List of Great Quotations used in Omnivore

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It is a profitable thing, if one is wise, to seem foolish. - Aeschylus

It isn't necessary to be rich and famous to be happy. It's only necessary to be rich. - Alan Alda

When you're as great as I am, it's hard to be humble. - Muhammad Ali

If thine enemy offend thee, give his child a drum. - Anonymous

Money can't buy happiness; it can, however, rent it. - Anonymous

Business conventions are important because they demonstrate how many people a company can operate without. - Anonymous

If you don't know how to do something, you don't know how to do it with a computer. - Anonymous

American is a very difficult language mixed with English. - Anonymous

If you don't have time to do it right you must have time to do it over. - Anonymous

Any sufficiently advanced bureaucracy is indistinguishable from molasses. - Anonymous

I don't mind what language an opera is sung in so long as it is the language I don't understand. - Edward Appleton

No opera plot can be sensible, for in sensible situations people do not sing. - W H Auden

Don't try to make children grow up to be like you, or they may do it. - Russell Baker

You never realize how short a month is until you pay alimony. - John Barrymore

Except for an occasional heart attack I feel as young as I ever did. - Robert Benchley

Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils. - Hector Berlioz

We know what happens to people who stay in the middle of the road. They get run over. - Ambrose Bierce

The covers of this book are too far apart. - Ambrose Bierce

When a young man begins to go down hill everything seems to be greased for the occasion. - Josh Billings

Laws are like sausages. It is better not to see them being made. - Otto von Bismarck

I have only one ambition left: I should like to have a good epitaph. - Prince Bismark

The only reason I would take up jogging is so I could hear heavy breathing again. - Erma Bombeck

Never lend your car to anyone to whom you have given birth. - Erma Bombeck, author

Few minds wear out; more rust out. - Christian Nestell Bovee

We can lick gravity, but sometimes the paperwork is overwhelming. - Wehrner von Braun

Nothing more clearly show how little God esteems his gift to men of wealth, money, position and other wordly goods, than the way he distributes these, and the sort of men who are most amply provided with them. - Jean De La Bruyere

An athiest is a man with no invisible means of support. - John Buchan

If you live to be one hundred, you've got it made. Very few people die past that age. - George Burns

All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of every organism to live beyond its income. - Samuel Butler

The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true. - James Branch Cabell, from The Silver Stallion

Mail your packages early so the post office can lose them in time for Christmas. - Johnny Carson

But at fifty you get the face you deserve. - Coco Chanel

Many a man has fallen in love with a girl in a light so dim he would not have chosen a suit by it. - Maurice Chevalier

Men occasionally stumble on the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened. - Sir Winston Churchill

An epitaph is a belated advertisement for a line of goods that have been permanently discontinued. - Irvin S. Cobb

The fellow who thinks he knows it all is especially annoying to those of us who do. - Harold Coffin

I have never seen pessimism in a Company prospectus. - Sir William Connor (Cassandra)

It is extraordinary how potent cheap music is. - Noel Coward

A cynic is just a man who found out when he was about ten that there wasn't any Santa Claus, and he's still upset. - James Gould Cozzens

Never vote for the best candidate, vote for the one who will do the least harm. - Frank Dane

History repeats itself. That's one of the things wrong with history. - Clarence Darrow

Someday I hope to write a book where the royalties will pay for the copies I give away. - Clarence Darrow

I am a friend of the workingman, I would rather be his friend than be one. - Clarence Darrow

When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President; I'm beginning to believe it. - Clarence Darrow

Avoid fruits and nuts. You are what you eat. - Jim Davis (Garfield the Cat)

My idea of an agreeable person is a person who agrees with me. - Benjamin Disraeli

Everyone likes flattery, and when it comes to royalty, you should lay it on with a trowel. - Benjamin Disraeli

Be the first to say what is self-evident, and you are immortal. - M. Ebner-Eschenbach

When Solomon said that there was a time and a place for everything he had not encountered the problem of parking an automobile. - Bob Edwards

Gravitation can not be held responsible for people falling in love. - Albert Einstein

An atheist is a guy who watches a Notre Dame-SMU football game and doesn't care who wins. - Dwight D. Eisenhower

The years betwen 50 and 70 are the hardest. You are always asked to do things, and yet you are not decrepit enough to turn them down. - T S Eliot

People do not deserve good writing, they are so pleased with bad. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Men are what their mothers made them. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Once, during prohibition, I was forced to live for days on nothing but food and water. - W. C. Fields

I like children. Properly cooked. - W.C. Fields

A conclusion is the place where you got tired thinking. - Martin H. Fischer

As you get older, the pickings get slimmer, but the people don't. - Carrie Fisher

A person is never happy except at the price of some ignorance. - Anatole France

To die for an idea is to place a pretty high price on conjectures. - Anatole France, from The Revolt of the Angels

The books that everybody admires are those nobody reads. - Anatole France

A bank is a place where they lend you an umbrella in fair weather and ask for it back when it rains. - Robert Frost

The brain is a wonderful organ. It starts working the moment you get up and does not stop until you get into the office. - Robert Frost

Ugliness is in a way superior to beauty because it lasts. - Serge Gainsbourg, French vocalist

Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof. - John Kenneth Galbraith

Opera is when a guy gets stabbed in the back and instead of bleeding, sings. - Ed Gardner

You know you're getting old when everything hurts. And what doesn't hurt doesn't work. - Hy Gardner

Pro football is like nuclear warfare. There are no winners, only survivors. - Frank Gifford

