Sayings Collection


King Harold Godwinson at the Battle of Hastings, 1066 said-We are unconquerable except by death which does not count in honor (Gerald of Whales wrote that he may have been discovered some years later in Chester disguised as a hermit with only one eye)

He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire- Winston Churchill

It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues- Abe Lincoln

Guests, like fish, start to smell after three days- Ben Franklin

The five Pillars of Aristocracy are beauty, wealth, birth, genius and virtues. Any one of the first three can at any time over bear any one or both of the last two. –part of a letter written by John Adams to Thomas Jefferson on government

I never think of failure ...it comes soon enough-Albert Einstein

In any moment of decision the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing- Teddy Roosevelt

I already told you more than I know-Ralph Hersey

Keep the faith-Ralph Hersey

He is thick as two short planks- Duncan Mackay

I'm sometimes wrong but never in doubt- Dr. Tom Reichert

The important things in life are: oak, apples, sex, skin, bread, fire, showers and ice cream scoops-Jerry Griffith

If you cherish good health, eat apples at night and nuts in the morning -a Welsh proverb "Afalau'r nos, cnau'r bore, os ceri'th iechyd"

It felt like someone tied my tongue to the tailpipe of their car and drove me naked through a field of broken glass-James Woods in the movie Hard Times with Michael J Fox

Don't blame me...I didn't do anything- Harvey Schulte

You can never get a PIR from something that hasn't shipped-Stote Ellsworth/ BDIS

Western man is unable to be happy in a empty room-Pascal

Thy will be done-The Lord's Prayer (in Welsh "A fynno Duw, a fydd")

Abundance is the consciousness of wholeness, oneness, and quality...not separateness, multiplicity, and quantity-David Spangler

"If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well."

Speaking about the kind of person that belongs to the Bohemian Club-a fellow that is just sorter lying around not eating regular unless asked-Will Rogers

I was born during peacetime....I don't know what you know.....I haven't seen what you're seen-
the movie "Hear my Song' at the varsity in PA

You can't put a square peg in a round hole....how many times must I learn that lesson?- J Griffith

"No" is the most powerful word in the English language- J Griffith

May you always dance to the beat of life with the spirit of youth!-Leanin'Tree birthday card given to M. Johns '92

When in need- find a substitute- its a marvelous creative challenge-M Johns

Under stress, the first thing to go is the non-believers- J Griffith

Success is not final, failure is not fatal, courage is what counts- Winston Churchill

He is all mouth and trousers– Chris English

Communication requires full agreement- J Griffith

This is not yesterday, it is tomorrow - Bill Murray in the movie "Ground Hog Day"

Bartender!!.....Rum!.. and water for my horses-customer at The Typesetting Shop'93

I'm searching for something so undefined, it can only be seen by the eyes of the blind in the middle of the night - Billie Joel.. song entitled River of Dreams

Beware of a naked man offering you his shirt - Maya Angela from an old African proverb

Silence gives consent in common law - Thomas Moore, Henry VIII's Lord Chancellor

I do not understand - Oleanna by David Momet performed in Ashland's Black Swan Theater '94

Love each other or perish - the poet Auden

Re-engineer hunger to attach to our storage rather than our stomachs- J Griffith

Namaste...The sanskrit word Namaste means 'I bow to the divine in you'.

My name is "I am", don't look for me in the past, I am not called "I was", don't look for me in the future, for I am not called "what will be". My name is "I am". -Sermon by Walt Gerber, MPPC, 5/95.

Comfort is not important. - J Griffith

What I want is what I don't have, what I need is all around me.- David Matthew's song'95

Status Quo has gotten a bad rap. - J Griffith

The time is now and you are expected. - the Louis Faracon million blackman march on Washington, D. C. 10/16/95

Everything has been thought of before but the problem is to think of it again. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I revere truth and cry when I come close to it. - J Griffith after a Walt Gerber sermon on friendship

Honor is a gift one gives oneself- Robert McGregor

In 1947, Mahatma Gandhi, just shortly before his tragic death, listed seven specific blunders that he believed caused the violence plaguing the world.
They are:
wealth without work
pleasure without conscience
knowledge without character
commerce without morality
science without humanity
worship without sacrifice
and, politics without principles.

Everything looks impossible to those who never try anything...Jean Louis Etienne

Making money is not a heroic action cried the artist. Making money is boring you to death! Money bored them, but worse, so did peace. Finally, they could not endure the boredom any longer, they allowed the war to begin.-Charles Van Doren in his book "A History of Knowledge".

