A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.

-- Maya Angelou, Unknown , Unknown

A degree of chaos is essential to discover what we don't know we're looking for.

-- George ?, theater designer, Box Conspiracy play., Unknown , Unknown

A fool's brain digests philosophy into folly, science into superstition, and art into pedantry. Hence University education.

-- George Bernard Shaw, Unknown , 1856-1950

A half truth is a whole lie.

-- Yiddish Proverb, Unknown , Unknown

A line is a dot which goes for a walk.

-- Klee, Unknown , Unknown

A man finds room in the few square inches of his face for the traits of all his ancestors: for the expression of all his history, and his wants.

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson, Unknown , Unknown

A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are portals of discovery.

-- James Joyce, Unknown , Unknown

A PBS mind in an MTV world.

-- Bumper Sticker, Unknown , Unknown

A photograph is a moral decision taken in one-eighth of a second, or one sixteenth, or one one-hundred and twenty-eighth.

-- Salman Rushdie, The Ground Beneath Her Feet. NY: Henry Holt & Co., P. 13, 1999

A teacher who can arouse a feeling for one single good action, for one single good poem, accomplishes more than he who fills our memory with rows and rows of natural objects, classified with name and form.

-- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Elective Affinities, Book II, Unknown

Adde, quod ingénues didicisse fideliter artes Emollit mores, nec sinit esse fervos. To be instructed in the arts, softens the manners and makes men gentle.

-- Ovid, Epistoloe Ex Ponto. II. 9. 47., Unknown

All generalizations are false.

-- Unknown , Unknown , Unknown

All great truths started out as blasphemies.

-- George Bernard Shaw, Unknown , Unknown

An artist is a person who has invented an artist.

-- Harold Rosenberg, Unknown , Unknown

Any fool can write a bad advertisement, but it takes a genius to keep his hands off a good one.

-- David Ogilvy, Unknown , Unknown

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction.

-- Albert Einstein, Unknown , 1879-1955

Anything too stupid to be said is sung.

-- Voltaire, Unknown , Unknown

Aristotle noted that it was a mark of understanding to know what sorts of things can be proven and made precise, and what sorts, on the other hand, require our tolerance of vagueness and probable conclusions.

-- John Churchill, From the Secretary: Inspiring Conversations in The Key Reporter. Vol 67, Number 4. P. 2., Summer 2002

Art consists of limitation. The most beautiful part of every picture is the frame.

-- G.K. Chesterton, Tremendous Trifles, Unknown

Art is I; science is we.

-- Claude Bernard, Unknown , 1813-1878

Art is the objectification of feeling, and the subjectification of nature.

-- Suzanne Langer, Mind, 1967

Artistic growth is, more than it is anything else, a refining of the sense of truthfulness. The stupid believe that to be truthful is easy; only the artist, knows how difficult it is.

-- Willa Cather, 1873-1947, The Song of the Lark, 1915

Attain deliverance in disturbances.

-- Kyong Ho, (1849-1912), Unknown

Attempt the impossible in order to improve your work.

-- Bette Davis, Mother Goddamn, 1974

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

-- Margaret Wolfe Hungerford, Molly Brown, 1878

Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -- that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

-- John Keats, Ode on a Grecian Urn, Unknown

Breathe-in experience, breathe-out poetry.

-- Muriel Rukeyser, 1913-1980, Poem Out of childhood, 1935

Chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit.

-- Henry Brook Adams, The Education of Henry Adams, Unknown

Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.

-- Pablo Picasso, Unknown , Unknown

Consider the postage stamp: its usefulness consists in the ability to stick to one thing till it gets there.

-- John Billings, Unknown , 1818-1885

Context is always as relevant as concept.

-- Terry Olson, Focus on Faculty, Vol 15(2), Brigham Young University Faculty Center, 2005

Cover less, uncover more.

-- possibly Bland Tomkinson, Unknown , Unknown

Creation is a drug I can't do without.

-- Cecil B. DeMille, Unknown , Unknown

Creative minds have always been known to survive any kind of bad training.

-- Anna Freud, Unknown , Unknown

Dakota tribal wisdom says that when you discover you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount.

-- Unknown , Unknown , Unknown

Dance is the hidden language of the soul.

-- Martha Graham, Unknown , Unknown

Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.

-- Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, Unknown , Unknown

Dying Is an art, like everything else. I do it exceptionally well.

-- Sylvia Plath, 1932-1963, Lady Lazarus, 1960

Education is the art of the utilization of knowledge. This an art very difficult to impart…We must beware of what I will call 'inert ideas' that is to say, ideas that are merely received into the mind without being utilized or tested or thrown into fresh combinations.

-- Alfred North Whitehead, Aims of Education and Other Essays, NY: MacMillan, 1924

Elvis Presley had nothing to do with excellence, just myth.

-- Marlon Brando, Unknown , Unknown

Encourage spontaneity…by regularly scheduling creative activities.

-- Art Peteron, Unknown , Unknown

Every decision you make is a mistake.

-- Edward Dahlberg, Unknown , Unknown

Every job is a self-portrait of the individual who did it.

-- Carolyn Coats, Things Your Mother Always Told you but You Didn't Want to Hear, 1994

Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow the talent to the dark place where it leads.

-- Erica Jong, Unknown , Unknown

Everyone is gifted. Some open the package sooner.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

Everything an artist loves eventually comes to the surface...

-- Joe Downing, Unknown , 1993

Excellence can be attained if you -Care more often than others think wise. -Risk more often than others think is safe. -Dream more often than others think is practical. -Expect more than others think is possible.

-- Janet Cagery, Unknown , Unknown

Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterwards.

-- Vernon Law, Unknown , Unknown

Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.

-- Truman Capote, Unknown , Unknown

Fear is what prevents the flowering of the mind.

-- J. Krishnamurti, On Education., Unknown

Fiction reveals truths that reality obscures.

-- Jessamyn West, 1902-1984, To See the Dream, 1956

Find out who you are and do it on purpose.

-- Dolly Parton, Unknown , Unknown

Five mysteries hold the keys to the unseen: the act of love, and the birth of a baby, and the contemplation of great art, and being in the presence of death or disaster, and hearing the human voice lifted in song.

-- Salman Rushdie, The Ground Beneath Her Feet. NY: Henry Holt & Co., P. 13, 1999

Flops are a part of life's menu, and I've never been a girl to miss out on any of the courses.

-- Rosalind Russell, New York Herald Tribune, April 11, 1957

Foolishness is infinitely more fascinating than intelligence…. Intelligence has limits while foolishness has none.

-- Claude Chabrol, Unknown , born June 24, 1930

For an actress to be a success she must have the face of Venus, the brains of Minerva, the grace of Terpsichore, the memory of Macaulay, the figure of Juno, and the hide of a rhinoceros.

-- Ethel Barrymore, in George Jean nathan, (1953) The Theatre in the Fifties, lived 1879-1959

For original ideas to come about, you have to let them percolate under the level of consciousness in a place where we have no way to make them obey our own desires or our own direction. Their random combinations are driven by forces we don't know about.

-- Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi, Unknown , Unknown

Genius is only a form of sustained patience.

-- Donald Murray, Unknown , Unknown

Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astair did only backwards and in high heels.

-- on a Button, Unknown , Unknown

Good teaching is one-fourth preparation and three-fourths theatre.

-- Gail Godwin, The Odd Woman, Ballantine Books, 1995

He and his boys up there were keeping it new, at the risk of ruin, destruction, madness, and death, in order to find new ways to make us listen. For, while the tale of how we suffer, and how we are delighted, and how we may triumph it is never new, it always must be heard. There isn't any other tale to tell, it's the only light we've got in all this darkness.

-- James Baldwin, Sonny's Blues, 1957

He has Van Gogh's ear for music.

-- Billy Wilder, Unknown , Unknown

He prayed—it wasn’t my religion. He ate—it wasn’t what I ate. He spoke—it wasn’t my language. He dressed—it wasn’t what I wore. He took my hand—it wasn’t the color of mine. But when he laughed—it was how I laughed, and when he cried—it was how I cried

-- Amy Maddox, age 16, Franklin Community High School. Bargersville, IN, "Underneath we're all the same", Unknown

He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils, for time is the greatest innovator.

-- Francis Bacon, Unknown , Unknown

He who influences the thought of his times, influences all the times that follow. He has made his impress on eternity.

-- Hypatia, in Elbert Hubbard, (1908) Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Teachers, c. 370-415

He [Hercule Poirot] tapped his forehead. "These little grey cells. It is 'up to them.'"

-- Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, 1920

Hope is the most precious treasure to a person.

-- Fortune Cookie, Unknown , Unknown

How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.

-- Anne Frank, Unknown , Unknown

Human beings do not carry civilization in their genes. All that we do carry in our genes are certain capacities-- the capacity to learn to walk upright, to use our brains, to speak, to relate to our fellow men, to construct and use tools, to explore the universe, and to express that exploration in religion, in art, in science, in philosophy.

-- Margaret Mead, 1901-1978, "Human Nature Will Flower If--" in the New York Times Magazine, April 19, 1964

Human salvation lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted.

-- Martin Luther King, Jr., Unknown , Unknown

Humankind can't stand too much reality.

-- T.S. Eliot, Unknown , 1888-1965

I am glad all the great masters are dead! I only wish they had died sooner.

-- Mark Twain, Unknown , Unknown

I cannot pretend to feel impartial about colors. I rejoice with the brilliant ones and am genuinely sorry for the poor browns.

-- Winston Churchill, Unknown , Unknown

I didn't like the play but then I saw it under adverse conditions--the curtain was up.

-- Groucho Marx, Unknown , Unknown

I don't know anything about music. In my line, you don't have to.

-- Elvis Presley, Unknown , Unknown

I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.

-- Bill Cosby, Unknown , Unknown

I don't think necessity is the mother of invention--invention, in my opinion, arises directly from idleness, possibly also from laziness. To save oneself trouble.

-- Agatha Christie, An Autobiography, 1977

I don't think of all the misery, but of all the beauty that still remains.

-- Anne Frank, Unknown , Unknown

I have great belief in the fact that whenever there is chaos, it creates wonderful thinking. I consider chaos a gift.

-- Septima Clark, in Brian Lanker (1989). I Dream a World., 1898-1987

I have never been hurt by anything I didn't say.

-- Calvin Coolidge, Unknown , Unknown

I know there are many who have pitied my beginnings, thinking it tragic that I had to endure such traumas both as a child and throughout my life, but I confess that I have rather pitied those who have never tasted the bitterness of a trial "too severe." For how is one to appreciate the contrast of light's dawning hope if his soul has never trembled through the dark hours of a nightmare's watch? ...We dare not steel ourselves against our trials, running away from the fires where our pruned branches crumble to ashes. For if we escape those flames, we will risk barrenness of soul and will miss out on the beauty that only is born through the ashes of yesterday's grief.

-- Cammie Van Rooy, Commemoration of Martyrs of Papua New Guinea, 1942, Unknown

I never saw an ugly thing in my life: for let the form of an object be what it may, --light, shade, perspective will always make it beautiful.

-- John Constable, Unknown , Unknown

I refuse to organize my life. It would interfere with the creative process.

-- on a Button, Unknown , Unknown

I refuse to star in your psychodrama.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

I restore myself when I'm alone. A career is born in public--talent in privacy.

-- Marilyn Monroe, Ms. Magazine, August 1972

I think that one's art is a growth inside one. I do not think one can explain growth. It is silent and subtle. One does not keep digging up a plant to see how it grows.

-- Emily Carr, Unknown , Unknown

I thought I could change the world. It took me a hundred years to figure out I can't change the world. I can only change Bessie. And honey, that ain't easy either.

-- Bessie Delany, Unknown , Unknown

I wanted a perfect ending. Now I've learned, the hard way, that some poems don't rhyme, and some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next. Delicious Ambiguity.

-- Gilda Radner, Unknown , Unknown

I watched "Titanic" when I got back home from the hospital, and cried. I knew then that my IQ had been damaged.

-- Stephen King, Unknown , Unknown

I write from my knowledge not my lack, from my strength not my weakness.

-- Lucille Clifton, Unknown , Unknown

I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance.

-- e e cummings, Unknown , Unknown

Ideas without precedent are generally looked upon with disfavor and men are shocked if their conceptions of an orderly world challenged.

-- J. Harlen Bretz., Unknown , Unknown

If a man is called to be a streetsweeper, 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 streetsweeper who did his job well.

-- Martin Luther King, Jr., Unknown , Unknown

If I didn't start painting, I would have raised chickens.

-- Grandma Moses, My Life's History, 1947

If people only knew how hard I work to gain my mastery, it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all.