A clever man commits no minor blunders. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Know thyself? If I knew myself, I'd run away. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

If a man writes a book, let him set down only what he knows. I have guesses enough of my own. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I always get the better when I argue alone. - Oliver Goldsmith

Television has raised writing to a new low. - Samuel Goldwyn

Dying is easy. Comedy is difficult. - Edmund Gwenn, last word

I never said all actors are cattle; what I said was all actors should be treated like cattle. - Alfred Hitchcock

Men heap together the mistakes of their lives, and create a monster they call Destiny. - John Oliver Hobbes

Give us the luxuries of life and we will dispense with the necessities. - Oliver Wendell Holmes

You know you're getting old when the candles cost more than the cake. - Bob Hope

Middle Age is when your age starts to show around your middle. - Bob Hope

None of us can boast about the morality of our ancestors. The records do not show that Adam and Eve were married. - Ed Howe

No woman ever falls in love with a man unless she has a better opinion of him than he deserves. - Ed Howe

If you don't advertise yourself you will be advertised by your loving enemies. - Elbert Hubbard

Perfume: any smell that is used to drown a worse one. - Elbert Hubbard

You can lead a boy to college but you can't make him think. - Elbert Hubbard

A pessimist is one who has been intimately acquainted with an optimist. - Elbert Hubbard

Some people pay a compliment as if they expected a receipt. - Kin Hubbard

Everything comes to him who waits, except a loaned book. - Kin Hubbard

Lots of folks confuse bad management with destiny. - Kin Hubbard

It is pretty hard to tell what does bring happiness; poverty and wealth have both failed. - Kin Hubbard

The truth is not always the same as the majority decision. - Pope Jean Paul

Almost every man wastes part of his life attempting to display qualities which he does not possess. - Samuel Johnson

Children are a great comfort in your old age -- and they help you reach it faster, too. - Lionel Kauffman

Marrying a man is like buying something you've been admiring for a long time in a shop window. You may love it when you get it home, but it doesn't always go with everything in the house. - Jean Kerr

Research is an organized method for keeping you reasonably dissatisfied with what you have. - Charles Kettering

Smoking is one of the leading causes of statistics. - Fletcher Knebel

Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge where there is no river. - Nikita Krushchev

All major weaknesses have been exposed, analyzed, and replaced with new weaknesses. - Bruce Leverett

I went on a diet, swore off drinking and heavy eating, and in fourteen days I lost two weeks. - Joe E. Lewis

I distrust camels and anyone else who can go a week without a drink. - Joe E. Lewis

If you drink like a fish, don't drive. Swim. - Joe E. Lewis

It takes less time to do a thing right, than it does to explain why you did it wrong. - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I don't like money, actually, but it quiets my nerves. - Joe Louis

Of course there's a lot of knowledge in universities: the freshmen bring a little in; the seniors don't take much away, so knowledge sort of accumulates.... - Dr. A. Lawrence Lowell

Ours is a world where people don't know what they want and are willing to go through hell to get it. - Don Marquis

Middle age is the time when a man is always thinking in a week or two he will feel as good as ever. - Don Marquis

The person who knows how to laugh at himself will never cease to be amused. - Shirley Maclaine

Military intelligence is a contradiction in terms. - Groucho Marx

A child of five could understand this. Fetch me a child of five. - Groucho Marx

Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana. - Groucho Marx

Outside of a dog, a book is your best friend, and inside of a dog, it's too dark to read. - Groucho Marx

From the moment I picked your book up until I laid it down I was convulsed with laughter. Some day I intend reading it. - Groucho Marx

Death is a very dull, dreary affair, and my advice to you is to have nothing whatsoever to do with it. - W. Somerset Maugham, author

Only a mediocre writer is always at his best. - W. Somerset Maugham

'Tis more blessed to give than to receive; for example, wedding presents. - H.L. Mencken

To be in love is merely to be in a state of perpetual anesthesia - to mistake an ordinary young woman for a goddess. - H.L. Mencken

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard. - H.L. Mencken

Democracy is the art and science of running the circus from the monkey cage. - H.L. Mencken

No one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public. - H.L. Mencken, philosopher

If sex is such a natural phenomenon, how come there are so many books on how to? - Bette Midler, singer and actress

Money can't buy friends, but you can get a better class of enemy. - Spike Milligan

Everbody sets out to do something, and everybody does something, but no one does what he sets out to do. - George Moore

A careful driver is one who honks his horn when he goes through a red light. - Henry Morgan

A man generally has two reasons for doing a thing. One that sounds good, and a real one. - J.Pierpoint Morgan

The world is divided into people who do things--and people who get the credit. - Dwight Morrow

They take the paper and they read the headlines. So they've heard of unemployment and they've heard of breadlines. And they philanthropically cure them all By getting up a costume charity ball. - Ogden Nash, from Pride Goeth Before a Raise

A conservative is a man who wants the rules changed so no one can make a pile the way he did. - Gregory Nunn

I take my children everywhere, but they always find their way back home. - Robert Orben

The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. The Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it. - P.J. O'Rourke

The secret of a successful restaurant is sharp knives. - George Orwell

Being Politically Correct means always having to say you're sorry. - Charles Osgood

The optimist thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. The pessimist fears it is true. - Robert Oppenheimer

There's a helluva distance between wisecracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wisecracking is simply calisthenics with words. - Dorothy Parker

