ALEX de TOCQUEVILLE 1805-1859 “Democracy in America”
LIFE IS TO BE ENTERED UPON WITH COURAGE.
ONE OF THE MOST ORDINARY WEAKNESSES of the human intellect is to seek to reconcile contrary principles and to purchase peace at the expense of logic.
A MAN’S ADMIRATION OF ABSOLUTE GOVERNMENT is proportionate to the contempt he feels for those around him.
MILITARY DISCIPLINE IS MERELY A PERFECTION OF SOCIAL SERVITUDE.
THERE ARE MANY MEN OF PRINCIPLE in both parties in America, but there is no party of principle.
KEN BURNS 1953—AMERICAN FILMAKER
DO NOT LOSE YOUR ENTHUSIASM. In Greek etymology, the word enthusiasm means, “God in us.”
THERE ARE NO ORDINARY LIVES.
THE ONLY ART FORM THAT AMERICANS HAVE CREATED that’s recognized around the world is jazz music born in a community that had the peculiar experience of being unfree in a free land.
BY ITS VERY NATURE, NO ONE PERSON Can ever be the center of jazz.
LOUIS ARMSTRONG is quite simply the most important person in American music. He is to 20th century music (I did not say jazz) what Einstein is to physics.
THE FLAME IS NOT OUT, BUT IT IS FLICKERING.
THERE IS NO COMMUNICATION IN THIS WORLD EXCEPT BETWEEN EQUALS.
A JAZZ BEAT IS A DYNAMIC CHANGING RHYTHM.
I WAKE THE DEAD. I bring Jackie Robinson and the Roosevelts to life. Who do you think I’m trying to wake up?
DO SOMETHING THAT WILL LAST AND BE BEAUTIFUL.
IT IS THE GREAT ARROGANCE of the present to forget the intelligence of the past.
PEOPLE TEND TO FORGET that the word “history” contains the word “story”.
I THINK WE TOO OFTEN make choices based on the safety of cynicism, and what we’re lead to is a life not fully lived. Cynicism is fear, and it’s worse than fear– it’s an active disengagement.
DON MARQUIS “Archy does His Part” 1878-1937
THE CHIEF OBSTACLE TO THE PROGRESS OF THE HUMAN RACE IS THE HUMAN RACE.
AN IDEA ISN’T REPONSIBLE FFOR THE PEOPLE WHO BELIEVE IT.
THE TROUBLE WITH THE PUBLIC IS THAT THERE IS TOO MUCH IF IT; what we need in public is less quantity and more quality.
I SUPPOSE the human race is doing the best it can but hells bells that’s only an explanation its not an excuse.
THE ART of newspaper paragraphing is to stroke a platitude until it purrs like an epigram.
THE MOST PLEASANT and useful persons are those who leave some of the problems of the universe for God to worry about.
RELAX INTO THE ARMS OF GOD