Charlie Bunker > Charlie's Quotes

“The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust, from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.”
― Walter Scott, The Lay of the Last Minstrel

“He disliked emotion, not because he felt lightly, but because he felt deeply.”
― John Buchan

“A room without books is like a body without a soul.”
― Marcus Tullius Cicero

“Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.”
― Frederick Douglass

“If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”
― Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass: Selected Speeches and Writings

“I prayed for freedom for twenty years, but received no answer until I prayed with my legs.”
― Frederick Douglass, Autobiographies: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass / My Bondage and My Freedom / Life and Times of Frederick Douglass

“No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck.”
― Frederick Douglass

“It is an absurdity to believe that the Deity has human passions, and one of the lowest of human passions, a restless appetite for applause”
― David Hume

“Your corn is ripe today; mine will be so tomorrow. 'Tis profitable for us both, that I should labour with you today, and that you should aid me tomorrow. I have no kindness for you, and know you have as little for me. I will not, therefore, take any pains upon your account; and should I labour with you upon my own account, in expectation of a return, I know I should be disappointed, and that I should in vain depend upon your gratitude. Here then I leave you to labour alone; You treat me in the same manner. The seasons change; and both of us lose our harvests for want of mutual confidence and security.”
― David Hume

“The friend in my adversity I shall always cherish most. I can better trust those who have helped to relieve the gloom of my dark hours than those who are so ready to enjoy with me the sunshine of my prosperity.”
― Ulysses S. Grant

“But my later experience has taught me two lessons: first, that things are seen plainer after the events have occurred; second, that the most confident critics are generally those who know the least about the matter criticised.”
― Grant, Ulysses S., Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant: All Volumes

“I only knew what was in my mind, and I wished to express it clearly”
― Ulysses S. Grant

“I have never advocated war except as means of peace, so seek peace, but prepare for war. Because war... War never changes. War is like winter and winter is coming.”
― Ulysses S Grant

“The distant rear of an army engaged in battle is not the best place from which to judge correctly what is going on in front.”
― Ulysses S. Grant, The Complete Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant

“The natural disposition of most people is to clothe a commander of a large army whom they do not know, with almost superhuman abilities. A large part of the National army, for instance, and most of the press of the country, clothed General Lee with just such qualities, but I had known him personally, and knew that he was mortal; and it was just as well that I felt this.”
― Grant, Ulysses S. (Ulysses Simpson), Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant - Volume 1

“There never was a time when, in my opinion, some way could not be found to prevent the drawing of the sword.”
― Ulysses S. Grant

“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake up in the day to find it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.”
― T.E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph

“I loved you, so I drew these tides of men into my hands/and wrote my will across the sky in stars”
― T.E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph

“We lived always in the stretch or sag of nerves, either on the crest or in the trough of waves of feeling.”
― T.E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph

“The trick, William Potter, is not minding that it hurts.”
― T.E Lawrence

“Many men would take the death-sentence without a whimper, to escape the life-sentence which fate carries in her other hand.”
― T.E. Lawrence

“I wrote my will across the sky, in stars”
― T. E. Lawrence

“The fringes of their deserts were strewn with broken faiths.”
― T.E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph

“Dark clouds bring waters, when the bright bring none.”
― John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress

“But was you not afraid, good sir, when you see him come with his club?"
"It is my duty," said he, "to distrust mine own ability, that I may have reliance on him that is stronger than all".”
― John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress

“If you ever looked at me once with what I know is in you, I would be your slave.”
― Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

“Some people could look at a mud puddle and see an ocean with ships.”
― Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God

“The best way to become acquainted with a subject is to write about it. ”
― Benjamin Disraeli

“Why so much grief for me? No man will hurl me down to Death, against my fate. And fate? No one alive has ever escaped it, neither brave man nor coward, I tell you - it’s born with us the day that we are born.”
― Homer, The Iliad

“When you re-read a classic you do not see in the book more than you did before. You see more in you than there was before.”
― Clifton Fadiman, Any Number Can Play