Behind every successful man there is a surprised woman. - Maryon pearson

What the country needs is dirtier fingernails and cleaner minds. - Will Rogers

A difference of opinion is what makes horse racing and missionaries. - Will Rogers

I belong to no organized political party -- I am a Democrat. - Will Rogers

Old men are fond of giving advice to console themselves for being no longer in a position to give bad examples. - Francois de la Rouchefoucald

The scientific theory I like best is that the rings of Saturn are composed entirely of lost airline luggage. - Mark Russell

I love Americans, but not when they try to talk French. What a blessing it is that they never try to talk English. - Saki (H. H. Munro)

An autobiography is the story of how a man thinks he lived. - Herbert Samuel

The tendency of an event to occur varies inversely with one's preparation for it. - David Searles

I never thought much of the courage of a lion-tamer. Inside the cage he is at least safe from people. - George Bernard Shaw

Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same. - George Bernard Shaw

Love is the gross exaggeration of the difference between one person and everyone else. - George Bernard Shaw

Great Britain and the United States are nations separated by a common language. - George Bernard Shaw

What is the use of straining after an amiable view of things, when a cynical view is most likely to be the true one? - George Bernard Shaw

He knows nothing and thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career. - George Bernard Shaw

Do you know what a pessimist is? A man who thinks everybody as nasty as himself, and hates them for it. - George Bernard Shaw

The perfect love affair is one which is conducted entirely by post. - George Bernard Shaw

Youth is a wonderful thing. What a crime to waste it on children. - George Bernard Shaw

Alcohol is the anesthesia by which we endure the operation of life. - George Bernard Shaw

Moral indignation is, in most cases, 2% moral, 48% indignation, and 50% envy. - Vittorio de Sica

The more I see of man . . . the more I like dogs. - Madam de Stael

There's nothing wrong with the average person that a good psychiatrist can't exaggerate. - Toronto Star Newspaper

In America, anyone can become president. That's one of the risks you take. - Adlai Stevenson

Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm. - Publius Syrus

Let a fool hold his tongue and he will pass for a sage. - Pubilius Syrus

With sixty staring me in the face, I have developed inflammation of the sentence structure and definite hardening of the paragraphs. - James Thurber

A great many open minds should be closed for repairs. - Toledo Blade Newspaper

I always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific. - Lilly Tomlin, actress, author and commedian

Man invented language to satisfy his deep need to complain. - Lilly Tomlin, actress, author and commedian

The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win you're still a rat. - Lilly Tomlin, actress, author and commedian

I could never learn to like her, except on a raft at sea with no other provisions in sight. - Mark Twain

Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint. - Mark Twain

The difference between the right word and almost the right word is the difference between lighning and the lightning bug. - Mark Twain

I find that the further I go back, the better things were, whether they happened or not. - Mark Twain

If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a man and a dog. - Mark Twain

Providence protects children and idiots. I know because I have tested it. - Mark Twain

The radical of one century is the conservative of the next. The radical invents the views. When he has worn them out, the conservative adopts them. - Mark Twain

"Be Yourself" is about the worst advice you can give to people. - Mark Twain

Adam and Eve had many advantages, but the principal one was that they escaped teething. - Mark Twain

By trying we can easily endure adversity. Another man's, I mean. - Mark Twain

Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example. - Mark Twain

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

A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read. - Mark Twain

I have witnessed and greatly enjoyed the first act of everything which Wagner created, but the effect on me has always been so powerful that one act was quite sufficient; whenever I have witnessed two acts I have gone away physically exhausted; and whenever I have ventured an entire opera the result has been the next thing to suicide. - Mark Twain, 1891

Let us be thankful for fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed. - Mark Twain

July 4. Statistics show that we lose more fools on this day than in all the other days of the year put together. This proves, by the number left in stock, that one fourth of July per year is now inadequate, the country has grown so. - Mark Twain, from Pudd'nhead Wilson

Love is much nicer to be in than an automobile accident, a tight girdle, a higher tax bracket, or a holding pattern over Philadelphia. - Judith Viorst

One is never more on trial than in the moment of excessive good fortune. - Lew Wallace

I never loved another person the way I loved myself. - Mae West

When women go wrong, men go right after them. - Mae West

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time. - E.B. White

I am not young enough to know everything. - Oscar Wilde

Don't give a woman advice; one should never give a woman anything she can't wear in the evening. - Oscar Wilde

Bad artists always admire each other's work. - Oscar Wilde

Conscience and cowardice are really the same things. - Oscar Wilde

A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal. - Oscar Wilde

Please do not shoot the pianist. He is doing his best. - Oscar Wilde, from Impressions of America (quoting someone in 'Leadville')

Ah! Don't say that you agree with me. When People agree with me I always feel that I must be wrong. - Oscar Wilde

It is very vulgar to talk like a dentist when one isn't a dentist. It produced a false impression. - Oscar Wilde, from The Importance of Being Earnest

The good ended happily and the bad ended unhappily. That is what fiction means. - Oscar Wilde, from The Importance of Being Earnest

On an occaision of this kind it becomes more than a moral duty to speak one's mind. It becomes a pleasure. - Oscar Wilde, from The Importance of Being Earnest

I couldn't help it. I can resist everything except temptation. - Oscar Wilde, from Lady Windermere's Fan

Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months. - Oscar Wilde

Either the wallpaper goes or I do. - Oscar Wilde, last words

You can pick out actors by the glazed look that comes into their eyes when the conversation wanders away from themselves. - Michael Wilding

