Cool Quotes

They who best deserve to escape the snares of artifice, are most likely to be entangled.

Nakedness

No beauty she doth miss
When all her robes are on:
But beauty's self she is
When all her robes are gone.

Beauty when most unclothed is clothed best.

Name

What’s in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.

I hate the man who builds his name
On ruins of another’s fame.

He that hath an ill name is half hanged.

He is a fool and ever shall, that writes his name upon a wall.

It is a heavy burden to bear a name that is too famous.

I am the last of my race. My name ends with me.

Men are the constant dupes of names, while their happiness and well-being mainly depend on things.

I would rather make my name than inherit it.

Nap

The rest and the spell of sleep in the middle of the day refresh the human frame far more than a long night.

Naples

The inhabitants of Naples have been always very notorious for leading a life of laziness and pleasure, which arises partly out of the plenty of their country, and partly out of the temper of their climate.

Napoleon

I used to say of him [Napoleon] that his presence on the field made the difference of forty thousand men.

Napoleon was, I will not say made, but permitted, for a cat-o'nine-tails to inflict ten thousand lashes upon the back of Europe as divine vengeance for the atheism, infidelity, fornications, adulteries, incests, sodomies, as well as briberies, robberies, murders, thefts, intrigues, and fradulent speculations of her inhabitants.

Bonaparte was a lion in the field only. In civil life, a cold-blooded, calculating, unprincipled usurper, without a virtue; no statesman, knowing nothing of commerce, political economy, or civil government, and supplying ignorance by bold presumption.

Had I succeeded, I should have died with the reputation of the greatest man that ever existed. As it is, although I have failed, I shall be considered as an extraordinary man. I have fought fifty pitched battles, almost all of which I have gained. I have framed and carried into effect a code of laws that will bear my name to the most distant posterity.

Napoleon was, of all the men in the world, the one who most profoundly despised the race. He had a marvelous insight into the weaker sides of human nature.

Narcissism

The common employments or pleasures of life, love or opposition, loss or gain, keep almost every mind in perpetual agitation. If any man would consider how little he dwells upon the condition of others, he would learn how little the attention of others is attracted by himself.

Nation

Nations, like men, have their infancy.

Nations are changed by time; they flourish and decay; by turns command and obey.

Satiate with power, of fame and wealth possess'd,
A nation grows too glorious to be blest;
Conspicuous made, she stands the mark of all,
And foes join foes to triumph in her fall.

No nation can last which has made a mob of itself, however generous at heart.

There is no nation on earth so dangerous as a nation fully armed, and bankrupt at home.

The nations which have put mankind and posterity most in their debt have been small states—Israel, Athens, Florence, Elizabethan England.

Be assured, my young friend, that there is a great deal of ruin in a nation.

The great nations have always acted like gangsters, and the small nations like prostitutes.

National Character

A Frenchman drinks his native wine,
A German drinks his beer;
An Englishman his 'alf and 'alf,
Because it brings good cheer.
The Scotchman drinks his whiskey straight
Because it brings on dizziness;
An American has no choice at all—
He drinks the whole damn business.

An Englishman thinks it a deadly insult if you say he is no gentleman, or, still worse, a liar; a Frenchman if you call him a coward; a German if you say he is stupid.

National Pride

The cheapest sort of pride is national pride; for if a man is proud of his own nation, it argues that he has no qualities of his own of which he can be proud; otherwise, he would not have recourse to those which he shares with so many millions of his fellow-men.

Nationality

Why do people speak of great men in terms of nationality? Great Germans, great English-men? Goethe always protested against being called a German poet. Great men are simply men.

Natural

Nothing prevents us being natural so much as the desire to appear so. (Rien n'empêche tant d'être naturel que l'envie de le paraître.)

Natural Law

Nature in man's heart her laws doth pen.

The laws of nature, as justice, equity, modesty, mercy, and, in sum, doing to others as we would be done to, of themselves, without the terror of some power to cause them to be observed, are contrary to our natural passions, that carry us to partiality, pride, revenge, and the like.

Natural Selection

Nature has made up her mind that what cannot defend itself shall not be defended.

Naturalization

Only those who will be loyal to our institutions, who are here in conformity with our laws, and who are in sympathy with our national traditions, ideals, and principles should be naturalized.

Nature

A vacuum is a hell of a lot better than some of the stuff that nature replaces it with.

Is dishwater dull? Naturalists with microscopes have told me that it teems with quiet fun.

In nature there are neither rewards nor punishments—there are consequences.

In such condition [Nature with every man against every man], there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain; and consequently … no arts, no letters, no society, and which is worst of all, continual fear and danger of violent death, and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

But the works of man are impotent against the assaults of nature.

