J. R. R. Tolkien Quotes

Without the high and noble the simple and vulgar is utterly mean; and without the simple and ordinary the noble and heroic is meaningless.

Quotes to Explore
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A hero cannot be a hero unless in a heroic world.
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It is the vice of a vulgar mind to be thrilled by bigness.
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Arguments are to be avoided: they are always vulgar and often convincing.
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Major religions are examples of 'noble lies' aimed at uplifting human stature.
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Getting a record deal is a meaningless thing now.
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In judging of a beautiful statue, the aesthetic faculty is absolutely and completely gratified by the splendid curves of those marble lips that are dumb to our complaint, the noble modelling of those limbs that are powerless to help us.
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Have all the hopes of ages come to naught? Is life no more with noble meaning fraught?
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The art schools... you get young kids doing the most vile and meaningless crap. I think they believe every bit of it.
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Do nothing because it is righteous or praiseworthy or noble to do so; do nothing because it seems good to do so; do only that which you must do and which you cannot do in any other way.
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The study of law is sublime, and its practice vulgar.
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The heroic hours of life do not announce their presence by drum and trumpet.
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Without a soundtrack, human interaction is meaningless.
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We could say that compassion is the ultimate attitude of wealth: an anti-poverty attitude, a war on want. It contains all sorts of heroic, juicy, positive, visionary, expansive qualities. And it implies larger scale thinking, a freer and more expansive way of relating to yourself and the world.
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I count this thing to be grandly true: That a noble deed is a step toward God.
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The task of history is to hold out for reprobation every evil word and deed, and to hold out for praise every great and noble word and deed.
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Ambition is the way in which a vulgar man aspires.
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Medicine is of all the Arts the most noble; but, owing to the ignorance of those who practice it, and of those who, inconsiderately, form a judgment of them, it is at present behind all the arts.
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Friends are an aid to the young, to guard them from error; to the elderly, to attend to their wants and to supplement their failing power of action; to those in the prime of life, to assist them to noble deeds.
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Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks; methinks I see her as an eagle mewing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full midday beam.
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Saying that all documentaries are the same is like saying all foreign films are the same.
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There is a strange interdependence between thoughtlessness and evil.
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When I do a workshop, there is always at least one author who comes up afterward and asks if I'll take a look at his or her book and consider blurbing it. For some reason, I can turn someone down in e-mail, but when he or she is looking me in the eye, I cave.
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Without the high and noble the simple and vulgar is utterly mean; and without the simple and ordinary the noble and heroic is meaningless.