Twixt the optimist and pessimist The difference is droll: The optimist sees the doughnut But the pessimist sees the hole. - McLandburgh Wilson, Optimist and Pessimist

The main ingredient of stardom is the rest of the team. - John Wooden

On the outskirts of every agony sits some observant fellow who points. - Virginia Woolf, playwrite

The only true love is love at first sight; second sight dispels it. - Israel Zangwill

Politics makes estranged bedfellows. - Goodman Ace

A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. - Edward Abbey

There is no such thing as an underestimate of average intelligence. - Henry Adams

Most of the time I don't have much fun. The rest of the time I don't have any fun at all. - Woody Allen

I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead. Not sick, not wounded, dead. - Woody Allen

Jack Benny played Mendelsson last night. Mendelsson lost. - Anonymous

I don't mind what language an opera is sung in so long as it is a language I don't understand. - Sir Edward Appleton

People seem to enjoy things more when they know a lot of other people have been left out of the pleasure. - Russel Baker

A bureaucrat is a Democrat who holds some office that a Republican wants. - Alben W. Barkley

Life is a long lesson in humility. - James M. Barrie

If you suveyed a hundred typical middle-aged Americans, I bet you'd find that only two of them could tell you their blood types, but every last one of them would know the theme song from the 'Beverly Hillbillies'. - Dave Barry

The word aerobics comes from two Greek words: aero, meaning "ability to," and bics, meaning "withstand tremendous boredom." - Dave Barry

The old system of having a baby was much better than the new system, the old system being characterized by the fact that the man didn't have to watch. - Dave Barry

I've noticed that one thing about parents is that no matter what stage your child is in, the parents who have older children always tell you the next stage is worse. - Dave Barry

It is not necesssary to understand things in order to argue about them. - Caron de Beaumarchais

It is quite untrue that British people don't appreciate music. They may not understand it but they absolutely love the noise it makes. - Sir Thomas Beecham

Everything is worth precisely as much as a belch, the difference being that a belch is more satisfying. - Ingmar Bergman

The gambling known as business looks with austere disfavor upon the business known as gambling. - Ambrose Bierce

Calamities are of two kinds: misfortunes to ourselves, and good fortune to others. - Ambrose Bierce

Rugby is a beastly game played by gentlemen; soccer is a gentleman's game played by beasts; football is a beastly game played by beasts. - Henry Blaha

One thing they never tell you about child raising is that for the rest of your life, at the drop of a hat, you are expected to know your child's name and how old he or she is. - Erma Bombeck

I do not participate in any sport with ambulances at the bottom of a hill. - Erma Bombeck

Guidelines for Bureaucrats: 1. When in charge, ponder. 2. When in trouble, delegate. 3. When in doubt, mumble. - James H. Borden

The one function that TV news performs very well is that when there is no news we give it to you with the same emphasis as if it were. - David Brinkley

The difference between a violin and a viola is that a viola burns longer. - Victor Borge

You can't make up anything anymore. The world itself is satire. All you're doing is recording it. - Art Buchwald

Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victems he intends to eat until he eats them. - Samuel Butler

I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of old ones. - John Cage

Automatic simply means that you can't repair it yourself. - Frank Capra

We're having something a little different this year for Thanksgiving. Instead of a turkey, we're having a swan. You get more stuffing. - George Carlin

An economist is a surgeon with an excellent scalpel and a rough-edged lancet, who operates beautifully on the dead and tortures the living. - Nicholas Chamfort

You don't have to suffer to be a poet; adolescence is enough suffering for anyone. - John Ciardi

I find it rather easy to protray a businessman. Being bland, rather cruel and incompetent comes naturally to me. - John Cleese

I believe in luck: how else can you explain the success of those you don't like? - Jean Cocteau

Cookbooks bear the same relation to real books that microwave food bears to your grandmother's. - Andrei Codrescu

Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first call promising. - Cyril Connolly

I don't believe in astrology. The only stars I can blame for my failures are those that walk about the stage. - Noel Coward

The trouble with children is that they are not returnable. - Quentin Crisp

An appeal is when you ask one court to show it's contempt for another court. - Finley Peter Dunne

Most vegetarians look so much like the food they eat that they can be classified as cannibals. - Finley Peter Dunne

Never judge a book by its movie. - J.W. Eagan

History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives. - Abba Eban

Canada has never been a melting pot; more like a tossed salad. - Arnold Edinborough

For most men life is a search for the proper manilla envelope in which to get themselves filed. - Clifton Fadiman

Early morning cheerfulness can be extremely obnoxious. - William Feather

You can't find any true closeness in Hollywood, because everybody does the fake closeness so well. - Carrie Fisher

Instant gratification takes too long. - Carrie Fisher

To be stupid, selfish, an have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost. - Gustave Flaubert

Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing. - Redd Foxx

Hell hath no fury like a bureaucrat scorned. - Milton Friedman

I believe in equality for everyone, except reporters and photographers. - Gandhi

The meek shall inherit the earth, but not the mineral rights. - J. Paul Getty

Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious. - Brendan Gill

People come to Washington believing it is the center of power. I know I did. It was only much later that I learned that Washington is a steering wheel that's not connected to an engine. - Richard Goodwin

No, Groucho is not my real name. I am breaking it in for a friend. - Groucho Marx

I like a friend better for having faults that one can talk about. - William Hazlitt

There are more fools in the world than there are people. - Heinrich Heine

Death will be a great relief. No more interviews. - Katherine Hepburn

This paperback is very interesting, but I find it will never replace a hardcover book -- it makes a very poor doorstop. - Alfred Hitchcock