-- Michelangelo Buonnarroti, Unknown , Unknown

If the horse you're drawing looks more like a dog, make it a dog.

-- Cynthia Copeland Lewis, Really important stuff my kids have taught me, 1994

If truth is beauty, how come no one has their hair done in a library?

-- Lily Tomlin, Unknown , born September 1, 1939

If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all.

-- Noam Chomsky, Unknown , Unknown

If we don't change, we don't grow. If we don't grow, we aren't really living.

-- Gail Sheehy, Unknown , 1937-

If you always do what you always did, you will always get what you always got.

-- FMEA, Stamatis, Unknown , Unknown

In a mere half-century films have gone from silent to unspeakable.

-- Doug Larson, Unknown , Unknown

In music we gain a sense of rhythm through the absence of sound. A similar process occurs in communication between two people.

-- Sheldon Roth, Unknown , Unknown

In the matter of soliloquies we cannot accept Hamlet as an unbiased authority. We merely find in him the possible origin of the belief that talking to oneself is a bad sign.

-- Max Beerbohm, Unknown , Unknown

Interpretation is the revenge of the intellect upon art.

-- Susan Sontag, Evergreen Review, December 1964.

It feels a lot colder when you're shoveling snow than when you're building a snow fort.

-- Cynthia Copeland Lewis, Really important stuff my kids have taught me, 1994

It is best to learn as we go, not go as we have learned.

-- Leslie Jeanne Sahler, Unknown , Unknown

It is by teaching that we teach ourselves, by relating that we observe, by affirming that we examine, by showing that we look, by writing that we think, by pumping that we draw water into the well.

-- Henri Frederic Amiel, Unknown , Unknown

It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.

-- Albert Einstein, Unknown , Unknown

It's more fun to color outside the lines.

-- Cynthia Copeland Lewis, Really important stuff my kids have taught me, 1994

Karate is a form of martial arts in which people who have had years and years of training can, using only their hands and feet, make some of the worst movies in the history of the world.

-- Dave Barry, Unknown , Unknown

Less is a bore.

-- Venturi, Unknown , Unknown

Less is a snore.

-- Versace, Unknown , Unknown

Less is more only when more is no good.

-- Wright, Unknown , Unknown

Less is more work.

-- McCue, Unknown , Unknown

Less is more.

-- Mies van der Rohe, Unknown , Unknown

Life forms illogical patterns. It is haphazard and full of beauties which I try to catch as they fly by, for who knows whether any of them will ever return?

-- Margot Fonteyn, Unknown , Unknown

Life requires thorough preparation. Veneer isn't worth anything.

-- George Washington Carver, Unknown , Unknown

Live your life as an exclamation,not an explanation.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.

-- H.L. Mencken, Unknown , born September 12, 1880

Meandering to a different drummer.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

Men seldom make passes At girls who wear glasses.

-- Dorothy Parker, 1893-1967, "News Item" (1926) in Not So Deep as a Well (1937), Unknown

Most of us would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism.

-- Anonymous, Unknown , Unknown

My evil genius Procrastination has whispered me to tarry 'til a more convenient season.

-- Mary Todd Lincoln, Unknown , Unknown

New and stirring things are belittled because if they are not belittled, the humiliating question arises: why then are you not taking part in them?

-- H.G. Wells, Unknown , Unknown

No matter how often you use the same brushes and paints, each canvas will be different.

-- Greg Henry Quinn, 365 Meditations for Teachers, March 19., 1995

No opera plot can be sensible, for people do not sing when they are feeling sensible.

-- W.H. Auden, Unknown , Unknown

No other creative field is as closed to those who are not white and male as is the visual arts. After I decided to be an artist, the first thing that I had to believe was that I, a black woman, could penetrate the art scene, and that, further, I could do so without sacrificing one iota of my blackness or my femaleness or my humanity.

-- Faith Ringgold, Ms. Magazine, January 1973

No two people on earth are alike, and it's got to be that way in music or it isn't music.

-- Billie Holiday, Unknown , Unknown

No writer or teacher or artist can escape the responsibility of influencing others whether he intends to or not, whether he is conscious of it or not.

-- Arthur Koestler, Unknown , Unknown

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is quite common. Education alone will not; the world is full of educated failures. Persistence and Determination alone are the all-powerful elements.