The law of nature instructs most animals to cherish and educate their infant progeny. The law of reason inculcates to the human species the returns of filial piety.

I am at two with nature.

Charlie Allnut: A man takes a drop too much once in a while, it's only human nature.
Rose Sayer: Nature, Mr. Allnut, is what we are put in this world to rise above.

Let us give Nature a chance; she knows her business better than we do.

Accuse not Nature, she hath done her part;
Do thou but thine.

Nature does not proceed by leaps. (Natura non facit saltus.)

Nature never deceives us; it is always we who deceive ourselves.

All things are artificial, for nature is the art of God.

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep sea, and music in its roar:
I love not man the less, but nature more.

What a book a devil's chaplain might write on the clumsy, wasteful, blundering, low, and horridly cruel works of nature!

Any person who has spent time outdoors actually doing something, such as hunting and fishing as opposed to standing there with a doobie in his mouth, knows nature is not intrinsically healthy.

Nature, red in tooth and claw.

Nature without education has oftener raised man to glory and virtue than education without natural abilities.

Those things are better which are perfected by nature than those which are finished by art.

It is difficult to change nature. (Naturam mutare difficile est.)

It is hard to make out whether [nature] is a kind parent or a harsh stepmother to man.

Let us permit nature to have her way: she understands her business better than we do.

Chase nature away, and it returns at a gallop.

Wolves may lose their teeth, but not their nature.

The nearer we get to any natural object the more incomprehensible it becomes. A grain of sand is undoubtedly not what I take it to be.

Nature, which is the time-vesture of God and reveals Him to the wise, hides Him from the foolish.

There are no fixtures in nature. The universe is fluid and volatile.

Nature is no spendthrift, but takes the shortest way to her ends.

Nature is a hanging judge.

Human subtlety … will never devise an invention more beautiful, more simple or more direct than does Nature, because in her inventions nothing is lacking, and nothing is superfluous.

There is no object to life. To nature nothing matters but the continuation of the species.

Be not blind, but open-eyed, to the great wonders of Nature, familiar, everyday objects though they be to thee. But men are more wont to be astonished at the sun's eclipse than at his unfailing rise.

Nature abhors a vacuum.

Nature vs Nurture

Nature is stronger than rearing.

Navy

Naval tradition? Monstrous. Nothing but rum, sodomy, prayers, and the lash.

Stick close to your desks and never go to sea,
And you all may be Rulers of the Queen's Navee!

There were gentlemen and there were seamen in the navy of Charles II. But the seamen were not gentlemen; and the gentlemen were not seamen.

Ne'er-do-well

My dear firstborn is the greatest ass, and the greatest liar, and the greatest canaille, and the greatest beast in the whole world, and I heartily wish he was out of it.

Neapolitan

The Neapolitan will embrace you with one and rip your guts with the other.

Necessary

The graveyards are full of indispensable men.

There is no such thing as a necessary man.

Very few of us are irreplaceable in our professional lives, but all of us are irreplaceable to those who love us.

Make yourself necessary to someone.

Necessity

[Yet] the true creator is necessity, who is the mother of our invention. [Often quoted as "necessity is the mother of invention"].

Necessity hath no law. Feigned necessities, imaginary necessities … are the greatest cozenage that men can put upon the Providence of God, and make pretences to break known rules by.

Necessity makes an honest man a knave.

Nothing have I found stronger than Necessity.

Necessity never made a good bargain.

This quest may be attempted by the weak with as much hope as the strong. Yet such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere.

Necessity is the constant scourge of the lower orders; ennui that of the higher classes.

Necessity is the mother of courage, as of invention.

We are more ready to strive and work for superfluities than for necessities.

Neck

Would that the Roman people had but one neck! (Utinam populus Romanus unam cervicem haberet!)

When we say a woman has a handsome neck we reckon into it many of the adjacent parts.

Need

A friend in need is a friend indeed.

Think twice before you speak to a friend in need.

Neglect

Perpetual devotion to what a man calls his business, is only to be sustained by perpetual neglect of many other things.

Negligence

A little neglect may breed great mischief … for the want of a nail the shoe was lost; for the want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for the want of a horse the rider was lost.

Nothing is easy to the negligent.

Gross negligence is equivalent to intentional wrong. (Culpa lata dolo aequiparatur.)

Negro

Black men are pearls in beauteous ladies' eyes.

All I ask for the Negro is that if you do not like him, let him alone. If God gave him but little, that little let him enjoy.