I understand the inventor of the bagpipes was inspired when he saw a man carrying an indignant, asthmatic pig under his arm. Unfortunately, the manmade sound never equalled the purity of the sound achieved by the pig. - Alfred Hitchcock

There are several differences between a footballl game and a revolution. For one thing, a football game usually lasts longer and the participants wear uniforms. Also there are more injuries at a football game. - Alfred Hitchcock

Seeing a murder on television can help work off one's antagonisms. And if you haven't any antagonisms, the commercials will give you some. - Alfred Hitchcock

When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other. - Eric Hoffer

A pessimist is a man who has been compelled to live with an optimist. - Elbert Hubbard

A good listener is usually thinking about something else. - Kin Hubbard

Nothing is as irritating as the fellow who chats pleasantly while he's overcharging you. - Kin Hubbard

The fellow that agrees with everything you say is either a fool or he is getting ready to skin you. - Kin Hubbard

One of the simple but genuine pleasures in life is getting up in the morning and hurrying to a mousetrap you set the night before. - Kin Hubbard

Classical music is the kind we keep thinking will turn into a tune. - Kin Hubbard

Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad. - Aldous Huxley

Most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted. - Aldous Huxley

Events in the past may be roughly divided into those which probably never happened and those which do not matter. - W. R. Inge

Everyone has a right to a university degree in America, even if it's in Hamburger Technology. - Clive James

We English are good at forgiving our enemies; it releases us from the obligation of liking our friends. - P.D. James

Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies. - Thomas Jefferson

The avoidance of taxes is the only intellectual pursuit that carries any reward. - John Maynard Keynes

The nice thing about being a celebrity is that when you bore people, they think it's their fault. - Henry Kissinger

Ninty percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad name. - Henry Kissinger

Everyone who ever walked barefoot into his child's room late at night hates Legos. - Tony Kornheiser

An economist is a man who states the obvious in terms of the incomprehensible. - Alfred A. Knopf

Both the cockroach and the bird could get along very well without us, although the cockroach would miss us most. - Joseph Wood Krutch

The trouble with America isn't that the poetry of life has turned to prose, but that it has turned to advertising copy. - Louis Kronenberger

Radio news is bearable. This is due to the fact that while the news is being broadcast, the disk jockey is not allowed to talk. - Fran Lebowitz

Every time I look at you I get a fierce desire to be lonesome. - Oscar Levant

Advertising is a valuable economic factor because it is the cheapest way of selling goods, especially if they are worthless. - Sinclair Lewis

People will buy anthing that is 'one to a customer.' - Sinclair Lewis

Once a newspaper touches a story, the facts are lost forever, even to the protagonists. - Norman Mailer

Not even computers will replace committees, because committees buy computers. - Edward Shepherd Mead

It is even harder for the average ape to believe that he has decended from man. - H.L. Mencken

Say what you will about the ten commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them. - H.L. Mencken

Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in memory as the wish to forget it. - Montaigne

Our national flower is the concrete cloverleaf. - Lewis Mumford

The trouble with a kitten is that it eventually beomes a cat. - Ogden Nash

I don't understand the appeal of Spuds McKenzie. He's always surrounded by beautiful women. Now, I'm single, and I know the pickin's can be mighty slim, but you have to be really desperate to date out of your own species. - Susan Norfleet

Never raise your hand to your children; it leaves your midsection unprotected. - Robert Orben

Cab drivers are living proof that practice does not make perfect. - Howard Ogden

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects. - Lester Pearson

Bureaucracy defends the status quo long past the time when the quo has lost its status. - Laurence J. Peter

Equal opportunity means everyone will have a fair chance at being incompetent. - Laurence J. Peter

A financier is a pawnbroker with imagination. - Arthur Wing Pinero

Americans will put up with anything provided it doesn't block traffic. - Dan Rather

It is after you have lost your teeth that you can afford to buy steaks. - Pierre August Renoir

There ought to be one day -- just one -- where there is open season on senators. - Will Rogers

When those waiters ask me if I want some fresh ground pepper, I ask if they have any aged pepper. - Andy Rooney

I don't like food that's too carefully arranged; it makes me think that the chef is spending too much time arranging and not enough time cooking. If I wanted a picture I'd buy a painting. - Andy Rooney

No degree of dullness can safeguard a work against the determination of critics to find it facinating. - Harold Rosenberg

If I had a hammer, I'd use it on Peter, Paul, and Mary. - Howard Rosenberg

In Hollywood a marriage is a success if it outlasts milk. - Rita Rudner

Most turkeys taste better the day after; my mother's tasted better the day before. - Rita Rudner

My husband gave me a necklace. It's fake. I requested fake. Maybe I'm paranoid, but in this day and age, I don't want something around my neck that's worth more than my head. - Rita Rudner

My husband and I are either going to buy a dog or have a child. We can't decide whether to ruin our carpet or ruin our lives. - Rita Rudner

I want to have children and I know my time is running out: I want to have them while my parents are still young enough to take care of them. - Rita Rudner

I love being married. It's so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life. - Rita Rudner

Someday I want to be rich. Some people get so rich they lose all respect for humanity. That's how rich I want to be. - Rita Rudner

Beethoven always sounds to me like the upsetting of a bag of nails, with here and there an also dropped hammer. - John Ruskin

I squirm when I see athletes praying before a game. Don't they realize that if God took sports seriously he never would have created George Steinbrenner. - Mark Russel

