# The coolest quote you know.

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [April 4, 2002, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857 "2002-04-04T20:54:32Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 20\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\
**Post date:** [April 5, 2002, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/41 "2002-04-05T23:31:27Z")

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They fuck you up your mom and dad  
They may not mean to, but they do;  
They give you all the faults they had,  
And add some new ones just for you.

But They were fucked up in their time  
By fools in old style hats and coats,  
Who half the time were sloppy stern,  
And half at one another’s throats.

Man hands on misery to man,  
It deepens like a coastal shelf,  
Get out as quickly as you can,  
And don’t have any kids yourself.

Philip Larkin

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**Author:** ![xcheopis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/bc8723/32.png) [@xcheopis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xcheopis)\
**Post date:** [April 5, 2002, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/42 "2002-04-05T23:32:04Z")

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“The wish to hear such baseness is degrading.” Dante; Inferno

“I tell you all my secrets, but I lie about my past.” Tom Waits song lyric; Tango 'Til They’re Sore

“You impudent jumped-up pantry boy!” Evelyn Waugh but I can’t remember the book or the character.

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**Author:** ![Rodd\_Hill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3ab097/32.png) [@Rodd\_Hill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodd_Hill)\
**Post date:** [April 5, 2002, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/43 "2002-04-05T23:47:40Z")

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I think, **xcheopis** , that “jumped-up pantry boy” is from the Anthony Shaffer film _Sleuth_, delivered by Lawrence Olivier’s character (and in the Smith’s song _This Charming Man_ , too!)

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**Author:** ![happyheathen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5e925/32.png) [@happyheathen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/happyheathen)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/44 "2002-04-06T00:50:56Z")

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‘Living Well Is the Best Revenge’

- George Herbert (?)

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**Author:** ![The\_Big\_Cheese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8baadc/32.png) [@The\_Big\_Cheese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Big_Cheese)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/45 "2002-04-06T00:57:17Z")

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Standing on the moon, with nothing left to do.  
A lovely view of heaven, but I’d rather be with you.

- Robert Hunter

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**Author:** ![45\_70](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/4/5f9b8f/32.png) [@45\_70](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/45_70)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/46 "2002-04-06T01:06:12Z")

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“People scare better when their dying” Henry Fonda, Once upon a time in the west.

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**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/47 "2002-04-06T03:56:35Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> The fair one has smiled and her sparkling eyes give a promise. That is enough. The rest is up to you.

> [@](#):
>
> The gods reward bravery and courage, but punish pride.

–Bernard Evslin

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**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/48 "2002-04-06T05:57:42Z")

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Has any one supposed it lucky to be born?  
I hasten to inform him or her it is just as lucky to die, and I know it.

I pass death with the dying and birth with the new-wash’d babe,  
and am not contain’d between my hat and boots,  
And peruse manifold objects, no two alike and every one good,  
The earth good and the stars good, and their adjuncts all good.

I am not an earth nor an adjunct of an earth,  
I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and  
fathomless as myself,  
(They do not know how immortal, but I know.)  
-Walt Whitman, _Song of Myself_

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**Author:** ![Turpentine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecd19e/32.png) [@Turpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turpentine)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 8:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/49 "2002-04-06T08:32:36Z")

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“…however, the number of deaths each year resulting from a flaming merkin is surprisingly small…”

-Cecil Adams

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**Author:** ![Anubis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dfb087/32.png) [@Anubis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anubis)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/50 "2002-04-06T15:57:02Z")

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Only two things are infinite: The Universe, and Human Stupidity. And I’m not sure about the Universe.

-Albert Einstein

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**Author:** ![Efrem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d78d45/32.png) [@Efrem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Efrem)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/51 "2002-04-06T17:55:03Z")

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Friedrich Nietzsche

The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.

God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.

