Construction and Creation

The whole difference between construction and creation is exactly this: that a thing constructed can only be loved after it is constructed; but a thing created is loved before it exists. 

Source: GK Chesterton, Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens, Chapter III "Pickwick Papers" (1911)

Procrastination

My advice is to never do tomorrow what you can do today. Procrastination is the thief of time.

Source: Mark Twain, David Copperfield, Ch 12, 1850

On Trying

My meaning simply is, that whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart to do well; that whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself to completely; that in great aims and in small, I have always been thoroughly in earnest.

Source: Mark Twain, David Copperfield Ch42, 1850

Tears

Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlying our hard hearts.

Source: Mark Twain, Great Expectations, 1861

Dignity and Holiness

Dignity, and even holiness too, sometimes, are more questions of coat and waistcoat than some people imagine.

Source: Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist Ch37, 1838

Possibilities as Probabilities

The most important thing in life is to stop saying ‘I wish’ and start saying ‘I will.’ Consider nothing impossible, then treat possibilities as probabilities.

Source: Mark Twain, Unsourced

On Communication

I have heard it broached that orders should be given in great new ships by electric telegraph. I admire machinery as much is any man, and am as thankful to it as any man can be for what it does for us. But it will never be a substitute for the face of a man, with his soul in it, encouraging another man to be brave and true.

Source: Charles Dickens, The Wreck of the Golden Mary

Death

Death may beget life, but oppression can beget nothing other than itself.

Source: Charles Dickens, Unsourced

The Next War

The next war ... may well bury Western civilization forever.

Source:  Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Unsourced
Taken From: Antiwar.com Anti-War Quotes

Friends and Chocolate

There is nothing better than a friend, unless it is a friend with chocolate.

Source: Charles Dickens, Unsourced
Taken From: Unknown

Freedom

I only ask to be free. The butterflies are free.

Source: Charles Dickens, Bleak House, 1853
Taken From: Unknown

Poetic Life

From a biological standpoint, human life almost reads like a poem.  It has its own rhythm and beat, its internal cycles of growth and decay.

Source: Lin Yutang, Unsourced
Taken From: Strauss and Howe, The Fourth Turning, 1997

Starvation

In a country where the sole employer is the State, opposition means death by slow starvation.

Source: Leon Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed, Ch11 1936
Taken From: Richard Weaver, Ideas Have Consequences 1948

On DDT (Stops Malaria)

Michael Crichton, an author and PhD molecular biologist, plainly stated, “Banning DDT is one of the most disgraceful episodes in the twentieth century history of America. We knew better, and we did it anyway, and we let people around the world die, and we didn’t give a damn.”

Source: Paul Driessen, Eco-Imperialism: Green Power, Black Death. (Merril Press: 2004), page 73
Taken From: New Eugenics and the Rise of the Global Scientific Dictatorship: The Technological Revolution and the Future of Freedom, Part3

Natures Infinite Book of Secrecy

In nature's infinite book of secrecy
a little I can read.

Source:  Shakespeare's Soothsayer in Antony and Cleopatra, Act I, Scene II 1603-1607
Taken From: Richard Weaver, Ideas Have Consequences 1948

On the Size of the State

"[W]hen you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing; when you see that money is flowing to those who deal not in goods, but in favors; when you see that men get rich more easily by graft than by work, and your laws no longer protect you against them, but protect them against you. . . you may know that your society is doomed."

Source:  Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged 1957
Taken From: Simon Black, July 8, Boiling frog alert: Congress wants automatic wage deductions to pay down the debt

Forced Good

Do not ever say that the desire to "do good" by force is a good motive. Neither power-lust nor stupidity are good motives.

Source: Ayn Rand, Unsourced
Taken From: Antiwar.com

Statism and War

Statism needs war; a free country does not. Statism survives by looting; a free country survives by producing.

Source: Ayn Rand, Unsourced
Taken From: Antiwar.com

US Imperialism

... U.S. imperialism has been the greatest force for good in the world during the past century.

Source: Max Boot, American Imperialism? No Need to Run Away from Label - 5/6/2003
Taken From: Wikipedia 

Note:  The blog author completely disagrees with Max Boot on this point.

Equality

All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

Source: George Orwell, Animal Farm, 17 August 1945