-- Adapted by ? From a quote by Calvin Coolidge, Unknown , Unknown

Nothing is foolproof to a talented fool.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

Nothing is more beautiful than cheerfulness in an old face.

-- Jean Paul Richter, Unknown , Unknown

Often people attempt to live their lives backwards; they try to have more things, or more money, in order to do more of what they want, so they will be happier. The way it actually works is the reverse. You must first be who you really are, then do what you need to do, in order to have what you want.

-- Margaret Young., Unknown , Unknown

On those who overanalyze his music: When you tear the wings off a butterfly, it is no longer a butterfly

-- Claude Debussy, Unknown , Unknown

One cannot collect all the beautiful shells on the beach; one can collect only a few, and they are more beautiful if they are few.

-- Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Unknown , Unknown

One cannot create an art that speaks to men when one has nothing to say.

-- Andre Malraux, Unknown , Unknown

One of the things that Ivar knew about Mrs. Walker was that she would only tell him what she knew if he asked the right question, so he spent a portion of his time meditating over what he might ask Mrs. Walker and how he might phrase the question.

-- Jane Smiley, Moo. New York: Fawcett Columbine. P. 20., 1995

One who has imagination without learning, has wings without feet.

-- Joseph Joubert, Unknown , Unknown

Only people who do things make mistakes.

-- Unknown , Unknown , Unknown

Only the brave should teach….Teaching is a vocation. It is as sacred as priesthood; as innate a desire, as inescapable as the genius which compels a great artist. If he has not the concern for humanity, the love of living creatures, the vision of the priest and the artist, he must not teach.

-- Pearl S. Buck, Unknown , Unknown

Order is the shape upon which beauty depends.

-- Pearl Buck, Unknown , Unknown

Original thinking migrates each day in search of nourishment.

-- Maya Angelou, Unknown , Unknown

Our busy age does not always have time to read, but it always has time to look.

-- Theophile Gautier, Unknown , 1858

Our greatest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our greatest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

-- Boston-NY AIDS Ride., Unknown , c2000

Painting is not done to decorate apartments. It is an instrument of war.

-- Pablo Picasso, Unknown , Unknown

Personality is more important than beauty, but imagination is more important than both of them.

-- Laurette Taylor, on actors, in Toby Cole and Helen Krich, (1970), Actors on Acting., lived 1887-1946

Plain women know more about men than beautiful ones do.

-- Katharine Hepburn, Unknown , Unknown

Plato used the dialogue format because the exchange of views, the posing and answering of questions, showed that understanding is a living, dynamic process. He distrusted writing because the settled character of the written word makes it look as if truth can be fixed and made to stand still. It is worth remembering that this greatest advocate of the objective reality of truth also believed that our access to that truth was sustained in reasoned discussion.

-- John Churchill, From the Secretary: Inspiring Conversations in The Key Reporter. Vol 67, Number 4. P. 2., Summer 2002

Play it again, Sam.

-- Misattributed to movie Casablanca. It's never said in the movie., Unknown , Unknown

Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

Remember, any jackass can kick over the barn, but it takes a carpenter to build one.

-- Tip O'Neil quoting Sam Rayburn, former Speaker of the House, Unknown , Unknown

Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us.

-- William O. Douglas, Unknown , Unknown

Rossini would have been a great composer if his teacher had spanked him enough on his backside.

-- Ludwig van Beethoven, Unknown , Unknown

Rules and models destroy genius and art

-- William Hazlitt, "On Taste", 1778-1830

Science, engineering, technology. All worthless unless they make you feel something.

-- BMW ad, Brill's Content, p. 16, 1998, November

She was so dramatic she stabbed the potatoes at dinner.

-- Sydney Smith, on Mrs. Sara Siddons, 18th c actress, Unknown , Unknown

Sigmund Freud was a half-baked Viennese quack. Our literature, culture, and the films of Woody Allen would be better today if Freud had never written a word.

-- Ian Shoales, Unknown , Unknown

Silence is more musical than any song.

-- Christina Rossetti, Unknown , Unknown

Since new developments are the products of a creative mind, we must therefore stimulate and encourage that type of mind in every way possible.

-- George Washington Carver, Unknown , Unknown

Since these mysteries exceed my grasp, I shall pretend to have organized them.

-- Jean Cocteau, Unknown , born July 5, 1889.