Acting is like roller skating. Once you know how to do it, it is neither stimulating nor exciting. - George Sanders

In order to fully realize how bad a popular play can be, it is necessary to see it twice. - George Bernard Shaw

There are only two classes in good society in England: the equestrian class and the neurotic class. - George Bernard Shaw

The English are not very spiritual people, so they invented cricket to give them some idea of eternity. - George Bernard Shaw

If the French were really intelligent, they'd speak English. - Wilfred Sheed

There are more bad musicians than there is bad music. - Isaac Stern

Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is thought necessary. - Robert Louis Stevenson

The best reason I can think of for not running for president of the United States is that you have to shave twice a day. - Adlai Stevenson

Some people approach every problem withan open mouth. - Adlai Stevenson

Skill without imagination is craftsmanship and gives us many useful objects such as wickerwork and picnic baskets. Imagination without skill gives us modern art. - Tom Stoppard

Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed. - Johnathan Swift

Ants are so much like human beings as to be an embarrasment...They do everything but watch television. - Lewis Thomas

I am not a cat man, but a dog man, and all felines can tell this at a glance -- a sharp, vindictive glance. - James Thurber

If I have any beliefs about immortality, it is that certain dogs I have known will go to heaven, and very, very few persons. - James Thurber

Progress was all right. Only it went on too long. - James Thurber

I personally think we developed language because of our deep need to complain. - Lily Tomlin

The national sport of England is obstacle racing. People fill their rooms with useless and cumbersome furniture, and spend the rest of their lives trying to dodge it. - Herbert Beerbohm Tree

Canada is a country whose main exports are hockey players and cold fronts. Our main imports are baseball players and acid rain. - Pierre Trudeau

Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself. - Mark Twain

Familiarity breeds contempt -- and children. - Mark Twain

Honesty is the best policy -- when there is money in it. - Mark Twain

I would like to live in Manchester, England. The transition between Manchester and death would be unnoticeable. - Mark Twain

Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer. - Mark Twain

If you can find something everyone agrees on, it's wrong. - Mo Udall

A healthy adult male bore consumes each year one and a half times his own weight in other people's patience. - John Updike

If the world should blow itself up, the last audible voice would be that of an expert saying it can't be done. - Peter Ustinov

Muscles come and go; flab lasts. - Bill Vaughan

An ugly baby is a very nasty object, and the prettiest is frightful when undressed. - Queen Victoria

Today's public figures can no longer write their own speeches or books, and there is some evidence that they can't read them either. - Gore Vidal

Having the critics praise you is like having the hangman say you've got a pretty neck. - Eli Wallach

Actions lie louder tha words. - Carolyn Wells

Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered. I myself would say that it merely had been detected. - Oscar Wilde

The basis of action is lack of imagination. It is the last resource of those who know not how to dream. - Oscar Wilde

It is only the intellectually lost who ever argue. - Oscar Wilde

When good Americans die they go to Paris. When bad Americans die they go to America. - Oscar Wilde

I love acting. It is so much more real than life. - Oscar Wilde

It is only by not paying one's bills that one can hope to live in the memory of the commercial classes. - Oscar Wilde

No woman should ever be quite accurate about her age. It looks so calculating. - Oscar Wilde

Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship. - Oscar Wilde

Women are never disarmed by compliments. Men always are. That is the difference between the sexes. - Oscar Wilde

Creative semantics is the key to contemporary government; it consists of talking in strange tongues lest the public learn the inevitable inconveniently early. - George Will

I did a picture in England one winter and it was so cold I almost got married. - Shelley Winters

All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening. - Alexander Wolcott

There's a fine line between fishing and just standing on the shore like an idiot. - Steven Wright

An incompetent attorney can delay a trial for months or years. A competent attourney can delay one even longer. - Evelle J. Younger

The United States is a nation of laws: badly written and randomly enforced. - Frank Zappa

It is a fitting irony that under Richard Nixon, 'launder' became a dirty word. - William Zinsser

So long as any amount shall remain unpaid under this note, the Borrower covenants and promises to that Bank that the borrower will not permit or suffer to exist any of the following conditions: death of the borrower. - American Security Bank loan agreement

We're not afraid of challenges. It's like we always say: if you want to go out in the rain, be prepared to get burned. - Anonymous Brazillian Soccer Player

How to store your baby walker: First, remove baby. - Anonymous Manufacturer

Traffic is very heavy at the moment, so if you are thinking of leaving now, you'd better set off a few minutes earlier. - Anonymous Traffic Report

This is no longer a slum neighborhood. I haven't heard of a Cubs fan being shot in a long time. - Anonymous Wrigley Field Neighbor, Chicago, IL

We are unable to announce the weather. We depend on weather reports from the airport, which is closed, due to weather. Whether we will be able to give you a weather report tomorrow will depend on the weather. - Arab News report

Caution: Cape does not enable user to fly. - Batman Costume warning label

Sure the body count in this movie bothers me, but what are you gonna do? It's what everybody likes. At least its not an awful body count--it's a fun body count. - Bonnie Bedelia, actress, regarding the movie Die Harder

Well, I used to look like this when I was young and now I still do. - Yogi Berra, baseball catcher, manager

Always go to other people's funerals, otherwise they won't come to yours. - Yogi Berra, baseball catcher, manager

The other teams could make trouble for us if they win. - Yogi Berra, baseball catcher, manager

It was pretty good. Even the music was nice. - Yogi Berra, after attending an opera