Plato was a bore. (and Nietzsche was a jerk :p)  
Mahata Gmandhi  
It is wrong and inhuman to impose the Jews on the Arabs. What is going on in Palestine today cannot be justified by any moral code of conduct…And now a word to the Jews in Palestine. I have no doubt that they are going about it the wrong way. The Palestine of the Biblical conception is not geographical tract. It is in their hearts. But if they must look to the Palestine of geography as their national home, it is wrong to enter it under the shadow of the British gun. A religious act cannot be performed with the aid of the bayonet or the bomb. They can settle in Palestine only by the goodwill of the Arabs. They should seek to convert the Arab heart. The same God rules the Arab heart, who rules the Jewish heart. They can offer satyagraha (non-violence) in front of the Arabs and offer themselves to be shot or thrown in to the Dead Sea without raising a little finger against them. They will find the world opinion in the their favor in their religious aspiration. There are hundreds of ways of reasoning with the Arabs, if they will only discard the help of the British bayonet. As it is, they are co-sharers with the British in despoiling a people who have done no wrong to them. I am not defending the Arab excesses. I wish they had chosen the way of non-violence in resisting what they rightly regarded as an unwarrantable encroachment upon their country. But according to the accepted canons of right and wrong, nothing can be said against the Arab resistance in the face of overwhelming odds.  
Let the Jews who claim to be the chosen race prove their title by choosing the way of non-violence for vindicating their position on earth. Every country is their home including Palestine, not by aggression but by loving service.  
I confess that I have no argument to convince through reason. Faith transcends reason.

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**Author:** ![Largo62](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/45deac/32.png) [@Largo62](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Largo62)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/52 "2002-04-06T18:52:21Z")

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Authority intoxicates,  
And makes mere sots of magistrates.  
The fumes of it invade the brain,  
And make men giddy, proud and vain.  
–Samuel Butler

Awards are like hemorrhoids; in the end, every asshole gets one.  
– Frederick Raphael

It may be that the race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong – but that is the way  
to bet.  
– Damon Runyon

Sports do not build character. They reveal it.  
– Heywood Hale Broun

Committee – a group of men who individually can do nothing but as a group decide that nothing  
can be done.  
– Fred Allen

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![DAVINCHI](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DAVINCHI](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DAVINCHI)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/53 "2002-04-06T19:35:46Z")

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"I do not at all resent criticism, even when, for the sake of emphasis, it for a time parts company with reality. - Winston Churchhill

**Also:**

“On the highest throne in the world, we still sit on our own behinds” - Michel de Montaigne.

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**Author:** ![JillGat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9fc29f/32.png) [@JillGat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JillGat)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/54 "2002-04-06T20:16:05Z")

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From there to here, from here to there; funny things are everywhere. Today is gone, today was fun, tomorrow is another one.  
Dr. Suess

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**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2002, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/55 "2002-04-06T20:23:42Z")

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Fire And Ice  
Some say the world will end in fire,  
Some say in ice.  
From what I’ve tasted of desire  
I hold with those who favor fire.  
But if it had to perish twice,  
I think I know enough of hate  
To say that for destruction ice  
Is also great  
And would suffice.

© Robert Frost

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**Author:** ![Shortie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecd19e/32.png) [@Shortie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shortie)\
**Post date:** [April 7, 2002, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/56 "2002-04-07T01:36:05Z")

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“Ships and sail proper for the heavenly air should be fashioned. Then there will also be people who do not shrink from the dreary vastness of space.”  
-Johannes Kepler, 1609  
“I am prepared to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.”  
-Sir Winston Churchill

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**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\
**Post date:** [April 7, 2002, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/57 "2002-04-07T04:01:44Z")

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“It has long been believed that a million monkeys at a million typewriters would eventually produce the works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know that’s not true.”

I don’t know who said it, but it’s one of my favorite quotes of all time.

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**Author:** ![MickNickMaggies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/59ef9b/32.png) [@MickNickMaggies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MickNickMaggies)\
**Post date:** [April 7, 2002, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/58 "2002-04-07T04:57:39Z")

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“We’re actors. We’re the opposite of people” - Tom Stoppard, “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead”

Cyn

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**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\
**Post date:** [April 7, 2002, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/59 "2002-04-07T15:30:43Z")

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“Come up with a really neat quote and people will remember your name forever.” - anonymous

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**Author:** ![Azure\_Eternity](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f05b48/32.png) [@Azure\_Eternity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Azure_Eternity)\
**Post date:** [April 7, 2002, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-coolest-quote-you-know/101857/60 "2002-04-07T15:58:52Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> Do I dare  
> Disturb the universe?  
> In a minute there is time  
> For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

```
                                                      - T. S. Eliot, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"

```

Probably doesn’t make much sense all by itself, but I love the whole poem and that’s my favorite part.

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