So many gods, so many creeds, So many paths that wind and wind, While just the art of being kind Is all the sad world needs.

-- Ella Wheeler Wilcox, "The World's Need," Custer, 1896

Some things are stored in the heart and not in the mind.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

Sometimes you just have to take the leap, and build your wings on the way down.

-- Kobi Yamada, Unknown , Unknown

Spend all you have for loveliness, Buy it and never count the cost

-- Sara Teasdale, "Barter," Love Songs, 1917

Success is 99 percent failure.

-- Soichiro Honda, Unknown , Unknown

Success means we go to sleep at night knowing that our talents and abilities were used in a way that served others.

-- Marianne Williamson, Unknown , Unknown

Success or failure is often determined on the drawing board.

-- Robert J. McKain, Unknown , Unknown

Teachers at all levels encourage the idea that you have to talk about things in order to understand them, because they wouldn't have jobs, otherwise. But it's phony, you know.

-- Denise Levertov, The Craft of Poetry, Unknown

Teachers believe they have a gift for giving; it drives them with the same irrepressible drive that drives others to create a work of art or a market or a building.

-- A. Bartlett Giam[m]atti, Unknown , Unknown

Tell us again, for we forget, that work done without love is stillborn, mindless, and lost in the very hour of its deliverance.

-- Ray Bradbury, Unknown , Unknown

The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray.

-- Oscar Wilde, Unknown , born October 16, 1954

The art of progress is to preserve order amid change, and to preserve change amid order.

-- Alfred North Whitehead, Unknown , Unknown

The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart.

-- Hellen Keller, Unknown , Unknown

The camera makes everyone a tourist in other people's reality, and eventually in one's own.

-- Susan Sontag, Unknown , Unknown

The cruelest lies are often told in silence.

-- Adlai Stevenson, Unknown , Unknown

The difference between pornography and erotica is lighting.

-- Gloria Leonard, Unknown , Unknown

The distance is nothing; it's only the first step that is difficult.

-- Mme. du Deffand, Unknown , Unknown

The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlearn.

-- Gloria Steinem, Unknown , 1934

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

-- Eleanor Roosevelt, Unknown , Unknown

The graduate with a Science degree asks, "Why does it work?" The graduate with an Engineering degree asks, "How does it work?" The graduate with an Accounting degree asks, "How much will it cost?" The graduate with a Liberal Arts degree asks, "Do you want fries with that?"

-- Unknown , Unknown , Unknown

The graduate with a Science degree asks, "Why does it work?" The graduate with an Engineering degree asks, "How does it work?" The graduate with an Accounting degree asks, "How much will it cost?" The graduate with an Arts degree asks, "Do you want fries with that?"

-- Unknown , Unknown , Unknown

The greatest of all inventors is accident.

-- Mark Twain, Unknown , Unknown

The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder.

-- Alfred Hitchcock, Unknown , born August 13, 1899

The man who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything.

-- Bishop W. C. Mager, Unknown , Unknown

The only difference between a good shot and a bad shot is whether it goes in or not.

-- Charles Barkley, Unknown , Unknown

The only genius with an IQ of 60.

-- Gore Vidal, on Andy Warhol, Unknown , Unknown

The past is a work of art, free of irrelevancies and loose ends.

-- Max Beerbohm, Unknown , Unknown

The quickest way to unlock your talent is to take the flute out of the box.

-- James Galway, Centrepiece, 2003

The real art of conversation is not only to say the right thing in the right place, but also to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.

-- E-mail humor, Unknown , Unknown

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one.

-- Mark Twain, Unknown , Unknown

The superfluous is very

-- Unknown , Unknown , Unknown

The trouble with a lot of artists today is that they have too much technique and equipment. They don't know what to do with it all. If you cut down on it, you can work more strongly within narrower limits.

-- Alexander Calder, Unknown , Unknown

The truth is not a crystal that can be slipped into one's pocket, but an endless current into which one falls headlong.

-- Robert Musil, Unknown , Unknown

The way to get good ideas is to get lots of ideas and throw the bad ones away.

-- Linus Pauling, Unknown , Unknown

The white fathers told us, "I think, therefore, I am" and the black mother within each of us--the poet--whispers in our dreams, I feel, therefore I can be free.

-- Audre Lorde, Unknown , Unknown

The wildest colts make the best horses.