Congratulations on breaking my record. I always thought the record would stand until it was broken. - Yogi Berra, to Johnny Bench

What good is the moon if you can't buy or sell it? - Ivan Boesky, inside stock trader

I think "immoral" is probably the wrong word to use...I prefer the word "unethical." - Ivan Boesky, inside stock trader

The Minutemen are not tall in terms of height. - Dan Bonner, CBS sportscaster, during a UMass basketball game

The private enterprise system indicates that some people have higher incomes than others. - Gerry Brown, California governor

Our strength is that we don't have any weaknesses. Our weakness is that we don't have any real strengths. - Frank Broyles, college football coach

All I was doing was appealing for an endorsement, not suggesting you endorse it. - George Bush, US President

It's no exaggeration to say that the undecideds could go one way or another. - George Bush, US President

I have opinions of my own -- strong opinions --but I don't always agree with them. - George Bush, US President

Any time Detroit scores more than 100 points and holds the other team below 100 points they almost always win. - Doug Collins, basketball commentator

I wanted all my ducks in a row so if we did get into a posture we could pretty much slam-dunk this thing and put it to bed. - Lee Cooke, mayor of Austin, TX, abusing cliches

To forcibly remove a politician from office, one has to meet a much higher standard of dishonesty. - Michael Cooney, Santa Barbara attorney

We shall reach greater and greater platitudes of achievement. - Richard J. Daley, Chicago Mayor

Not only is he ambidextrous, but he can throw with either hand. - Duffy Daugherty , football coach and sports analyst`

Ordinary rape and murder just doesn't make it anymore. It's much better to have ultra-violence, chainsaw massacres, X-rated Draculas, and continents sinking into the sea with the entire population lost, at the very least. - Jon Davidson, advertising executive at New World Pictures, on what makes a good movie

Your food stamps will be stopped effective March 1992 because we received notice that you passed away. May God bless you. You may reapply if there is a change in your circumstances. - Department of Social Services, Greenville, South Carolina

I find it interesting how we get carried away by the dogma a-la-mode. - Lincoln Diaz-Ballart, US representative from Florida

We all get heavier as we get older because there's a lot more information in our heads. - Vlade Divac, NBA basketball player

Life is very important to Americans. - Bob Dole, U.S. Senator from Kansas

To move cabin, push button of the wishing floor. If the cabin should enter more persons, each one should press the number of wishing floor. Driving is then going alphabetically by natural order. Button retaining pressed position shows received command - Elevator Instructions, Madrid, Spain

We apologize for the error in last week's paper in which we stated that Mr Arnold Dogbody was a defective in the police force. We meant, of course, that Mr Dogbody is a detective in the police farce. - Correction Notice in the Ely Standard, a British newspaper

If somebody has a bad heart, they can plug this jack in at night as they go to bed and it will monitor their heart throughout the night. And the next morning, when they wake up dead, there'll be a record. - Mark S. Fowler, FCC Chairman

It was not my class of people. There was not a producer, a press agent, a director, an actor. - Zsa Zsa Gabor, on the jury used in her assault trial

The only reason we're 7-0 is because we've won all seven of our games. - David Garcia, baseball team manager

Go see it and see for yourself why you shouldn't go see it. - Samuel Goldwyn

Keep a stiff upper chin. - Samuel Goldwyn

This book has too much plot and not enough story. - Samuel Goldwyn

You've got to take the sour with the bitter. - Samuel Goldwyn

We're overpaying him but he's worth it.. - Samuel Goldwyn

Don't pay any attention to the critics--don't even ignore them. - Samuel Goldwyn

I don't think anyone should write his autobiography until after he's dead. - Samuel Goldwyn

If you don't dissagree with me, how will I know I'm right? - Samuel Goldwyn

A bachelor's life is no life for a single man. - Samuel Goldwyn

Why only twelve? - Samuel Goldwyn, while filming The Last Supper, (attributed)

Here lies Jan Smith, wife of Thomas Smith, marble Cutter. This monument was erected by her husband as a tribute to her memory and a specimen of his work. Monuments of this same style are two hundred and fifty dollars. - Gravestone Inscription

Please deposit your valuables in the management. - Guangdong Victory Hotel instruction Card, Guangdong, China

Sometimes they write what I say and not what I mean. - Pedro Guerrero, baseball player, on reporters

Teeth extracted by the latest methodists. - Hong Kong dental advertisement

We've got to pause and ask ourselves: How much clean air do we need? - Lee Iacocca

Secretaries for openings in college administrative areas. Good typing, word processing helpful. Able to interfere with faculty, staff, and students. - Irondequoit, NY want-ad

Passive activity income does not include the following: Income for an activity that is not a passive activity. - IRS form 8583, Passive Activity Loss Limitation

You will find it a distinct help if you know and look as if you know what you are doing. - IRS Training Manual for tax auditors

Please provide the date of your death. - from an IRS letter

If people get a kick out of running down pedestrians, you have to let them do it. - Paul Jacobs, marketing director for a video game company

Cheered by their words with an altogether more positive attitude to boxing...I found myself recalling the words of Marlin Brando in On the Waterfront, "I could have been a bartender." - Look Japan magazine article

Four people were killed, one seriously, and eight more received slight injuries. - Japan Times article

All of the Mets' road wins against Los Angeles this year have been at Dodger Stadium. - Ralph Kiner, NY Sportscaster

Most of my cliches aren't original. - Chuck Knox, NFL football coach

He was probably our greatest living painter -- until he died. - LBC British Television News