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother. Be he ne'er so vile, this day shall gentle his condition; And gentlemen in England now abed shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here, and hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks that fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day. -Harry 1415 Agincourt-Shakespeare

I have just figured out how God created the universe in only 6 days...He was working alone-J Griffith

Our house has everything. If you can't find it here, you don't need it.-J Griffith

You can always tell a Harvard man but never very much-Alan Madden

The only limit to ones consumption of pizza is its size and availability-J Griffith

Money does not make people, build character or a good person....involvement, sincerity, values, time, elbow grease, some hard decisions, fun and sex does-J Griffith

When things go wrong, it's always because you have tried to do something....-J Griffith

Truth exists but you can only know it by the fact that it makes you cry, all else is just opinion...-J Griffith 

He burnt a hole in the sun - Bonnie Raitt speaking about a Stevy Ray Vaughn performance to Mike Wallace

Poor Wales, so far from Heaven, so close to England -Sharon Kay Penman in her book called the Reckening

Don't eat until you have to- J Griffith 1999

There is no worst shame than a man dying rich -Andrew Carnegie

You can't under dress a salad -J Griffith 2000

The past is never dead- wrote William Faulkner, It's not even past.

Does dim allt heb oriwaered which in english means "There is no uphill without a downhill."- Welsh proverb

Humankind cannot bear much reality. T.S. Eliot 

I have nothing but affection for those who sailed with me- Sheryl Crow song

It is hoped that one can see the big picture of what Wales is, what it means to be Welsh, and how the local community, centered on the church, can keep us different from a world that is evolving into one country that is controlled by just a few companies. Our main problem as a nation is that true Welshmen do not seek power, as we know from our history that those who want power should on no account receive it. -Terry D Breverton

I'm either retired or day trader or unemployed or a butler/handy man for a rich lady in Palo Alto- when asked what he did for a living-J Griffith 1999

I've never held patience to be a virtue - Simon de Montfort on his way to see Henry III Plantagenent 1241

Always try to take something for yourself (insight, idea, attitude or feeling) from every relationship or human contact… or you can learn something from everyone/situation– J Griffith

It's not having what you want but wanting what you have and What is yours you will never loose and what's ahead may shine – Sheryl Crow 2002

I have to get back to the place I was before….. Relax said the night man. We are programmed to receive. You can check out but you can never leave. –‘ Hotel California’ sung by the Eagles

A sound banker, alas!, is not one who foresees danger and avoids it, but one who, when he is ruined, is ruined in the conventional way, along with his fellows, so no one can really blame him -John Maynard Keynes 1913

At poor peace I sing To you strangers (though song Is a burning crested act, The fire of birds in The world’s turning wood, For my sawn, splay sounds), Out of these seathumbed leaves That will fly and fall Like leaves of trees and soon Crumble and undie Into the dogdayed night…. Part of a prologue for a collection of poems 1952 –Dylan Thomas

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Ben Franklin

Such as thou art, so once was I, As I am now, so shalt thou be -French inscription on grave stone of the Black Prince, Edward, son of the English King Edward III died 1376

Control the input and output of your mouth and you will have a good and long life – H Carr 2002

My greatest lesson… to learn for every situation – J Griffith
A people unused to restraint must be led, they will not be drove - George Washington

He was not a brilliant strategist or tactician, not a gifted orator, not an intellectual. At several crucial moments he had show marked indecisiveness. He made very serious mistakes in judgment. But experience had been is teacher from boyhood, and in this greatest test, he learned steadily from experience. Above all, Washington never forgot what was at stake and he never gave up. –David McCullough in his history of 1776.

Victory or death- George Washington at Trenton 12/25/1776

Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition, I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem. How far I shall succeed in gratifying this ambition, is yet to be developed. - Abraham Lincoln running for the Illinois state legislature from Sangamon County March 1832 at the age of 23.

If nothing is funny then nothing is serious Richard Ford

Go ahead and live you life, to simply exist sucks -Ken Barnes (after he scuttled Privateer 600 miles off Chile 1/3/07)....

An honest politician, is one who, when he is bought, stays bought Simon Cameron Political boss in PA in the 1850s & in Lincoln's Cabinet.

As physics rules the world, justice rules the heart - J Griffith Feb. 2006

What will happen when the buffalo are all slaughtered? The wild horses tamed? What will happen when the secret corners of the forest are heavy with the scent of many men and the view of the ripe hills is blotted by talking wires? Where will the thicket be? Gone! Where will the eagle be? Gone! And what is it to say goodbye to the swift pony and the hunt? The end of living and the beginning of survival. [Chief Seattle, more or less 1852]

If you tell me to do something, I won’t…. Ask, I may…. show need, I will. –J Griffith 2005

Risk is the enemy of money. Watch the principal not the interest -J Griffith 2001