-- Plutarch, Unknown , Unknown

The workings of the human heart are the profoundest mystery of the universe. One moment they make us despair of our kind,and the next we see in them the reflection of the divine image.

-- Charles W. Chesnutt, he Marrow of Tradition, 1901

The world is but a canvas to the imagination.

-- Henry David Thoreau, Unknown , Unknown

The world is but canvas to our imaginations.

-- Henry David Thoreau, Unknown , Unknown

There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will have truly defeated age.

-- Sophia Loren, Unknown , Unknown

There is a great difference between information and inspiration. You can get information by the cartful and the wagonful and the libraryful and the Sunday newspaperful, or in any other chunks or lumps that you choose. ..It is cheap; it is common; and it is worth about as much as it costs. But inspiration which comes from touching the life of truth itself is a priceless gem which comes only from close, devoted and continuous toil. A man knows when he has touched red-hot truth. He feels the shock…

-- Martin Grove Brumbaugh, Unknown , 1898

There is majesty in simplicity.

-- Alexander Pope, Unknown , Unknown

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

-- Maya Angelou, Unknown , 1928

There's a natural law that says you never get something without giving up something.

-- Carolyn Coats, Things Your Mother Always Told you but You Didn't Want to Hear, 1994

There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself.

-- Johann Sebastian Bach, Unknown , Unknown

Those who do not learn how to decipher photographs will be the illiterate of the future.

-- Walter Benjamin, Unknown , Unknown

To draw, you must close your eyes and sing.

-- Picasso, Unknown , Unknown

To encourage literature and the arts is a duty which every good citizen owes to his country.

-- George Washington, Unknown , Unknown

To thine own self be true.

-- Shakespeare, Hamlet, act 1, scene iii, line 78, Unknown

Today I will remind myself and others that mistakes are lessons too.

-- Linda Conway, Unknown , Unknown

True genius can be identified by the fact that its expression changes the world into something it has never been before.

-- David Gerrold, Unknown , Unknown

Truth fears no questions.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

Truth is such a rare thing, it is delightful to tell it.

-- Emily Dickinson, 1830-1886, letter to Thomas Wentworth Higginson, August 1870

Use what talents you possess. The woods would be very silent if no birds sang there except those that sang best.

-- Henry van Dyke, Unknown , Unknown

Wagner's music is better than it sounds.

-- Mark Twain, Unknown , Unknown

We are all creative, but by the time we are three of four years old, someone has knocked the creativity out of us. Some people shut up the kids who start to tell stories. Kids dance in their cribs, but someone will insist they sit still. By the time the creative people are ten or twelve, they want to be like everyone else.

-- Maya Angelou, Unknown , 1928

We cannot tell what may happen to us in the strange medley of life, but we can decide what happens in us--how we take it, what we do with it--and that is what really counts in the end. How we take the raw stuff of life and make it a thing of worth and beauty--that is the test of living.

-- Joseph Fort Newton, Unknown , Unknown

We ought to hear at least one little song every day, read a good poem, see a first-rate painting, and if possible speak a few sensible words.

-- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Unknown , (1749-1832)

We see things not as they are, but as we are. Our perception is shaped by our precious experiences.

-- Dennis Kimbro, Unknown , Unknown

We would rather criticize ourselves than not talk about ourselves at all.

-- LaRochefoucauld, Unknown , Unknown

What a strange illusion it is to suppose that beauty is goodness.

-- Leo Tolstoy, Unknown , 1828-1910

What is beautiful is good and who is good will soon also be beautiful.

-- Sappho, Fragment, 101, c 613-580 B.C.

What may be done at any time will be done at no time.

-- Scottish proverb, Unknown , Unknown

Whatever we believe about ourselves and our ability comes true for us.

-- Susan L. Taylor, Unknown , Unknown

When a man is singing and cannot lift his voice, and another comes and sings with him, another who can lift his voice, the first will be able to lift his voice too. That is the secret of the bond between spirits.

-- Hasidic saying, Unknown , Unknown

When in doubt, make a fool of yourself. There is a microscopically thin line between being brilliantly creative and acting like the most gigantic idiot on earth. So what the hell, leap.

