberry
  • Way
  • Hit
  • Los Angeles

• Good courage in a bad affair is half of the evil overcome.

  

  Plautus
  • Good
  • Bad
  • Evil

• I must take issue with the term 'a mere child', for it has been my invariable experience that the company of a mere child is infinitely preferable to that of a mere adult.

  

  Fran Lebowitz
  • Experience
  • Child
  • Company

• I have a past of making a fool of myself.

  

  Jed S. Rakoff
  • Past
  • Fool

• Far from being a sum of distinct and partial results, victory is the consequence of efforts, some of which are victorious while others appear to be fruitless, which nevertheless all aim at a common goal, all drive at a common result: namely, at a decision, a conclusion which alone can provide victory.

  

  Ferdinand Foch
  • Alone
  • Decision
  • Victory

• How readily we wish time spent revoked, that we might try the ground again where once--through inexperience, as we now perceive--we missed that happiness we might have found!

  

  William Cowper
  • Trying
  • Past
  • Wish

• As Charles Lamb says, there is nothing so nice as doing good by stealth and being found out by accident, so I now say it is even nicer to make heroic decisions and to be prevented by 'circumstances beyond your control' from ever trying to execute them.

  

  William James
  • Trying
  • Nice
  • Decision