Neighbor

Have you told them it bothers you? … Are they bigger than you? … Are you afraid of getting your ass kicked? … Ah, okay, I probably should have asked that question first, woulda saved time. Yeah, you're just gonna have to deal with the noise [from the neighbor], son.

The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because they are generally the same people.

Lock your door and keep your neighbors honest.

I do not love my neighbor as myself, and apologize to no one. I treat my neighbor as fairly and politely as I hope to be treated, but there is no law in nature or common sense ordering me to go beyond that.

It is discouraging to try to be a good neighbor in a bad neighborhood.

A good neighbor doubles the value of a house.

Ask about the neighbors before you buy the house.

Nervousness

If you’re not nervous, you’re not paying attention.

Nest

It's an ill bird that fouls its own nest.

Neutrality

God will have all, or none; serve Him, or fall
Down before Baal, Bel, or Belial:
Either be hot, or cold: God doth despise,
Abhor, and spew out all neutralities.

Neutrals never dominate events. They always sink. Blood alone moves the wheels of history.

Never

Never is a long time.

New

There is nothing new save that which has been forgotten.

New England

I saw but one drunken man through all New England, and he was very respectable.

New Orleans

Many of the cemeteries are beautiful, and are kept in perfect order. When one goes from the levee or the business streets [of New Orleans] to it, to a cemetery, he observes to himself that if those people down there would live as neatly while they are alive as they do after they are dead, they would find many advantages in it; and besides, their quarter would be the wonder and admiration of the business world.

There is no architecture in New Orleans, except in the cemeteries.

New York

A car is useless in New York, essential everywhere else. The same with good manners.

New York, like London, seems to be a cloacina [sewer] of all the depravities of human nature.

New and Old

Men are better when they are old; things when they are new.

News

I tell people that if it's in the news, don't worry about it. The very definition of "news" is "something that hardly ever happens." It's when something isn't in the news, when it's so common that it's no longer news—car crashes, domestic violence—that you should start worrying.

It is better to be making the news than taking it; to be an actor rather than a critic.

Ill news hath wings, and with the wind doth go,
Comfort's a cripple and comes ever slow.

The idea of a news broadcast once was to find someone with information and broadcast it. The idea now is to find someone with ignorance and spread it around.

Evil news fly faster than good.

No news is good news.

I predict that news outlets will try to compensate for the loss of relevant news by focusing on stories that are more shocking and depressing than ever. At least that way they'll get your attention and sell advertising even if the stories aren't "news" in the traditional sense.

The nature of bad news infects the teller.

Newspaper

I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it.

If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed. If you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed.

I read the newspapers avidly. It is my one form of continuous fiction.

Every newspaper, from the first line to the last, is nothing but a tissue of horrors. Wars, crimes, thefts, lecheries, tortures, the evil deeds of princes, of nations, of private individuals; an orgy of universal atrocity. And it is with this loathsome appetizer that civilized man daily washes down his morning repast.

As to [General Douglas] Macarthur, I don't feel in a position to have clear opinions about anyone I know only from newspapers. You see, whenever they deal with anyone (or anything) I know myself, I find they're always a mass of lies & misunderstandings: so I conclude they're no better in the places where I don't know.

Every newspaper editor pays tribute to the Devil.

A newspaper consists of just the same number of words, whether there be any news in it or not.

The printers can never leave us in a state of perfect rest and union of opinion. They would be no longer useful and would have to go to the plow.

The man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them, inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.

Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper.

If a man makes money by publishing a newspaper, by poisoning the wells of information, by feeding the people a daily spiritual death, he is the greatest criminal I can conceive.

Newspapers are read at the breakfast and dinner tables. God's great gift to man is appetite. Put nothing in the paper that will destroy it.

The newspaper is of necessity something of a monopoly, and its first duty is to shun the temptations of monopoly. Its primary office is the gathering of news. At the peril of its soul it must see that the supply is not tainted. Neither in what it gives, nor in what it does not give, nor in the mode of presentation, must the unclouded face of truth suffer wrong. Comment is free but facts are sacred.

The probabilities are all against what one reads in the newspapers. If it is a subject you happen to know something about yourself you always find the papers are wrong.

The function of a newspaper is to make the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier.

The secret of a successful newspaper is to take one story each day and bang the hell out of it.

Niagara

You can descend a staircase a hundred and fifty feet down, and stand at the edge of the water. After you have done it you will wonder why you did it; but you will then be too late.

When I first saw the falls I was disappointed in the outline. Every American bride is taken there, and the sight must be one of the earliest, if not the keenest, disappointments in American married life.

Nickname

Nicknames and whippings, when they are once laid on, no one has discovered how to take off.

To the last he called me Charley. I have none to call me Charley now.