-- Cynthia Heimel, "Lower Manhattan Survival Tactics" in Village Voice, Unknown

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

-- Eric Hoffer, Unknown , born July 25, 1902

When preparing a presentation for a class I look for surprises, I found that surprise, that juxtaposition. It's that creation of an expectation and then hitting you with cold water to make you wake up-that's what I feel the great life of art is all about.

-- Steven Urkowitz, Unknown , Unknown

When you are looking for obstacles, you can't find opportunities.

-- J.C. Bell, Unknown , Unknown

When you dance with a bear, you can't quit just because you're tired.

-- Russian Proverb, Unknown , Unknown

When you do not know what you are doing, do it neatly.

-- Unknown, Unknown , Unknown

When you have nothing to say, say nothing.

-- Charles Caleb Colton, Unknown , Unknown

When you stop learning, stop listening, stop looking and asking questions, always new questions, then it is time to die.

-- Lillian Smith, Unknown , 1897-1966

When you tear the wings off a butterfly, it is no longer a butterfly.

-- Claude Debussy…on overanalyzing his music, Unknown , Unknown

Whether we are building a railroad or a cathedral, writing a book or painting a picture, few Americans are willing to take time to produce a really great result. Life today is so hurried, so tense, so frenzied, that the possibility of a sane and normal life is almost precluded.

-- Marion Le Roy Burton, Unknown , 1914

Who among us has not gazed thoughtfully and patiently at a painting of Jackson Pollock and thought, "What a piece of crap?"

-- Rob Long, Modern Review, 1992

Why do some people always see beautiful skies and grass and lovely flowers and incredible human beings, while others are hard-pressed to find anything or any place that is beautiful?

-- Leo Buscaglia, Unknown , Unknown

Why pose and posture a self that is other than you, when I know your true name.

-- Leon Forrest, Unknown , Unknown

Wisdom is oft times nearer when we stoop than when we soar.

-- William Wordsworth, Unknown , Unknown

With all your science, can you tell me how it is that light comes into the soul?

-- Henry David Thoreau, Unknown , Unknown

Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible

-- Frank Zappa, Unknown , Unknown

Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.

-- Unknown., Unknown , Unknown

Yes, reading history will make you a better citizen and more appreciative of the law, and of freedom, and of how the economy works or doesn't work, but it is also an immense pleasure--the way art is, or music is, or poetry is. And it's never stale.

-- David McCullough, "Rethinking Washington," Newsweek, p. 40, May 23, 2005

You always pass failure on the way to success.

-- Mickey Rooney, Unknown , Unknown

You can clutch the past so tightly to your chest that it leaves your arms too full to embrace the present.

-- Jan Glidewell, Unknown , Unknown

You don't get to decide your part in the school play, but you do get to decide whether or not you play it well.

-- Cynthia Copeland Lewis, Really important stuff my kids have taught me, 1994

You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm.

-- Colette, Unknown , Unknown

[W]hat is the use of a book…without pictures or conversations?

-- Lewis Carroll. Said by Alice, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Ed by Roger Lancelyn Green. Oxford University Press, 1982

….increasingly, we live in a world of pictures and a world of television. My presentation yesterday went out around the world and people saw it. There was a picture in of our newspapers this morning of a group of young Marines sitting on an aircraft carrier watching the presentation live. They are not waiting for it to be written up. They are not waiting for somebody to comment on it. They are not waiting for a talking-head to tell them what they saw. They were seeing it 10,000 miles away in real time, and making their own judgment.

-- Colin Powell, Secretary of State, Unknown , February 6, 2003

…I had been fed, in my youth, a lot of old wives' tales about the way men would instantly forsake a beautiful woman to flock around a brilliant one. It is but fair to say that, after getting out in the world, I had never seen this happen.

-- Dorothy Parker, 1893-1967, Constant Reader, 1970

…I have left no immortal work behind me--nothing to make my friends proud of my memory--but I have loved the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had time I would have made myself remembered.

-- John Keats, Unknown , born October 31, 1795

…It's a great comfort to have an artistic sister.

-- Louisa May Alcott, 1832-1888, Little Women, 1868

…The tragedy in life doesn't lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach.

-- Benjamin E. Mays, Unknown , Unknown

…while "cute" is hopelessly anchored to the Teletubby ideal, "ugly" is free to take infinite varieties. In this way, ugly is beautiful…

-- Jim Toomey, Poodle: The other white meat. Kansas City: Andrews McMeel Pub., 1999

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