I want to thank each and every one of you for having extinguished yourselves this session. - Gib Lewis, Texas Speaker of the House

And now, will y'all stand and be recognized? - Gib Lewis, Texas Speaker of the House, to a group of people in wheelchairs on Disability Day

This is unparalyzed in the state's history. - Gib Lewis, Texas Speaker of the House

Mattie's Restaurant and Yogurt Palace, "An alternative to Good Eating" - Restaurant Business Card from Decatur, Texas

The people don't take baths and they don't speak English. No golf courses, no room service. Who needs it? - Jim McMahon, NFL football quarterback, on Europe

People say I'm extravagant because I want to be surrounded by beauty. But tell me, who wants to be surrounded by garbage? - Imelda Marcos , one-time Phillippine first lady, and owner of 3,000 pairs of shoes

If ever there was a case of clearer evidence than this of persons acting in concert together, this case is that case! - Sir R. Megarry

Can't act. Can't sing. Balding. Can dance a little. - MGM summary of a screen test by some guy named Fred Astaire

No one wants to say the sky is falling, but in this instance I am afraid the emperor has no clothes. Despite Herculean efforts by the Council and Council staff, we are still only dealing with the tip of the iceberg. - Charles Millard, NYC councilman, in a press release

All you have to do is go down to the bottom of your swimming pool and hold your breath. - David Miller, US DOE spokesperson, on protecting yourself from nuclear radiation

You are welcome to visit the cemetery where famous Russian and Soviet composers, artists, and writers are buried daily except Thursday. - sign in a Moscow Hotel

I was under medication when I made the decision to burn the tapes. - Richard Nixon, US President

I was provided with additional input that was radically different from the truth. I assisted in furthering that version. - Colonel Oliver North, from his Iran-Contra testimony

Ladies are requested not to have children at the bar. - sign in a Norwegian cocktail lounge

We've been working on the basics because, basically, we've been having trouble with the basics. - Bob Ojeda, baseball pitcher

It is beyond my apprehension. - Danny Ozark, baseball team manager, regarding his team's losing streak

We are sorry to announce that Mr Albert Brown has been quite unwell, owing to his recent death, and is taking a short holiday to recover. - Parish Magazine

I didn't know Onward Christian Soldiers was a Christian song. - Aggie Pate, at a non-denominational mayor's breakfast, Fort Worth, Texas

This planet is our home. If we destroy the planet, we've destroyed our home, so it is fundamentally important. - H. Ross Perot

These people haven't seen the last of my face. If I go down, I'm going down standing up. - Chuck Person, NBA Basketball player

Men, I want you just thinking of one word all season. One word and one word only: Super Bowl. - Bill Peterson, football coach

The Lybian army is capable of destroying America and breaking its nose. - Muammar Qaddafi

Space is almost infinite. As a matter of fact, we think it is infinite. - Dan Quayle, US VP, head of the Space Council

Hawaii is a unique state. It is a small state. It is a state that is by itself. It is a --it is different from the other 49 states. Well, all states are different, but it's got a particularly unique situation. - Dan Quayle, US VP

And now the sequence of events in no particular order. - Dan Rather, television news anchor

Seafood brought in by customers will not be entertained. - Restaurant sign in Langkawi, Malaysia

At present there are such goings-on that everything is at a standstill. - Sir Boyle Roche

P.S. If you do not receive this, of course it must have been miscarried; therefore I beg you to write and let me know. - Sir Boyle Roche

Order you summers suit. Because is big rush we will execute customers in strict rotation. - Sign in a tailor's shop

Is forbidden to steal towels, please. If you are not person to do such is please not to read notice. - Sign in a Tokyo hotel

I have nothing to say, and I'll only say it once. - Floyd Smith, NHL Hockey coach

Be sure and put some of those neutrons on it. - Mike Smith, Baseball pitcher, ordering a salad at a restaurant

It's got lots of installation. - Mike Smith, Baseball pitcher, describing his new coat

There will be a Moscow Exhibition of Arts by 15,000 Soviet Republic painters and sculptors. These were executed over the past two years. - article in Soviet Weekly

You don't tell us how to stage the news, and we don't tell you how to report it. - Larry Speakes, press secretary for President George Bush, addressing the media

Was it you or your brother who was killed in the war? - Reverand William Spooner, of Oxford, England (for whom the 'Spoonerism' is named)

The team has come along slow but fast. - Casey Stengel, baseball player, Mets manager

There comes a time in every man's life and I've had many of them. - Casey Stengel, baseball player, Mets manager

We are not without accomplishment. We have managed to distribute poverty equally. - Nguyen Co Thatch, Vietnamese foreign minister

The word "genius" isn't applicable in football. A genius is a guy like Norman Einstein. - Joe Theisman, NFL football quarterback and sports analyst

Fiction writing is great. You can make up almost anything. - Ivana Trump, upon finishing her first novel

Q: What should I do if I find a rock in a bag of potatoes?
A: Simply return the rock to your grocer, who will give you the rock's weight in potatoes. - from a USDA booklet, titled How to Buy Potatoes

I've read about foreign policy and studied -- I know the number of continents. - George Wallace, 1968 presidential campaign

We don't necessarily discriminate. We simply exclude certain types of people. - Colonel Gerald Wellman, ROTC Instructor

Well, that was a cliff-dweller. - Wes Westrum, baseball coach, about a close game

I'm the consul for information, but I don't have any information. - Ofra Ben Yaacoe, Israeli Consul, Chicago