Nietzsche

An agile but unintelligent and abnormal German, possessed of the mania of grandeur.

Night

Never greet a stranger in the night, for he may be a demon.

Is not the night mournful, sad and melancholy?

The night has a more melancholy air than the day; the stars seem to march more silently than the sun, and our thoughts wander freely because we fancy all the world at rest but ourselves.

Night is the half of life, and the better half.

The night
Shows stars and women in a better light.

Night is the time to weep,
To wet with unseen tears
Those graves of memory where sleep
The joys of other years.

Those long, dreary hours in the twenty-four when the shadow of death is darkest, when despondency is strongest, and when hope is weakest.

When trade and traffic and all the noise of town
Is dimmed, and on the streets and squares
The filmy curtain of the night sinks down
With sleep, the recompense of cares,
To me the darkness brings not sleep nor rest.

Nihilism

Our first work must be the annihilation of everything as it now exists. The old world must be destroyed and replaced by a new one. When you have freed your mind from the fear of God, and that childish respect for the fiction of right, then all the remaining chains that bind you—property, marriage, morality, and justice-will snap asunder like threads.

No is no negative in a woman's mouth.

Between a woman's yea and no
There is not room for a pin to go.

Nobility

Noblesse oblige [Rank has its obligations].

Noble blood is an accident of fortune; noble actions are the chief mark of greatness.

Noise

Noise proves nothing. Often a hen who has merely laid an egg cackles as if she had laid an asteroid.

Nonconformist

If there is anything the nonconformist hates worse than a conformist it's another nonconformist who doesn't conform to the prevailing standards of nonconformity.

Why do you have to be a nonconformist like everybody else?

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist.

Nonconformists travel as a rule in bunches. You rarely find a nonconformist who goes it alone. And woe to him inside a nonconformist clique who does not conform with nonconformity.

Nonsense

Mix a little folly with your wisdom; a little nonsense is pleasant now and then.

No one escapes talking nonsense; the misfortune is to do it seriously.

Normal

He had that rare weird electricity about him—that extremely wild & heavy presence that you only see in a person who has abandoned all hope of ever behaving "normally."

North and South

Disguise the fact as you will, there is an enmity between the Northern and Southern people that is deep and enduring, and you never can eradicate it—never!

Nosiness

"If everybody minded their own business," said the Duchess in a hoarse growl, "the world would go round a good deal faster than it does."

Nothing

I was raised to feel that doing nothing was a sin. I had to learn to do nothing.

Noticing

Disdaining to notice human contrasts isn't Respectable Science; it's intentional ignorance.

Novel

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.

In writing novels and plays the cardinal rule is to treat one's characters as if they were chessmen, and not try to win the game by altering the rules—for example, by moving the knight as if he were a pawn.

The literature of the people begins with fables and ends with novels.

Novels are sweets. All people with healthy literary appetites love them—almost all women; a vast number of clever, hardheaded men.

Things were easier for the old novelists who saw people all of a piece. Speaking generally, their heroes were good through and through, their villains wholly bad.

Novelist

Imagine the future historian writing in wonderment of the absurd reticence with which our novelists treat sexual subjects, and comparing this with their licence to describe in detail the most hideous of murders.

Novelists are generally great liars.

The business of the novelist is not to relate great events, but to make small ones interesting.

Novelty

Corporal sensation is known to depend so much upon novelty, that custom takes away from many things their power of giving pleasure or pain.

Man is by nature fond of novelty.

Nuclear Bomb

The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants.

The atom bomb is a paper tiger which the United States reactionaries use to scare people. It looks terrible, but in fact it isn't … All reactionaries are paper tigers.

Nuclear Holocaust

Wouldn't this nucleus of [nuclear holocaust] survivors be so grief-stricken and anguished that they'd, well, envy the dead and not want to go on living?

Nuclear Power

The fear of nuclear power is not based upon a rational calculation but on superstitious dread of ray-like emanation, akin to a diabolic force.

Nudism

The fact is that nudism is not natural, unless you are doing something such as swimming, where clothes are a nuisance. In any other situation, the nudist is a joke, and often an unfunny joke.

Number

A great profusion of things, which are splendid or valuable in themselves, is magnificent. The starry heaven, though it occurs so very frequently to our view, never fails to excite an idea of grandeur. This cannot be owing to the stars themselves, separately considered. The number is certainly the cause.

I never could make out what those damned dots [decimal points] meant.

Nun

Get thee to a nunnery: why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners?

Nurse

It is better to be sick than to attend the sick. The one is a simple ill; the other combines pain of mind and toil of body.

Cool Quotes - N

Naivety